Assignment Brief Assignment title: Innovation Proposal (UoN Students Only) Weighting: 30% Purpose of the Assessment The purpose of this assignment is to write a concise report, identifying a ‘new venture’ opportunity and proposing an ‘innovative solution’, justifying and explaining the proposal. Assessment Task This is an individual assignment, resulting in a report of 1500 words (excluding appendices). You are required to identify an opportunity which would be suitable for a New Venture, and create a proposal (report), explaining and justifying your thinking concerning exploiting the opportunity. The proposed New Venture can take the form of: a new business; a social enterprise or project; a new product or service; or improvements to an existing business, product or service. Your proposal must be in the context of the degree subject which you are studying (e.g. HRM, Tourism, Economics; Business, etc). In other words, your innovation should be linked to your intended future career. Produce a 1500 word report with a max of 3 appendices to address the following elements: Identify the opportunity Identify why it would be a good opportunity for an entrepreneur starting a new venture Explain the ‘market’ which would be addressed Conduct secondary research to investigate the validity of the proposal and any competitors Consider the problems which could arise in developing the concept Reflect on the process you went through finding and developing an idea – consider the creative process involved. This should be in Business English with care taken with punctuation, spelling and presentation. The report style and quality should be appropriate for presentation to a professional manager. Note that appendices should be used to provide supporting research and information. A maximum of three brief appendices are allowed, each no more than 2 sides. Appendices will not contribute to the grade. Assessment Breakdown The report will be graded using standard university procedures and requirements. It will be graded equally on five criteria: 1.Identification and justification of opportunity (incl. evidence of background research) 2.Feasibility of the proposal, in practical and commercial terms (incl. ‘proof of market’, competitors) 3.Identification of critical success factors essential to developing the proposal (the operational and managerial challenges that will need to be overcome) 4.Evidence of creativity and innovation in developing the proposal (incl. explicit commentary concerning personal reflections on the process) 5.Correct use of report format, together with Harvard referencing of all sources of information. Assessment Submission . Assessment Guidance This is not a full business plan. It is a proposal … in essence, a feasibility study. In the early stages of preparing the assignment, you should focus on being alert to opportunities. Ideally, you can identify several opportunities, and start to identify which has the most potential. You should base all your justifications on research, using industry and consumer data where appropriate. Once you start to create your ‘solution’ (new venture), you should comparing your proposal with existing competitors / products and utilise your creativity to innovate. Explain exactly why you think your new venture will succeed in its market. Also, identify any major barriers to success and show consideration of how these barriers could be overcome. Finally, include a short reflective analysis of the creative process you have just completed. 1500 words are not many to do this assignment. Use bullet points, tables and visual representations to optimise the impact of the report. Present the key research findings in the body of the report, utilising appendices to show further detail / data. You may want to relate your findings to ‘academic’ models or theories, although that isn’t the main focus of this assignment. Remember that you should write the report entirely in your own words … be wary of any ‘cut and paste’, as TurnItIn will expose your plagiarism.