ACCT7020 INTERMEDIATE FINANCIAL
REPORTING RESEARCH PROJECT 2024, S1
As part of your Masters degree you are required to undertake a research project which is embedded across the three core financial accounting courses. This second part follows on from your project in Accounting Concepts and Methods and will inform. your project in Advanced Financial Accounting.
PERCENTAGE WEIGHTING: 20%
OBJECTIVE
The objective of the research project is to familiarise yourself with your allocated company, the general content of an annual report, accounting policies and some specific disclosure notes and the Australian Accounting Standards.
After you have submitted this assignment you should be:
• Familiar with the contents of annual reports from more than one industry
• Able to locate, read and interpret financial information and associated disclosure notes
• Able to read and interpret a selection of Australian Accounting Standards
• Able to compare and contrast accounting policy choices and suggest reasons for such choices.
• Able to communicate your findings in a business-like manner
While many assignments are designed to test your knowledge this assignment is designed to help you develop your understanding of the course content and important workplace skills. Therefore you should approach this as ‘not just another thing I have to do’, but instead as a valuable opportunity to develop knowledge and skills which will help you to not only pass the final exam but also help you in your professional career.
You will develop the following skills:
Technical skills:
T1. Apply accounting knowledge and skills to new situations and emerging issues in accounting practice
T2. Analyse complex business issues/problems using relevant theories, concepts and models
T3. Integrate theoretical and technical knowledge to solve accounting and business problems
T4. Exercise judgement in making decisions in diverse contexts (local and/or global)
Research skills:
R1. Demonstrate critical thinking when evaluating solutions to complex accounting issues/problems
R2. Use environmental and organisational information to diagnose complex accounting and business problems
R3. Apply research principles and skills in planning and executing a research-based project to investigate an accounting issue or problem
R4. Find, collate, analyse and present relevant technical information
Generic skills:
G 1. Communicate accounting information in writing, using various business formats
G2. Present information using appropriate technology
G3. Self-awareness and emotional intelligence.
This project will help you to gain the following University Graduate Attributes in particular:
• Deep discipline knowledge
• Critical thinking and problem solving
• Teamwork and communication skills
• Self-awareness and emotional intelligence
SUBMISSION
Ensure each team members ’ name and student ID number is clearly stated on the first page of your document. A cover sheet is provided as a Word doc. Use this as your first page.
Save your Word document as a pdf before submitting (ifyou don’t know how to save as a pdf do some research - google “saving word doc as a pdf). The advantage of saving as a pdf is that your document will look the same on most computers. You should check your pdf file to ensure that the page breaks, headings, any images etc. are where you expect them to be and if not fix it before you submit. It is your responsibility to present a professional looking document and you are graded on presentation.
You will submit one pdf document per team via the assignment submission function on MyUni. Any team member can submit the document. MyUni will handle who is in the team and who this assignment belongs to. Please ensure that your name and student ID numbers are on the first page as this serves as a double check that we have the correct assignment for each of you.
IMPORTANT: The research project is designed to consolidate your understanding of the material we have covered. It is an important part of the learning and understanding process. Doing this diligently will certainly help you get better results in the exam and there may also be an exam question relating to this research project.
GENERAL REQUIREMENTS FOR THE RESEARCH PROJECT
1. You are responsible for this assignment as a team, not as individuals for separate sections. All
team members should review the whole project before submission. Please make sure each section in your team assignment is structured consistently. When you provide useful information to users (readers), it is important to make sure the information that you provide is relevant and faithfully represented. The usefulness of the information can be enhanced by the qualitative characteristics such as comparability and understandability. Content in the research project may be assessed in the final exam.
2. When reviewing your team submission, please consider the following specific points:
a. Content: Ensure that the content is complete and succinct. This means that everything that is relevant should be included and the main points should be highlighted or summarised. It also means that there should not be any superfluous or irrelevant information and no duplication.
b. Grammar and Style. Reduce as many grammatical or language mistakes as you can. Run a spell and grammar check. Everyone in the team should proofread the final document.
c. Presentation: Ensure that the presentation is coherent, neat and professional. For example, do not use different fonts or different types of headings and colours. Make sure that the document reads well and check it again after converting it to pdf format to ensure it is still formatted how you intended.
3. Word limit
Maximum of 15 pages not including the cover sheet,table of contents, and bibliography
4. The assignment should be submitted before 6:00 pm, Sunday, 25 May 2025. Late submissions will be penalized with a 25% deduction for each day of delay.