OMGT2103 Transportation and Freight Logistics
Assessment name: Business Report
Weight: 30%
Length: 2,500 words ± 5%
Learning Objectives Assessed:
This assignment assesses Course Learning Objectives (CLOs) 1, 2 and 3.
Why this task?
This assignment will evaluate the following:
- Ability to conduct quality collection of information relevant to assignment requirements.
- Ability to analyse collected information to address assignment requirements.
- Ability to generate conclusions to real life challenges faced by port operators as well as how such challenges impact the overall freight transportation industry.
Lessons gained:
- Awareness of Port of Melbourne operations and challenges.
- Awareness of operations and challenges of a leading global port.
- Awareness on how challenges in operations are managed differently/similarly by domestic and global port operators.
What do I need to do?
Conduct a comparative analysis between Port of Melbourne (PoM) and Port of Los Angeles, USA (PoL). Areas to be included,
Page 1 of 3
- Describe backgrounds and container operations of PoM and PoL;
- Identify one (1) major operational challenge commonly faced by both PoM and PoL (i.e., both ports sharing a similar challenge, e.g., inter-ports competition);
- Conduct a comparative analysis describing the impact(s) of the identified challenge on both port’s operations respectively; and
- Propose two (2) possible recommendation(s) that may address the identified challenge commonly faced by both ports.
Present your findings, discussions and analysis in the format of a business report. Refer to RMIT College of Business: Guidelines for referencing and presentation in written reports and essays (click here to download the guidebook) for an accurate illustration and explanation on the format of a business report (see Chapter 5 p36-44. See Table 17 p40 for a quick and helpful guide on how to present a business report). It should contain 2,500 words (±5%) in length and a word count is required to be declared on the title page of the business report. Note: College of Business adopts the Harvard Style of Referencing. Please use font type Arial or Times Roman and font size 11 or 12, with 1 .5 spacing between sentences. These specific presentation requirements will help improve reading clarity and adequate space for feedback for the assessor.
Tip: You will need 15-25 good articles (e.g. online news article or article from latest industry newsletter, corporate websites, white papers, etc.) to demonstrate adequate extent of research as well as content analysis.
How will the task be assessed?
The business report will be assessed according to the following criteria (out of 30 marks):
Note: Below sections are not the complete presentation formats for a business report. As suggested above, refer to College of Business styles of presenting written work for the correct presentation format for a business report.
- Executive Summary (6.0 marks). Succinct summary of main findings and recommendations.
- Extent of Research (4.5 marks). Comprehensive coverage of both Ports that can result in quality comparative analysis.
- Quality of Analysis (6.0 marks). Clear and concise comparative analysis of both Ports.
- Quality of Recommendations (6.0 marks). Well-thought and creative recommendations that include identification of stakeholders and their roles in implementing the recommendations.
- Academic language (3.0 marks). Ability to present quality discussions in discipline-specific vocabulary, grammar, punctuation and sentence structuring.
- References (4.5 marks). Adequate quantity and quality of articles used to support quality discussions and analysis.
More descriptions of the above rubrics can be seen in the next page.
Any instructions listed above not followed will see assignments being rejected.
** If you do not understand the instructions listed above, seek clarification BEFORE submission of assignments. Ignorance is unacceptable.