Video and Resource memo

The assessment is very current, as students are encouraged to use any present-day news in the market from business publications. This requires students to do research and to relate course content to real life case studies of their own choosing. The students develop an important skill of producing concise deliverables, from a lot of research, and presenting their analysis in a clear structured final output. Students also enhance their team working skills. All these skills are relevant for life after graduation and for an understanding of Organisational Behaviour itself.

Using a multimedia output, the video, encourages student creativity as there is freedom in the format. The memo gives the opportunity to students to showcase their references and supportive information and research, providing more academic supporting materials alongside the video presentation.

Organisational Behaviour is a Core module of the MSc Management, delivered over a five-week period in the autumn term. The video and memo assessment sits with an additional 10% course participation grade, and the main course assessment, an individual `best-self’ assessment (worth 20%) and `practice plan’ (40%). 

The video and memo assessment prepared students well for other assessments in the module. They needed to have a deep understanding of the course material on the topic they were considering and applying to a particular organisation which gave them a very solid grounding for other assessments on that material (exam and related individual reflection questions).

Students are assigned to groups by the programme team. The coursework is discussed during the first lecture, as well as the deadline for groups to submit their topic and article on a shared excel spreadsheet agreed.

Some time is set aside in class to work with the students on the assessment, typically one session. The lecturer is then able to spend time with each group and answer questions, and provide guidance and advice. The lecturer gives the students an exercise in class focusing on a team process, and how they work as a team, and makes certain everyone is included – if there is any conflict, the team is able to share how the issues were resolved, etc.

There were no restrictions placed on what format the video could take, with the aim of giving students’ creative freedom. Videos were uploaded to the course Insendi page (the Business School virtual learning hub).

The purpose of the memo is to provide more analytical background information on the connection between the business and the Organisational Behaviour, allowing the video to be less formal. The students were told to see the video as something that could be presented to staff in an organisation, and the memo would be used by a manager when explaining the video to staff. The memo was limited to one A4 page in length (one-sided, 1.2 spacing and 12 point Arial Font), plus the article on which the analysis was based added as an appendix.

In this specific module, the marking has been done exclusively by the lecturer.  The video and memo assessment are worth 30% of the total module mark. Within the 30%, the assessment was marked as follows:

• Quality of analysis and recommendations 50%
• Research support 30%
• Clarity of structure  10%
• Visuals and Presentation Style 10%

This assessment could be run online, although it would be more difficult with the loss of in-person group meetings, and the loss of the in-person lecturer supervision session in the class time close to submission. However, the video content format is easily transferrable – people can easily watch the videos online and comment in an online course format.