Strategic Guide Management Essay Research Coursework

Please read the assignment instructions and pay special attention to the description of the secondary analysis. Complete step 6 and step 7: write a 3-page essay (summary), and write one-page key takeaways (from interviews and secondary analysis) according to the format in the assignment instructions.
Please include a work cited page for the secondary analysis. OR Please provide links to the secondary analysis so that I can work cited them.
Interview scripts and the assignment instructions are attached.

MGG 303 – STATEGIC GUIDE FINAL PROJECT

PROFESSIONAL INTERVIEW INDIVIDUAL/GROUP ASSIGNMENT

INSTRUCTIONS

This project is designed to give you experience interacting with professionals, delving into their leadership experiences, and working with inductive research methods, including latent content analysis (thematic coding). This process will build on the learning you receive on the science of leadership and interpersonal performance, and also helps reinforce the importance of these skills in real-world contexts. 

You will interview three real-world professionals about their experience with feedback and performance appraisal. These will be simple interviews that you will document in detail. You will then code your data through a process we refer to as latent content analysis. Through this process, you will develop a system for describing the types of answers your participants provided. Ultimately, you will present these findings to the class near the end of the semester.

This project has several different parts, with different due dates. They are as follows:

• Professional Interviews:

You will identify and interview three professionals who work in careers that stem from the degree you currently pursue regarding their experiences in their respective careers. This assignment is designed to have you explore avenues you might pursue with your degree, as well as get advice from seasoned professionals about how you might prepare for such a career. These professionals may be from the same or different career paths (e.g., advertising, marketing, public relations, management, human relations, corporate sales, organizational consulting, entrepreneurship, etc.). After identifying careers of interest to you, you will then identify and approach individuals currently employed in those fields, asking if they would be willing to speak with you about their experiences and career.

• Importantly, I will discuss how to conduct an interview, taking care of how to think critically about the information provided, determine when more should be pulled from the subject, using guiding questions where necessary. You will take notes, distill main ideas, and quote key narratives if necessary.  

• Lastly, you will summarize in a series of the essential findings what you learned from your primary data collection (the interviews). First, you will summarize the key take away points from the interviews. You may consider this something akin to a Top 10 list (you should have at least 9-10). 

• You will then submit the interviews altogether, the list of sites/sources used in your secondary analysis, along with the key take away points from the interviews and the secondary analysis. 

Secondary Analysis:

You will also research current businesses and identify what skills they require recent hires to possess. Your results will serve as the basis for a Strategic Guide to Success you will create for students in the School of Management or students interested in the SOM program. In short, you are learning from professionals firsthand how best to prepare yourself for the workforce following your degree.

STEPS TO COMPLETION

Step 1: Identify career paths of special interest to you. This can be done through the Career Center, speaking with your professors, your personal network.

Step 2: After you have identified fields of interest, you then must identify professionals who work in these fields. This can be done via professional contacts (e.g., through your department, professors, etc.), through your personal network (e.g., friend of the family or a relative who know people who work in an areas of interest to you), UB Career Connector (alumni connection), or personal outreach (i.e., you identify organizations that house such individuals and you reach out to them, including cold-calling).  Be nice and ask politely. Most people and even companies will say yes. SEE NEXT SECTION FOR INTRODUCTION AND INTERVIEW QUESTIONS.

Step 3: Set up an opportunity to speak with each individual in real-time. Face to face interviews are preferred. However, if this is not possible a phone or Skype interviews is acceptable. We’ll discuss in class about how to use probing and follow-up questions to ensure you’re getting useful answers.

Step 4: When people are providing answers to your questions, your job is to write out their answers in as detailed account as possible. You may even wish to record your conversation and listen to it later to ensure that you’re getting every bit of the conversation correct. Be sure that you are taking notes and telling the stories EXACTLY as the person says it.

Step 6:  You will then create a document on key findings. These present the thematic and core takeaway messages from your two data sets. Starting with the interviews, you will look for examples from the interviews that underscore skills, experiences, and knowledge these employers think you should acquire before entering their field. This is called “latent content analysis,” or thematic coding of your data. You’ll likely hear several similar accounts given across the interviews. When you see similar examples/stories, you group them together and decide what to call their grouping. This will leave you with a list of “types” or “categories” of strategies that are important to perform or avoid. Since you’ll also have the stories coupled with these titles, you have examples of these categories to further explain your point. After you have developed your thematic coding and Master List of strategies from this list, you will do the same with your secondary analysis. You will have a total of 12 key takeaways. 

Step 7: You will create a "Strategic Guide" (a how to manual) for how to undertake your program to hit the job market in the best possible shape.

Step 8: Turn in the following two things before giving your presentation:

(1) The Strategy Guide, which will include your Report, Master List of Key Takeaways, and Three Individual Interviews.

INTRODUCTIONS AND QUESTIONS

Dear (Fill in name here),

I am currently an undergraduate student attending the University at Buffalo. In one of my courses, we’re asking people to share their experiences and perspectives on how best to prepare for entering their field of work. I, personally, am interested in (insert the field/career of the person you’re interviewing). I only have a few questions for you, but I’m genuinely interested in what you have to say. Afterward, I will discuss your feedback with my classmates, taking from them what we can do to best prepare for our future careers. I appreciate your time and consideration. I hope to hear from you soon. Thank you.

Sincerely,

(Your name)

Questions:

1. Why did you choose this field of study? What interests you about this field?

1. What core skill sets, knowledge, or experiences do you feel will best prepare a current college student interested in pursuing work in your field?

1. If you were in a position to design a college program from the ground up specifically to prepare students to enter your field, what would you ensure was included (specific training, course content, experiences, etc.)?

1. Are there specific experiences, training, content you wish you received in college that you think could have helped further your career?

1. What problems, frustrations, or concerns do you see with recent college graduates entering your field these days?

1. What is your highest academic qualification? Do you think a bachelor's degree in this field is sufficient?

1. Are there any other issues or suggestions you might have for someone interested in this career path?

FORMAT AND SEQUENCE OF STRATEGIC GUIDE

Essay - Summary

Explain how you intend to use the information you learned from the three interviews and secondary analysis throughout the rest of your time here at UB. How will this information help you to prepare for the job market? Be specific when explaining how you will go abou implementing what you learned.

Key Takeaways (From Interviews and Secondary Analysis)

List the key takeways here (12 total), also explain what each means.

1. Communication – an exchange of information.
2. Networking -  exchange of information and ideas among people with a common profession or special interest.

APPENDIX A

The Transcripts

Information to be included in Transcript (i.e., put this at the top of the page):

1. Person’s name
2. Occupation
3. Contact information (phone or e-mail, so we can confirm their participation if needed)
4. College
5. Major

 College: UB

Major: Communication

1. 1.     What core skill sets, knowledge, or experiences do you feel will best prepare a current college student interested in pursuing work in your field?

• First and foremost, the ability to write to pictures in true TV style. Many times we came across new recruits who delved into a topic without considering what visual material was available, and they used long, complex sentences in their writings. That may be fine with the print media but certainly not with TV.
• Secondly, a good grasp of hot issues in different parts of the world will definitely be a big plus for those aspiring to excel in the industry. Globalization has made the world a smaller place and the world economy more integrated. What appears to be a local news story could often have a global perspective. One example of that is last month’s disastrous building collapse in Bangladesh and the link to international brand name garment retailers.
• Thirdly, keeping up with technological advances is also necessary, especially in mobile networking. For reasons, it is becoming cost increasingly frequent for news crews working at a distant location to use the Internet to send their works back to the station.
• Fourth, they need good interpersonal skills.
  • PROBE: What do you mean when you say interpersonal skills? What exactly are you referencing?
  • They need to be able to talk to people. To carry a conversation. To be polite. To lead a work team. Handle conflict.

1. 2.     Are there specific experiences, training, content you wish you received in college that you think could have helped further your career?

• I didn’t do an internship in college, which was a mistake. If I were to do it over again, I’d definitely do that. I didn’t study abroad, either, which would have been a good thing for me. It would have helped me mature a bit more, see the world. It’s one of my regrets about college.  

1. 3.     What problems, frustrations, or concerns do you see with recent college graduates entering your field these days?

• They should be better read. Read continually, soaking up as much information and making as much connections as possible. They aren’t doing that enough.
• A lot of current affair issues to keep up with. They need to be updated.
  • PROBE: What do you mean by be better read?
  • They need to keep up with current events, not just their Facebook friends.
  • PROBE: What do you mean about making as much connections as possible?
  • I mean understanding the world around them, how it’s all connected. How does something in India affect something in Russia, which then affects us in the US.

1. 4.     If you were in a position to design a college program from the ground up specifically to prepare students to enter your field, what would you ensure was included (specific training, course content, experiences, etc.)?

• College graduates in America are often comparatively weak in terms of their general knowledge about the world and their understanding of Asia in particular. But Asia, especially China, is a rising power on the world stage.
• A recent Reuters report cited U.S. intelligence analysts as saying that by 2030, Asia is likely to overtake North America and Europe combined in global power based on GDP, military spending and technological investment. And China, now the world’s second largest economy, will probably surpass the United States a few years before 2030.
• Aspiring journalists in America need to have a deeper understanding of what is going on in Asia.
• The inclusion of courses about contemporary China and Asia and world economics in the core program plus student exchange schemes with Asian universities may help serve this purpose.

1. 5.     What role do effective writing skills play in this field?

• They are essential. If you can’t write well, you won’t be allowed to interact with clients or the public. People judge your intelligence by your writing. Poor writing means you won’t likely advance up the corporate ladder, if you even get hired in the first place.