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Conjoint Analysis Assignment (Consumer Behavior)

Purpose of Assignment

  • Understand how to extract attribute weights from attitude ratings using conjoint analysis.
  • Get hands-on experience with conducting regressions and understanding regression output.

Submission Instructions

Completion Instructions

Choose a Product Category, Attributes, and Attribute Levels

Choose a category that you think is fun so you can enjoy the process (e.g., potential dates, vacation destinations, movies, etc.).

Choose three attributes of that product category which you are interested in examining, and come up with two levels for each attribute. If you choose a product that has a monetary cost, include price as one of your product categories so you can see price sensitivity and tradeoffs between attributes will be easier to understand.

Create Stimuli, Gather Data, Analyze Data

Follow the steps listed in the lecture to create your matrix of products.

Then, turn that into a table that you send to two consumers to gather their ratings for each product. Make sure you present the products in random order in the table. [Note: If you were doing this in industry, you will get more accurate results if you present each product one at a time rather than all at once in a table. And, you would provide the actual products rather than descriptions of them.]

Follow the steps listed in the lecture to analyze the data using the regression function in Excel for each consumer separately.

Assemble Output to Turn In

You will turn in (1) an Excel file and (2) a Word Doc. Follow format of templates and submission instructions listed above.

Project Management Case Study

Instructions

For the case study, you and your team are to select a topic from the case study list, or you may propose one of your own choosing.  The topic for your case study should be a project that experienced significant project management challenges.  You are asked to identify those challenges and present them to the class, along with proposed methods of meeting those challenges.

Your team is to research the case and develop a narrated Powerpoint presentation to present the case to your classmates.  The length of the case study presentation should be in the range of 10-20 slides.  You should use graphics, pictures, and an easy-to-read sans serif font.  Please do not use animation (moving bullets, little men running around, etc.)  You are asked to write a short paper (3-5 pages, or more) summarizing the case and including a Works Cited page.

The focus of the case study is the management of the project.  You should include a time line.  How was the project generated, funded, managed, and performed?  Do you have recommendations for improvement? You should include financial information to the extent it is available:  budget, actual, reasons for variance.  You should attempt to determine if the project was successful.  You may wish to include a SWOT analysis.

SWOT analysis is used by management consultants to identify an organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.  A project can be broken down the same way.  For more information on SWOT analysis, you can check the description on Wikipedia, which presents an accurate picture.  SWOT analysis is not required, but some teams find it a useful way to organize some of the information.

Your case study will be graded on how well the case is presented, the analysis of project management issues, and the quality of the recommendations your team offers.  You should make a reasoned statement about project success or failure.

The case study presentation and supporting paper should be submitted in electronic format via upload to Canvas by midnight of the Sunday at the end of Week 8.   In an online asynchronous section of this class, the Powerpoint should be narrated, and the Presentation should be compressed before upload.

 

Internal Audit Exam Questions

2)  Internal auditing is going to be performing an assurance engagement dealing with controls over production and inventory. Some of the items to be covered in the engagement include:

  • Determine if there is an issue with excess, obsolete or unsaleable inventory
  • Determine if there are inventory shortfalls vs. what is shown in the general ledger
  • Determine if inventory write-offs have appropriate approval and support
  • Determine if there are material issues with the quality of the company’s finished products.

For each item, select the two best tests in the reading Audit Tests: Types, Advantages & Disadvantages which in your judgment are the most appropriate to gather the required evidence.  Briefly explain why you selected each test.   Briefly describe what evidence you are trying to obtain from each test.  For your response, you can create a chart. 

3)  The Foundation for Critical Thinking states that all subjects have a fundamental thought process.  In order to understand the thought process, they recommend raising some questions.  Please respond in your own words to the four questions below using what you have learned in this course.

  1. a) What viewpoint is fostered in this field (i.e., how do internal auditors tend to view the world)?
  1. b) What kinds of problems do they try to solve?
  2. c) How do they go about gathering information?
  3. d) What types of judgments and assumptions do internal auditors make?

4)  Explain whether you agree or disagree with the following statement:

For every control selected for testing, the internal auditor requires the same quality (relevance and reliability) and quantity (sufficiency) of audit evidence.

A yes or no answer is not sufficient.  I need to know why.  Please provide an example in your response. 

5) a)   When and in what ways do audit engagement communications occur?

  1. b) What actions regarding audit engagement observations must the internal audit function take after the final engagement communication is disseminated?

6) Describe four barriers to implementing data analysis tools in internal auditing.  I want your thoughts.