Assignment: Professional Report

ASSIGNMENT DETAILS

Requirement: You are required to construct an inductive professional report. The development of an inductive report is a strongly applied piece of work and must link theory and practice.

You are to:

1. Pick a company or organisation, either New Zealand or international.

2. Undertake a strategic analysis of the company to determine the current situation.

3. Develop a strategy for the company to provide direction and details about how it should proceed.

Your report must:
- Demonstrate understanding of the company's internal and external environment.
- Develop a strategy for the future direction of the company.
- Include a details about how it should implement the strategy.
- Determine how the performance of the strategy will be assessed.

The report must demonstrate comprehension of the whole strategic management topic. Therefore, whatever you choose you must make reference to strategic management models, frameworks, concepts and terminology that you have encountered in workshops and self- learning, and from directed material and independent research.

This must be combined with industry material and data to provide sound argument, rationale, and decisions, ultimately leading to useful recommendations that your report will produce.

Further, your report must:
- Be from the management perspective (i.e. not be a marketing or accounting report)
- Be real and addressable
- Use theory and practice to demonstrate knowledge

Length: 6,500 words (approximately 20 pages)

Learning outcome(s) addressed:

2. Analyse the internal and external environments within which an organisation operates.

3. Investigate factors the influence the effectiveness of strategy formulation.

4. Investigate factors the influence the effectiveness of strategy implementation.

5. Evaluate strategic performance and control systems.APPENDIX 2. CRITICAL READING
Critical reading is the process of reading that goes beyond just understanding a text. Critical reading involves:
• carefully considering and evaluating the reading
• identifying the reading's strengths and implications
• identifying the reading's weaknesses and flaws
• looking at the 'big picture' and deciding how the reading fits into the greater academic context (the understandings presented in other books and articles on this topic)
In brief, you are actively responding to the reading. Critical reading is useful at all stages of academic study, but is particularly important when writing an article critique or a literature review.
Critical reading often involves asking questions about the reading. In particular, you are examining the strengths and weaknesses of the reading's argument.
To do this, you need to consider:
• the reading's background
• its purpose and overall conclusion (claim)
• the evidence used in the reading
• the logical connections between the claim and the evidence
• the reading's balance
• its limitations
• how it relates to other sources and research
• if the reading is based on research, how this research was conducted
Each of these affects how 'strong' the argument is, that is, how convincing it is.
Note: The questions here can also be used to improve your own writing, especially when you are required to construct an argument.
Background
Before you consider the argument of a reading, you should build up a background picture of the reading.
• Who is the author?
• What type of source is this?
• Who is the audience?
• When was it written?
Purpose
Getting the 'big picture' of the reading is essential so that you can see how all the pieces fit together.
• What is the main claim of the reading?
• What are the implications of the claim?
• How is the reading structured?
Evidence
It is essential to consider the quality of the evidence in the reading, as this directly relates to the usefulness of the reading.
• Is the evidence fact, research, opinion, or personal experience?
• Is the evidence accurate?

• Is the evidence relevant to the conclusion?
• Is the theory appropriate for this topic?

Methodology
If the reading is based on any kind of research (e.g. a survey, an experiment, a case study) it is important to consider how the research was conducted, as this can affect the validity of the findings reported.
• Is the research qualitative or quantitative?
• What was the range / sample size of the research?
• Is the research falsifiable?
• Is the research repeatable?
• Are there better methods?

Logic
When reading critically it is important to examine the chain of reasoning used by the author, as any gaps or problems can undermine the validity of the conclusion.
• Are key terms defined?
• Does the logic flow?
• Are there any flaws in the reasoning?

Balance
In order to read critically you have to consider whether the argument is appropriately balanced, looking at the issue or problem from relevant perspectives.
• Do you have questions that are not answered in the reading?
• Is the reading biased?
• What other perspectives are there on this issue?
• Did the reading present a counter-argument?

Limitations
• What does the argument assume?
• What are the limitations of the theory?