GSBS6002

Foundations of Business Analysis

Trimester 2, 2019
Assignment 2
Weight: 35%
Total Marks: 100

Submission instructions:
1. Maximum word length: 3000 words (excluding references, tables and figures).
2. Submit a soft copy in Word format via Turnitin (with an assignment cover sheet).
3. Assignments submitted by other means (e.g. email) or forms (scanned copy, Excel docu-
ment) will attract no marks.

Late submissions: The mark for an assessment item submitted after the designated time on
the due date, without an approved extension of time, will be reduced by 10% of the possible
maximum mark for that assessment item for each day or part day that the assessment item is
late. Note: this applies equally to week and weekend days.

Hypothetical Case Study – Air New Zealand

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Faced with the growing concern about climate change, Air New Zealand (ANZ) is commit-
ted to its corporate social responsibility and has developed programs aiming to stablise its
carbon (greenhouse gas) emissions by 2020. FlyNetural is one of these programs that in-
volves encouraging ANZ passengers to minimise the impact of their air travel associated
with ANZ on the environment by donating to the FlyNeutral program. The donation is then
used to support projects that help absorb and reduce greenhouse gas emissions primarily
from sources, such as air and other forms of transport, energy production, agriculture and
a range of other industrial and development activities. ANZ recently conducted a review of
the program and identified a problem- the FlyNeutral program was not performing effective
enough to meet ANZ’s pre-set target for 2020 and there was a lack of support from its
passengers to donate to the program. To address this business problem, research was con-
ducted to collect data and provide recommendations for improving the effectiveness of
FlyNeutral and encourage more support from its passengers. A survey was developed in
order to collect data that target the following five research questions to allow the researcher
to make appropriate recommendations:

1. Research Question 1: What is ANZ passengers’ belief about:

a. The impact of climate change

b. The contribution of their air travel to climate change

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a. Their responsibility for minimising the impact of their air travel on climate
change

b. The effectiveness of carbon offset programs in reducing greenhouse gases

in the air.

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2. Research Question 2: What is the intention of ANZ passengers to compensate the
impact of their air travel by donating to FlyNeutral?

2. Research Question 3: Does a significant relationship exist between passengers’ in-

tention to donate to FlyNeutral and any of the following beliefs (the same set of
beliefs in Research Question 1)?

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 a. The impact of climate change

b. The contribution of their air travel to climate change

c. Their responsibility for minimising the impact of their air travel on climate
change

d. The effectiveness of carbon offset programs in reducing greenhouse gases

in the air.

3. Research Question 4: Does intention to donate to FlyNeutral differ between passen-

gers who differ in their gender identity?

4. Research Question 5: Does intention to donate to FlyNeutral differ between passen-

gers who differ in their level of education?

The survey was implemented online to a random sample 1,500 ANZ passengers who travelled
with ANZ during the past 12 months. A voucher that could be used to purchase an in-flight
drink was provided as an incentive to encourage participation. Overall, 515 passengers com-
pleted all the onlne survey questions. Responses were recorded in the SPSS data file, “Air New
Zealand, 2019.sav”, and Excel spreadsheet, “Air New Zealand, 2019.xlsx.” The data sets are
available in the folder of Assignment 2 on Blackboard. The questions included in the online
survey are provided in the next page.

Required:

Write a data analysis report that provides the results to each of the five research questions
presented above. Moreover, you will make recommendations to the executive team of Air New
Zealand to inform them of the strategies the company can adopt to encourage more support
from its passengers so that it can meet it carbon reduction target by 2020.

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 Survey on Air New Zealand’s Carbon Offset Program, FlyNeutral

Section 1: Your Belief in Climate Change, Air Travel, and FlyNeutral

Strongly
Nei- agree
Please indicate the extent to which ther
Strongly Dis- agree
you agree or disagree with the fol- agr nor Agree
disagree ee
lowing statements. disa-
gree

Q1. The threat of climate change is

imminent 1 2 3 4 5

Q2. Air travel significantly contrib-

utes to climate change 1 2 3 4 5

Q3. Airline passengers are responsi-

ble for offsetting the greenhouse gas
emissions associated with their 1 2 3 4 5
travel

Q4. Carbon offset programs such as

FlyNeutral can significantly reduce 1 2 3 4 5
greenhouse gases in the air

Section 2: Your Intention to Support FlyNeutral

Very
Nei- likely
ther
Please indicate how likely you are to per- Very likely
un- Un- Likely
form the following action. likely nor
likely un-
likely

Q5. I will make a donation to compensate

the greenhouse gas emissions associated
with my air travel with Air New Zealand 1 2 3 4 5
via FlyNeutral in my next trip

Part 3: Personal information (The value next to each response category is representative of
the category and the value recorded in the data files. For example, 1 represents male and 2
represents female for the variable, gender.)

Please complete the following information about yourself.

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Q6. What is your gender identity?

Male (1) Female (2)

Q7. What is your highest level of formal education?

Secondary education or below (1)

Vocational education (2)
University education (3)

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 Report Structure

Executive Summary
This section should provide a brief overview of the data analysis report. You should summarise
the subject matter, the method of analysis, the findings and recommendations and any limita-
tions of the report. It is suggested that the Executive Summary is the last section that you write.

Introduction
Provide a brief background to the case to put your analysis in context. Provide a discussion of
the research objectives that inform your analysis.

Research Design
Discuss the data collection process and the sampling procedures that were applied. In this sec-
tion you should also outline the ethical considerations that would have been taken into account
when collecting data from this survey and reporting your results. This section should include
references from at least three credible sources, such as textbooks or journal articles.

Hypothesis Development
You need to develop hypothesis linked to each of the five research questions on page 2 and 3.
You should mention the question first and then write corresponding null and alternate hypoth-
eses.
For example:
Research Question: Are female and male customers different in their trust in Airbnb?
Null hypothesis (H0): There is no significant difference between female and male customers
in their trust in Airbnb.
Alternate hypothesis (HA): There is a significant difference between female and male custom-
ers in their trust in Airbnb.

Statistical Technique and Justification

You should categorically mention which statistical technique is used to test a hypothesis. Suf-
ficient justification should be provided for choosing a statistical technique informed by lecture
content. You should mention whether you are comparing the means or measuring the degree
of relationship between/among the relevant variables. Use and cite the textbook and/or other
credible academic references to guide the development of this section.

Results, and Statistical and non-statistical Interpretation

In this section, you should present your empirical results and then provide statistical and non-
statistical interpretation of the results.

For example:

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Table 1 presents an example of an independent-samples t-test to test the research question-
“Does a gender difference exists in trust in Airbnb’s effort in preparing its hosts ready for
welcoming guests to their home?”, and associated null hypothesis — “there is no difference”–
and alternative hypothesis— “there is a difference”— based on the significance level (α) of
0.05

Table 1: Independent-samples t-test (α = 0.05) (SPSS)

Group Statistics

Std. Devia-
Gender N Mean tion Std. Error Mean
Trust in Get- Female 15 2.93 .961 .248
ting Host
Ready Male 17 3.06 .899 .218

Independent Samples Test

Levene's Test
for Equality
of Variances t-test for Equality of Means

95% Confidence
Interval of the Dif-
Sig. Mean Std. Er- ference
(2- Differ- ror Dif-
F Sig. t df tailed) ence ference Lower Upper

Equal vari- .026 .872 -.381 30 .706 -.125 .329 -.797 .546
Trust in ances as-
Getting sumed
Host Equal vari- -.380 28.896 .707 -.125 .330 -.801 .550
Ready ances not as-
sumed

Table 1: Independent-samples t-test (α = 0.05) (Excel)

t-Test: Two-Sample Assuming Equal Vari-

Male Female
ances

Mean 2.933333333 3.058823529

Variance 0.923809524 0.808823529

Observations 15 17

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 Pooled Variance 0.86248366

Hypothesized Mean Difference 0

df 30

t Stat -0.38144283

P(T<=t) one-tail 0.352781501

t Critical one-tail 1.697260887

P(T<=t) two-tail 0.705563001

t Critical two-tail 2.042272456

Statistical interpretation:
Table 1 shows that there is a minor difference between the mean value of male respondents
(Mean = 2.93) and female respondents (Mean = 3.06). To determine whether the difference is
significant, we look at the computed t-value (-.381), assuming equal variances, which is less
than the critical t-value (2.04) associated with df = 30 and α = 0.05. Moreover, the computed
p-value is 0.706 which is larger than α = 0.05. Thus, we cannot reject that null hypothesis that
there is no difference between male and female respondents in terms of their trust in Airbnb’s
effort in getting hosts ready for welcoming guests at the significance level of 5%.

Non-statistical interpretation:
The difference between male (Mean = 2.93) and female (Mean = 3.06) online consumers in
terms of their trust in Airbnb’s effort in getting hosts ready for welcoming guests (Mean Dif-
ference = 3.06 - 2.93 = 0.13) is small and statistically insignificant.

Discussion and Conclusion

Synthesise and discuss the hypothesis test results as they relate to the four key research ques-
tions stated in Page 2 and Page 3.

Report a summary of your key findings and the conclusions that can be derived from this anal-
ysis.

Recommendations

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Provide recommendations to Air New Zealand. Each recommendation should be linked to one
of your key findings presented in the previous section. Bullet points can be used for the recom-
mendations.

References

You are encouraged to use academic sources to inform your development of the report.
American Psychological Association (APA) 6th Edition of referencing style should be fol-
lowed. You can find helpful examples of APA 6th ed here, http://libguides.newcas-
tle.edu.au/apa-6th. Example:

Zikmund, W. G., Babin, B. J., Carr, J. C., & Griffin, M. (2013). Business research methods
(9th ed.). Mason, OH: South-Western.

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