Theoretical background

Final report – Checklist

Title page

• Choose an interesting and catchy title for your report.
• The name of your industry partner should be part of the title or subtitle.
• Indicate the nature of problem you investigated.
• If you do not wish to disclose the name of your industry partner, you can just write ‘company X’.

Executive summary

• Keep it short and simple (ideally not more than 2 pages – well formatted)
• Summarise the background of the research
• Summarise the research approach
• Summarise the findings (dot points is fine, but write full sentences)
• Summarise the implications/recommendations (dot points is fine, but write full sentences)

Table of contents

Introduction and research problem (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Introduction to topic
• Overview of the industry partner
• What real problem does your research seek to resolve?
• Why is this problem such a big issue for your industry partner? Why is it important that you research it? Convince us that your project is important and that it will help your industry partner
• State the overall research aim based on this problem
• Outline the structure of the report (for the audience/reader)

Theoretical background – Literature review (around 25-30% of your total word count)

• Clearly identify the factors investigated in the project
• Discuss what others have found in this research space and individual factors
• Link your literature review back to your problem space and use this as a foundation to formulate your research questions.

Methodology (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Only provide an overview of YOUR research design
• Inform and justify the nature of your research approach (qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods)
• Describe and justify your sample (who, how did you find them, sampling method and technique used)
• Describe how data was collected (in-person/online/..) and which research tools (e.g. interviews, surveys, etc.) were used
• Inform how data was analysed (e.g. themes analysis, frequency distribution, mean-score, etc.)
• Explain how the research plan addressed all ethical concerns

Findings (around 10-15% of your total word count)

• Present sample characteristics (e.g. age, gender, income…)
• Clearly differentiate between quantitative and qualitative findings
• Use figures, graphs, tables to visualise findings. Add numbers and titles for all visuals. Be creative in presenting the findings!

Discussion (around 20-25% of your total word count)

• If you are using a mixed method, triangulate quantitative and qualitative findings
• Compare findings with the literature reviewed earlier
• Clearly state the answers to research questions you found from the findings presented above

Recommendations (around 10-15% of your total word count)

• Clearly list and discuss the recommendations specific to the research problem
• Make sure all recommendations are based on findings of your research project
• Can also include any suggestions you have for the industry partner in regards to implementing your recommendations

Limitations and Conclusion (around 5-10% of your total word count)

• Inform the readers and management of any limitations that they should be aware of if they are to implement your recommendations
• Provide a brief summary of the project including major findings, recommendations and potential outcomes if recommendations are implemented by the management

Footnotes (as required – avoid if at all possible)

List of References

Appendix (as required)