Practical Business Project Design and Thesis Writing
VOB Discussion: Feedback on Assignment 01 and Guidelines for Assignment 02 Outline:
1.Feedback on Assignment 01
2.Guidance to Assignment 02
3.Q and A
Part I. Feedback on Assignment 01
1) General problems
●incompletion of the assignment
The delay must be made up before the deadline of the submission of Assignment 02 in order to avoid failure at the end of the mester.
●writing not in line with the requirements
Y our project proposal选题意义is required to be done in Chine, not English. For tho who were mistaken, adjustment should be made. The project proposal and the outline 论文大纲(three-level)of your thesis should be submitted to the platform as you fill in your论文指导手册, destined for university. Details will be discusd in Specific problems.
●language insufficiency
If the above two problems are somewhat exceptional, language problem is almost omniprent. It’s your responsibility to make your work prentable. U spelling check or look for help, if necessary.
2) Specific problems
●Problem identification
Some choices of study area are out of the business scope. For instance: A project to improve lf discipline will not be accepted by the supervisors. Y our general problem area should be within the six areas of problems mentioned in your assignment.
● a problem in customer rvice
● a problem in finance planning and asssment
● a problem in product promotion
● a problem in technology utilization in business
● a problem in staff management
● a problem in advertising planning or market rearch
●Problem analysis
- There are more than ONE primary problems. For instance: 业绩不佳←能够贡献利润的高端客户流失←现有的服务模式落后……
- The process and results of the problem analysis have not been clearly explained. For instance:
SWOT analysis without introductory paragraph, or in table without explanation in words.
●Project rationale and bibliography
- Project rationale is NOT one’s own argument. It should be the theoretical back-up of your project. Y ou need to read others!
●Evaluative criteria
⏹There are at least 5 references cited in the body of the paper, excluding cour textbooks.
Each reference has been properly introduced and discusd, so that the text involved in
prenting the references is at least 500 words in length.
⏹The references mentioned correspond to the items listed in the Bibliography.
⏹The references are properly formatted.
⏹The references have been ud to support key elements of the project, such as the
objective, hypothesis, rationale, significance, methodology, etc.
References have been ud to support the theoretical basis of the project, including related theories and rearch. Connections have been drawn between the work of other rearchers and the current project.
●Sample
As mentioned above, the establishing of an effective recruitment system has veral issues to consider. The are the core activities of the project’s implementation and main points of the project’s evaluation.
There are two commonly ud ways to look for candidates for vacancies: internal promotion and external recruitment. W e can talk of internal promotion when “... move from one position to a higher position.”(Mondy, 1995: 105) Internal promotion is inexpensive and motivates the staff. In addition, an employee who has been working for the company for some time is more likely to manage a quick adaptation to the new job, becau of the familiarity with the company’s system. However, internal promotion was not an option for our company. It is a fact that “... Internal promotion is effective when the company has sufficient staff and requires a healthy staff flow.” (Zhang, 2000: 8) From the organizational structure shown above it can clearly be en that the three vacancies called for three very different people, and our company XXX at that time didn’t have fitting personnel with sufficient experti and working experience who could be able to take up the jobs. The only solution was external recruitment, which has many advantages:
1)“The source s are endless and it is possible to recruit very talented people with
big potentials;
…
(Zhang, 2000: 189)
- The format of bibliography is wrong. The instruction is not carefully read: Bibliography (Unit 3>Activity 2, Unit 10>Activity 4) All the English references should come before the Chine ones. The English words should be in Time New Roman 12, the Chine characters in 宋体12, and the space between lines
should be 1.5.
●Sample
1) References to books
Deng, Y.C. & R.Q. Lui (1991) Language and Culture Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Rearch Press
Hilton, J. & X. Xian (2002) Practical Business Project and Proposal Design Beijing: China Central Radio & Television University Press
Pay special attention to the punctuation ud. In some cas, punctuation is completely omitted, leaving only enough space to parate the words. The title of the book should be highlighted or underlined.
2) References to articles in collection of articles
Hanvey, R.G.(1979) “Cross-cultural Awareness” in Hu, W.Z. (ed. 1990)
Again, punctuation can be totally omitted. The title of the article from a book should be highlighted through italics under double quotation marks. There should also be a full reference under Hu W Z (ed).
Hu, W.Z. (ed. 1990) Selective Reading in Intercultural Communication Hu Nan: Hu Nan Education Press
Barro, A. & M. Myram & H. Grimm et al (1993) “Cultural stud ies for advanced language learners” in Graddol et al (eds. 1993): 55-70
There should also be a full reference under Graddol et al:
Graddol, D. & L. Thompson & M. Byram (eds. 1993) Language and Cultural Clevedon: Multilingual Matters
3) References to articles in journals
West, R.L. (1996) “Approaches to Cultural Teaching” in Journal of Social Issues 23/2:283-299 4) References to articles from web:
Gates, Bill. (1993) “Interview” National Muum of American History, Smithsonian Institution.
A vailable from: www.americanhistory.si.edu/csr/comphist/gates.htm[accesd 3 Sept. 2003]
●Objective and hypothesis
●Evaluative criteria
⏹There is only one primary objective.
⏹The hypothesis has been clearly and specifically expresd.
⏹The objective and hypothesis define a measurable result that can be ud to evaluate
whether the goals of the project have been attained.
⏹The objective and hypothesis are consistent with the problem and problem analysis.
To formulate a hypothesis, you may consider the following three points:
First, always start with: It is hypothesized that + clau… It is quite uful, for it always reminds you that the clau which follows that is not an ordinary ntence.
Second, the content of a hypothesis often has a hidden cau-effect relation. For example, in the
hypothesis “Sales staff can provide better rvices to their customers through systematical training”, the cau is: systematical training, and the effect is: sales staff provide better rvices to their customers.
Third, you can make this hidden cau-effect relation explicit by using the structure if …then …For example, “If sales staff are trained systematically, then they can provide better rvices to their customers.”
So an explicitly expresd hypothesis goes like this: It is hypothesized that if sales staff are trained systematically, then they can provide better rvices to their customers.
Ca Study 1:
It is therefore hypothesized that if maintaining customer loyalty is related to taking better care of the customers’needs and wants, then a well designed market survey will help us know our customers better so we can take effective measures to maintain customer loyalty.
Sentence pattern：It is hypothesized that if … (Problem) is related to … (Cau of the problem), then … (Approach) will … (Goal)
Ca Study 2:
It is hypothesized that the expansion of the table tennis shop to an online shop will bring an increa in revenues and profits by 60% and 50% respectively within two months.
Sentence pattern: It is hypothesized that … (Approach) will… (Objective) Sample: What is a SMART project objective?
Poor example: Recently, our customer rvice department had received more and more complaints from our clients with respect to mistakes in the drawings. Clients complained that our engineers carelessly made many small mistakes such as…So I planned to carry out a four-week training cours
e for designers from different departments on the key topics as follows:
●Increasing professionalism on the frontline
●Improving customer relations
●Effective complaint handling
●Improving design quality to satisfy customers’ needs
●First-class quality for customers
Better: The goal of my project is to improve our design quality and build up long-term relationships with customers. Therefore, the objective of my project is to reduce or eliminate customers’complaints on designing by modifying design flow charts and then carrying out an eight-week training cour for designers from different departments.
●Project design
Instructions are not carefully respected. For instance:
-
activities planned to take place and the time scale (plea explain both in words and in flow chart)
- cost consideration (plea explain both in words and in table)
●Title
Y ou should give your thesis a proper title, indicating both the problem you try to tackle and the outcome you want to achieve.
Poor example: Time Management vs Working Efficiency
Good example: Introducing New Working Pattern To Improve Work Efficiency Poor: How to Improve Our Company’s Team Work Efficiency
Good: Improving Team Work Performance Through Training
●Project proposal
●Evaluative criteria
⏹The Proposal should provide the readers with a clear picture of the motives,
hypothesis, objectives, and significance.
⏹The Proposal should be written in Chine with no more than 400 words.
⏹The Outline should cover all the major elements of a BA Disrtation, like:
introduction, main body, conclusion, bibliography, and appendix.
⏹The Outline should be written in English with no more than 400 words.
●Sample
Motives of the rearch project:
CNCA是中国唯一一家专门从事老龄化工作的国家级机构，由于我国人口老龄化的日益加剧，其工作倍受我国政府及国际相关组织的关注和支持。(background of the business)随着员工队伍的不断扩大，工作人员和服务人员在专业素质方面的问题日益严重。不了解国家相关的政策，不掌握有效的调查研究方法，不能很好地与老年人沟通等问题给CNCA在中国的工作带来许多困难。(problem analysis) Rationale and hypothesis of the rearch project:
从员工招聘与管理以及客户服务的原理与实践来看，一个积极的人事管理政策和有效的新员工任职培训计划有助于帮助新员工更快地适应新的工作环境，更好地完成本职工作。
Objectives and approach of the rearch project:
本论文通过设计一个旨在帮助新员工提高专业素质的短期培训计划，力图在最短的时间里让新员工了解相关的信息和政策，掌握从事新工作的方法和技术，使他们适应新的工作环境，尽早成为CNCA的业务骨干。
Significance of the rearch project:
同时，本论文也试图通过该计划的设计、实施及评估过程，去研究探索一个能有效提高新员工素质的培训方法，从而积极推动我国老龄化工作的全面开展这一意义重大的事业。
