BUSM4448 Assessment 3: Business Research Plan

Overview

You need to use the same company that you have discussed in Assessment 2.

The purpose of this assessment is for you to submit a research plan that is clear, concise, consistent and convincing. You will continue with the problem statement/objectives specified in Assessment Task 2 and the company/industry that you have chosen. By doing this assessment, you will be able to not only apply what you learn in BRD course but also develop necessary written communication skills to communicate your plan.

Assessment criteria

This assessment will measure your ability to:

• Present a clear, consistent, cohesive, well-justified and relevant research plan (7%)
• Present relevant literature review that includes topics that are most relevant to the research question and concludes with a list of factors which are most important to arriving at a deep understanding of the research problem (8%)
• Evaluate and justify research methodology that is relevant to the research objectives (12%)
• Present estimated research costs relevant to the research objectives (4%)
• Present insightful, clear, concise and genuine reflection showing how your view has/has not changed compared to when the first essay on BRD was submitted (5%)
• Model clear, logical academic writing and referencing skills (4%)

Course learning outcomes

This assessment is relevant to the following course learning outcomes:

CLO 1 Critically evaluate the broad range of research designs applicable to the exploration of complex and ambiguous business problems

CLO 3 Critically evaluate and synthesise options for innovative business research design

CLO 4 Effectively communicate advanced and integrated research designs to professional target audiences 

Assessment Details

There are two main tasks in the course:

1. To write a research plan by applying all the theories and concepts that you learn in the course. Your research plan should be clear, concise, consistent with what you wrote in the Assessment Task 2 and convincing. This would demonstrate your level of skills relevant to gaining agreement from others, by convincing an organisation’s Board (or other industry relevant decision-maker such as a funding body) to approve the cost of employees being given time away from their normal duties to conduct the research that you are proposing.
2. Additionally, you will need to write a small/short reflection (to be included as an Appendix) showing how your view has/has not changed from since you submitted your Assessment Task 1.

We have deliberately used the term ‘research plan’ rather than ‘research proposal’ to emphasize that we are looking for content and structure suitable for presenting to a team of business executives or members of a company’s Board rather than the type of content and structure suitable for presenting to academic supervisors if you were preparing to enrol in a PhD Program.

A report writing style is to be used to complete the assignment.

!!! A minimum of eight (8) references is required in this assessment, consisting:

• 4 peer-reviewed articles
• 4 Articles from other reliable sources (newspaper articles, magazine articles, professional development videos, corporate documents etc.).

Please check out below some resources to help you to navigate the RMIT library database:

• Videos
  • Academic/Peer-reviewed articles
• Links
  • Business College Liaison Librarians: If you’re having trouble acquiring an article/paper, please seek the assistance of one of the Business Liaison Librarians.