MIS771 Descriptive Analytics and Visualisation
MIS771 MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 1 of 10 MIS771 Descriptive Analytics and Visualisation Assignment Two Background This assessment task is an individual assignment, which requires you to analyse a given data set, interpret and draw conclusions from your analysis, and then convey your findings in a written technical report to an expert in Business Analytics. Percentage of final grade 35% The Due Date and Time 11.59 PM Sunday 16th September 2018 AEST Submission instructions The assignment must be submitted by the due date electronically in CloudDeakin. When submitting electronically, you must check that you have submitted the work correctly by following the instructions provided in CloudDeakin. Please note that we will NOT accept any paper or email copies, or part of the assignment submitted after the deadline. No extensions will be considered unless a written request is submitted and negotiated with the Unit Chair before Thursday 13th September 2018, 5:00 PM. Please note that assignment extensions will only be considered if you attach your draft assignment with your request for an extension. You must keep a backup copy of every assignment you submit (that is, the work you have done to date) until the assignment has been marked. In the unlikely event that an assignment is misplaced, you will need to submit your backup copy. Work you submit will be checked by electronic or other means to detect collusion and/or plagiarism. When you submit an assignment through your CloudDeakin unit site, you will receive an email to your Deakin email address confirming that the assignment has been submitted. You should check that you can see your assignment in the Submissions view of the Assignment Dropbox folder after upload, and check for, and keep, the email receipt for the submission. MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 2 of 10 Penalties for late submission: The following marking penalties will apply if you submit an assessment task after the due date without an approved extension: 5% will be deducted from available marks for each day up to five days, and work that is submitted more than five days after the due date will not be marked. You will receive 0% for the task. 'Day' means calendar days or part thereof. The Unit Chair may refuse to accept a late submission where it is unreasonable or impracticable to assess the task after the due date. For more information about academic misconduct, special consideration, extensions, and assessment feedback, please refer to the document Your rights and responsibilities as a student in this Unit in the first folder next to the Unit Guide of the Resources area in the CloudDeakin unit site. The assignment uses the file stores.xlsx, which can be downloaded from CloudDeakin. Analysis of the data requires the use of techniques studied in Module 2. Assurance of Learning This assignment assesses the following Graduate Learning Outcomes and related Unit Learning Outcomes: Graduate Learning Outcome (GLO) Unit Learning Outcome (ULO) GLO1: Discipline-specific knowledge and capabilities - appropriate to the level of study related to a discipline or profession. GLO3: Digital Literacy - Using technologies to find, use and disseminate information GLO5: Problem Solving - creating solutions to authentic (real-world and ill-defined) problems. ULO 1: Apply quantitative reasoning skills to solve complex problems. ULO 2: Use contemporary data analysis and visualisation tools and recognise the limitation of such tools. Feedback before submission You can seek assistance from the teaching staff to ascertain whether the assignment conforms to submission guidelines. Feedback after submission An overall mark together with suggested solutions will be released via CloudDeakin, usually within 15 working days. You are expected to refer and compare your answers to the suggested solutions to understand any areas of improvement. MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 3 of 10 Case Study (Background to Furphy) Furphy is one of Australia's leading supermarket chains. There are 700 stores in the chain. Originating from a family based chain of general stores, Furphy now has stores all over Australia, with the first one being established 27 years ago. Regarding operation, individual store management has wide-ranging powers about the day-to-day operations of their stores. However, Furphy’s strategic planning and direction take place in the company Head Office in Melbourne. In 2016, Furphy Head Office asked all store managers to add an online channel to their stores to enable customers, in their suburbs, to make their purchase online. Despite their successful operations and solid financial turnovers in the last two years, Furphy is forecasting a shift in the business climate within the next five years. This is a result of ever-increasing competition in the grocery supermarket sector. Now more than ever, Furphy management feels the need to ensure a good understanding of their business performance. The Furphy Head Office is slightly confused about the lack of enthusiasm of store managers to open their online sales channel given that Furphy Head office has invested heavily on a digital platform and distribution partnership with a transport company. Also, they are planning to put in place a formal procedure to forecast their Sales. Subsequently, Furphy has approached BEAUTIFUL-DATA (a market research company) and asked them to conduct a study to understand the characteristics of Furphy’s stores and their business performance. The Data For this study, BEAUTIFUL-DATA has collected two sets of Data: 1. The data related to stores were extracted from the Furphy’s datamarts. It is a random sample of 150 stores in the Furphy chain. A complete listing of variables, their definitions, and an explanation of their coding are provided in Working Sheet “Stores-Variable Description. 2. Time-series data is available on Working Sheet “Quarterly Sales”. Your Role as a BEAUTIFUL-DATA Data Analyst Intern You are a Master of Business Analytics student doing an internship at BEAUTIFUL-DATA. The research team manager (Todd Nash, with a PhD in Data Science and a Master Degree in Digital Marketing) has asked you to lead the data analysis process for the Furphy project and directly report the results to him. You and Todd just finished a meeting wherein he briefed you on the vital purpose of the project. Todd explained that a model should be built to estimate Furphy’s Sales. Therefore, the first goal is to identify key factors that influence Sales. The second goal is to understand the relationship between number of competitors and Sales. He is also interested in gaining insights into factors that influence Furphy stores to open online sales channels. The final goal is to construct a forecasting model, which forecast Furphy’s Sales in the upcoming four quarters. From these insights, Todd and consequently Furphy will be in an excellent position to develop plans for the next financial year. MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 4 of 10 Todd also allocated relevant research tasks and explained his expectations from your analysis in the meeting. Minutes of this meeting are available on the next page. Now, your job is to review and complete the allocated tasks as per this document. MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 5 of 10 BEAUTIFUL-DATA, 727 Collins St, Docklands VIC 3008 Phone: (+61 3 212 66 000)
[email protected] Reference PH-102 Furphy Project Revised 06th August, 2018 Level Expert Analysis Meeting Chair Todd Nash Date 06th August 2018 Time 11:00 AM Location BEAUTIFUL-DATA F3.101 Topic Furphy Project – Analytics Details Meeting Purpose: Specifying and Allocating Data Analytics Tasks Discussion items: • Variable(s) description. • Modelling Sales. • Modelling the likelihood of opening an online channel. • Forecasting Sales in the upcoming four quarters. • Producing a technical report. Detailed Action Items Who: Graduate Intern What: 1. Provide an overall summary of the following two variables: 1.1. Sales 1.2. Online Sales Channel 2. Identify potential factors that may influence Sales: 2.1. An appropriate statistical technique could be used here to identify a list of possible factors. 2.2. Build a model (through a model building process) to estimate Sales. 2.3. Todd has done a regression analysis to predict sales using number of competitors and stores open on Sundays. He believes that the relationship between number of competitors and sales should be weaker for those stores that are open on Sundays. Your task here is to test Todd’s assumption by modelling the interaction between the predictors mentioned above and the target variable. Comment whether there is sufficient evidence that the interaction term makes a significant contribution to the model. 3. Finalise the model to predict the likelihood of opening an online sales channel: 3.1. Todd has already done an initial analysis for this task. Based on his analysis, Todd has narrowed down the key predictors of the likelihood of opening an online sales channel to “Manager’s Age, Experience and Gender”. Your task now is to continue his work and develop a predictive model to ascertain the MIS771 - Descriptive Analytics and Data Visualisation Trimester 2, 2018 Page 6 of 10 “likelihood of opening an online sales channel”. Todd is specifically interested in understanding the probability of stores which meet the following criteria to open an online sales channel: Those stores with managers, a) in their mid-thirties; b) with varying levels of Management Experience (i.e. 2-16 years?); c) and across both, male and female store managers. 3.2. Todd believes that the age, experience and the gender of the store manager may influence the decision to open an online sales channel. Therefore, it is essential for Furphy to know whether effort and money should be put into recruiting tech-savvy young managers. Accordingly, your job is to visualise the predicted probability of opening online sales channels with the