Module Title: Research Methodologies Programme: MBA Part Time Assessment Type: An individual type-written assignment Assignment Questions: You are required to submit a research proposal. The content of the document produced by each student is required to cover specific areas and to be within specific maximum word lengths (marks allocation and lengths in brackets) as follows:- 1. Title and Introduction: form a clear title for the proposed research. Outline the background to the industry and/or company to be researched as well as the problem or issue identified for research. [10 marks 600 words] 2. Explain the Significance of and rationale for the proposed research. [5 marks 100 words] 3. Research Questions: Construct the research questions to be addressed in the proposed research. [5 marks 100 words] 4. Research Objectives and Framework: State SMART research objectives to achieve your proposed research questions. Construct a proposed research model or conceptual framework to achieve the research objectives. [10 marks 100 words] 5. Literature Review: Using cited literature and other evidence sources, write your own critical review to complete a discussion of the contribution and discoveries made to extend your understanding of the research problem/issue. Make conclusions about the value of the literature review to your research topic and associated research questions. [35 marks 2000 words] 6. Research Methodology and Design: Propose a relevant research design with a detailed explanation of research methods, sampling and sample size, data types and sources of information and data collection methods. [15 marks 700 words] 7. Ethical Considerations: identify potential ethical challenges involved and initiatives proposed to prevent breach of research ethics. [5 marks 100 words] 8. Outcomes: State the expected outcomes from the research proposal [5 marks 100 words] 9. Timeline and Gantt chart: Construct a Gantt chart in weeks which includes the stages and mile stones of the research tasks and their respective time allocations. [5 marks 100 words] 10. References (protocols & formatting): Using the Harvard referencing system throughout, provide references and evidence sources and use appropriate academic protocol for the proposal [5 marks 100 words] Assessment Requirements: • The submission of your work assessment should be organized and clearly structured in a report format. • Maximum word length allowed is 4000 words, excluding words in charts & tables and in the appendixes section of your assignment. • Student is required to submit a type-written document in Microsoft Word format with Times New Roman font type, size 12 and line spacing 1.5. • Indicate the sources of information and literature review by including all the necessary citations and references adopting the Harvard Referencing System. • Students who have been found to have committed acts of Plagiarism are automatically considered to have failed the entire module. If found to have breached the regulation for the second time, you will be asked to leave the course. • Plagiarism involves taking someone else’s words, thoughts, ideas or essays from online essay banks and trying to pass them off as your own. It is a form of cheating which is taken very seriously. Report Structure Executive summary Table of Contents Title and Introduction Explain the Significance Research Questions Research Objectives and Framework Literature Review Research Methodology and Design Ethical Considerations Outcomes Timescale and Gantt chart References (Protocol & Formatting) Appendix Notes on Plagiarism & Harvard Referencing Plagiarism Plagiarism is passing off the work of others as your own. This constitutes academic theft and is a serious matter which is penalized in assignment marking. Plagiarism is the submission of an item of assessment containing elements of work produced by another person(s) in such a way that it could be assumed to be the student’s own work. Examples of plagiarism are: • The verbatim copying of another person’s work without acknowledgement • The close paraphrasing of another person’s work by simply changing a few words or altering the order of presentation without acknowledgement • The unacknowledged quotation of phrases from another person’s work and/or the presentation of another person’s idea(s) as one’s own. Copying or close paraphrasing with occasional acknowledgement of the source may also be deemed to be plagiarism is the absence of quotation marks implies that the phraseology is the student’s own. Plagiarised work may belong to another student or be from a published source such as a book, report, journal or material available on the internet. Harvard Referencing The structure of a citation under the Harvard referencing system is the author’s surname, year of publication, and page number or range, in parentheses, as illustrated in the Smith example near the top of this article. • The page number or page range is omitted if the entire work is cited. The author’s surname is omitted if it appears in the text. Thus we may say: “Jones (2001) revolutionized the field of trauma surgery.” • Two or three authors are cited using “and” or “&”: (Deane, Smith, and Jones, 1991) or (Deane, Smith & Jones, 1991). More than three authors are cited using et al. (Deane et al. 1992). • An unknown date is cited as no date (Deane n.d.). A reference to a reprint is cited with the original publication date in square brackets (Marx [1867] 1967, p. 90). • If an author published two books in 2005, the year of the first (in the alphabetic order of the references) is cited and referenced as 2005a, the second as 2005b. • A citation is placed wherever appropriate in or after the sentence. If it is at the end of a sentence, it is placed before the period, but a citation for an entire block quote immediately follows the period at the end of the block since the citation is not an actual part of the quotation itself. • Complete citations are provided in alphabetical order in a section following the text, usually designated as “Works cited” or “References”. The difference between a “works cited” or “references” list and a bibliography is that a bibliography may include works not directly cited in the text. • All citations are in the same font as the main text. Examples Examples of book references are: • Smith, J. (2005a). Dutch Citing Practices. The Hague: Holland Research Foundation. • Smith, J. (2005b). Harvard Referencing. London: Jolly Good Publishing. In giving the city of publication, an internationally well-known city (such as London, The Hague, or New York) is referenced as the city alone. If the city is not internationally well known, the country (or state and country if in the U.S.) are given. Examples of journal references are: • Smith, John Maynard. “The origin of altruism,” Nature 393, 1998, pp. 639-40. • Bowcott, Owen. “Street Protest”, The Guardian, October 18, 2005, accessed February 7, 2006.