APPENDIX
A
Research
Paper Guidelines
MBA–Managerial
Accounting
Southeastern
University
Combined Research Paper and
Case Study
The next section presents a balanced
scorecard case study. The assignment is to prepare an analysis of the case,
which includes a research component. Use
the following headings within the body of your paper as a basis for presenting
your material:
Balanced Scorecard
Theory (BST). Identify and explain what BST entails and discuss its
advantages and disadvantages. This
discussion should include references to a minimum of five published
sources. One of these should be
Kaplan and Norton, who first advanced this concept as a management tool in
1992. Only one reference can be
from a web site. All others must be
from published practitioner magazines or academic journals. You
may reference the text book, but it does not count as one of the five
reference sources. Remember: a research effort is only as good as the
quality of the reference sources.
Poor quality references are indicative of an uninspired research
effort.
Balanced Scorecard
Case Study.
Analyze the following case study (taken from the Horngren et al.
text) for a Law Firm. Support your
answer by references to material
in the case and to the material
you presented in the Balanced Scorecard Theory section of this paper. Include a discussion of balanced
scorecard management techniques that are being used and how effective the
law firm is employing this concept.
Young, Martinez,
and Cheung (YMC) is a law firm in Chicago.
The firm has had a very loose and relaxed management style that has
served it well in the past. However,
more aggressive law firms have been winning new clients faster than YMC
has. Thus, the managing partner, Jerry
Martinez, recently attended and ABA seminar on the performance measurement in
law firms, where he learned about the balanced scorecard. He thought it might be a good tool for YMC,
one that would allow the firm to keep its culture yet still more aggressively
seek new clients.
Martinez
identified the following strategic objectives that fit with the firmâs core
values and provide a framework for assessing progress toward the firmâs
goals.
Financial: To steadily increase the firmâs revenues and
profits.
Customer: (1) To understand the firmâs customers
and (2) to value customer service over
self-interest.
Internal Business Process:
(1) Encourage knowledge sharing among the legal staff, (2) Communicate with
each other openly, honestly, and often, and (3) Empowere staff to make decisions
that benefit their clients.
Organizational Learning: (1)To maintain
an open and collaborative environment that attracts and retains the best legal
staff, and (2) to seek staff diversity.
For this case
study, identify at least one measure (it should be very specific) for each of
the objectives set forth above. Then,
explain how YMC can use these measures to evaluate staff performance. Finally, present the pros and cons of using
the balanced scorecard measures as an aspect of the determination of
compensation.
3. Application. If your firm uses the balanced scorecard as a
management tool,
discuss in detail how it is doing this. If not, as an alternative, discuss how you
might employ the balanced scorecard
idea to improve performance in your organization.
References. Set forth all sources used to develop this case
study. All references must be from
published sources. If you use an
Internet source, make sure it is of academic quality. For example, the Academy of Management
or the American Accounting Association websites are examples of an
acceptable www citation.
Conversely, websites like .billhahn.com/”>www.billhahn.com
are not of academic quality
and, therefore, are unacceptable reference sources. Only one citation can
come from an Internet website source.
Wikipedia is NOT
an acceptable reference, nor is the textbook or any other textbook. These sources are not considered research
quality in academia.
Databases such as AIB/Inform, ProQuest, Science
Direct, and Wilson Business resources
SHOULD be used to collect meaningful research
materials from academic and practitioner
journals.
This is a combination research paper and
case study. Papers in this area normally are 8-10 pages in length. Your paper should not exceed 12 pages.
The paper MUST be presented Help write my thesis – APA style,
which is SEUâs specified style format.
RESEARCH
PAPER/CASE STUDY GRADING CRITERA
Research
papers are only as good as the reference sources used to construct the paperâs
narrative. The
idea is that you do not know much, if anything, about the topic, and you need
to find out what others say about it.
Then you use their thinking in order to set forth your narrative. Do not use the authorâs words and phrasing,
but DO put the authorâs ideas into your own words.
When doing this, you must put a reference
citation every time you use the idea of another author. In most research papers, every paragraph will
have at least one reference citation.
Not doing so is plagiarism and could be graded as a zero. I found this is several
papers and encourage those who did so to review the referencing material to insure that future papers are properly cited.
For in-text references, the current Help write my thesis – APA
guidance indicates the following style for a journal article:
Adams, G.B. & White, J.D. (1994). Dissertation research in public
administration and cognate fields: An
assessment of methods and quality. Public
Administration Review, 54(6),
565-576.
Books and other sources are similar, but
vary in certain aspects. If you are to
successfully write in the MBA program, you need to spend time with the Help write my thesis – APA
style manual, sixth edition.
Grading of the Research Paper/Case Study
will be accomplished using the grading rubric set forth in Appendix B. Following are some general guidelines I
employ in my evaluation of research papers:
1.
Referencing completeness and Help write my thesis – APA
Style -1 to -10 points
2.
No Kaplan & Norton reference source
-5 points
3.
Section headings set forth in assignment not used to develop paper -5
4.
Pros and Cons of BST, discussion not complete enough -5 to -10
5.
Theory development, including what BST is, how it works, and why it is
an
important management tool not complete enough. -5 to -20
6.
Case Analysis. Correct conclusion regarding the case and
completeness of discussion
-5 to -15
7.
Application discussion completeness.
-5 to -10
8.
Other issues with the paper or its presentation. -1 to -50
This paper represents a significant portion of the course
grade. It is intended to demonstrate that you have mastered literature research
techniques and have developed an understanding of the balanced scorecard
concept and are able to relate balanced scorecard ideas to a case study.
General appearance of the
paper. It is expected that papers will be neatly
typed and free from spelling and grammar errors. A further assumption is that papers will be
done on a word processor. Finally, all papers should be professionally
formatted. This paper must be at least 6
pages (1â margins, Times New Roman 12 font, double spaced) and have a minimum
of five references.
Quality of References. Only primary reference sources should be used. (NO TEXTBOOKS). The material should reflect a review of
important balanced scorecard literature.
A research paper is only as good as the quality of the references used
to develop it. Use of inferior
references, or simply meeting the minimum number of references, is an indicator
of average to below average research effort and quality.
No more than one of the references can be from Internet sites. Care must be taken to select quality internet
sites. Most are not of research quality. However, sites, such as the SEC, IRS, FRB,
AICPA, FASB, and other governmental or professional organizations, are of
higher quality than most sites available on the Internet.
Good use of the reference. In addition to identifying a good set of resources and listing
them in the reference, it is, of course, important that these sources be used.
Students sometimes develop a good list of references but then develop almost
the entire paper using one or two sources. This is not acceptable.
Case Analysis. This is the key element of a research paper. Without the other elements
mentioned above, you will not have a research paper which is scholarly in
appearance and content. What you must do to satisfy the analysis requirement is
take the materials you have gathered, review them in light of the research you
have conducted. Then present appropriate
evidence from your reference sources to support your analysis.
Because of
the importance of clarity in the presentation of information, points will be
based on what you write as well as how you write it. For the how component of your grade,
consideration will be given (among other things) to: spelling, punctuation,
grammar; as well as to the overall readability of your paper.
As for what you write, consideration will be
given to whether you used your research to develop your case study
analysis. In this regard, you should use
terms and concepts learned in the research to inform your analysis. Specifically: First, you will be evaluated on
whether you have understood balanced scorecard concepts and have expressed yourself
appropriately on the strengths and weaknesses of this management
technique. Second, your ability to
critique the case study is assessed along with your ability to present how your
topic is applicable to the workplace.
As a
potential manager and leader, it is important that you be able to express
yourself in written form. That is why a
research paper is a significant part of your course grade and why it is in your
best interest to budget your time wisely in order to complete it.
You must
also carefully document what you have to say following the rules for
attribution. Reference all quotes, paraphrasing, and ideas taken from
others. While it is very easy to
purchase term papers online, it is also easy for your instructor to trace
them. Plagiarism will result in a zero
for the paper. Please read the Nova plagiarism policy prior to finalizing and
submitting your paper.
The following is a list of journals and periodicals with
which might be useful in the development of your paper.
Journals and
Periodicals:
Academy of Management JournalAcademy of Management ReviewAcademy of Management ExecutiveAccounting
ReviewAdministrative
Science QuarterlyAdvanced
Management JournalAmerican
Behavioral ScientistAmerican
Journal of SociologyApplied
Economics Business
HorizonsBusiness
and Society Review/InnovationBusiness
WeekCalifornia Management ReviewConference
Board ReviewDecision
SciencesForbesFortuneGoverningHarvard Business ReviewHuman
FactorsHuman
RelationsIndustrial
Labor Relations ReviewIndustrial
ManagementJournal of
AccountancyJournal of
Applied Behavioral ScienceJournal of
Applied Management & EntrepreneurshipJournal of
Applied PsychologyJournal of
BusinessJournal of
ManagementJournal of
Occupational PsychologyJournal of
Vocational BehaviorLabor Law
JournalLong Range
PlanningJournal of
Strategic PlanningOrganizational
Behavior and Human PerformanceOrganizational
DynamicsPersonnelPersonnel
AdministratorPersonnel Journal
Personnel
ManagementPersonnel
PsychologyPsychological
BulletinPsychology
TodaySloan Management ReviewSocial
ResearchStrategic
ManagementSmall
Group BehaviorTraining
and Development JournalWall
Street Journal
Many of these publications are available in either hard
copy or electronic form using the search feature of ABI/INFORM Global, Science
Direct, or some similar periodical database.
There is a lot of garbage on the
Internet. Therefore, care must be used
when determining if material found on the Internet is useful to your research
purpose. In general, governmental web
sites (e.g. SEC, IRS, Treasury Department) and professional organization web
sites (e.g. AICPA, FASB, Academy
of Management, American
Marketing Association, etc.) contain higher level data than other sites.
Wikipedia is NOT an acceptable
reference. Textbooks for this class or
other classes you have taken are also unacceptable in academic research.
Format
of the Term Paper:
I. Introduction
II. Balanced
Scorecard Concepts and Process
–
Concepts. This should fully describe the balanced
scorecard.
–
Advantages/Disadvantages
III. Case
Study Assignment help – Discussion: Use what you learned in Part II for this purpose.
–
Performance Measures
–
Evaluation of Staff Performance
–
Compensation Tied to
Performance
IV. Workplace
Application: Related this concept to our
place of employment.
V. References
Your paper should have a cover sheet.
The first section should introduce your
topic and briefly identify key issues you are going to discuss. The literature review should be a polished
version of what you have learned from your sources set forth in the reference.
The case study discussion section is where use what you have learned about the
balanced scorecard approach to analyze the case study under consideration. Almost
every paragraph in the literature review should contain reference citations. Also, these sections should have subheadings
to separate distinct areas of discussion such as the balanced scorecard process
and strength and weaknesses.
The workplace application section provides
you with an opportunity to explore how the balanced scorecard idea is used in
your organization. If your organization does not use the balanced scorecard,
this section provides an opportunity to investigate how it might be useful if
you were to have an opportunity to install it in your organization. Here is
where you place any opinions you wish to express about the workability of the
balanced scorecard approach in an applied setting.
Next will be your reference and lastly any
appendices that are necessary for a complete presentation.
