Unit V
Write a paper describing a basic experimental design for the proposal.
Design a basic experiment to assess a cause and effect relationship based on your research question. Include the following information:
1. Research the objective.
2. Explain if the design is a true experiment or a quasi-experiment. Justify your selection.
3. Develop a hypothesis based on your research question.
4. Evaluate your hypothesis according to the characteristics provided in the lecture. Be specific.
MBA 5652, Research Methods 4
5. Describe the independent variables, blocking variables, dependent variables, and extraneous variables.
6. Explain how you plan to deal with issues related to internal and external validity. Be specific.
7. Conclusion: Highlight the major points discussed in the previous sections. Be sure to relate the information back to the purpose and relevance of the research.
You must use correct APA formatting when writing your paper. All references used, including the textbook, must be cited.

Here is Unit I.

Business Situation
Lack of Internal Control in the Organization

Current situation
In the organization, there has been a lack of internal control in the operations. Internal controls define and govern the responsibilities that each department of the organization has to handle. These systems outline the business operating environment, strategies, procedures and policies, communication strategies and monitoring of the organization performance.

Problem statement
Internal controls are methods and procedures that are applied to protect the legitimacy of the transactions that are made, the accuracy of the business records and the protection of business assets (Zikmund, Babin, Carr, & Griffin, 2013). As a result of the current situation whereby effective internal control has been lacking, it has been difficult to operate the business efficiently. There has been a lack of compliance with the set organization rules and regulations as well as poor business ethics. Hence, with the current situation, accomplishing the set objectives of the organization would be problematic.
Research objective
The objective of the research is to formulate measures that will ensure that there is efficient internal control within the organization. The causes of the challenge will also be researched and aspects that led to the occurrence of the issue. The research will enable the organization to institute an inclusive set of policies and procedures that will help to mitigate the problems that are caused by lack of an effective internal control.
Research questions
The research will formulate the following set of research questions:
What are the major causes of lack of internal control?
How has a lack of internal control impacted on the operations of the organization?
What strategies should be set to remedy the situation?
What are the likely outcomes of the proposed resolutions?
Hypothesis
The hypothesis that will be used in the research will be:
Hypothesis 1: Poor organization performance can be attributed to the lack of an effective internal control.
Hypothesis 2: Lack of internal control in has not had a significant impact on the performance of the organization.

References
Zikmund, W. G., Babin, B. J., Carr, J. C., & Griffin, M. (2013). Business research methods (9th ed.). Mason, OH: South-Western.
Here is Unit II:
Introduction
Internal control refers to the evaluation and monitoring of the functioning of the operations within an organization. Internal controls define and govern the responsibilities that each department of the organization has to handle. These systems outline the business operating environment, strategies, procedures and policies, communication strategies and monitoring of the organization performance. Internal control is an important aspect since it allows a specific and high level of services that are provided by the management leading to the effective performance of its duties. Internal control offers crucial security to an organization regarding the credibility of its affairs. The literature review will be organized based on the basic concepts of internal control. They include the management lapse and control culture, risk identification and assessment, control activities and separation of duties and information and communication.
Management lapse and the control culture
The management board ought to have the obligation for approving and reviewing the overall policies and strategies of the organization periodically (Gatewongsa & Ussahawanitchakit, 2013). This will enable the understanding of the main risks that face the business and set tolerable levels for the risks. The organization will hence be able to take the necessary steps to identify, monitor and control the various types of risks that might inhibit the performance of the firm. Therefore, the management board is accountable for making sure that there is the establishment and maintenance of an adequate and effective internal control. According to Pfister (2009), the senior management of a firm is responsible for setting up directives to the board of directors. These includes the implementation of policies and strategies and the formulation of an efficient internal control system.

Risk recognition and assessment
Keane (2014) ascertains that the risks that could affect the achievement of an organization adversely should be identified and regularly assessed in an effective control system. The assessment that is conducted ought to cover the all the potential risks in the organization and should be revised appropriately to address any uncontrolled or new risk. The risk review process should typically focus on the review of business strategies that are aimed at maximizing the reward trade-off within different sectors of the organization (Bentley-Goode, Newton, & Thompson, 2014). The risk control process should involve determining whether the organization can control the risk or not. For the risks that can be controlled, the organization ought to determine the degree to which it needs to moderate the risks. For the uncontrollable risks, the organization needs to determine whether to reduce the concerned business activity or withdraw from the practice completely.
Control activities and segregation duties
In the organization, internal control activities necessitate being a crucial part of its operations. A suitable control structure that has control activities distinct at every business level is required for an effective control system. These activities include checking for compliance with the set policies of the organization, system authorizations and approvals and the verification of procedures and policies that are being complied with.
Information and communication
For any business to have an internal control system that is effective, there is the need to have adequate information regarding the internal financial operations and the external market conditions to improve the decision-making process. The information that is obtained should be reliable, accessible, timely, and ought to be provided in a consistent design.
In conclusion, the main objective of the project is to formulate measures that will ensure that there is an efficient internal control within the organization. The steps that can be undertaken by the organization to solve the internal control problems include, the management lapse and the control culture, risk identification and assessment, control activities and separation of duties and information and communication. Through efficient strategies that are based on these measures, the lack of internal control within the organization can be solved effectively.

References
Bentley-Goode, K., Newton, N., & Thompson, A. (2014) Business Strategy and Internal Control over Financial Reporting. SSRN Electronic Journal.
Gatewongsa, K., & Ussahawanitchakit, P. (2013). Internal control strategy of beverage businesses in Thailand: Effects on goal achievement. International Journal of Business Strategy, 13(3), 53-74.
Keane, M. (2014). The remediation of internal control weaknesses, non-audit fees and auditor independence. Journal of International Business and Economics, 14(1), 75-86.
Pfister, J. A. (2009). Managing Organizational Culture for Effective Internal Control: From Practice to Theory. Springer Science & Business Media.
Relationship between Internal Control, Internal Audit, and Organization Commitment with Good Governance: Indonesian Case. (2012). China-USA Business Review, 11(09).

Here is Unit III:
This questionnaire is designed by the Williamson Group of companies to determine the types of marketing strategies in business and how to improve customer services through feedback. The purpose is to collect data which helps the company in strategic business development for the next five years.
Williamson Group of Companies Questionnaire
All the information provided on this questionnaire is confidential and your identity is not required. Filling out this questionnaire helps the company improve services its customers. Please feel free to give honest feedback. Thank you in advance.

Please tick where applicable
1. Gender Male Female
2. Age group
• Under 18 years
• 19 to 25 years
• 26 to 35 years
• 36 and above years
3. How did you find out about our products and services? (I.e. newspaper adverts, social media, outdoor media, friends and family, text based services and many more)

__________________________________________________________
4. When you first bought from us what was the quality of the services offered?
Excellent
Good
Average
Poor
5. What encouraged you to buy from us?

__________________________________________________________
6. Williamson Group has run a number of advertisements on newspapers and television. Are you familiar with any particular advert?
Yes
No
7. If so, describe the details?

8. Did the advert give you enough information any of our new product or service?
Yes
No
9. What are some of the products that you have bought us that you have never tried before?

__________________________________________________________
10. Kindly give your general comments about Williamson group of companies?

__________________________________________________________

The first three questions give information about demographic profile of the customer and will help in target marketing. The next sets of questions require the customer to give feedback which helps the company have a competitive advantage over its competitors. The questions are in line with objective of marketing research which seeks to establish the best ways of marketing products and services to our customers. The questions that follow are set to determine and monitor the current market promotions and how to improve them. It also explores if they are effective for the business. Question 9 and question 10 helps the business know some of the products which should be stocked going by the market trends as well as producing feedback from the customer.

Here is Unit IV:
Sampling Design
The chosen sampling technique is purposive sampling. This sampling technique is non-probability type, meaning it does not rely on chance. It is mainly based on the judgment of the researcher based on the objectives of the study (Guarte & Barrios, 2006). In most cases, this sampling method is used when the target population is large and the researcher only needs certain identifiable characteristics. Purposive sampling will be advantageous for this study for many reasons. First, the time and cost constraints for the study will be eliminated because the participants can be quickly identified (Guarte & Barrios, 2006).
Secondly, in case some of the participants decide to abandon the study before it is done, new respondents can be easily identified as replacements. However, this sampling technique may result in biases as shall be outlined in this paper. Despite these biases, the sampling method has been identified as most suitable based on the main research objectives.
Research Objective
The research is meant to determine the perceptions of college students on online shopping platforms. Perception related surveys cover a great geographical area in order for the study to be qualified as viable. In most cases, there are characteristics of respondents to be captured, which usually require purposive sampling. Rather than leaving the sampling process to come up with a particular sample that may not be representative of the total population, the researcher is able to control this by varying the sampling parameters. Perception is also based on individual values, which are mostly influenced by their social affiliations. When such affiliations are known in advance, it is easy to pick individuals to represent them in the survey.
Population and Sampling Frame
All students in colleges form part of the population in this study. From the population, a good sample size should be obtained to ensure equal representation. The sample size also affects the credibility and viability of this study. Given that purposive sampling has been chosen for the study, the sample frame will be guided by the parameters already set by the researcher. The different parameters include age, gender, race and social class. From each category, an equal number of individuals will be chosen as study respondents.
Biases
Purposive sampling has its own biases, which are well noted by the researcher. First, there is a problem of over-representation in the case where the respondents arrived at do not actually represent all groups involved in online shopping. One group’s perception may be captured more than the others’. However, this bias will be eliminated through a thorough review of respondent representation before the study commences. Secondly, under-representation may also occur when respondents of particular groups decide to opt out of the study or do not submit responses in time.
However, this challenge will be solved through the identification of stand in respondents in case many initial ones opt out. Lastly, there is also a problem of generalization when making study conclusions (Guarte & Barrios, 2006). Given that perceptions are likely to change, the conclusions made on this particular study may not hold for long.
Conclusion
Assessing the perception of individuals will lead to the development of a suitable online shopping model. This model may be used by merchandisers to design their business units as well as their websites. Marketing of online products may also benefit from the study.\