UN SDGs GROUP REPORT - Expanded Instructions (INT)

This is a GROUP assessment task that will require you to work in groups/teams consisting of
between four to five members to develop an analytical style REPORT with respect to the
topic area of business . Development of
will involve both primary and secondary data analysis in relation to the
above noted topic area. The required secondary analysis has already occurred to a large
extent via Assessment Task #1 the Literature Review.

The GROUPS for this assessment task will be formed in the Week 3 Workshops.
The same groups will ALSO be used for Assessment Task #3 the Group Oral Presentation.
It is essential that you are in attendance at this class otherwise you will be placed into a
group with other non-attendees. If you are unable to attend this class / session and you wish
to be in a group with a particular classmate, you should ask that they ensure that you are
registered into the same group as them.

» There are a number of steps to this assessment piece:

Each person in the group will need to select one industry / business sector
. They will then
need to track down and analyse FIVE companies within the selected sector with
respect to how/if each company is identifying engagement with the UN SDGs and
action.
which

A list of companies for each of the above industry sectors that can be included in the
analysis has been complied by your lecturer and is available via the Assessment Task #2
folder within
The output of the relevant company reporting and industry sector analysis should be
presented via a series of tables accompanied by supporting narrative in the Results &
Findings section of the group report. It is recommended that you construct your tables
in a way similar in style that which will be shown to you during the Week 5 workshop
(copy to be made available in the ).

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2. primary analysis along

Literature Reviews (secondary analysis) should result in the group having sufficient
information to create a report that successfully responds to the assignment task as
detailed in the Subject Outline for Assessment Item #2.
The report needs to be constructed collaboratively with others in your group. You
may meet face to face with other group members, but this is not strictly necessary.
Where face to face meetings are not possible the idea is that the group work in
partnership online to develop a collaborative effort. Each person in the group is
expected to contribute to a variety of sections within the report [as opposed to just one
single section].

Your should consist of those sections as identified on pages 12-13 of

the Subject Outline.

The Body section of the Report MUST NOT exceed 3,500 words in length. A rough
guide as to section lengths within the Body of the report is provided below. Note these
are approximations and can be exceeded and/or not reached as your group sees fit
however the TOTAL word count must NOT exceed 3,500 words.

Introduction (150 - 250 words)

Results & Findings** (1,250 1,500 words)
Discussion** (1,100 1,500 words)
Conclusion (150 - 200)
Total = 2,750 3,500 words
** Results & Findings plus Discussion sections are likely
to vary in accordance with how many group members there are in the group, as this
impacts how many Industry / Business sectors are analysed.

In association with the Results and Findings section and the subsection within it titled
the Methodology you should provide an Appendices item that identifies and briefly
explains the UN SDGs to the reader. This could be the same appendix item as used in
one of your group members Literature Review.

The Introduction section of your report should identify the purpose of the report,
provide a brief overview (background information) regarding the
so as to ensure that reader is provided with sufficient context ahead of reading the
report, identify any limitations that the report might have, and identify to the reader
the framework via which the relevant information is to be presented.

The Results & Findings section of the report should be broken up into subsections.
The first of these should identify the methodology used with respect to collecting the
relevant data / information. This should be followed by a series of subsections that
relate to each of the industry sectors as analysed by the different group members.

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The final subsection should draw together the data obtained for the different industry
sections on a combined basis and provide a snapshot of the overall results obtained.

The role of the Results and Findings section is to report in a factual way what
your primary data analysis has found. This section of the report should NOT
identify why the results might be as they are or identify their implications. Nor should
it draw comparisons with other studies. Commentary along these lines should be
reserved for the Discussion section of the report.

The Results and Findings section of the report should include not only narrative
but also visuals such as tables and graphs to assist in providing clarity. For this
report you are expected as a minimum to present a table in support of each industry
sector plus a table and graph in rounding out the section when presenting its overall
findings regarding the combined analysis of the industry sectors analysed. You can if
you wish to do so include additional graphs in the Appendices section of the report
BUT if doing so make sure that they are referred to in the relevant narrative of your
report.

NOTE: The Results & Findings section carries two and a half times weighting in the
calculation of your group score.

The Discussion section then is where you identify your viewpoints regarding the data
obtained and compare your findings to previous studies conducted. It is recommended
that this section be presented using a similar subsection-based structure (excluding the
Methodology) to that employed in the Results & Findings section. In this assignment it
is recommended that any contrasts that you wish to highlight within a particular
industry / business sector be made as part of the discussion.

NOTE: The Discussion section also carries two and a half times weighting in the

The final section of the report s body section will be its Conclusion. Your main task
here is to reiterate / reinforce the main findings of the report in a concise way. You
may also wish to make recommendations here as to any future studies (styles of
research) that could be of benefit to the topic area in the future.

Preceding the Body Section of the report (but always produced after it) is what is
known as the Front Matter section of the report. In this assignment the Front Matter
section of your report should include a Report Title (Cover) page, a Table of Contents
section and an Executive Summary.

Your Executive Summary should not exceed 300 words for this assignment. It should
provide a very brief synopsis of each of the reports key sections. Its role is two-fold
firstly it needs to be effective in providing a CONCISE summary of the report and

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 secondly it needs to be written in a way that will see it act as an incentive for people
to read the report in fuller detail.

Following on from the Body Section of the report is the End Matter Section. For this
report your End Matter section should include a References List and an Appendix or
Appendices or section. Information is provided above with respect to potential
inclusions for your Appendices section and this element will be discussed further in
your relevant workshop / online tutorial.

The References (List) should be presented after the Conclusion and ahead of the
Appendices section. It should adhere to APA 7 standards and identify those sources
that are cited within the narrative of your report.
Additionally, in this assignment, you will also need to list the referencing details
associated with the reports (or websites) upon which the analysis of the company
reporting of UNSDGs, as reported in your Results & Findings section, were based.
Note these sources do not need to be identified via in-text citations.

The Reference List along with the correct application of in-text citations within the
narrative of your report will impact the score that you are awarded with respect to the
Referencing related marking criteria.

» You should aim to spend some time working on this assignment each week between the
date on which it is introduced to you in class (Week 4) & its due date (End of Week 8).
Given the nature of this task it is strongly recommended that you do NOT leave it until
the last week or last few days to get started as doing so is likely to result in a lower
quality report being submitted and a low mark being achieved.

» A key aim of this assignment is that the group gradually builds up an inventory of
knowledge. This means that you should contribute to an appropriate range of sections
within the report. You should also be prepared to correct and make changes to the work
of other group members. The group should agree upon protocols in this regard.
Finishing report should not be left until the last minute. You should work on
it progressively throughout the semester.
Your report will be assessed based on the quality of contributions across its different
sections, the extent to which the report provides reader utility, the extent of collaboration
and resultant report cohesiveness / consistency achieved and the overall quality and
completeness of the group effort in terms of , structure, logical flow
and visual appeal.
This assessment task aims to develop a number of important skills, including
being capable of successfully conducting both primary & secondary research, critical
thinking & the analysis of information, report writing skills, teamwork skills and online
collaboration skills.
In order to do well on this assessment task you will need to engage with the vodcasts
released to you in weeks 3 through to 5 of the trimester. Vodcast 5.3 in particular

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provides key information with respect to report writing conventions associated with the
style of report that your group should be producing for this assignment. When marking

to do so is likely to see marks being lost across a number of the marking criteria.

» Submission and Return of Assessment: Each GROUP will need to deposit their
completed report into the Assignment Drop Box located in the ASSESSMENT area on
Learn JCU. Reports submitted AFTER the due date will be deemed as being LATE
SUBMISSIONS and as such will incur the normal late submission penalties as applied to
assignments in the Business discipline.

Results and feedback with respect to the GROUP Report will be provided at the end of
the Trimester on the same date that your results for the subject are published.

» Team Conflict and Disbandment:

set sought by employers. Working in teams,
under realistic conditions, encourages peer learning and peer support.

Being a team player means taking into consideration the impact of your actions on others
and ensuring that you communicate openly with others in the group should there be any
situations that might impinge upon your ability to contribute and meet agreed deadlines.
It is also important that all group members are fully aware of the interdependencies that
might exist between different tasks within the assignment.

» Should you experience dysfunctional conflict in your team it is important to advise

the lecturer as soon as possible.
If your group contains a member[s] who has/have fallen out of contact for an extended
period of time you should also alert the lecturer.
The lecturer will retain the right (after hearing claims from students) to decide when a
group should be disbanded or certain members removed.
In exceptional circumstances, individual assessment options might be made available to
students BUT only after a concerted effort has been made to work with other team
members. Individual assessment will inevitably result in more work than would be the
case if working effectively within a group/team.