Welcome! Croeso !

1. Welcome! Croeso! Your Librarians are: ElenWyn Davies Sam Oakley Michele Davies Rebecca Kelleher Marie Bevan buslib@swansea.ac.uk www.swansea.ac.uk/iss

2. Your MSc Part 2 assignments • A management consulting report • A new business plan What information will you need for these assignments? During this session we’ll look at reputable & scholarly sources of business information, using EBSCO Business Source Complete, ProQuest Business Collection , FAME and Mintel

3. The management consulting report: what will I need? • A company profile – to get an overview • Annual financial report – financial health • An industry report – state of the industry • Market research reports – consumer behaviour and trends • Commodity reports– forecasts on supply & demand & prices of crops and raw materials • Country profile – economic & political risks • Scholarly articles – **very important** • Latest news– ensure you’re up-to date

4. Format of the management consulting report • “The project should be in the format of a strategic management report, however, students should make full use of academic references.” • Page 3 & 4 of the MSc Management handbook • Referencing advice: on Library support for Business & Economics (Blackboard)

5. Business plan for a new business venture • Similar information sources as the Management Consulting report EXCEPT • Focus is on a new venture • The business ideas need to be grounded in research (your own investigations, plus information from industry and market research reports and scholarly articles). • Need ideas? Try Mintel Inspire (more later)

6. Format of the Business Plan • Page 7 of the MSc Management handbook • Examples of business plans on ProQuest Business Collection

7. Tools to find business information • Google? Why not? • iFind Research – gateway to specialist business sources, such as: • EBSCO Business Source Complete • ProQuest Business Collection • Mintel (for market research reports and data) • FAME UK (financial company information) • Nexis – global business news • IBIS and Euromonitor Passport (on trial)

8. What is Athens? • Athens is a username/password system so that Swansea University users can access the online books, journals and databases which we subscribe to. • Username – 123456@swansea.ac.uk • Password – your usual password (for email) • IMPORTANT – set the ATHENS cookie first here on your PC, laptop and mobile devices.

9. Search for a company profile • EBSCO Business Sources Complete • I’m going to search for the British chocolate confectionary company Thorntons.....

10. Search for a company profile • Go to EBSCO Business Sources Complete • Search for the Chinese multinational company LENOVO. • Using the section on SWOT analysis, name one of the “threats” to Lenovo’s success. • 2 minutes

11. Search for an industry profile EBSCO Business Source Complete, I’m going to search for an industry profile on the chocolate industry....

12. Search for an industry profile In EBSCO Business Source Complete, search for an industry profile on: The global consumer electronics industry

13. Effective search tips for searching for journal articles • Don’t just dive into a database and type in the first words which come into your head. • Plan. • Break down your complicated research topic into concepts. • Think of other search terms which mean the same thing

14. A Search Strategy Topic: Strategic planning for growth in chocolate manufacturing companies

15. A Search Strategy

16. Boolean Operators

17. Phrase searching: use “quotation marks” “strategic planning” “SWOT analysis” “chocolate confectionary industry”

18. Truncation: use * on the root of a word Strateg* Strategic Strategy Strategically

19. Wildcard: use ? in the middle of a word to replace one or more letters Examples Wom?n woman, women Organi?ation organisation, organization Behavio?rbehavior, behaviour

20. Search for scholarly articles on EBSCO Chocolate OR confectionary AND growth OR diversification OR innovation OR expansion AND planning OR strateg*

21. Search for scholarly articles on “innovation management” AND “electronic industries” Limit to Full-Text Scholarly articles published over the last 10 years.

22. Company finance • Database: FAME (Financial Analysis Made Easy) • UK & Ireland – all companies, large and small • 10 years of company financial reports as filed at Companies House. My search: Thorntons

23. Company finance Go into the FAME database and search for Lenovo UK Ltd. Look at the standard report – how many employees? Look at the peer group (bar chart format).

24. Market Research Mintel Oxygen – market research reports • Market : size, share, environment, competition • Consumer behaviour: ownership, purchasing, usage • Brands: leading companies and products My search: chocolate

25. Market Research Mintel Oxygen – market research reports Search on : computer tablets Take a look at the Executive summary of the Desktop, laptop and tablet computers report – which European country leads on mobile broadband penetration?

26. Other types of reports See your handout for help searching for: Country reports – economic overview of a country Commodity reports – forecasts on supply and demand and prices for key commodities (raw materials and foodstuffs)

27. Need help? Just ask! Appointments & questions – email buslib@swansea.ac.uk Guides, links and tutorials on Blackboard subject support for Business & Economics

28. Need help? Just ask! Appointments available:buslib@swansea.ac.uk /swanuni.iss @swanuni_iss http://buseconlib.wordpress.com/