ASSESSMENT GUIDE
COMM1190
Data, Insights and Decisions
Term 3, 2024
UNSW Business School 1
Assessment Summary
Assessment Task Weighting Due Date* Learning Outcomes
Assessment 1: Individual Report
Review and revise a report for a large organisation.
20% Week 4: 5 pm Friday 4th October CLO1, 2, 3
Assessment 2: Team Assessment
Apply key concepts discussed in the course to a real-world scenario
30% Stage 1: Week 7: 5 pm Wednesday 23rd October
Stage 2: Week 9: 5 pm Wednesday 6th November
CLO2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Assessment 3: Final Exam
The final exam will test your understanding of course concepts
discussed in all weeks of the course.
50% Exam period CLO1, 2, 3, 5, 6

* Due dates are set at Australian Eastern Standard/Daylight Time (AEST/AEDT). You can use the time and date converter if you are located in a different time zone.
Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs)
1. Explain how an organisation uses analytical and statistical tools to gain valuable insights. [PLO1]
2. Apply statistics and data analysis skills to real data sets from various organisations and domains to generate insights to make informed
decisions. [PLO2]
3. Visualise and analyse data to support arguments that increase stakeholder comprehension of information and business insights. [PLO3]
4. Work effectively in teams to communicate cohesive data insights and recommendations to various stakeholders. [PLO4]
5. Critically evaluate the suitability of data and data sources to identify and analyse business problems. [PLO2]
6. Evaluate the ethical implications of the organisational use of big data and analytics on stakeholders and society. [PLO5]
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Assessment Details
Icon Legend
Due Date Weighting Format Length/Duration Submission
Turnitin
Turnitin is an originality-checking and plagiarism-prevention tool that checks submitted written work for improper
citation or misappropriated content. Each Turnitin assignment is checked against other students' work, the Internet,
and key resources selected by your Course Coordinator.
If you are instructed to submit your assessment via Turnitin, you will find the link to the Turnitin submission on your
Moodle course site. You can submit your assessment well before the deadline and use the Similarity Report to
improve your academic writing skills before submitting your final version.
You can find out more information on the Turnitin information site for students.
Late Submissions
The parameters for late submissions are outlined in the UNSW Assessment Implementation Procedure. If you submit
your assessments after the due date for this course, you will incur penalties for late submission unless you have
Special Consideration (see below). Late submission is 5% per day (including weekends), calculated from the marks
allocated to that assessment (not your grade). No submission will be accepted later than 8 am on Monday, 24 June.
Extensions
You are expected to manage your time to meet assessment due dates. If you require an extension to your
assessment, please request as early as possible before the due date via the particular on myUNSW (My Student
profile > Special Consideration). You can find more information on Special Consideration and the application process
below. Lecturers and tutors cannot grant extensions.
Important note:
COMM1190 uses this integrated sequence of assessment tasks to simulate an authentic project within an
organisation. Because of the sequential nature of the functions, it isn't easy to allow extensions without impacting the
academic integrity of the assessment. This course does not use the short extension process you may have seen in
other classes. Moreover, suppose you are granted special consideration due to exceptional circumstances precluding
you from completing the assessment task on time. In that case, you will likely have your final exam reweighted rather
than being given an extension.
Special Consideration
Special consideration is assessing the impact of short-term events beyond your control (exceptional circumstances)
on your performance in a specific assessment task.
What are circumstances beyond my control?
These are exceptional circumstances or situations that may:
 Prevent you from completing a course requirement,
 Keep you from attending an assessment,
 Stop you from submitting an assessment,
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 Significantly affect your assessment performance.
A list of circumstances that may be beyond your control is available here. This is only a list of examples; your exact
circumstances may not be listed.
You can find more details and the application form on the Special Consideration site or in the UNSW Special
Consideration Application and Assessment Information for Students.
Assessment overview
COMM1190 has two assessment tasks and one exam. According to the timeline below, separate documents for each
assessment task will be made available.
The two assessments relate to the same case and fundamental business problem. You will be an analyst reporting to
the Head of Management Services of a grocery store chain operating throughout Australia. She is interested in
learning more about the customers enrolled in their rewards program and how their characteristics and spending
patterns inform management about customer loyalty and retention—their customer churn problem.


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Assessment 1: Individual Assignment
Week 4: 5 pm Friday 4th October
20%
Report
~4 pages (+/-10%) + separate file containing R code

Via Moodle course site
Context of assessment task
You are a Business Analyst working for TelcomCo, a telecommunications organisation in Australia. The General
Manager (GM) has asked you to conduct a deeper analysis to explore the factors associated with the churn rate and
suggest recommendations on how to enhance customer retention. He provided you with a copy of the Memo
produced by a freshly recruited junior analyst.
GM has expressed concerns over the quality of the Memo in form and substance. Your task is to review the initial
report and produce a revised version using an updated, expanded personalised data set containing the original pilot
data and some extra observations.
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Instructions from the General Manager
From: GM
Subject: Report revision project
Good morning,
Thank you for agreeing to revise the initial report. It is imperative that I have high-quality, data-driven insights to use
in my presentation to the Board of Directors, and I am not satisfied with the initial report provided—there are
mistakes that need to be corrected. Please see below for details on what is required.
As outlined below, I am interested in understanding the factors triggering the churn rate.
1) Characteristics of the customers
2) How much do they spend, and what services do they subscribe to?
3) How satisfied they are with our services
4) Any insights into customer churn and recommendations on extra data we need to continue this
investigation.
This is the first step in a more extensive analysis of customer retention. It is important because we need to
encourage repeat business from loyal customers and avoid losing them to competitors.
Some guidelines that will aid you in improving upon the original report:
 Please create high-quality graphics using R to meet our organisation’s presentation standards.
 Please conduct the entire analysis in R for quality control reasons. I’ll leave the choice of graphs and
associated analyses to you as an analyst.
 Please provide advice on what other variables and data would be useful as the project develops,
specifically related to spending patterns, services provided, and customer retention.
 You can use the initial report as a template; it is appropriate for sections and length, so your revised report
should be approximately the same in these two dimensions. Any other elements of the report structure are
left to your discretion.
The dataset you will use contains both the initial data used by the junior analyst and some additional data collected
after the fact. In a separate communication, I will provide access to these data and a copy of the original report.
Good luck with the project. I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
Kind regards,
General Manager| TelcomCo
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Approach to the assessment task
a) Read the GM’s instructions carefully, including the metrics she wants insights into and her guidelines to improve
the original report.
b) Download the entire dataset. Note that this dataset contains both the original (pilot) data used by the intern and
extra observations. All students in the course will have the same pilot data, but the extra observations are
individualised. You will access your dataset on Moodle.
c) Review the intern’s initial report to plan how you will revise it using your analyses and visualisations with R.
Remember that the structure of your report will be approximately the same as the initial report, i.e. similar length
and sections.
d) As there were problems with the initial report, as highlighted by the GM in his email, you should not be restricted
to the analyses presented in the initial report.
e) Ensure you carefully select and include only data and visualisations supporting your main findings and
conclusions. It would be best to outline key assumptions or limitations in your analysis.
f) When submitting your report, you must provide a separate file containing the R code used to conduct your
analysis and generate visualisations. No marks will be awarded for this code file, but your submission will be
deemed incomplete and given a zero mark if this file is not included.
g) Submit your revised report and code file as separate documents via Turnitin on the Moodle course site. You can
choose the structure of the code file. There is no word limit for the code file.
h) Late submission will incur a penalty of 5% per day or part thereof (including weekends) from the due date and
time. Assessment 1 will not be accepted after 9:00 a.m.11 October 2024. For further information, please refer
to Policies and Support.
i) Special consideration will be granted only in the case of serious illness, misadventure, or bereavement, which
must be supported with documentary evidence. In these circumstances, students must apply for Special
Consideration. Because of the sequential nature of the assessment tasks, it isn't easy to allow extensions
without impacting the academic integrity of the assessment. This course does not use the short extension
process you may have seen in other classes. Moreover, suppose you are granted special consideration due to
exceptional circumstances precluding you from completing the assessment task on time. In that case, you will
likely have your final exam reweighted rather than being given an extension.
Feedback
General feedback on this assignment will be in the form of an exemplary presentation to the Board of Directors. You will
be given this exemplar to support you in Assessment 2. You will then receive your grades and personalised feedback
on Moodle later. Please see Page 9 of this document for the rubric.
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Assessment 2: Team Assessment
Stage 1: Week 7, Wednesday 23rd October 2024
Stage 2: Week 9, Wednesday 6th November 2024
30% (10% for Stage 1, 20% for Stage 2)
Report (Two stages):
Stage 1: Individual
Stage 2: Group
Stage 1: Submission via a template
Stage 2: ~4 pages (+/-10%) + separate file containing R code
Via Moodle course site
Assessment Overview
You will undertake a project as a team, applying the key concepts discussed in the course to a real-world scenario. In
this assessment, you will explore data using descriptive and predictive analytics to derive actionable insights that can
be used to assist with business decision-making. The assessment task is designed to develop teamwork skills within
an analytics team and technical skills for analysing data to arrive at decisions and recommendations based on the
team’s data-generated insights.
Instructions
In Week 5, you will receive detailed instructions regarding Assessment 2, the associated rubric, and the formation of
groups.
Approach to the assessment task
a) As soon as you have the assessment instructions, you are encouraged to start working with your group from
Week 5 onwards.
b) You should first complete Stage 1 (individual component) of Assessment 2 to support your group work for
Stage 2.
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Assessment 3: Final Exam
Exam Period
50%
Examination on Moodle
N/A
Via Moodle course site
Assessment Overview
The final exam will test your technical competence, problem-solving skills, and understanding of the concepts
discussed in all weeks of the course. Later, a range of questions and examples drawn from past exams will be
provided.
You will be able to access the COMM1190 exam and detailed instructions via the course Moodle site closer to the
examination's time.
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Marking Rubric
INDIVIDUAL REPORT | Assessment 1
Criteria %  Fail
(0%-49%)
Pass
(50%-64%)
Credit
(65%-74%)
Distinction
(75%-84%)
High Distinction
(85%-100%)
Analysis 30%  Fails to demonstrate a basic
understanding of the business problem
or issue and the appropriate tools and
methods to derive insights from data.
Demonstrates limited awareness of the
critical problems in the initial report and
uses poor judgment in deciding what
should be highlighted and how it is
reported.
Demonstrates a proficient
understanding of the business
problem or issue,
and the appropriate tools and
methods necessary to extract
valuable insights from the data.
Recognises some of the critical
problems in the initial report and
attempts to address some of the
errors and omissions. Shows a
basic understanding of what should
be highlighted and how it is
reported, but some topics are
irrelevant and not well-supported by
the data.
Demonstrates good knowledge of
the business problem or issue
and the appropriate tools and
methods necessary to extract
valuable insights from the data.
Recognises some of the critical
problems in the initial report and
effectively addresses some of the
errors and omissions. Generally,
he shows good judgement in
deciding what should be
highlighted and how it is reported,
but some topics are not as
relevant and not well-supported
by the data.
Demonstrates an advanced
understanding of the business
problem or issue and the
appropriate tools and methods
necessary to extract valuable
insights from the data.
Recognises most critical problems
in the initial report and effectively
addresses errors and omissions.
Uses good judgment in deciding
what should be highlighted and
how it is reported.
Demonstrates an outstanding
understanding of the business
problem or issue and the
appropriate tools and methods
necessary to extract valuable
insights from the data.
Recognises the initial report's
fundamental problems and
expertly addresses errors and
omissions. Uses excellent
judgement in deciding what
should be highlighted and how it
is reported.
Quality of
conclusions and
recommendations
20%  Develops no conclusions or conclusions
that are not based on the analysis
results.
Recommendations are absent or do not
provide helpful advice on addressing
data deficiencies.
Develops appropriate conclusions,
although not always closely linked
to the analysis results.
Recommendations identify some
deficiencies in the data and attempt
to provide advice on how to
address them.
Develops appropriate conclusions
based on the results of the
analysis.
Recommendations identify some
deficiencies in the data and
provide advice on addressing
them.
Develops well-reasoned and
appropriate conclusions based on
the results of the analysis.
Recommendations identify critical
deficiencies in the data and provide
sound advice on addressing them.
Develops well-reasoned and
insightful conclusions that are
fully supported and closely
linked to the analysis results.
Recommendations identify
critical deficiencies in the data
and provide wise advice on
addressing them.
Visualisation 40% Inappropriate use of visualisations and
graphs do not communicate insights
effectively.
Graphs are unsatisfactory and
unprofessional.
Some but not all chosen
visualisations are appropriate or
effectively communicate insights.
Graphs are satisfactory and mostly
presented professionally.
Good choice of appropriate
visualisations to effectively
communicate insights. Most
graphs communicate an essential
insight.
Graphs are of good quality and
mainly presented professionally.
This is a perfect choice of
appropriate visualisations to
communicate critical insights
effectively. Most graphs
communicate an essential insight.
Graphs are of good quality and
presented professionally.
Excellent choice of appropriate
visualisations to effectively
communicate critical insights.
All graphs communicate an
essential insight.
Graphs are high quality and
presented professionally.
Criteria Unsatisfactory Satisfactory
Report length 10% Did not follow the instructions of the Head and produced a report that
differed markedly from that of the intern. The report may be too brief or too
long.
Followed instructions from the head and produced a report with a structure that approximates the
intern's.
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