School for Business and Society Module Code: MAN00018H Module Title: Decision and Information
Ha Open/Closed Assessment: Open Maximum Word Count: 2,500 words Release Date: End of Week 4 Submission Deadline: 11:00:00am UK Time on 30th January 2025 Weighting: 80% Important information A penalty of five marks will be deducted for late submissions that are made within the first hour after the deadline. Submissions that are more than one hour late but within the first 24 hours of the deadline will incur a penalty of ten marks. After the first 24 hours have passed, ten marks will be deducted for every 24 hours (or part thereof) that the submission is late for a total of 5 days. After 5 days it is treated as a non-submission and given a mark of zero. The consequences of non-submission are serious and can include de-registration from the University. If you are unable to complete your open assessment by the submission date indicated above because of Exceptional Circumstances you can apply for an extension. If unforeseeable and exceptional circumstances do occur, you must seek support and provide evidence as soon as possible at the time of the occurrence. Applications must be made before the deadline to be considered. Full details of the Exceptional Circumstances Policy and claim form can be found here: https://www.york.ac.uk/students/studying/progress/exceptional-circumstances Page 1 of 8 If you submit your open assessment on time but feel that your performance has been affected by Exceptional Circumstances you may submit an Exceptional Circumstances Affecting Assessment claim form by 7 days from the published assessment submission deadline. If you do not submit by the deadline indicated without good reason your claim will not be considered. Please take proper precautions to safeguard your work and remember to make backup copies of your data. The University provides all its students with storage space on the University server and you should save and back up any work in progress on this server on a regular basis. Computer failure and theft of your equipment or storage media are not considered exceptional circumstances and extensions cannot be granted for work lost for these reasons Word count requirements The word count for this assignment is 2,500 words. You must state on the front of your assignment the number of words used and this will be checked. The main text for this assignment must be word-processed in Arial, font 12, double spacing, minimum 2 cm margins all around. You must observe the word count specified in this assignment brief. The School has a policy of accepting variations to the recommended word count of plus or minus 5%. What does this mean for you? Markers will mark your work up to the word count maximum plus 5% and then will stop marking; therefore all words which are in excess of the word count plus 5% will not be marked. Where your word count is more than 5% below that specified, it is likely that this will result in a lack of analytical depth or relevant content, which will be reflected in the mark assigned. What is in the word count? The word count includes: - the main text, including in-text reference citations and quotations. The word count does not include: -
Appendices. These may be used to include supporting data, which may be too detailed or complex to include as a Table. They are not a device to Page 2 of 8 incorporate material, which would otherwise cause you to exceed the word limit. -
Title page -
Contents page -
Abstract/executive summary -
Tables, figures, legends -
Reference lists -
Acknowledgements Page 3 of 8 Assignment: Case Background A manufacturing company has the following areas of concern and has hired you as a Consultant to analyse them and write a technical report in order to help the manager make informed decisions. Area 1: Decision trees This company is considering expansion of its current capacity, the options are to build a small, a medium or a large plant. Of course, there is also the option of doing nothing. The new plant would introduce a new product and potential marketability of that product is relatively unknown, forecasts say it is 70% likely that the market will be unfavourable. If a large plant is built and a favourable market exists, a profit of ￡80,000 would be realised. However, an unfavourable market for this plant would yield a ￡30,000 loss. If a medium plant was built it would generate ￡40,000 profit within a favourable market, but a loss of ￡10,000 would result from unfavourable market. A small plant, on the other hand, would return ￡20,000 with favourable market conditions and lose ￡5,000 in an unfavourable market. There is an option to get hold on an updated forecast that could provide some key information for the decision. The manager knows, from previous experience, that the reliability of the updated forecast in relation to the original forecast, is as follows. Original forecast Updated forecast Favourable Unfavourable Favourable 0.50 0.50 Unfavourable 0.40 0.60 Area 2: Data mining Last month, the marketing department sent a mailing to 15,000 of the company’s existing customers with a special offer. The response was exciting: 5% of them responded, which brought in ￡15,000 in revenue. The manager is now considering continuing the program, with a budget of ￡10,000, which will allow the marketing department to target another 10,000 customers (out of your customer base of 50,000). The manager does not want to just target them randomly, as previously done. So, the idea is to classify the customers into two categories of responsive and non-responsive to this offer, and only target those from the responsive category. The manager has asked you to build two data mining models for the classification purpose, i.e., a tree model and a K-nearest Neighbours model. Therefore, you need to evaluate them before deciding which model is preferable. Page 4 of 8 Area 3: Linear Programming There are four different types of products made at the company: Sweet, Salty, Sour and Plain. In order to meet demand, the company needs to make at least 950 Kg. of Sweet, between 450 and 550 Kg. of Salty, no more than 300 Kg of Sour and no more than 400 Kg. of Plain. Each Kg. of the products contains 65%, 45%, 15%, 100% of Ingredient 1 with the remaining weight made of Ingredient 2. The company has 1000 Kg. of ingredient 1 and 800 Kg. of ingredient 2 for use next week. Each machine has 56 hours of time available next week. The following table shows the time required for each product on each machine: Machine Minutes required per Kg. Sweet Salty Sour Plain A 1 0.8 0.6 0.9 B 2 1.5 1 1.75 C 1 0.7 0.2 0 D 2.5 1.6 1.25 1 The financial manager has presented the following: Sweet Salty Sour Plain Total Sales Revenue 5000 2000 1000 1500 9500 Variable Costs Page 5 of 8 Direct materials 1200 550 150 300 2200 Direct labour 1000 440 100 120 1660 Manufacturing overhead 350 120 35 100 605 Selling and Administrative 550 200 60 150 960 Allocated fixed costs Manufacturing overhead 700 350 100 140 12** Selling and Administrative 600 280 85 120 1085 Net Profit 600 60 **0 570 1700 Units sold 2500 1400 800 1000 5700 Net Profit per Unit 0.24 0.04 0.59 0.57 0.30 Prior to conducting any analyses, you meet with the manager at the company to verify what are the aims and objectives of the project-report that you need to produce. Meeting with the manager The manager tells you that the report should be concerned with three equally important areas: Area 1: Decision trees. The manager wants you to provide a structured approach and a graphical representation to explain the expansion problem, Page 6 of 8 first with the original forecast to calculate the expected monetary values for each option, and to provide recommendations based on your analysis. Second, the manager wants you to consider the updated forecast information and to help them decide what is the value of the imperfect information. Finally, to recommend a course of action. Area 2: Data mining. The manager wants you to present and describe the confusion matrix and explain how you will fill it out for one of the models. Then, present and describe the cost/benefit matrix for this case. Also, justify why these matrices are important for evaluating data mining models. Next, show the evaluation function you will use to compare the models. Finally, discuss how the confusion and cost/benefit matrices come into play in this evaluation function. Area 3: Linear Programming. The manager wants you to conduct a thorough Linear Programming analysis including sensitivity analysis using a spreadsheet modelling software such as MS Excel Solver. The manager wants to know in particular: (a) What is the optimal production of each type of product they should make in order to increase net profit per unit and (b) Explain the meaning of the shadow price results for two results in the sensitivity report. Report Presentation The manager wants you to write a report to support your analyses and findings. Your report to the manager should be structured to include the following points: 1. Brief introduction. This should detail the purpose and structure of the report. 2. Research Strategy. This section should include but not be limited to, the following for each area of the project: a. plan, outline and justification of the modelling method used b. implementation issues (e.g. modelling assumptions) 3. Data analysis. This section should include but not be limited to, the following discussions for each area: a. relevant graphical and/or tabular output b. description of concerns raised with the data and the models used c. description of how you determined the types of model(s) to use 4. Discussion of the results. This section should include but not be limited to, the following for each area: a. summary presentations of the findings from your analyses b. the benefits/downsides of using your selected models for this case study c. any insights or suggestions based on your findings Page 7 of 8 5. References: provide some evidence of reading, all referencing must be in Harvard format (look beyond the module notes) 6. Appendices (only required if necessary). Summarise your work, using selected MS Excel output, in a word-processed report with all appropriate results and analyses. Note: you should only include important output such as charts, graphs and tabular data that support or enhance your report. You should not include all output generated; you must be selective. Summarising output in your own tabular format is acceptable. Your report should be no more than 2500 words; this limit excludes tables, figures, captions, table of contents, references and appendices. Beyond this, if you are not sure then assume it is included in the word limit. Your report should be written using size 12 Arial font, justified and use double line spacing (this lends itself to easier reading). Divide your report into sections with clear headings (use the format described in points 1-6), summarise key points up front. You should provide a clear report title. Pay attention to the professional appearance and use of language. Do not use ‘clip art’ or fancy fonts and page borders. Figures and tables should be legible, correctly titled and include a caption. Avoid the use of footnotes and tabloid style presentation. Show correct use of grammar with no spelling errors. Use appendices only if necessary and choose to use them for their relevance and not as a continuation of the debate (or they will be included as part of the word count). The style of the report should be appropriate to a management report and NOT like an essay.
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