Assessment 3 Final Research Report

Assessment item 3 – Final Research Report

Due:                     Sunday of Week 13, 11 pm AEST

Length:                7000-7,500 words

Conditions:          Individual

Weighting:           50%

Requirements

You are required to present a final written report based on your completed research project. This should follow the structure outlined in the Final Report checklist document. This assignment must be submitted through the Turnitin link for this assignment.

Final report – Checklist

Title page

• Choose an interesting and catchy title for your report.
• The name of your industry partner should be part of the title or subtitle.
• Indicate the nature of problem you investigated.
• If you do not wish to disclose the name of your industry partner, you can just write ‘company X’.

Executive summary

• Keep it short and simple (ideally not more than 2 pages – well formatted)
• Summarise the background of the research
• Summarise the research approach
• Summarise the findings (dot points is fine, but write full sentences)
• Summarise the implications/recommendations (dot points is fine, but write full sentences)

Table of contents

Introduction and research problem (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Introduction to topic
• Overview of the industry partner
• What real problem does your research seek to resolve?
• Why is this problem such a big issue for your industry partner? Why is it important that you research it? Convince us that your project is important and that it will help your industry partner
• State the overall research aim based on this problem
• Outline the structure of the report (for the audience/reader)

Theoretical background – Literature review (around 25-30% of your total word count)

• Clearly identify the factors investigated in the project
• Discuss what others have found in this research space and individual factors
• Link your literature review back to your problem space and use this as a foundation to formulate your research questions.

Methodology (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Only provide an overview of YOUR research design
• Inform and justify the nature of your research approach (qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods)
• Describe and justify your sample (who, how did you find them, sampling method and technique used)
• Describe how data was collected (in-person/online/..) and which research tools (e.g. interviews, surveys, etc.) were used
• Inform how data was analysed (e.g. themes analysis, frequency distribution, mean-score, etc.)
• Explain how the research plan addressed all ethical concerns

Findings (around 10-15% of your total word count)

• Present sample characteristics (e.g. age, gender, income...)
• Clearly differentiate between quantitative and qualitative findings
• Use figures, graphs, tables to visualise findings. Add numbers and titles for all visuals. Be creative in presenting the findings!

Discussion (around 20-25% of your total word count)

• If you are using a mixed method, triangulate quantitative and qualitative findings
• Compare findings with the literature reviewed earlier
• Clearly state the answers to research questions you found from the findings presented above

Recommendations (around 10-15% of your total word count)

• Clearly list and discuss the recommendations specific to the research problem
• Make sure all recommendations are based on findings of your research project
• Can also include any suggestions you have for the industry partner in regards to implementing your recommendations

Limitations and Conclusion (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Inform the readers and management of any limitations that they should be aware of if they are to implement your recommendations
• Provide a brief summary of the project including major findings, recommendations and potential outcomes if recommendations are implemented by the management

Footnotes (as required – avoid if at all possible)

List of References

Appendix (as required)