FUNDAMENTALS OF MANAGEMENT

FINAL RESEARCH REPORT

Instructor: Beenish Arshad

Weightage:15%-20%
Due Date: In last week of semester. Date to be announced
Purpose: This assignment will provide students an opportunity to examine the impact of effective management
on the overall success of an organization. You will need to obtain information through primary data collection
such as interviewing managers at your selected organizations as well as utilize resources available through the
library and other sources (including the internet) to obtain information.
You will be required to examine an organization from a variety of points of view with a focus on its leadership,
management style, ethics commitment, strategies and strategy execution. In your paper you should discuss
and identify as many Fundaments of Management concepts as possible. A minimum of 4 concepts is required.
Conclusions should be drawn regarding the effectiveness of the use of the broad range of management tools
and their impact on the success of the company. In class you will present the summation of your report as well
as your specific, critically thought out conclusions.

Introduction: It has been a belief for many years that the long term success of an organization is based
largely on the quality of its management. Much has been written about the “Search for Excellence,” “The
Quest for Quality,” “The Sustainable Competitive Advantage.” All this research and all of the studies of the
“100 Best Companies,” have eventually focused on the importance of the quality of management. Nothing
seems to have a greater impact on the financial returns, shareholder value or employee satisfaction than the
quality of the organization’s management. Your challenge is to select a company you can examine from the
variety of perspectives covered in this course. Most specifically, these include POLC, Planning, Organizing,
Leading, and Controlling. You will examine the company you select utilizing a variety of research sources:
business publications, the company’s own external and internal communications, the mass media, interviews
of managers etc .From your research, you will be able to answer the following questions. Your paper, which
should be 10 - 15 pages in length, should follow standard format for citations and presentation utilizing the APA
guidelines.
Directions: Select any company, a local or international company with presence in Pakistan. Research the top
management of the organization, and detail the strategies that they advocated to help grow the company.
Examine the critical issues that the organization faced, and detail the strategies employed to mitigate them. All
top managers are not successful. If the company you choose employed strategies that failed, detail the failure
and add analysis as to why it failed and what may have been done to foster success.
Items that should be discussed with your selected company include:

o Mission and Vision

o Values and Ethics
o Organization structure and culture
o Leadership style and motivational style
o Overall measurements of success for this company

The following questions should be addressed:

A. Who is/are the Top Leader(s) of the company, and under what circumstances did they become leader?
B. What issues did they face?
C. What are the major strengths of the company?
D. In what ways did Planning, Organizing, Leading & Controlling contribute to the company’s success (or
failure)?
E. What was the most important thing leading to that success (or failure)?
 F. What do you see as major challenges facing this company in the next five years?
G. What are your conclusions about the management based on your research?

The report should have the following structure:

i. Introduction to the company (Company profile, vision, mission, core values)

ii. Management
a. Planning
Questions and Answers & Evaluation
b. Organizing
Questions and Answers & Evaluation
c. Leading
Questions and Answers & Evaluation
d. Controlling
Questions and Answers & Evaluation
iii. Conclusion
iv. Bibliography
v. Appendices
a. Meeting minutes
b. Contribution to assignment
c. Plagiarism report

Requirements:

 The report should be minimum of 10-15 typed pages, using one and a half spaced, 12 point Times New
Roman font. Diagrams and charts are encouraged (ex. Org charts, financials, stock performance, etc.)
but will not be counted towards the page count of the paper.
 There will be 5 team members researching each company. This is a hybrid team/individual
project. Each student should work independently to contribute to the final project. Each team member
should document his/her contributions to the paper. Grades will be determined by individual effort as
well as team effort.
 A discussion of the use of a minimum of 4 Fundamentals of Management Concepts is required. The
more concepts used in the report the better.
 You should use and document at least five sources. You are encouraged to use as many sources as
possible. All sources must be appropriately identified in your paper. You must follow APA rules for
documentation of sources and bibliography.
 Teams will be presenting a 10-15 minute oral review of your report focusing on a summary of the
company, its management success (or failure) and your individual, well thought out conclusions.

Submission: Project Report must be submitted in two ways:

1. Submit written assessment in hard-copy typed and printed directly to the instructor on its due date.
2. Submit as an attachment on Google Classroom on or before deadline

Name the attached file as follows: the course name (FOM), Report, your group number. For
instance your group number is 1, and then your assessment file should be named “FOM Report
Group 1.doc”

Students are advised to submit their work on or prior to the due date. Work submitted after the deadline will
get 25% deducted of the available points. Further 10% will be deducted for each day after the initial 25%
deductions. Extension of due date will not be allowed.