In the last assessment, you were asked to prepare the first part of your analytics report by creating graphs and calculating some descriptive statistics. In this assessment, you will write your 5-8 page analytics report by interpreting those graphs and statistics, and explicitly connecting those interpretations to implications in the practical business context. The first step in creating meaningful information from raw data is to represent the data effectively in graphical format and to calculate any required statistics. The second step is interpreting and explaining those graphs and statistics in order to apply them in the business context. In the previous assessment, you were asked to create the first part of your analytics report by preparing graphs and calculating some descriptive statistics. In this assessment, you will complete your analytics report by interpreting those graphs and statistics, and connecting those interpretations explicitly to implications in the business context. In business and applied analytics, oftentimes you are interested in drawing conclusions about a population of interest. However, it may not be feasible or practical to gather data on the entire population. In those cases, data is gathered from a sample or subset of the population. Analyses done on the sample are then used to draw inferences regarding the overall population; this mathematic process is referred to as inferential statistics. In this assessment, we begin discussing the topics of sampling and drawing inferences. All the inferential statistical techniques and methods covered in this course are considered parametric techniques and require certain assumptions to be used and for the results to be reliable, many of which are assumptions about an underlying distribution. Nonparametric techniques require no assumption about underlying distributions and are often used when the assumptions of parametric techniques are not met. Although these are beyond the scope of this introductory course, they are a great option for additional reading and research. Analytics projects often result in two distinct types of reports or summaries: one tailored to the executive level, which takes the form of a presentation, and the other, a detailed analytics report, which documents an analysis so thoroughly that another analyst can reproduce the analysis exactly. Many times, the latter type is referred to by other departments or analysts wishing to conduct a similar analysis on similar data or by the same analyst who wants to repeat the analysis on a new or revised set of data. In this assessment, you will learn the essential elements that should be included in a report at this level of detail and you will create your own analytics report addressing the business problem you have been working on. Scenario The first step in creating meaningful information to develop a business report for decision making. The business report includes the analyzed raw data, effectively presents the analysis results in text and graphical format, as well as calculate any required statistics. The second step is interpreting and explaining the graphs and statistics to understand the impact in the practical business context. In the last assessment, you were asked to create the first part of your business analytics report by introducing a company, analyzing company stock data, developing graphs, and calculating some descriptive statistics. In this assessment, you will adjust your business report to minimize limitations of one year’s worth of data. You will use the same company for this assessment and you will use 5 years of data! You will also enhance your introduction or business context section of your business report based on your new graphs and your interpretation of the data graphs and descriptive statistics over a five year period. Your interpretation efforts of graphs and descriptive statistics will explicitly connect in the conclusion area. Conclusions and recommendations are the final effort in the development of a practical business report and should be supported by citations. Remember that opinion is not allowed. Your Role Your supervisor has asked you to prepare a report for the quarterly company meeting. The first part of the task was to download the data and create scatterplots and histograms, and to calculate mean, median, and mode of 5 years of stock prices for your report. Now you must analyze and interpret those graphical representations of the company stock and write the report of your findings and recommendations for your supervisor. You are an analyst using the same company and five years of stock data. Having accessed the company data and placed it in an appropriate graphical format, you must now use descriptive statistics and analysis to develop a report to inform business decisions. Instructions After reviewing and integrating your instructor’s feedback on your previous Assessment, complete the report as follows: For each graph you created, write at least one well supported paragraph interpreting the graph: What does that graph represent? What does the shape of the graph tell you about how the data have changed over time? For each statistic you calculated, include at least two to three well-supported sentences explaining what the statistic represents: What does the mean tell you? How do you know? What does it imply if the median is different from the mean? What does the standard deviation tell you about the volatility of the data? Write a new conclusions section in which you explain how these interpretations can be used in the company: What are some trends about which company leaders should be aware? How might the information you have provided be used in decision making in the company? What are other analysts indicating about the stock? Explicitly connect other analysts’ comments and recommendations to your interpretations to possible impact to the business context Lastly, should your company invest of partner with the company or stock being evaluated? Create a 5-8 page report containing: APA-formatted title page. 1-2 page introduction of your chosen company that you created in your previous assessment. Section labeled Graphical Representations of Data that includes the four graphs you created as well as your interpretations of the graphs. Section labeled Descriptive Statistics, with the statistics you calculated as well as your interpretations of the statistics. One-page conclusion in which you describe the potential business applications of the data and interpretations. APA-formatted references page (remember to cite the source of your financial data, analyst comments and support for your interpretations). Example Assessment: You may use the following to give you an idea of what a Proficient or higher rating on the scoring guide would look like: Assessment 3 Example [PDF].

USING QUALITY TOOLS: Welz Business Machines sells and services a variety of copiers, computers, and other office equipment. The company receives many calls daily for service, sales, accounting, and other departments. All calls are han- dled centrally by customer service representatives and routed to other individuals as appropriate. A number of customers complained about long waits when calling for service. A market research study found customers became irritated if the call was not answered within five rings. Scott Welz, the company president, authorized the customer service department manager, Tim Nagy, to study the problem and find a method to shorten the call-waiting time. Tim met with his service representatives who answered calls (Robin Coder, Raul Venegas, LaMarr Jones, Mark Staley, and Nancy Shipe) to attempt to determine the reasons for long waiting times. The following conver- sation ensued: Nagy: This is a serious problem. How a customer phone inquiry is answered is the first impression the customer receives from us. As you know, this company was founded on efficient and friendly service to all our customers. It’s obvious why customers have to wait: You’re on the phone with another customer. Can you think of any reasons that keep you on the phone for an unnecessarily long time? Coder: I’ve noticed quite often the person I need to route the call to is not present. It takes time to transfer the call and see if it is answered. If the person is not there, I end up apologizing and transferring the call to another extension.Nagy: You’re right, Robin. Sales personnel often are out of the office on sales calls, away on trips to preview new products, or away from their desks for a variety of reasons. What else might cause this problem? Venegas: I get irritated at customers who spend a great deal of time complaining about a problem I cannot do anything about except refer to someone else. Of course, I listen and sympathize with them, but this eats up a lot of time. Jones: Some customers call so often, they think we’re long-lost friends and strike up a personal conversation. Nagy: That’s not always a bad thing, you realize. Jones: Sure, but it delays my answering other calls. Shipe: It’s not always the customer’s fault. During lunch, we’re not all available to answer the phone. Venegas: Right after we open at 9 a.m., we get a rush of calls. I think many of the delays are caused by these peak periods. Coder: I’ve noticed the same thing between 4 and 5 p.m. Nagy: I’ve had a few comments from department man- agers who received calls that didn’t fall in their areas of responsibility and had to be transferred again. Staley: But that doesn’t cause delays at our end. Shipe: That’s right, Mark, but I just realized sometimes I simply don’t understand what the customer’s problem really is. I spend a lot of time trying to get him or her to explain it better. Often, I have to route it to someone because other calls are waiting. Venegas: Perhaps we need to have more knowledge of our products. Nagy: Well, I think we’ve covered most of the major reasons why many customers have to wait. It seems to me we have four major reasons: the phones are short-staffed, the receiving party is not present, the customer dominates the conversation, and you may not understand the customer’s problem. Next, we need to collect some information about these possible causes. Raul, can you and Mark set up a data collection sheet we can use to track some of these things? The next day, Venegas and Staley produced a sheet that enabled the staff to record the data. Over the next two weeks, the staff collected data on the frequency of reasons why some callers had to wait. The results are summarized as follows: Instructions: Form groups of three to five students and, based on the conversation between Nagy and his staff, Questions to be answered: ( a couple paragraphs each) 2. Perform a Pareto analysis of the data collected. 3. Develop some possible actions that the company might take to improve the situation.