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Sample Research Paper on CitiFinancial and NTIC Announce Expansion of Partnership

This paper discusses in detail the research proposal that examines the perception of the administrators in CitiFinancial regarding branch expansion. Basically, the researcher attempts to identify the impact and factors related to branch expansion. It attempts to discover the feasible plan in order to have a successful branch expansion.  This includes discussion of its history, the current status of CitiFinancial in terms of branch expansion, and its impact to the overall progress of the organisation. Specifically, this proposed research explores the perceptions of the respondents and their view regarding branch expansion. Founded in 1912 as Commercial Credit, the company was bought by Sandy Weill in 1986. Citifinancial is consumer lending subsidiary of financial services giant Citigroup Inc. Thus, CitiFinancial offers bill consolidation, debt refinancing, home equity, home improvement and other personal loans through approximately 3,000 offices in the US, Canada, Mexico and Japan. In addition, the CitiFinancial group reaches customers through retail partnerships. The banking industry faces a lot of incurring issues and challenges when it comes to certain business branch expansions as it can be due to diverse banking processes within bank sector industry as for Citifinancial it is imperative to involve the aspects of branch assimilation, assumptions as well as implications of the such desire to adopt to the process of total branch expansion to various regions globally. Thus, the research investigation will identify descriptively the branch expansion factors as well as positive outcomes of the expansion in determining strong and weak points of the expansion process in the banking sector industry and determine the value levels of branch networking paradigms and context of Citifinancial respectively. RESEARCH QUESTIONS The following research questions will be explored in the study: <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">What are the supplies needed for the project? (e.g. labour force, building materials, supplies after expansions such as office personnel, office materials, etc.) </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">How much will 25 branches expansions cost? </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Which locations are potential places for CitiFinancial to operate? </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">How much people does CitiFinancial need for a single expansion project? </li> a. the number of people for the project management of the expansion? b. the required number of staff once the expansion has been completed? <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Is using integrated supply chain described OSD Comptroller iCenter effective for the project? </li> The research questions will be explored qualitatively by conducting interviews with the engineering management of CitiGroup Inc. in Hong Kong. Thus, the questions provided below are to be answered also for more depth of research meaning and relevance.  1. What are the value of branches and core competence?, and How it is realized in Citifinancial for possible success of their branch expansion? 2. How imperative is Citifinancial’s roles and responsibilities models in realizing better branch networks? Explain the value and importance of Citifinancial’s goal statements of the matter. 3. Determine and Discuss briefly Citifinancial’s focus for strategy, Is it moving towards a better and a positive branch expansion network? How and in what way? 4. What are the branch expansion challenges that Citifinancial may face upon the realization of such branch expansion plans? 5. Is Citifinancial well prepared to exert full effort in expanding its branches? Any evidence or support for the latter? STRATEGIC IMPORTANCE OF THE RESEARCH The research will have a strategic importance in identifying barriers and problems that CitiFinancial may face during its expansion. Further, the research will make the expansion easier for the company. Expansion projects are difficult because there are many issues to consider. There is the budget, the time-frame, the supplier and the resources (human, space, equipment, etc). CitiBank is planning to expand with an additional 25 branches for CitiFinancial in Hong Kong – an exercise that requires much preparation and background research. This study will assess the process by identifying the key variables that would affect the successful completion of the expansion. By estimating the budget necessary, the timeframe necessary and staffing required, this study will be able to predict the success of the expansion in Hong Kong. Furthermore, identifying the advantages that an integrated supply chain approach can contribute to the project would help in its development. Research Goals This study will try to achieve the following research goals: -          To be able to acquire useful research evidences and information and the finding out of certain possibilities for CitiFinancial to increase more of their branches internationally and expand their networks within the banking sector industry not just in the US but other countries as well -          To interview and survey head and staffs of Citigroup for the possible branch expansion -          To study the data collected from literatures and the respondents and look for relationships that are important in the study’s issue Research Plan and Methodology             The first month will be dedicated on the knowing more about the problem of the research. This will be followed an in-depth literature search on the internet and local libraries. Literature search will continue for as long as four months. The three among those four months will also be dedicated in knowing more about the research design and methods chosen for the study. The following months will be dedicated in data collection. A letter of permission to conduct research will be submitted to the management of Citifinancial as appropriate. Several branches of Citifinancial globally will then be chosen for interviews and surveys. Data analysis will soon follow. The data will be analyzed both qualitatively and or quantitatively. Quantitative testing is for the data collected from Citifinancial, basically to find out the statistical prevalence of branching and expansion issues and prevalence of such applied measures. Multi-method is the chosen means of conducting this research so that data collection can be flexible and the topic will be better explained and elaborated. Overview of the Dissertation The dissertation will be composed of five chapters.             The first chapter will introduce the problems of the study, aims and objectives, as well as the methodology used.             Then, the second chapter will deal with providing the details of precise review of literature pointing and reflecting towards branch expansion processes and other relevant data and information for the completion of the study. Here, financial banking industry will be explored as well as the different issues and challenges that CitiFinancial face and apply.             The third chapter will present the data collected from the interviews and surveys amicably. Each data will be followed by discussions guided by references from related literatures.             Thus, the fourth chapter will present and discuss the data collected from the selected sectors within the CitiFinancial team. This will include the presentation of qualitative and quantitative data acquired and discussions on each of them.             Lastly, Chapter 5 will present the conclusion of the study as well as its recommendations. Expected Results              The research study anticipates discovering such realization and actualization of  branch network expansion of CitiFinancial that will involve its corporate and management ways as to how they can be successful in a lot of ways as there involves management team participation and the determining of branch expansion techniques and methods that the bank can use in their branching expansion. The study also integrates to know and realize imperative and critical points to be reflected in the research analysis and discussion of research findings and be able to meet the guidelines and procedures recommended by the people involved in the branch expansion study of CitiFinancial. chapter two Review of Related literature Traditional supply chains can be problematic. According to Sabath (1995): “…each step back in the supply chain, volatility of demand increases and forecast accuracy decreases”.  The reason in because it relies on at least three discrete inventory buffers to smooth the flow of goods through production and provide a reliable response to volatile consumer demand (Sabath, 1995). Traditional approaches also react very slowly with the demand trends and also treat all items very much the same. This is not the case in the integrated approach (Sabath, 1995). An integrated supply chain is linked organizationally and coordinated with information flows, from raw materials to on-time delivery of finished products to customers (Sabath, 1995). Partnering-oriented business relationships are established between, and among, all supply chain members to facilitate coordination of supply chain activities (Sabath, 1995). Sabath (1995) explained that integrated, coordinated supply chain “superorganizations” are extremely responsive and can react quickly to support a partner company’s rapid growth.              According to OSD Comptroller iCenter (2006), the advantages of supply chain management include: quicker customer response and fulfillment rates; greater productivity and lower costs; reduced inventory throughout the chain; improved forecasting precision; fewer suppliers and shorter planning cycles; improved quality and products that are more technologically advanced; enhanced inter-operational communications and cooperation; shortened repair times and enhanced equipment readiness; and more reliable financial information. This study will aim to identify if these characteristics are achieved by CitiFinancial in their expansion in Hong Kong. (CitiFinancial, 2007).                 Basically, the aim of building a presence is not just for profit motive but also to offer convenient services to customers among all segments and walks in life. According to CitiGroup Inc., 25 branches will be targeted to open by the end of 2007. This paper presents a briefing on the expansion and argues the reason why such an action is needed. It presents the problem to be solved, the main hypothesis, and the methods and procedures by which they can be solved during the pursuit of the project.  The following variables will be explored in the study: Ø      Location Ø      Cost Ø      Safety The expansion of CitiFinancial is a major breakthrough for CitiGroup in Hong Kong. The key locations where it expanded will offer more versatility to the company’s services. However, there are still several problems that the company should explore first to ensure the positive impact of the expansion project. For instance, because it concerns expansion, there is a need to identify who will lead the engineering department, who will manage the supply chain, etc. The 25 additional expansions that CitiFinancial plan also require sufficient survey of potential areas where the new infrastructures would be developed. Specifically, this study will focus on the supply chain side of the project. The problem with the expansion is identifying the right supplies to use for the project, generally the overall management of supplies needed to be used for building infrastructures. Hong Kong‘s banking industry has been an increasingly competitive business environment. With concerns over rising bad debts and shrinking interest margins, many commercial banks have introduced new product initiatives, ranging from credit cards, investment management and insurance to e-banking. These have all been major sources of revenue for banks in adjusting to the new economic setting. For organisations that move into new product areas, there is also likely to be greater uncertainty surrounding customer preferences (Von Hippel, 1988) and a corresponding need for customer accounting information. For example, Davila (2000, p. 387) found that medical equipment manufacturers who moved into new markets had a greater need for customer information, and noted that, “management control systems in new product development are viewed as sources of information that are used to close the gap between the information required to perform a task and the amount of information already possessed.”. The need for customer accounting information in banks is also likely to increase as market competition increases. Market competition places pressure on revenue streams and forces banks to consider new product development initiatives and a corresponding need for information concerning customer preferences. Cobb et al. (1995) studied the management accounting system (MAS) in a division of a multinational bank from 1989 to 1993, and found that the introduction of new products, among other factors such as new competitors, place pressure on firms to initiate changes in the management accounting system. The management accounting practices that were adopted included new cost allocation methodology, value for money exercises, new cost reports, competitive benchmarking and more participative budgeting processes, all of which increased the levels of discussion and produced greater communication between managers and management accountants. When a bank begins to serve new customers, their needs and requirements are less well understood and uncertainty is high. In this case, information about customers obtained from a customer accounting system is expected to be beneficial in tailoring products to customer needs as well as helping the bank to allocate resources to support the promotion and sale of such products. Community banks faced with the need for a major expansion wrestle with a common dilemma: whether to increase their investment downtown or build a new facility in high-growth corridors. In towns across America, banks have traditionally played a highly visible role in downtown commerce. For many, the headquarters office is recognized as a downtown landmark, an enduring symbol of the bank itself. So, despite the possible advantages of relocating, bank executives also recognize the need to maintain a strong downtown presence. The question then becomes what is the best strategic facility to not only meet current customer needs, but also to support future growth? One option may be to build a new branch in the path of retail development and relocate some of the bank’s operations to the new facility, freeing up needed space at the downtown main office. That may solve the immediate space problem, but splitting operations between two locations may not be an optimal solution. Another option is to convert the main office to a branch, and build a new headquarters in an outlying area to keep pace with residential and shopping patterns. The downtown location can continue to serve key commercial accounts, since banks want their executives to be highly visible and accessible to this important customer base. Maintaining a downtown main office may also be seen as a priority in towns that serve as county seats and are home to state and county government offices. In many cases, the best solution is to expand and renovate the main office. A remodel/addition project often presents greater challenges than building an entirely new facility, requiring a carefully integrated approach to design, engineering and construction. Many downtown banks are landlocked, with limited space for building additions, drive-up facilities or expanded parking. Aging facilities may pose limitations from a design or structural standpoint. And, keeping the bank operational and secure during the phasing of construction is critical. A design vision is as important as structural considerations. More than just alleviating space problems, how will the facility design create or maintain a strong identity for the bank? Will the finished project provide a unified look? Having employees or the community compliment the bank on its “new addition” is not as flattering as receiving rave reviews about the “new bank.” The interior design must not only be aesthetically pleasing, but also must enhance customer service and convenience, and provide a productive, efficient work environment for employees. Expansion plans must also take into account a bank’s need to upgrade its technology infrastructure or provide additional space for marketing activities, such as interactive kiosks or video displays. There is no single formula for an effective expansion and remodeling program. But all successful projects should have the common goal of better meeting customer needs and maximizing the bank’s opportunities for future growth. Few banking executives would consider launching a major new product or service initiative without first conducting an in-depth marketing analysis to determine customer needs. Strategic planning is just as important when it comes to building or relocating bank facilities. A comprehensive Facilities Planning Study should be the foundation for any building initiative to help bank management make the right decision about where facilities should be located to best serve the customer base, and how much space will be needed to meet current and future needs. No two banks are exactly alike. Therefore, every planning study is different. But a sound strategic plan should include the following steps: -          Analyze the local market from an economic and demographic standpoint in order to assess growth opportunities -          Review the bank’s financial history as well as any other significant trends that can be used as a base for projecting future activity. -          Recommend a long-term facility strategy that prioritizes branch and main office alternatives from a geographic, staffing, competitive and affordability standpoint. Local Market Profile The performance of the financial services market is generally tied very closely to the strength or weakness of the local economy, including changes in population, income, home construction and the local job market. A Facilities Planning Study, therefore, should begin with an examination of the local market economy. Local competitive activity is another key consideration. Facility design can be an important factor in helping a financial institution differentiate itself in terms of service delivery and branding. Bank Operations Customer growth, staffing trends and account activity are important criteria for assessing future needs. Management growth strategies will also have a direct bearing on future facility requirements. Does the bank want to retain its current positioning in the market or expand its customer base through geographic expansion? Staffing Space needs generally can be calculated based on a ratio of square footage per employee, but total space requirements under one roof will vary according to the specific needs of each institution. Future staffing levels can be impacted by a number of factors, such as technology changes and local market conditions, so specific guidelines will vary for different banks. Location Selection  Location selection is one of the most critical factors in the decision-making process, and one that should be determined through a comprehensive and logical approach. Key criteria include: -          Serving customers – How will the needs of current customers best be served from a facility standpoint, taking into account current customer residences and their community and shopping patterns? -          Positioning for future operations – What will be an effective location 5, 10 or even 15 years from now, considering economic and demographic trends? -          Preserving and, if possible, enhancing the value of the real estate investment – What location represents the best investment for the bank’s dollar? Regardless of specific circumstances, a strategic planning study can be an invaluable tool to help bank management ensure that their facilities will successfully meet customer needs and maximize the organization’s opportunities for future growth. New Direction Needed With the dynamics of the future so unclear, it only makes it more apparent that banks will need: -          Greater focus on what differentiates them from the competition, less attention — and spending — on commodity-like functions -          Heightened responsiveness to ongoing changes in the marketplace, more empowered customers and increasingly complex demands from regulators and stakeholders -          Variable cost structures that allow banks to accommodate fluctuations in market demand and product preferences while improving financial position through lower cost structures -          Improved resilience to counteract increased internal and external uncertainty and marketplace volatility — whether protecting your business from shocks such as natural disasters, privacy and security threats and geopolitical events or addressing everyday challenges like business expansion and credit risk <ul type="disc" style="MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Banks are cobbling together an integrated view of the customer; however, channels are still predominately product-centric and management control remains within business units. With interdependent processes across competencies and business units, banks are struggling with overwhelming operational complexity. Connections between different areas of the enterprise tend to be static, inflexible and sometimes manual. Without adequate integration, the cost associated with the resulting organizational complexity can sometimes rise to the point where it offsets any benefits gained from shared processes. Moving into the future, banks will get relief. Technology advances will ease the friction of enterprise reconfiguration, and financial institutions will become more comfortable operating across product lines. As collaborative capabilities expand, companies will be able to push the concept of shared processes past their initial competency-based structures to a much more granular business composition. </li> </ul> To a large extent, technology advances are the key enablers that are making it possible for firms to operate in an on demand fashion. As IT becomes more open, integrated, virtualized and autonomic, it provides new ways of collaborating, eases business integration and reconfiguration and helps firms better manage the rising complexity of managing IT itself. To achieve this state of flexibility, a bank’s IT infrastructure needs to be: -          Based on open standards — to simplify systems integration and adapt to technology changes rapidly -          Integrated — to facilitate transaction and process integration across the enterprise; allow real-time connectivity among partners, suppliers and customers; enable active data mining and decision support -          Virtualized — so that distributed computing resources are shared and managed as a single, virtual data center to increase the utilization of existing assets and lower IT costs -          Autonomic — with systems that can be managed remotely, have embedded privacy protection and security features and are capable of self-optimization, self-diagnosis and self-healing About CitiFinancial CitiFinancial provides community-based lending through more than 1900 branches in the United States and distributes a wide variety of consumer loan products and services including real estate, personal loans and loans to finance consumer goods. CitiFinancial is part of Citigroup (NYSE: C), the preeminent global financial services company has some 200 million customer accounts and does business in more than 100 countries, providing consumers, corporations, governments and institutions with a broad range of financial products and services, including consumer banking and credit, corporate and investment banking, insurance, securities brokerage, and asset management. Major brand names under Citigroup’s trademark red umbrella include Citibank, CitiFinancial, Primerica, Smith Barney, Banamex, and Travelers Life and Annuity. Additional information may be found at www.citigroup.com U.S.: CitiFinancial and NTIC Announce Expansion of Partnership  New York and Chicago — CitiFinancial and the National Training and Information Center (NTIC) today announced the expansion of their partnership, designed to promote stable home ownership in communities around the country. Nearly a year after striking a groundbreaking agreement, CitiFinancial and NTIC have broadened their commitment to not only meet the lending needs of individuals and communities but to promote financial education, a fundamental building block to financial stability in neighborhoods across the country. CitiFinancial and NTIC and its network of grassroots organizations in Chicago, Central Illinois, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Des Moines, Indianapolis and Syracuse are pleased to announce that a specialized program will be developed to promote financial literacy for individuals. CitiFinancial will provide its financial education curriculum, as well as 0,000 over two years to support the program. NTIC and its local community groups and CitiFinancial will work together to blend their resources for the common goal of developing individuals’ personal finance skills, enabling them to make sound financial decisions. “CitiFinancial is pleased its relationship with NTIC and its community-based organizations continues to strengthen and expand,” said Harry Goff, President and CEO, CitiFinancial. “Our dialogue began more than three years ago and, since then, we have made significant progress towards raising the lending standards in the industry and promoting home ownership. We’re excited to embark on this new phase of our relationship because CitiFinancial believes that financial literacy can lead to home ownership which is instrumental to neighborhood stability.” “NTIC is pleased that CitiFinancial is committed to increasing homeownership in our neighborhoods,” said Inez Killingsworth, an NTIC board member. “Over the past year, CitiFinancial has demonstrated their willingness to combat predatory lending. They are sending a clear message to other financial institutions that it is good business to invest in our communities.” CitiFinancial and NTIC will continue to work together to: <ul type="disc" style="MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Review the progress of CitiFinancial’s Real Estate Lending Initiatives and encourage the adoption of similar practices by other lenders; </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Focus on a multi-stage foreclosure review process for borrowers in NTIC and local-affiliate cities; </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Develop and promote affordable mortgage product solutions for customers, especially in the communities served by NTIC and its affiliates; </li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Implement a review and repair process for loans submitted by borrowers from cities served by NTIC and its affiliates. </li> </ul> CitiFinancial continues to make enhancements to its industry-leading changes to its lending and sales practices. Most recently, CitiFinancial introduced a new mortgage product that provides a near-prime rate loan to qualified applicants through its branch network. This is in addition to the elimination of single premium credit insurance for real estate secured loans; a reduction of the maximum number of points charged on real estate secured loans originated via CitiFinancial’s branch network to three from five; the implementation of “Customer First” a redesign of credit insurance sales practices across its branch network; and a complete revamping of its broker-based operations. CitiFinancial Opens 200 Branches in North America in 2006  Baltimore, MD – CitiFinancial today announced that it opened its 200th branch of 2006 on December 22, located at 9251 Baltimore National Pike in Ellicott City, Maryland. The branch is one of three new CitiFinancial offices opened in Maryland in 2006 as part of the company’s North American expansion plan. CitiFinancial now has more than 2,000 branches in the United States. “Opening 200 branches in one year is a significant accomplishment,” said Harry D. Goff, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CitiFinancial. “By expanding our distribution into more markets, we’re able to serve more consumers in more communities than ever before, continuing to lead the industry as the premier community-based lender.”  With the addition of Ellicott City, CitiFinancial now has 36 branches in Maryland and more than 300 in the Northeast. By early 2007, CitiFinancial expects its total North American branches to reach more than 2,500. “We are also thrilled to open a branch so close to our downtown Baltimore headquarters,” Mr. Goff continued. “Our 1,000 Baltimore-area employees are already active in this area, volunteering their time to serve many local organizations. I am confident the new Ellicott City branch team will help us make a difference in our community.” “I am proud to help the consumers in the Ellicott City area reach their financial goals and dreams,” said Althea Moore, manager of the new Ellicott City branch. “My branch team and I are committed to helping our customers take control of their financial futures.” CitiFinancial, a financial services company specializing in personal and home equity loans, has been in business in the United States since 1912, with more than 3.5 million customers and more than billion in receivables. In addition to its core products, CitiFinancial also offers affiliate products including auto loans, insurance, and Citi credit cards.  CONTINUING OPERATIONS  Consumer volumes and net interest margins. U.S. consumer loans grew 7%, reflecting loan growth in consumer lending and retail distribution of 17% and 7%, respectively, which was partially offset by a decline in cards average receivables. Commercial business core loans increased 20%. The benefit of higher loan volumes in U.S. consumer was partially offset by a flatter yield curve and a competitive pricing environment. In the international consumer franchise, cards average loans grew 15% and branch expansion drove a 7% increase in consumer finance loans outside of Japan. International retail banking deposits increased 5% and investment products sales and AUMs grew 28% and 19%, respectively. Net interest margins in international consumer expanded due to pricing actions and marketing initiatives. Continued momentum in capital markets driven businesses. In capital markets and banking, continued franchise momentum resulted in a 39% increase in equity markets revenues and a #1 rank in global equity and equity-linked underwriting for 2005. Increased merger and acquisition activity drove record advisory revenues, up 25%, and reflected a #2 rank in completed global M&A for 2005. An expanding customer base in transaction services contributed to growth in liability balances and assets under custody of 12% and 9%, respectively. Smith Barney continued to focus on advisory-based relationships, which was reflected in 19% growth in fee-based and net interest revenues. Expanding distribution. During the fourth quarter and the full year, continued investment spending led to significant expansion of our physical branch distribution network. Citibank international branch openings or acquisitions for the full year included 68 in Mexico, 36 in the Philippines, 16 in Brazil, and 15 in Russia. CitiFinancial international branch openings included 78 in Mexico, 73 in India, 28 in Korea, and 23 in both Brazil and Poland. CHAPTER THREE Methodology – the approach The study generally aims to identify the supply issues in the expansion of CitiFinancial. The following are the specific aims of the study: To be able to: 1.      identify the supply chain needs of CitiFinancial in their expansion of 25 more branches in Hong Kong. 2.      determine problems in terms of costs and time duration. 3.      identify the obstacles in terms of land in expansion in Hong Kong. 4.      identify problems in human resource in the expansion of CitiFinancial in Hong Kong. 5.      identify key safety issues that the engineering department should handle. 6.      identify if integrated supply chain approach would help to make the expansion faster and less costly. To recommend key strategies for expanding in Hong Kong, the study will explore the problems presented by means of qualitative research. Data Collection Interviews will be conducted to the management of CitiFinancial, specifically the department that handles the expansion project. Questions will be asked regarding plans of purchase (e.g. supplies, equipments), how many people to be hired, the planning cycles for the expansion, and the forecasting plan and how precise it is. The interviews will be conducted personally. A tape recorder will be used during the interviews so that the recorded responses will be transcribed later for analysis and documentation. Questions for the interviewee : (1)               What are the major challenges for CitiFinancial’s branch expansion? (2)               What happened in the old state? (3)               How to determine the branch expansion network and its process? (4)               How to implement the branch expansion measures? (5)               What’s happened in the new state? (6)               Any improvement after branch expansion realization? (7)               How to monitor or control the process? (8)               Any feedback from the staffs after the expansion? (9)               What’s the main duty that affected the process? Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Sample Research Paper on CitiFinancial and NTIC Announce Expansion of Partnership

This paper discusses in detail the research proposal that examines the perception of the administrators in CitiFinancial regarding branch e...

Sample disserertation on alternative techniques to respond to student difficulties

CHAPTER 1: APPLICATION PROBLEM 5. It is evident that from the three listed uses of research results, the second application, that is, to generate decision making that leads to action, applies to the example research result above. Survey of the respondents (teachers) revealed that they found the strategy module lacking on such topics as a rationale for the strategy, a clear specification of the type of student who would benefit from the strategy, and alternative techniques to respond to student difficulties. The curriculum developer, then, should come to the decision to revise and improve on the strategy module in order to be more useful to the intended users, who are the teachers. The decision should then be followed by an action to revise the module as suggested by the respondents, so that the objective to help adult basic education teachers teach a reading strategy could be realized. CHAPTER 2: APPLICATION PROBLEM 1. Classify each as a type of research design: experimental, non-experimental, quantitative, qualitative, or mixed-method.       A pilot investigation of the validity of the Back Stroke Test to identify problem swimmers ~ QUANTITATIVE       A comparison of the effect of two reading programs on fourth-grade classes in Kalamazoo ~ NON-EXPERIMENTAL       An investigation of the structure of attitudes of college students ~ QUALITATIVE       The effect of extrinsic rewards on the motivation of randomly assigned children to play groups ~ EXPERIMENTAL       A survey of principals’ general attitudes toward collective bargaining as well as interviews with a small number of principals ~ NON-EXPERIMENTAL       A study of the relative effectiveness of different counseling techniques used by counselors over the past five years ~ MIXED METHOD       An investigation of the difference in attendance between students in two high schools with different leadership styles ~ NON-EXPERIMENTAL       A posttest-only study of the effect of humorously written review sentences on comprehension for two groups of children ~ EXPERIMENTAL       A study of the meaning of merit pay to teachers ~ QUALITATIVE CHAPTER 6: APPLICATION PROBLEM 1. List potential threats to internal and external validity for case 1. The potential threats to the internal validity of case 1 are: (1) HISTORY – History threats can occur in this research setting as the students may be affected by something that happens during the duration of the tennis class; (2) PRETESTING – Since the researchers conducted a pretest, the items in the test could be enough to change the performance of the class; (3) ATTRITION – or mortality can affect the internal validity of the research because since this is a normal PE class, students, at one time or another, may drop out from the class and therefore become lost in the research; (4) TREATMENT REPLICATION – is a threat to the internal validity of the research to the extent that the reported number of students in a class is not the same as the number of independent replications of the research in other classes; and (5) SUBJECT EFFECTS – may lead to the students changing their performance level because they were informed that the class they will enroll in is different in composition from the other tennis classes offered during the term, and would want to present themselves in the most positive manner. The potential threat to the external validity, on the other hand, is the ECOLOGICAL aspect of external validity. The performance of the students may become affected by the time of the day that the tennis class is offered, as there are morning, noon and afternoon classes. The pretest sensitization could also become a source of threat to the external validity of the study. Also, the effects caused by the presence of the researchers in the class, particularly the Hawthorne effect, may challenge the external validity of the study in that the students may react in certain ways because of their knowledge of aspects of the research. VARIOUS METHODS OF DATA COLLECTION       SURVEY – Questionnaires for surveys are typically open-ended or closed ended. The latter is easier and quicker to answer, that is why it is more employed in research than the former. Being the most common data collection method, it has advantages as well as disadvantages. An advantage is that it is relatively easy to conduct and provides quantitative data otherwise absent in other data collection methods. Research usually has time constraints, and using questionnaires in the conduct of surveys allow the researcher to leave the forms to respondents while conducting other aspects of the study, allowing for multi-tasking. Face-to-face surveys are also the norm. This is done especially when the questions that the researcher has prepared are open-ended, which means that follow-up questions are possible. Although this eats up more time than the previously mentioned method, the researcher has the advantage of being more involved in the data collection process and thus, can provide more input in the analysis and evaluation sections of the research.       OBSERVATION – This involves the actual participation of the author of the research in the data collection process. It has the advantage of not relying on users’ perceptions. Direct observation has its disadvantage, though in that not every goal the researcher would want to study can be directly observed. It is also rather clumsy; it can interfere with activities; and it is costly in terms of time, money, and personnel, unlike in survey where the cost of doing such is relatively small. Through this, the primary data of the research could be gathered. Although there is no interaction with the respondents unlike in the surveys, this method allows the respondents to act naturally and then the researcher just draws conclusions from the way they behave during the time of observation. Observation may be interpretive or ethnographic, and may come in the form of a participant observer or case studies.       FOCUS GROUPS – Focus groups are used to understand the perceptions and feelings of users. They do not supply a consensus but are more suited for surveying a variety of points of view. One advantage of focus groups is that you can easily ask follow-up questions and obtain much more detailed information. The downside, on the other hand, focus groups is that they can be costly in terms of money, time, and labor. This method is a major qualitative method which could explicitly uses group interaction to generate data and insights that would be unlikely to emerge without the interaction found in a group. The technique inherently allows observation of group dynamics, discussion, and firsthand insights into the respondents’ behaviors, attitudes, language, etc.       DOCUMENTS – Historical data, literature review, meta-analysis, diaries, content analysis and secondary data (data mining) are some of the types of documents which could be used to gather secondary data for the research. These methods identify trends in leisure research and practice. Participants keep diaries and journals researcher conducts content analysis of studies, reports and diaries. Knowledge from these secondary sources often proves important to the conduct of the research in that it provides insight to the researcher and could guide the direction that the research is going to take. A major advantage of this method is that the documents are usually easy to acquire, and in a number of accessible media. There is often a wealth of information already available on the topic of the research. On the negative side, it is not conclusive. The data gathered from this method needs to be coupled with actual data or the primary data garnered by the researcher in order for the study to be reliable and valid. ISSUES OF RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY             The related research issues of reliability and validity ask researchers to consider whether they are studying, what they think they are studying and whether the measures that the research is using are consistent. Researchers are often challenged by the difficulty of producing a reliable and valid research output, as researchers can go to great lengths and make every attempt to ensure accuracy in their studies, and still deal with the inherent difficulties of measuring particular events or behaviors and proving that such measures are acceptable and legitimate. The dangers of generalizing from research that is inconsistent, invalid, unreliable, and incomplete could prove to produce more problems for the researcher, as he or she is faced with ethical issues as well. Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Sample disserertation on alternative techniques to respond to student difficulties

CHAPTER 1: APPLICATION PROBLEM 5. It is evident that from the three listed uses of research results, the second application, that is, to...

Success in business is possibly the ends towards which every organisation intends to achieve

Chapter 1   Problem and Its Background Introduction Success in business is possibly the ends towards which every organisation intends to achieve. However, this achieving such ends is no easy task. Management theories and organisational studies already exist in literature to provide businesses and organisation some semblance of a formula for success. Though some models may have been tried and tested in the field, there are instances that show that it is not cut-and-dried. Some models are not wholly applicable to each and every organisation making organisational success still ever so elusive. Though these models of organisational development apparently fail to establish some form of consistency with its applications, some aspects of the model still provide honest-to-goodness improvements in the organisations. It is in this regard that this paper contends that certain critical factors are the ones that trigger and consequently maintain development in the organisation. For this dissertation, the respondent company shall be Singapore Airlines. More specifically, this study intends to find the critical success factors present in the operations of Singapore Airlines. Background of the Company Singapore Airlines is one of the top airline companies in Asia and one of the more respected brand names in the world. The company has been flying the friendly skies, giving its passengers safe passage to anywhere in the world since 1947. As stated in its website, the company is geared towards “providing air transportation services of the highest quality and to maximising returns for the benefit of its shareholders and employees.” The airline company currently have a hundred and forty-three destinations in at least forty-one countries in the world. Singapore Airlines boast of having to first introduce in-flight telecommunication services and first to put in operation the Airbus 380 which is currently the world’s largest commercial aircraft. With these achievements alone, there is no doubt that Singapore Airlines is one of the more prominent and successful companies in the airline industry.   Aims and Objectives Critical success factors are essentially elements that contribute to the overall achievements of the company particularly with reference to its organisational goals. These critical success factors could be found in the internal ( 2005, 16) and external environment (1999,) of the organisation. For this dissertation, the main objective is to determine the implications of the critical success factors of Singapore Airlines to its operations. To effectively carry out this study, the following questions shall be answered: 1.                             How does the internal and external environment affect the operations of Singapore Airlines? 2.                             How does Singapore Airlines deal with the external environment in terms of? a.      The general environment (Political, Economic, Social, and Technical); and b.       The Task Environment (Customer, Supplier, Competitors, New Entrants, Substitutes) 3.                             How does Singapore Airlines employ deal with the internal environment in terms of? a.      Organisational Learning; b.      Management Styles; c.      Market Orientation; and d.      Organisational Flexibility 4.                             What are the critical success factors of Singapore Airlines? 5.                             What is the relationship of the critical success factors of Singapore Airlines with the overall operations of the organisation?       Chapter 2   Literature Review     Chapter 3   Methods and Procedures   Since this study has limited time and resources at its disposal, the general method that shall be employed is descriptive research. Recent studies have defined this type of research as the approach employing statistical processes like averages, percentages and frequency distributions. ( 2000) This means that this study shall use simple statistical processes to guarantee that the findings shall be clear and unambiguous. The study will also make use of both qualitative and quantitative data. This means that survey results as well as those acquired from secondary sources shall form part of the study. In doing so, the noteworthy contributions of the said processes shall help in emphasising the findings of this paper. (  2003, 25) Hence, the shallow numerical information acquired through qualitative research and the rich information uncovered using qualitative information will be able to eventually complement each other and ultimately provide a veritable conclusion for this dissertation. The respondents of this study shall include fifty randomly selected personnel of Singapore Airlines. The respondents shall be answering questions regarding the critical success factors of the company and how it affects the operations of the organisation. This shall commence with the use of a survey questionnaire so as to acquire a succinct and the existing interests significant to the respondents. ( 2004,) To help the researcher measure the responses of the employees, the Likert scale shall be used. RANGE INTERPRETATION 4.50 – 5.00 Strongly Agree 3.50 – 4.49 Agree 2.50 – 3.49 Uncertain 1.50 – 2.49 Disagree 0.00 – 1.49 Strongly Disagree   Consequently, the acquired data shall be processed using the following statistical formulae:   1.       Percentage – to determine the magnitude of the responses to the questionnaire.             n % = ——– x 100        ;           n – quantity of responses             N                                 N – overall quantity of respondents     2.       Weighted Mean               f1x1 + f2x2  + f3x3 + f4x4  + f5x5 x= ———————————————  ;                         xt   where:             f – weight provided to each response                         x – amount of responses                                    xt – overall amount of responses       Chapter 4   Presentation, Interpretation and Analysis of Data     Chapter 5   Conclusion and Recommendation     Bibliography         Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Success in business is possibly the ends towards which every organisation intends to achieve

Chapter 1 Problem and Its Background Introduction Success in business is possibly the ends towards which every organisat...

Customer Relationship Management

Statement Analysis: Customer Relationship Management   Introduction             Along with the changing business environment, customers or clients also changes and they become more knowledgeable, observant, and demanding.  In turn, the management of different organization try to shift their focus on their target market to sustain their competitive advantage. Such changes mean that the companies have to completely transform their traditional aims and purposes from being process-focused to customer-centered or customer-oriented. Restructuring and rethinking the organization on one hand, entails the consideration of various factors which include technology, process, environment, and the human resources aspects ( 2002).  Thus, to be able to bring excellent customer services embedded in the operation of the company, the management must be able to employ fine-tuned customer management approach.  One of the most important management approach that can be used to ensure good customer relationship is the implementation of customer relationship management (CRM) by the intensive process and approach which can result in having or sustaining competitive advantage (2000). The context of Customer relationship management is said to be essential to this generation considering that most of the products and services available in the market have certain similarities. Primarily, the goal of this paper is to analyse the statement of (2006) which states that “Successful strategic CRM will be a complex set of activities that together form the basis for a sustainable and hard-to-imitate competitive advantage”, pp 33.   Customer relationship Management  According to  (2006), “Successful strategic CRM will be a complex set of activities that together form the basis for a sustainable and hard-to-imitate competitive advantage”. The statement means that if a company would be able to use strategic customer relationship management successfully, they can be able to sustain their competitive advantage and they can have business strategies which is unique and distinctive from their competitors.  Perhaps, business strategies is the most important key to successfully have sustainable competitive advantage and the integration of these strategies with the context of customer relationship management can enable an industry to establish unique, distinctive and hard-to-imitate competitive advantage. In order to do so, company management must realize that, either directly or indirectly, the attainment of its objectives contributes to the much to the target market’s general experience within the industry. The successful integration of the process, technology and people is considered to be the important aspects for successful implementation of the customer relationship management approach (, 2003).  The CRM strategy, as based on the statement provided above, the company may set activities which starts with the purposeful and intensive alignment of the processes implemented by the entire management of specific company. These set of activities may include the planning, organizing, directing, and controlling process, which are all catered to provide and satisfy the needs of the target market or the customers (2002; 2003). Hence, customer management relationship, can also be considered as a form customer service management, which adheres more than the attainment of customer satisfaction but the retention of the customers and making them loyal that no other rival companies can outgrow. Aside from this, other set of activities that may lead to a sustainable competitive advantage through the help of the customer relationship management approach is the balance between improved and development company processes and renewed objectives. In this regard, the company should ensure that customers should also feel that the industries and businesses they support or patronize give due value and importance, as well as vitality to their customer relationship operations ( 2005). In addition, such context should also consider the important of the change management process as a set of activities that geared towards attaining hard-to-imitate competitive advantage. As mentioned in the given statement above, an industry that employed Customer relationship management as part of their business operations was noted to have sustainable competitive advantage than industries that do not adhere to value their customer relationship. It can be said that customer relationship management is concentrated to the use of information technology which can also be considered as a complex set of activity to aid the company to stay abreast of its client’s needs and concerns and sustain their competitive advantage. The statement of (2006) can also be perceived that customer relationship management also enable the company to appropriately respond in time to the calls of their customers. The statement makes the company realized that customer relationship management is a business approach and process which encompasses various business strategies other than the implementation and application of information technology.  The strategy on the customer relationship management also encompasses all other activities of the business processes in which an organization utilizes so as to identify, select, gather, enhance or improve and retain their target market and ensure good rapport and relationship with them, which is also important to sustain competitive advantage. It can be said that during this time, the customer relationship management is noted as a combination of set of activities business processes, technological solutions and advanced analysis, which makes different industries understand clients from a multifaceted context which in return enable them to have hard-to-imitate competitive advantage. Through the understanding of this statement, companies are able to establish in-depth and more profitable customer relations management approach ( 2004).   Sample Companies that used CRM             To be able to establish hard-to-imitate and sustainable competitive advantage, different companies are able to apply customer relationship management as part of their business strategies.  One of the industries that use customer relationship management is the Irish Life and Permanent, which provides broad range of investment products, life insurance and assurances and pension for different individuals and groups or commercial entities to over a million customers across Ireland.  The company is considered as the market leader in the Ireland market, and because of this their aim is to merge with TSB Bank to be able to become the largest provider of financial services within the nation (2004). In these two separate industries, there are three customer relationship managements which has been utilized which makes it difficult to determine. Both of these industries attempted to use a single customer relationship management approach to be able to present a united post-merger image and give their sales power the information that it needed to sell joint products. To be able to maximize their sales revenues as well as enhance their customer satisfaction, these companies have use, a software platform which enables them to sustain seamless, quality sales as well as quality through multiple lines of business portfolios, product lines, as well as communication channels. With their combined profile, each of the customer’s business data and history from these merged companies can make it easier to determine and in addition the Irish Life and Permanent are also given the chance to identify determine prospects for a more sustained competitive advantage and more advanced business growth.             With the problems of handling large customer data, the use of customer relationship management approach has been able to solve the issue by using the HP server, which is responsible to become the database server. In this regard, a combined single view of customer information and data are being noted In addition, the customer relationship management also enables the company to have an intensive image of the different financial products and services that they offer. It can be said that the use of the customer relationship management approach at Irish Life and Permanent’s Information technology department under a great deal of pressure and stress to be able to urgently get the solution implemented and in production. Nonetheless, after overcoming such customer relationship management initial challenges, the use of the customer relationship management system has been able to make Irish and Life Permanent have the opportunity to  sell its items and products with their TSB clients via the customer information analysis; which also include the automatic generation of recommendations as well as the negotiation of financial models which depends on the client’s distinctive profiles and presentation of such solutions in different eye-catching and attention-catching graphical and text-based styles. In this regard, the customer relationship management system had also enabled Irish Life and Permanent to present personal finance to their respective clients using a highly professional, holistic, and tailored manner. By and large, it can be said that the customer relationship management applied in this company had been able to enhance their competitive advantage and also improved the customer satisfaction and enables the industry to become the best provider of personal financial services in the entire Ireland (2004).             Another company that uses the customer relationship management and to establish competitive advantage is FAW-Volkswagen. The company has been established and founded in 1991 and was regarded for its production of contemporary cars all over China.  In addition, this company is also known to be the sole car manufacturing industry in China which was able to manufacture and distribute a medium and luxury class sedan for their target market. FAW-Volkswagen was also considered to be among different industries which have been able to use the context of customer relationship management approach. The FAW-Volkswagen has decided to utilize and apply a customer relationship management approach because of the major business challenges which include slow reaction times, unresponsive customer service, lack of real-time information, deficiency of the incorporation of data and processes and the perceived shortage of IT personnel in the company (2001).             This car manufacturing company has been able to put their products on sale tall throughout the regional dealers. Nonetheless, FAW-Volkswagen has encountered failure in acquiring the direct customer feedback it needed to make sue that they will be able to attain excellent customer service and quality products and obtain market intelligence all over China.  Within six month-period, the management of the company has been able to decide to use and implement the context of mySAP Customer Relationship Managementto be able to sustain their competitive advantage and to enhance their customer service and acquire more vital data and information about its client base, to know whether their products adhere to their needs.  The car industry perceived that mySAP CRM can help them in reinforcing their good relationship with the clients and customers as well as integrate the entire function of customer service. The main goal of the implementation of the customer relationship management in the company is generally concentrated on three main factors, which include the sales, service, and marketing strategies to have sustained competitive advantage. Through the customer relationship management system, the company’s consumers have been able to access and avail the FAW-Volkswagen through different communication channels such as telephone, fax, e-mail and with their website, they have reached even international clients. The customer relationship management system is tightly integrated, and combined with set of activities of the company to enable the industry to share communication and information with their target market, service representatives and the entire company ( 2001). According to the management of FAW-Volkswagen, the customer relationship management has enabled them to make real-time information on products, and also their dealers and suppliers which also make their company more accessible for the clients.  As a result, the customer relationship management system had been an important strategy in enabling customer service representatives to have the information of their latest product and cars and they are able to attend to customer concerns anytime and anywhere (2000). Customer relationship management system range from the simplest contact-management systems that gives attention on assisting individual salespeople to most complex enterprise-wide and cross-enterprise systems. The main role of Customer relationship management system for the company is to connect the suppliers and the customers. Customer relationship management system also ensures that customers have a consistent experience across multiple sales channels.             An effective implementation of a CRM system meets the needs of the customer, the salesperson and the company by means of utilizing system elements in several, different ways. Such elements and its implementation mirror the success or failure of the marketing design of any organisation as the management-centred functions of CRM system ( 2001). According to  and (2000), CRM is concentrated on the use of information technology so as to aid the organization to stay abreast of its customers’ needs and concerns. Customer Relationship Management also helps the organization to respond in time and appropriately to their customers’ concerns. Another company that uses the concept of customer relationship management system is the Interamerican Group, which is a leading Greek insurance industry. Throughout the years, the industry has been capable of sustaining their competitive position in the life insurance field in Greece. Moreover, the industry is also known to be one of the leaders in property and casualty insurance aspects.. Since 2001, the company has become part of a Dutch Holding industry which is commonly known as Eureko BV, in which approximately owns 98.07% of the insurance company’s share capital in the marketplace ( 2002).             In spite of the progressive growth of the insurance company, competition within the Greek automobile insurance market remains active and strict. For the past ten years, the statistics of the industry have shown alarming results. For instance, a 35% increase on the number of claims has been observed. A 317% increase was observed in the average cost of claims whereas only 226% increase was derived from the average premium (2002).  Though these results were not as bad as in the Anti-American case, still the results alone were enough for the company to be alarmed.         The use of the customer relationship management system in this company had been able to make them achieve their organizational objective based on revenue growth in order to develop competitive market share without leaving profitability behind (2001). The customer relationship management application within this company has also enable the company to identify customer segments and related exceptions leading to having sustained competitive advantage. In addition, the customer relationship management integration also helped Anti-American Group to create underwriting rules through enhanced understanding and comprehension of the pricing policy as well as its implications to the business. According to the management of the company, the use of customer relationship management approach has also allowed them to pave the way for an effective response to the trends in the marketplace, leading them to s sustain competitive advantage but perhaps the most essential thing is that the use of customer relationship management has taught them w how to understand and serve their various rate groups better and efficient and how they can sustain good customer relationship to their target clients ( 2002).   Conclusion             Based on the analysis and the given samples of companies that used customer relationship management, it can be said that the statement being analyzed is through and correct since the use of customer relationship management enables different companies to use all their resources to gain complex set of activities that would enable them to have sustainable and hard-to-imitate competitive advantage.             Hence, it can be argued that, if a an organisation would want to implement CRM as part of their systems or strategies, the management of such company must be able to make a comprehensive and intensive planning and an efficient execution to achieve their organizational objective.     Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

Customer Relationship Management

Statement Analysis: Customer Relationship Management Introduction Along with the changing business environment, custome...