All students enrolled in BUS 104: Introduction to Business will complete a group project focusing on career research, to identify a long-term career that one or more team members might be interested in pursuing.
Groups will be preassigned and all group members are expected to participate equally. Part of each students’ grade will be based on group member evaluations of each student.
Here’s what each group needs to do in order to be successful:
Contents
Personality Assessment
Each student will complete a free personality assessment on 16-Personalities and examine the options presented in the Careers portion of your assessment results. Students should meet with their group members to see if there are any career paths that are recommended for all members (or at least most members) of the group.
Group Meetings
Next, group members will set up regular meetings to divide up portions of the project, collaborate on the final paper and presentation slides, and prepare to deliver their presentation in class on November 17th.
Career Path Selection
- Based on the information gathered through individual personality assessments and/or insight from the brainstorming session, each group should:
- Identify a specific professional title/position many of the team members might want to work towards (can also be an entrepreneur);
- Based on the profession title(s)/position(s) identified conduct research to determine the following:
- General Job Description for the profession(s) selected;
- Requirements for the chosen profession(s);
- The job outlook for the profession(s) selected.
- The number of positions available in the U.S. and the median salary for this career.
- Suggested sites to research this information are:
- http://www.onetonline.org
- http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/statistics/occupations.htm
Students should submit their agreed upon career path as soon as possible to Professor Buckler at bbuckler@bmcc.cuny.edu. Each group must choose a different career path to explore, and options will be first-come, first-served, pending professor approval.
Group Paper
Once the team has collected this information, the team will collaborate to write and submit an essay of no more than three single-spaced pages in the following format:
First paragraph – Introduction
• Identify the career and state two important skills, two critical knowledge, and two major responsibilities one needs to be in this career.
• Why you are interested in this career.
• Limit this paragraph to no more than 5 sentences.
Second paragraph – Skills and knowledge
• Discuss why the skills identified in the first paragraph are important for this career.
• Discuss why the knowledge identified in the first paragraph is critical for this career.
• Limit this paragraph to between 4 to 6 sentences.
Third paragraph – Responsibility
• Discuss why the responsibilities identified in the first paragraph are its main responsibility.
• Are these responsibilities something that you are willing to do? Are these responsibilities something that you like to do?
• Limit this paragraph to between 4 to 8 sentences.
Fourth paragraph – Outlook for this career
• Is the number of positions increasing, decreasing, or stable in the future.
• What kind of living standard would someone have with this career? Is this living standard what you want from a career?
• Limit this paragraph to between 4 to 6 sentences.
Fifth paragraph – SWOT
Create a SWOT Analysis based on the template provided (see below). SWOT analysis is described in our textbook. You might consider this exercise as part of a marketing plan for your own career. The SWOT analysis should reflect your personal strengths and weaknesses and the opportunities and threats in the career area you have selected. Make a comparison between your current level of skills and knowledge with what is expected for this career. The paragraph should answer the following:
• Identify what you lack and how you might be able to close the gap. For example, is there an education requirement (like a bachelor’s degree) or is there a certification requirement (like an exam that one must pass)?
• Do you need to sharpen any skills or learn new skills to enter into this career?
• What is the employment outlook for this career?
• Limit this paragraph to no more than one page.
Sixth paragraph – Conclusion
• After the research, is this career still attractive to you?
• If you do not possess the level of education (or pass the needed certification), how are you planning to get it done?
• If you are pursuing this career, where might you be in this career in five or ten years?
• If you do not like this career anymore, what might be your backup plan?
• Limit this paragraph to about ½ a page.
Group Presentation
Groups will present in order of group number in our class on Wednesday, November 17th. Presentations must not exceed 20 minutes, and must include the following:
Group Project Presentation Content & Structure
• Identify the career to be discussed in the presentation (30 Seconds / 1 slide)
• Identify two (2) or more tracks for this career (1 minute / 1 slide)
• Discuss how this career help the organization (how they add value to the company) (about 6 minutes / less than 10 slides)
• Discuss the general outlook of this career. A SWOT analysis is recommended here. (about 2 minutes / less than 5 slides)
• Conclusion (who might you recommend working in this career?) (about 2 minutes / less than 2 slides)
Grading
More information about grading will be provided to students.
Groups
| Group 1 |
| Grisselle Diaz |
| Ana Pamias |
| Dayana Jean Louis |
| Alisson Guachichullca |
| Steven Branch |
| Group 2 |
| Sabrina Palamaru |
| Jamil Bello |
| Mohammed Hossain |
| Amauri Garraway |
| Tomas Herrera |
| Group 3 |
| Andres Saa |
| Eren Martinez |
| Maria Soriano |
| Mohammad Ullah |
| Antonio Sugirin |
| Group 4 |
| Olive Ivey |
| Antoniya Koleva-Canavan |
| Gabriel Goring |
| Ariel Bonifacio |
| Group 5 |
| Stacey Espinal |
| Amanda Jimenez |
| Irina Zheng |
| Omri Alvarez |
Peer & Self Evaluation
In order to receive full credit for this assignment, all students must submit a Peer & Self Evaluation document to assess group members’ efforts and to determine to what extent they contributed to the project.
There are two ways to access the template for this assignment:
- Students can click here to access the template in Google Docs. Click File > Make a Copy for an editable version.
- Click here download the template for Microsoft Word.
Please email your completed document to Professor Buckler at bbuckler@bmcc.cuny.edu by Sunday, November 21st at 11:59pm ET.
