6128-Strategic Management – Formative Assessment Guidelines 2024-25

NBS 6128A: Formative Assessment (FM1) – Assessment Brief

Deadline: (Monday 11^th November via Blackboard Submission link). 

Key Information

· Your work must be submitted via the Formative Assessment (FM1) link on Blackboard in a single Word file (doc) or PDF.  

· Links to cloud hosted documents (e.g., Sharepoint, OneDrive, Google Docs) will not receive feedback.

· Your work must also be formatted using 1.5 line spacing; justified margins with black text on a white background. The font size is 12-point and the font style. must be Calibri, Times New Roman or Arial.  Work that is incorrectly formatted (e.g., line spacing, font size, font style) will not receive feedback.  

· The Maximum Word Count is 1, 000 (see breakdown below).  

1. Background to the Individual Assessment

The formative assessment is an opportunity to gain feedback on all three parts of the summative assessment.

You should start by selecting a Public Limited Company (PLC) currently listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) (FTSE Index).  The LSE website has an up to date list of all PLCs https://www.londonstockexchange.com/indices?tab=ftse-indices 

Work that is not based on an LSE PLC will not be assessed.   

Once you have selected a PLC from the London Stock Exchange you can start to work through the three stages of the strategic venturing process.  Support will be provided in lectures and seminars to help students prepare.

2. Important Details about Formatting and Submission

Your formative report should be submitted as a single upload (doc or PDF only) via Blackboard using the Formative Assessment Link (FM1).  

Your work must be formatted using 1.5 line spacing; justified margins with black text on a white background. The font size is 12-point and the font style. must be Calibri, Times New Roman or Arial.  Work that is incorrectly formatted (e.g., line spacing, font size, font style) will not receive feedback.  

Links to cloud hosted documents (e.g., Sharepoint, OneDrive, Google Docs) will not receive feedback.

This is because

· Students are responsible for submitting coursework in the format specified above.  

· Students are also responsible for checking their coursework submissions can be accessed and read once uploaded.

Please see ‘Submission of Work for Assessment Policy’ which can be accessed here  (Sections 18-20 cover electronic submission) https://www.uea.ac.uk/about/university-information/governance/policies-and-regulations/general-regulations/submission-of-work-for-assessment-taught-programmes 

3.0  - Assessment Parts

FM1 has three sections which mirror the summative assessment.  There is no mark, but the feedback you receive is designed to help you improve the final summative assessment.

To receive feedback on all three sections, ensure you include the following:

1. One Paragraph Strategy Initiative (200 words)

2. Optimal Strategic Initiative: Three Statements (500 words)

3. One paragraph Critical Reflection (300 words).

Your assignment should also include a Cover page with your Student ID number, the assessment title, word-count, date of submission, course title. This is not included in the word count.  

3.1 -  One Paragraph Strategic Initiative (200 words)

Description:  Many leading organisations use one-page strategy documents to reduce the information burden managers face.  One example is Amazon which banned the use of PowerPoint files. Writing a successful one-page strategy is challenging.  The formative assessment is an opportunity to practice by writing one paragraph summarising your proposed strategic initiative in 200-300 words.

Suggested Structure: Your one paragraph should   

· Briefly describe what the optimal strategic initiative is and which gap it is addressing for your case organisation?      

· Briefly state why your optimal strategic initiative will extend the current strategy and enhance organisational performance.     

It is important to stick to the one-paragraph format. Anything over the 300 word limit will not be marked.  You can re-use your one paragraph in the summative assessment, so it is worth spending time on this exercise.  

3.2  - Optimal Strategic Initiative: Three statements (500 words)

Description. Treat this as the foundation or basis for your summative report by drafting your generating, evaluating and championing statements.  

· Generating Statement – Briefly summarise the strategy context of your case organisation. Your statement should reference materials from your case organisation, such as annual reports, press releases, financial statements, webcasts etc.  You can also use high quality secondary data (e.g., Mintel, Keynote, Statista).  By synthesising this data you are developing an evidence base that you can use to demonstrate understanding about where your case organisation currently is today and where it needs to move in the future.  Your generating statement should also include three proposed  strategic initiatives.

1. Evaluating Statement -  Briefly summarise your evaluation of the three proposed initiatives. This should be grounded in your SAFE analysis where you rank and score each Initiative.  Use the ranking and scoring to provide a short justification for selecting your optimal SI.  You can also include a short summary of a pilot test for your optimal SI.

2. Championing – Briefly summarise how you plan to ‘sell’ your optimal SI.  Your championing statement should aim to get ‘buy in’ by explaining how your optimal SI will extend the current strategy and enhance organisational performance in your case company.  You can also include a draft strategy map and try to be as comprehensive as possible by addressing all four sections of the strategy map (e.g., financial, customer, operations, learning and growth). Due to the word limit you can use bullet points to summarise key points for the four sections in the strategy map.   

You can re-use the three statements in the summative assessment, so it is worth spending time on this exercise.  You are encouraged to include supporting data in your formative assessment. References should be in Harvard style. an added to a list of references in alphabetical order.

3.3  - Critical reflection.  (1.5 line spaced, Arial or Calibri) (300 words)

Description. Critical reflection an important skill that is used extensively in professional management development.  Managers are frequently asked to reflect on their current activities and how they might develop strengths and address weaknesses in the future. Reflective writing and thinking are important skills that are rarely taught.  The aim of this part of the assessment is to prove an opportunity to develop your ability to critically reflect on debates, theories and concepts introduced in this module. As such, you are invited to critically reflect on what enables or constrains strategic management?

As the aim is to get feedback on your critical reflexive writing you are advised to follow the following structure.  

1. Select one topic from the module to focus your critical reflection. This should be one of the lecture themes. For example, you might want to reflect on why purpose is relevant for strategic management, or how strategic venturing is used to enhance the strategy process? You are free to select other topics providing they are covered in the lectures (e.g., leading strategic change, formulating strategy, strategy as practice etc).

2. Read around the topic you have selected using journal articles, monographs (books) and the textbook or other materials from the module reading list.  For example, your reading will help to critically reflect on why strategic venturing is seen as important, how it works and what outcomes it is expected to generate.

3. Using academic literature write a max of 300 words demonstrating your critical reflection on the topic you have chosen to explore.  Focus on a single topic. It is better to go deep into a single topic and show you can use relevant academic literature to critically reflect rather trying to cover lots of topics and using unrelated or no academic literature.

4. Suggested structure is:

a. Briefly introduce the topic you have chosen and why it is relevant for critically reflecting on strategic management?

b. Pick one or two relevant academic journal articles from the module reading list and use them to demonstrate your critical understanding about the topic you have selected.  

This part should be written in essay format using references to core journal articles included in the reading list. You can also write in the first-person tense (I believe, I think etc). References should be in the Harvard style. listed in alphabetical order at the end of part three.  

4.0 Artificial Intelligence Inclusive.

You are encouraged to use generative AI (e.g., ChatGPT, Google Gemini etc) for the formative and summative assessment on this module.  AI will provide an additional voice you can engage with to develop your understanding about strategic management. For example, you could use AI to increase your comprehension of key articles or concepts discussed in the module.  In this way, AI can be helpful for co-developing your ideas as you ask questions and receive instant feedback.  However, care should be taken to only work with reading materials and concepts used in this module (e.g., Textbook, Journal Articles, Lecture materials).  This means that some of your AI searches might go off topic and cover unrelated issues.  The advice is to first ensure you have an understanding about the theories or concepts that have been carefully selected for this module.  For example, we will discuss strategic venturing and strategy as practice which are based on theory published in world leading peer reviewed academic journals.  To score highly on the module you should be able to discriminate between theories of strategic management as developed in this module and whatever materials AI might find.  As such, the assessment and the module are carefully designed to develop and test your understanding about strategic management, not whatever materials AI finds.

To reinforce this point, as a Level 6 final year module, Strategic Management requires students to go beyond using AI.  This is because the module requires students to demonstrate ‘higher-order cognitive skills’, such as creativity, evaluation, analysis, communication and critical reflection (Baaji, 2024). These skills are all viewed as vital 21^st century business skills as they are key to managing under conditions of Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity (VUCA).  

5.0 - Suggested Structure for your Formative Report

6.0 - Feedback

Although there is no mark for the formative assessment you will receive the following:

· An evaluation sheet (see below) with written comments highlighting areas that could be improved for the summative assessment.