There seems to be a general lack of practical guidelines in the literature that could help the prospective researcher to apply the basic scientific principles found in all the textbooks on research methodology. Evidence of this lack was found through countless consultation sessions, scrutiny of available literature, as well as discussions with experienced researchers who are usually quite conversant with the theoretical aspects of their subjects. This article introduces the researcher to the different phases in the research process and the dendrogram technique that is specifically designed to take the researcher through the conceptualisation phase in such a way that it paves the way to progress through the different phases in the research cycle with ease. The biggest value of the technique is that it provides the researcher with all the relevant variables that are to be investigated to support or reject a specific hypothesis.