The Internal Assessment c/o 2024
The IA is a research project in which students apply appropriate business management tools and theories to a real organizational issue or problem using a conceptual lens. It is common for both HL and SL. The students will be required to:
*Do not use SWOT, PEST, or Force Field Analysis as business management tools in your IA.
- select a real business issue or problem for their business research project that relates to any part of the syllabus
- refer directly to a single business organization but may consider industry-wide issues that impact on that organization
- provide a research question for the business research project that could either be forward looking or backward looking
- base their research on primary and/or secondary research, selected for its suitability, depth and breadth
- use only one of the four key concepts (change, creativity, ethics or sustainability) as a lens through which to analyze the IA
- attach to the business research project three to five supporting documents from which the majority of the information for the project has been obtained
- produce a business research project that does not exceed 1,800 words
- fully reference all supporting documents and additional sources and include them in a bibliography.
*Do not use SWOT, PEST, or Force Field Analysis as business management tools in your IA.
Link to more information re: the Internal Assessment
Important Dates for YEAR 2 class of 2024:
- August 31, 2023: Internal Assessment research proposal DUE
- September 30, 2023: SL/HL Internal Assessment rough draft DUE
- November 30, 2023: SL/HL Internal Assessment FINAL version DUE
The business management internal assessment (IA) is the same for SL and HL students, and groups should be prepared in a similar fashion. The IA task is for students to produce a business research project of 1,800 words or less on one organization (but may include industry-wide issues that impact upon the organization) based upon three to five supporting documents. In addition, students should integrate one of the four key concepts of the course (change, creativity, ethics or sustainability) into the project.
Step 1: Determining a timeline
When setting a timeline for the project, teachers need to consider the following two issues.
Step 2: Reading the IA sections of the guide
The teacher should issue and read the IA guidelines and the assessment criteria found in the guide together with the students and answer any questions they may have as an essential step. It is important to highlight key areas where students tend to make mistakes that cost them marks. For example, students sometimes fail to attach supporting documents, include more than five supporting documents or fail to meet the presentation standards.
At some point, students will search for sources online. Many students may only know how to type a topic into a search engine and may not know how to do refined searches. Other students may not know what databases their school’s library has access to. Students need to learn these aspects of research and the teacher should teach them how to do refined searches and access databases.
Step 3: Selecting a research topic
As with any research project, an important step is the determination of a good research question and identification of appropriate resources to answer it. The Business management guide indicates that students and teachers should work together to formulate an issue or problem for investigation and that the teacher should “guide students in the selection of appropriate supporting documents” (for further information, refer to the Business management guide section “Role of teacher's guidance”).
Teachers should consider several relevant issues.
Step 4: Framing the research project with a key concept
A central part of the assessment focuses on how effectively the student integrates one of the four key concepts of the course into the project, an essential aspect of concept-based teaching and learning in the IB. When students have the “big idea,” seen through the conceptual approach, they often have better retention of the content. The “big ideas” end up providing a framework for storing information. In the last several decades, advocates of concept-based teaching and learning have stressed that teachers, all with good intentions, tend to jump into the specifics of teaching curriculum content but have not always stepped back to consider certain big ideas like change, creativity, ethics and sustainability. Each of these key concepts can be reduced to content, which is not what the IA asks of the students. Rather, in the IA, students should pick one key concept and reflect on how their project can shed light on the big ideas embedded in that key concept.
Consider an example from the guide. An example of an appropriate research question is “Should company Y change its manufacturing to outsourcing?” The guide then suggests using “change as a conceptual lens”. refer to Business management guide section “Internal assessment details—SL and HL”>“Examples of appropriate questions”). The answer to the research question would probably be based upon some type of make-or-buy financial analysis, with some appropriate consideration of operations management and human resource management.
A student could then consider, if outsourcing appears to be the better option: what are examples of how outsourcing could cause other changes at company Y? If a make-or-buy analysis revealed that the company should continue to make rather than outsource, the student should then ask the question about changes without outsourcing: what changes does company Y need to make to ensure that continued in-house manufacturing remains viable in the short- and medium-term?
In the example, the research question is answered by using a standard business tool; make-or-buy. The key concept of change is explored as the student considers the implications of change in one central area of the business.
Step 5: Writing an initial proposal
The students should then submit a brief initial proposal for the IA. An initial proposal is not a formal requirement of the business management course. However, asking students write an initial proposal is helpful because they are, in effect, stating their understanding of what is mentioned in steps 3 and 4. If, at this point, the students’ understanding differs from the teacher’s, the teacher and student can discuss the proposal to resolve any differences.
Step 6: Refining the list of supporting documents
At this point, students should have a research question; provisionally know what business management tools and theories they are going to use; know the key concept that they will be reflecting on; and have a preliminary idea of what they will use for supporting documents. The next step is to refine the supporting documents. Ideally, students should find more than five documents that could potentially be used as supporting documents, but then cut the list down to five. The other documents can be used as sources for the research project, though they should not be included with the supporting documents when the IA is submitted.
How do students select which five supporting documents to use?
Any documents that are not part of the five supporting documents can be used as a source for the project. When this is the case, students should reference these sources, for example, articles or government reports within the research project and include the source in the bibliography. Any sources of this kind that are not the three to five supporting documents should not be submitted with the research project. Having more than five supporting documents automatically means that the maximum mark awarded under criterion B is 1.
Step 7: Researching their research projects and writing drafts
The teacher’s role is important here. According to the guide, the teacher and students should “engage in dialogue supportive of the students’ work” (for further information, refer to the Business management guide section “Role of teacher's guidance”). This is important for the following three reasons.
Step 8: Reviewing each student’s first draft
Teachers should always emphasize to their students that the first draft should be as high quality as the student can produce on their own. The better the first draft, the more precise and helpful the teacher’s comments on the draft will be.
In commenting on the draft, teachers must bear in mind that the IA is the student’s work. In making comments, teachers may provide suggestions while giving feedback but may not rewrite the work for the student.
Ideas for how to integrate the key concepts are an area where teacher support will be especially crucial. Teachers should then return the drafts to the students with comments—students should then revise their projects, reflecting on the teacher’s feedback.
Step 9: Reviewing assessment criteria with a penultimate draft in hand
On a specified day at least two weeks before the IA is due, all students should bring a penultimate draft of their research project to the class along with their copy of the IA requirements and assessment criteria. The teacher should then go over the requirements again, point by point, and ask students to record where they may need to make changes to the research project.
The teacher should then ask each student to mark their own research project. Teachers should encourage the students to be “strict markers”. Upon completion of the activity, teachers should ask students to ask themselves: in every place where I did not get the highest mark possible, what could I do to earn one more mark on that criterion?
Teachers may develop a checklist and ask the students to complete them, which could highlight omissions or draw attention to key elements that should be considered before submission.
Step 10: Making final revisions based on activity in step 9 and submitting the research project.
Students should then make their final revisions and submit their research projects to their teacher by the school’s internal deadline for the IA.
The teachers then mark the final submitted versions.
Step 1: Determining a timeline
When setting a timeline for the project, teachers need to consider the following two issues.
- Students need to have acquired sufficient knowledge of the contents of the course to make informed choices about what organization to research, and what business theories and tools to use.
- Students need to begin the IA process early enough in the course to have time to complete the project by the school’s internal deadline.
Step 2: Reading the IA sections of the guide
The teacher should issue and read the IA guidelines and the assessment criteria found in the guide together with the students and answer any questions they may have as an essential step. It is important to highlight key areas where students tend to make mistakes that cost them marks. For example, students sometimes fail to attach supporting documents, include more than five supporting documents or fail to meet the presentation standards.
At some point, students will search for sources online. Many students may only know how to type a topic into a search engine and may not know how to do refined searches. Other students may not know what databases their school’s library has access to. Students need to learn these aspects of research and the teacher should teach them how to do refined searches and access databases.
Step 3: Selecting a research topic
As with any research project, an important step is the determination of a good research question and identification of appropriate resources to answer it. The Business management guide indicates that students and teachers should work together to formulate an issue or problem for investigation and that the teacher should “guide students in the selection of appropriate supporting documents” (for further information, refer to the Business management guide section “Role of teacher's guidance”).
Teachers should consider several relevant issues.
- In general, the narrower the research question is, the more likely it is that the student can answer the question thoroughly and in an in-depth fashion. However, the narrower the research question is, the harder it is to find three to five relevant supporting documents. Thus, the formulation of the research question and finding appropriate supporting documents are an iterative process that may take several attempts.
- Supporting documents can either be primary sources and/or secondary sources. In general, though not mandatory, a project based mostly upon primary research should have a forward-looking research question and projects based mostly on secondary research should have a backward-looking research question. An issue when determining which types of sources to use is criterion B of the assessment criteria. To earn maximum marks under this criterion, a student must have three to five supporting documents that “are relevant, sufficiently in-depth and provide a range of ideas and views” (refer to the Business management guide “Criterion B: supporting documents”, in the “Internal assessment criteria” section). As a practical matter, students should have at least four documents and preferably five if they aspire to earn four marks for criterion B.
- The best research questions are the ones where the student does not know the answer before the research process begins or the ones that cannot be answered with minimal research. The IAs of students with simplistic research questions that are easily answered often contain large amounts of material that is of marginal relevance.
- As the teacher and student are formulating a good research question and it is becomes clear that the student will be able to proceed with this question and supporting documents, the teacher and student should now consider the business management tools and theories to be used in answering the question. Generally, when students are purposeful in their selection of tools and theories and apply them in depth in answering their research question, the students produce better IAs. An indiscriminate approach, where students use many different tools and theories very superficially, weakens the overall result of an IA.
Step 4: Framing the research project with a key concept
A central part of the assessment focuses on how effectively the student integrates one of the four key concepts of the course into the project, an essential aspect of concept-based teaching and learning in the IB. When students have the “big idea,” seen through the conceptual approach, they often have better retention of the content. The “big ideas” end up providing a framework for storing information. In the last several decades, advocates of concept-based teaching and learning have stressed that teachers, all with good intentions, tend to jump into the specifics of teaching curriculum content but have not always stepped back to consider certain big ideas like change, creativity, ethics and sustainability. Each of these key concepts can be reduced to content, which is not what the IA asks of the students. Rather, in the IA, students should pick one key concept and reflect on how their project can shed light on the big ideas embedded in that key concept.
Consider an example from the guide. An example of an appropriate research question is “Should company Y change its manufacturing to outsourcing?” The guide then suggests using “change as a conceptual lens”. refer to Business management guide section “Internal assessment details—SL and HL”>“Examples of appropriate questions”). The answer to the research question would probably be based upon some type of make-or-buy financial analysis, with some appropriate consideration of operations management and human resource management.
A student could then consider, if outsourcing appears to be the better option: what are examples of how outsourcing could cause other changes at company Y? If a make-or-buy analysis revealed that the company should continue to make rather than outsource, the student should then ask the question about changes without outsourcing: what changes does company Y need to make to ensure that continued in-house manufacturing remains viable in the short- and medium-term?
In the example, the research question is answered by using a standard business tool; make-or-buy. The key concept of change is explored as the student considers the implications of change in one central area of the business.
Step 5: Writing an initial proposal
The students should then submit a brief initial proposal for the IA. An initial proposal is not a formal requirement of the business management course. However, asking students write an initial proposal is helpful because they are, in effect, stating their understanding of what is mentioned in steps 3 and 4. If, at this point, the students’ understanding differs from the teacher’s, the teacher and student can discuss the proposal to resolve any differences.
Step 6: Refining the list of supporting documents
At this point, students should have a research question; provisionally know what business management tools and theories they are going to use; know the key concept that they will be reflecting on; and have a preliminary idea of what they will use for supporting documents. The next step is to refine the supporting documents. Ideally, students should find more than five documents that could potentially be used as supporting documents, but then cut the list down to five. The other documents can be used as sources for the research project, though they should not be included with the supporting documents when the IA is submitted.
How do students select which five supporting documents to use?
- First, students need to eliminate any document that is over three years old and take it out of consideration to be a supporting document.
- Second, they need to determine which documents yield the best information to answer the research question they have selected. Under criterion B of the IA criteria, to earn 3 out of 4 marks, students must select documents that are “relevant and sufficiently in-depth”.
- Third, they need to determine which selection of documents will provide “a range of ideas and views”. A range of ideas and views is necessary to earn 4 out of 4 marks under criterion B.
Any documents that are not part of the five supporting documents can be used as a source for the project. When this is the case, students should reference these sources, for example, articles or government reports within the research project and include the source in the bibliography. Any sources of this kind that are not the three to five supporting documents should not be submitted with the research project. Having more than five supporting documents automatically means that the maximum mark awarded under criterion B is 1.
Step 7: Researching their research projects and writing drafts
The teacher’s role is important here. According to the guide, the teacher and students should “engage in dialogue supportive of the students’ work” (for further information, refer to the Business management guide section “Role of teacher's guidance”). This is important for the following three reasons.
- First, the IA is an assessment for learning. The process of doing the IA should be a learning experience and teacher-student engagement increases the likelihood that learning will happen.
- Second, as a practical matter, the IA is also an assessment of learning, with potentially serious consequences for the students’ future. Teacher-student engagement should lead to higher quality work on the part of the student and a higher moderated mark awarded in the IA.
- Third, an important role of the teacher is to make sure that what a student submits is their own work. Ongoing engagement with the student during the process reduces the likelihood that some academic malpractice will occur.
Step 8: Reviewing each student’s first draft
Teachers should always emphasize to their students that the first draft should be as high quality as the student can produce on their own. The better the first draft, the more precise and helpful the teacher’s comments on the draft will be.
In commenting on the draft, teachers must bear in mind that the IA is the student’s work. In making comments, teachers may provide suggestions while giving feedback but may not rewrite the work for the student.
Ideas for how to integrate the key concepts are an area where teacher support will be especially crucial. Teachers should then return the drafts to the students with comments—students should then revise their projects, reflecting on the teacher’s feedback.
Step 9: Reviewing assessment criteria with a penultimate draft in hand
On a specified day at least two weeks before the IA is due, all students should bring a penultimate draft of their research project to the class along with their copy of the IA requirements and assessment criteria. The teacher should then go over the requirements again, point by point, and ask students to record where they may need to make changes to the research project.
The teacher should then ask each student to mark their own research project. Teachers should encourage the students to be “strict markers”. Upon completion of the activity, teachers should ask students to ask themselves: in every place where I did not get the highest mark possible, what could I do to earn one more mark on that criterion?
Teachers may develop a checklist and ask the students to complete them, which could highlight omissions or draw attention to key elements that should be considered before submission.
Step 10: Making final revisions based on activity in step 9 and submitting the research project.
Students should then make their final revisions and submit their research projects to their teacher by the school’s internal deadline for the IA.
The teachers then mark the final submitted versions.