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BUS 305 Course Guide: Library Research Guide

Introduction

Use this guide as a springboard for doing the research for your Individual Final Project in the BUS 305 course on Management Information Systems.

When choosing a company to research, be sure to verify that it has 10 years of financial data in the Morningstar database below.  This ensures that your company has been publicly traded for the past decade, meaning that annual reports and financial data will be available.

To track the sources you find on your company during the librarian's visit, make a copy of this Paper Trail document and fill it out.

Industry Research

Use these library databases to research Section e of your paper (Current State of the Industry).

Company SWOT Analyses

Use these reports to research Section f of your paper (Company Introduction).

Annual Reports

Visit your company's website and look for the corporate information or investor's webpage, where its Annual Reports are published. These present the company's perspective on the year's activities and performance.

Look through the company's most recent 2-3 reports for information about its technology, systems, or privacy.  You can use Ctrl-F to search for words like these in the reports, which are often lengthy.

Also be sure to look for other useful reports on the website, such as their Privacy Policy.

Articles from Magazines and Trade Publications

Use these library databases to find articles containing information about your company's technology, systems, and privacy issues, which can be used in section f of your paper.

Article Search Tips

When searching Business Source Premier for articles, keep these tips in mind:

  1. Use AND and OR to connect keywords: e.g., Nike AND (security OR privacy OR cybersecurity)
  2. In your search results, limit to the last five years
  3. In your search results, limit the Source Type to Magazines or Trade Publications (which are industry-specific magazines)
  4. When viewing an article, click Cite to create a properly styled citation, or Permalink for a persistent URL back to the article
  5. If the full text isn't available, click Check for Full Text, and if necessary, request the article from another library

Financial Data

Use this data to complete the analysis for Section f-iv of your paper (Financial Data Analysis).

Business Librarian

Profile Photo
Jeff Waller
Contact:
jhwaller@meredith.edu
109 Carlyle Campbell Library
919-760-8382

Citation Help

To cite articles found in Business Source Premier, use the Cite tool inside the database to generate a citation in your chosen style.

Here are examples of APA-style citations for other resources used in this project.  You can use these as models for your own:

IBISWorld Industry Report
Daly, J. (2021, July). Pharmacies and Drug Stores in the US. IBISWorld Industry Reports. https://my-ibisworld-com.proxy108.nclive.org/us/en/industry/44611/about

MarketLine Industry Profile
MarketLine (2021, October). Hotels and Motels in the United States. MarketLine Industry Profiles.  Business Source Premier. https://login.proxy108.nclive.org/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=buh&AN=153730348&site=bsi-live

Company Annual Report
Pfizer Inc. (2021). Annual Report on Form 10-K. https://investors.pfizer.com/Investors/Financials/Annual-Reports/default.aspx

Morningstar Financial Data
Morningstar. (2021). Ford Motor Co.: Income Statements [Data set]. Morningstar Investment Research Center. https://login.proxy108.nclive.org/login?url=https://www.nclive.org/cgi-bin/nclsm?rsrc=220