Prof Xavier - Team Paper, Chart or Graph (Satistics Class) wk3

Data Collection Paper

Team A

QNT/351

October 9, 2014

BIMBS is a support company that specializes in providing housekeeping and foodservice to corporations and institutions. The company typically experiences and annual turnover rate of 55 to 60% which is common for the industry. For the past 4 months BIMS rate has climbed to over 64%. Barbara Tucker, general manager for BIMS, department heads and supervisors are highly concerned about the staff’s morale and work ethics. Employees seem not very interested in working and the use of sick time has increased. There has been an increase in complaints from hospital administration regarding poor work. (BIMS 2014)

There has been an agreement between Barbara and her division managers to survey the employees in an attempt to identify the root cause of the decrease in morale and to possibly identify the cause of higher turnover rate. The Learning Team will act as a consulting group to analyze the data in the case study and present research questions and hypothesis to hopefully identify a solution to the current situation of the company.

In order to attain the research objectives in the case study, data collection methodologies have been used. The data collection methods applied in this case is aimed at collecting information from the respondents, where such information will be useful in making the findings for the study. Surveys are the main data collection tools used in the BIMS case study. A survey acts as a tool for ensuring consistent implementation of a scientific mode of obtaining data from the man respondents in the study (Hall, 2008). The instrument is complemented by questionnaire data collection tools. The questionnaire used in the case study presents a standard collection of questions that result in standard response options for the respondents and the researcher thereof. The survey instrument has questions that are relevant to the study objectives and is thus, used in collecting demographic information that will be used in calculating survey weights.

The BIMS case study leads to the collection of both quantitative, as well as qualitative data. Quantitative data involves data that is measurable and quantifiable, whereas qualitative data is not measurable in numerical forms. Quantitative data included shift hours, as well as level of compensation (BIMS, 2014). Such data was collected by asking the respondents to quantify their views according to the quantifiable aspects of shift hours and levels of compensation. Additionally, qualitative data was collected through the expression of the respondents views on such qualitative aspects as working conditions, quality of training, fair treatment, job security, as well as internal company communications. The quantitative and qualitative data collected during the study will be used for computing the frequency and descriptive techniques respectively.

The BIMS employee survey used three levels of measurement to determine the relationship among the values to the attributes. The values in 1, 2, 3,4,5,6,7,8,9 and 10 of the employee survey use the ordinal measurement. The attributes are ranked in a scale of 1-5, 1 meaning "Very negative" and 5 meaning "very positive". The values in A, C and D use nominal measurements to express the attributes. The numerical values do not represent any particular order of ranking. The values in B use ratio measurement to express its attributes. There is an absolute zero that has a meaning. Meaningful fractions can be constructed with a ratio variable.

The data collected from the survey has been coded using numerical codes for the variables using represented by numerical values. The values assigned to all the attributes being tested are simply short codes for the longer text terms of the attributes. For the purpose of this research, the numerical values 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 have been assigned arbitrarily to the values in 1-10. This part of the survey determines the views of the employees (1 meaning "very negative" and 5 meaning "very positive") about fair treatment, level of compensation, working conditions, quality of training etc. The variables A, C and D collected the demographics of the employees and were coded in no particular order. The values in B also collected demographics and was coded using the number of years and months that the respondents had worked

When collecting data, it is important to make sure that all data is inputted properly and accurately. As mentioned in the Ballard Integrated Managed Services exercise, Sally the office support staff member in charge made a choice to use the number zero in place were people did not answer and had a bad habit of mistyping the number six instead of five. These examples are ways of how inaccurate data input errors can affect the outcome of the BIMS employee survey. Cleaning up the data by preventing the input errors will help the company make good choices on making recommendations to ensure that their employees are satisfied and have all the tools they need to help themselves and the company be profitable and successful.

In performing the BIMS employee survey in an accurate and efficient way, the company can benefit from the results. All employees will feel as if the company has given them the opportunity to voice their opinions and make recommendations. Like any survey, this form may seem as generic or vague but it will be a start to possibly opportunities that the employees may have been looking for. There can also be a possibility that an outsourced company to ensure that all the information is used correctly without mistakes can perform an audit of the information. As a team, we suggest general manager Barbara Tucker encourages employees to give accurate surveys by possibly offering an incentive for those employees that cooperate with the survey in cash or movie tickets. Forms of incentives have proven to work towards employees because after all, when employees perform a survey properly the company will collect accurate data thus allowing them to make changes and fix problems that their workforce may face on a daily basis.

References

BIMS. (2014). Ballard Integrated Managed Services, Inc., Part 1. Phoenix: University of Phoenix.

Hall, R. (2008). Applied Social Research: Planning, Designing and Conducting Real-world Research. New York: Macmillan Education AU.