you will explore data analysis in a real context. You will use data to assess, analyse and describe a specific business or organizational problem/ challenge. Through the assignment, you should be able to demonstrate the ability to convert data into value-added information such as through providing data-driven suggestions orrecommendations that help organizations or companies grow or stay relevant in the market.
As the first step, you should determine a research question that is relevant to solve business or
organizational challenges. Your research question can be phenomenon-based or is inspired by
some trends and development in a specific market or industry. Keep in mind that the assignment
requires students to collect data to answer the research question(s). As such, you should select a
research question that is feasible meaning that you will be able to get data that you can use to
answer the research question(s). The data can be either primary (mainly through survey or online
experiments) or secondary such as data that you get from company publications, government
reports or through web-crawling/web-scrapping.
Below are examples of topic that you can pursue along with possible methodological choice:
1. Does sustainability index predict company’s financial performance? (method: secondary
through collecting data on sustainability index (such as Dow Jones index) and some
financial indicators such as revenue growth or EBITDA which can be collected from
Compustat or company report)
2. Does working from home predict job satisfaction and job engagement? (method: survey,
potential respondents: people who have been experiencing a (partial) shift to working from
home recently)
3. Does communication strategy in advertisement predict the brand attitude (method: online
experiment, potential respondents: regular people)
4. What predicts properties’ rating on AirBnB or Booking.com? (method: web-crawling or webscrapping)
You should combine your thoughtful analysis of the topic with information from your sources. Keep in mind, however, that this is to be an analytical paper, and you are not simply copying information from a source or merely summarizeyour reading. The academic sources must be of good quality meaning they are from reliable sources. Reliable academic sources include scholarly article, textbooks and company reports.
Data visualization is required. If using a lot of tables/charts/graphs, put some of them in an
appendix and only present the most important tables/graphs in the text. If the usage is moderate
it works to put it in the paper embedded in the text.
The expected length of the report is about 3000-4000 words which includes:
• Introduction including identification of the research question(s) and objectives of the study
• A clear hypothesis (hypotheses) or research questions
• Sampling techniques, data collection method (primary data or secondary data) and data
collection process
• Identification of relevant data and data cleaning
• Analysis of the findings and interpretation
• Data – driven suggestions / recommendations
• Visualization of the findings
• Conclusion
• Bibliography. Sources in the bibliography as well as intext must be in Harvard Style Citation
As you prepare a research paper, you want to be mindful of the following guidelines:
• Your topic must be related to the course of study. You will have greater success if you select a
topic that interests you and can be applied to your professional life.
• Select a research question that is feasible meaning that you will be able to get data to complete
the project.
• You must cite the sources of all ideas, facts, and information used that are not your own,
even if you have put the information into your own words, that is to paraphrase. Failure
to do so is plagiarism, even if the oversight is unintentional.
• Your sources should be stated in-text and in the bibliography according to Harvard
Style Citation. You can find all you need to know about Harvard Style Citation online.
For the appearance/graphics of the paper, you have more freedom and do not need to
follow Harvard Style.
• All research papers must be in Microsoft Word.
• Retain your research notes and rough notes so that if a question arises as to the actual
source and its location, you will be able to address that question promptly. Also, you should retain
one electronic copy of your final research project in case the first copy is lost or misplaced.
• Include the syntax that you use (in R) in the appendix.
Assessment criteria:
The assignment requires students to demonstrate skills and competence that are relevant for data
analysis including ability to define, source and clean the data; to select a proper method and to
select and use appropriate technique and tool for data analytics and visualization (such as R) and
the ability to formulate data-driven recommendations. The elements of assessment include:
• The approach to the analysis and evaluation of the problem
• Relevancy and appropriateness of the techniques and tools used for the analysis
• The overall quality of the report
• Data visualisation quality (graphic and data design techniques to create beautiful, easy-to
understand visualisations and uncover insights in data)
As the first step, you should determine a research question that is relevant to solve business or
organizational challenges. Your research question can be phenomenon-based or is inspired by
some trends and development in a specific market or industry. Keep in mind that the assignment
requires students to collect data to answer the research question(s). As such, you should select a
research question that is feasible meaning that you will be able to get data that you can use to
answer the research question(s). The data can be either primary (mainly through survey or online
experiments) or secondary such as data that you get from company publications, government
reports or through web-crawling/web-scrapping.
Below are examples of topic that you can pursue along with possible methodological choice:
1. Does sustainability index predict company’s financial performance? (method: secondary
through collecting data on sustainability index (such as Dow Jones index) and some
financial indicators such as revenue growth or EBITDA which can be collected from
Compustat or company report)
2. Does working from home predict job satisfaction and job engagement? (method: survey,
potential respondents: people who have been experiencing a (partial) shift to working from
home recently)
3. Does communication strategy in advertisement predict the brand attitude (method: online
experiment, potential respondents: regular people)
4. What predicts properties’ rating on AirBnB or Booking.com? (method: web-crawling or webscrapping)
You should combine your thoughtful analysis of the topic with information from your sources. Keep in mind, however, that this is to be an analytical paper, and you are not simply copying information from a source or merely summarizeyour reading. The academic sources must be of good quality meaning they are from reliable sources. Reliable academic sources include scholarly article, textbooks and company reports.
Data visualization is required. If using a lot of tables/charts/graphs, put some of them in an
appendix and only present the most important tables/graphs in the text. If the usage is moderate
it works to put it in the paper embedded in the text.
The expected length of the report is about 3000-4000 words which includes:
• Introduction including identification of the research question(s) and objectives of the study
• A clear hypothesis (hypotheses) or research questions
• Sampling techniques, data collection method (primary data or secondary data) and data
collection process
• Identification of relevant data and data cleaning
• Analysis of the findings and interpretation
• Data – driven suggestions / recommendations
• Visualization of the findings
• Conclusion
• Bibliography. Sources in the bibliography as well as intext must be in Harvard Style Citation
As you prepare a research paper, you want to be mindful of the following guidelines:
• Your topic must be related to the course of study. You will have greater success if you select a
topic that interests you and can be applied to your professional life.
• Select a research question that is feasible meaning that you will be able to get data to complete
the project.
• You must cite the sources of all ideas, facts, and information used that are not your own,
even if you have put the information into your own words, that is to paraphrase. Failure
to do so is plagiarism, even if the oversight is unintentional.
• Your sources should be stated in-text and in the bibliography according to Harvard
Style Citation. You can find all you need to know about Harvard Style Citation online.
For the appearance/graphics of the paper, you have more freedom and do not need to
follow Harvard Style.
• All research papers must be in Microsoft Word.
• Retain your research notes and rough notes so that if a question arises as to the actual
source and its location, you will be able to address that question promptly. Also, you should retain
one electronic copy of your final research project in case the first copy is lost or misplaced.
• Include the syntax that you use (in R) in the appendix.
Assessment criteria:
The assignment requires students to demonstrate skills and competence that are relevant for data
analysis including ability to define, source and clean the data; to select a proper method and to
select and use appropriate technique and tool for data analytics and visualization (such as R) and
the ability to formulate data-driven recommendations. The elements of assessment include:
• The approach to the analysis and evaluation of the problem
• Relevancy and appropriateness of the techniques and tools used for the analysis
• The overall quality of the report
• Data visualisation quality (graphic and data design techniques to create beautiful, easy-to
understand visualisations and uncover insights in data)
