Prepare a case study based presentation on Leveraging IT for Business Advantage

Objective(s)

 This assessment item relates to the unit learning outcomes as in the Unit of Study Guide. This assessment is designed to enhance students’ skills in cooperation in a group environment on critically analyzing and evaluating key issues and challenges in recent IS technologies and how they can be acquired and contribute to business core processes. The assessment helps develop presentation and problem-solving skills, and an ability to work in groups 

Instructions

 For this assignment students will be divided into small groups (the size will depend on class size), and each group will be given a specific technology/ topic to research. Each group will first be required to prepare a presentation on this topic and present it to the class during a designated tutorial period and answer questions from the audience associated with their presentation. Each group will then be required to research a real-life company and write a case study. The case study must be directly relevant to the group presentation. 

The presentations will be scheduled throughout the semester from weeks 3 to 12. The number of presentations per week and the timing will depend on the student enrollment and the number of groups. As the presentations are scheduled throughout the semester, by necessity, some groups will be first and have less preparation time for their research and practice. This will be taken into account in the grading within the first couple of weeks. 

Additionally, if this unit of study is running in block mode (compressed mode) then time will be further limited. Thus conditions may change depending on the mode. In standard mode, student may be given latitude to form their own groups, however in compressed mode, groups may be randomly assigned as there will be little time before the first presentations are due. 

Once the group's presentation date is assigned, the group must prepare a set of slides for the presentation, and the group will make the presentation on the date assigned. 

Points to Note:

• The assignment is worth 50% of the assessment divided into the two components
  • The presentation and slides: 30%
  • The case study: 20%
• Each member of the group should take part in the presentation
• The presentation should be for approximately 20 minutes
• Students should be prepared to answer questions
• The presentation slides are due for submission on the Friday of the week of the presentation
• The case study is due for submission on the Friday of Week
• If you miss your group presentation, your slides will be graded

The Key elements of the case study 

From a broad perspective, a case study is an in-depth analysis of a particular subject. Generally, the study covers a problem-solution-results format. When applied to this unit, a case study examines how a real-life company had a problem, found a solution using a particular information technology, and shares the results of the solution.

 The following eight elements must be included in your case study:

1. Executive Summary/Synopsis
2. Introduction
   • introduce the selected company, including the background and any previous studies of the issue (literature review); briefly describe the key problem and its significance
3. Challenges
   • explain the challenge the selected company faced before using the presented technology;
4. Discussion
   • discuss how the selected company found the presented technology; discuss the selected company’s decision process and the steps they went through before discovering the solution
5. Implementation
   • explain how the solution was implemented; discuss if the implementation meets the expectations, and who was involved in the implementation process
6. Conclusion
   • conclude your case study with the end results; sum up the main points from the challenges, discussion and recommendations
7. Recommendations
   • provide proposals for future action to solve the problem or improve the situation
8. References

 Note on Group Work

 As this is a group assignment, by default all members of the group will receive the same grade. However, this is assuming that all members of the group contribute equally. If during the course of the assignment a group member is not contributing their fair share of work, for whatever reason, the group should contact their unit coordinator or tutor as soon as possible. Arrangements will then be made to grade each member differently based on input to the project. If the group is satisfied with the level of input from each member, then there is no need to contact the unit coordinator or tutor. In the absence of any advice from the group members on such matters, all members will receive the same final grade.

 It may be possible that the unit coordinator or tutor will decide to grade the group members differently based on their own observations of contact, file sharing and messaging within the group folder.