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Purpose. This project is the largest collaborative learning activity for the course. Class members will work in teams of three people to work with or study a real organization. The team will choose an organization to work with. The project requires you to examine a problem or issue of concern in a real organization. The purpose of the project is to give your team an opportunity to apply what has been learned in the course (through course lectures, readings, and discussions) to problems in an organization of your team’s choice. Your team should identify a public, private, or notforprofit organization (or part of one) to study. This must be an organization, not a learner group. You may select an organization in which one or more of the team members has worked or been a member. I advise you to be selective in choosing an issue or problem within an organization, as a lack of depth in the issue itself will not be an acceptable excuse for lack of depth in the analysis. Your team is to gather information from people in an organization through direct contact. You may supplement this information with data from the media, the organization’s literature, and other secondary sources. You should identify a relatively recent problem to analyze (i.e., this should not be an historical account of a problem and the company’s solution). You should focus your analysis by applying the concepts from the course. While it is acceptable to incorporate several concepts from the course, please aim for depth rather than breadth regarding the use of course concepts. There are three broad goals for this assignment: 1. One goal of this assignment is obviously to take the initiative to make a positive contribution to an organization. 2. Another major goal is to provide an opportunity for you to learn more about organizational behavior first hand and to use your critical thinking and reflection skills to link your experience with this organization to your learning in relation to organizational behavior theory. 3. The final goal is to provide a forum for you to hone your skills as a team member and leader and to reflect on the learning gained from this team experience. Each team will make a presentation to the class and write a paper that describes what you did for the organization, what you learned about organizational behavior, and what you learned about working on a team. To meet these broad goals, your team should answer the following questions in the assignments detailed below. a) What are the issues or problems facing the organization? b) What course concepts can be applied to understand why this problem is occurring? c) What recommendations can you offer to help improve organizational functioning? THE GENERAL FORMAT FOR YOUR WRITING PROJECTS The required research projects allow you to pursue important topics of organizational behavior in depth. Structure your papers in the following way:
1. Title Page: There are two parts to the title page. A). Identifying Information. The title page should identify who wrote the paper and what the paper is about. Include the title of paper, your name, & identification number. B) Executive Summary. An Executive Summary is a brief, oneparagraph statement of the issue being researched, what you did, what you found, and what should be done about your find
2. Introduction and Overview (1 page). The introduction tells the reader what you doing in the paper
and how you are going to do it.
3. Body. (1015 pages). The body of the paper provides the purpose of your research, the details of
the issue being researched, your hypotheses (if appropriate), what you did, and what you found in
your research. (Be concise. A long paper is not more impressive than a brief one.)
4. Discussion. (12 pages). There are three parts to a conclusion. First, give a very concise summary of
your main points. Second, concisely state the conclusions your have deduced from your research.
Third, give your recommendations for future actions that can be taken based on your research. State
clearly what you want the reader to do now that s/he has read your research.
5. References. If you need to give references, use whatever format you are familiar with. We presume
that you know how to use the reference materials in the library. If not, consult with a reference
librarian.
Length of papers. On most projects the suggested length is 1520 pages of text (with 12 point type
and 3/4 inch margins all around), exclusive of title page, tables, and references. (Do not play games
with font sizes in order to stretch or shrink the apparent size of your paper. The real issue is the quality
of your report, not its length.)
All papers and projects must be computer printed. No hand written papers will be accepted.
Grading Criteria: The criteria used by the Instructors to assess your projects are spelled out explicitly
on the attached sheet. The sheet gives points for wellwritten, wellstructured reports so take the
effort to use good business reporting techniques. It gives points for creativity so give it some personal
flair. It gives points for substantiating your claims, so present a rationale for your assertions.
Integrity. Your paper must reflect your own work. When the thoughts of others are used they must be
cited and identified as such. Plagiarism involves taking the work of others as your own. Plagiarism is a
serious breach of ethics, and will result in a failure for the course.
make survives and use SPSSS from IBM to analyses the results
