Message – Business Principles Research Paper
Conduct research on a U. S. Corporation that trades stock on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) or the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ). Companies listed on those exchanges are “publicly traded companies” and are required to disclose information to the public.
Write an analysis of the corporation in four steps:
1. Company history
2. Company products or services
3. Company marketing
4. Company financial profile
You must use at least five LSCS Library Research Databases available online. If you use sources that are not from the LSCS Library Research Databases or if you use sources such as Google and Wikipedia, you will earn a grade of “F”.
For your paper, you must use at least 5 information sources from library resources. Realistically, though, you”ll use at least 20 to cover all of your topic.
You will research the history, marketing, products, services, and finances of your company. The company you choose must be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. You can make sure by going to Yahoo Finance (https://finance.yahoo.com/) and searching for the name of your company. If the search result prompted says “NYSE” at the right, then you”ve got a company on the New York Stock Exchange.
That”s the first step. You don”t want to do a bunch of a research on a company that doesn”t qualify as a paper topic.
Once you”ve verified that you have an NYSE-traded company, then you”ll search in two library databases for information about the history, marketing, products, and services of your company. The business databases are here (https://www.lonestar.edu/library/15186.htm) (LIBRARY ID # 23136600752716). Click on “Articles.” The two databases that we will use are Business Source Complete and Business Abstracts with Full Text.
I suggest searching for the history, marketing, products, and services of your company separately. For example, if you were researching Exxon, then you might use these search terms:
Exxon and history
Exxon and marketing
Exxon and product
Exxon and service
Do each search separately, gathering articles on each aspect. Be sure to limit your search results to recent articles–about the past 5 years should do it.
Most of the articles that you will find will be from trade magazines for particular industries. I said that you would probably need at least 20 sources because you”re unlikely to find an article that describes all of the marketing practices of a company. It”s more likely that you will find a news report on a single marketing effort by your company. From gathering together many such articles, you will be able to get a broader scope of what your company is attempting to do.
Now let”s cover the finances. Go to Yahoo Finance and pull up your company”s profile. One of the tabs in the search results is marked “Financials”. This tab has the data that you need for that element of your research paper.
All papers must be submitted in MS Word format.
Your paper must be at least 5 full pages (1400 words approx), double-spaced, with page 6 for the bibliography. Papers must follow MLA format. Papers must be written in correct paragraphing, reasonably correct grammar, and correct spelling. If you quote lines from your sources, use quotation marks with a citation in parentheses. Do not use more than three sentences of quoted material in your paper and do not write an entire paragraph with quoted material.
Do not plagiarize by copying word-for-word from your sources. A plagiarized paper earns a grade of “F”. Write the paper in your own words.