Introduction to Business Analytics

This is Module 1 of 10 of the Business Analytics course.

Readings

Self-Directed Learning

The readings above hopefully have given you a basic introduction to data analytics and its important role in business. To continue your own learning about business analytics, search the internet for articles, other resources, and examples related to business analytics. See what you can learn from what others are saying about this new and important field.

Below are two lists of prompts related to the module topic and exercises. Use these to help guide your learning process. There is a place in the module exercises for you to share your responses.

Discussion of Module Topic

Write down your thoughts and experiences while you’re learning. This is a helpful practice for processing new information and building on what you’ve learned. It’s also a way for other students to learn from you and for you to learn from other students. Here are some prompts to get you started for writing about the module topic:

Try to define and explain business analytics in your own words.
Provide links to any useful and relevant resources that you find on the internet.
We have all used data analytics at some level. Can you think of any personal examples?
You may already have some experience related to business analytics. Please share.
What do you find interesting or exciting about business analytics?
Do you have any concerns about how personal data is used?
Provide a personal example of how you as a customer have received a service based on data analytics.

Discussion of Module Exercises

Writing about a technical exercise can help you process what you’re learning and where you’re running into issues. Doing so in an online course discussion forum also allows you to share your experience and learn from other students. As you’re working on the module exercises below, here are some prompts to get you started for writing about it:

Have you ever used Excel before? Write about your experience.
If you are relatively new to using Excel, what was it like getting started? Any questions come up?
Describe any features of Excel that you discover as you’re exploring it.
Does your mind start to imagine any possible uses for Excel that you would like to explore further?

Module Exercises

We will be working in the cloud-based Office 365. As a student, you can log in to your Office account using your student email through office.com. Once you’ve logged in, you will see the list of applications on the left side.

We will be using Microsoft Teams as our collaboration app for this course. Teams is used widely in business, so the use of Teams in this course will help you prepare for digital collaboration in the workforce. Since COVID emerged, digital collaboration has become even more essential to productivity.

Step 1. Click on the Microsoft Teams app from the list of applications. From there, click on “Join or create team.” Under “Join a team with a code” enter the Teams code provided in the course syllabus.

Step 2. Once you’ve joined the course Team, click on the Team icon to see the team landing page. Under “Channels,” you will see a channel for Module 1 that begins with “M1.” Click on this channel. Across the top banner, you will see three tabs for “Posts”, “Files”, and “Notes.”

Step 3. Click on the Posts tab for the Module 1 channel. This is where we will share ideas and questions as a class for Module 1. On this tab, you should be able to see any posts already made by other students or the professor. Posts is our communication hub for the module. Read through the posts and notice that each post can include a thread of comments and responses, just like in social media. When you read something interesting, click on the “Reply” button and add your own comment or question for the person who made the post. Once you’ve read and replied to other posts, you should add your own post by clicking on “New conversation.” For your post, you could share some thoughts from the lists above about the Discussion of Module Topic or Discussion of Module Exercises. The posts do not need to be very long. You should post more lengthy thoughts and links to resources in the Notes tab referenced in Step 6 below.

Step 4. Click on the Files tab for the Module 1 channel. This is where we will share files and collaborate on files as a class for Module 1. On this tab, you should be able to see any files already shared by other students or the professor.

We will be using Microsoft Excel as our spreadsheet app in this course. It is a good idea to get familiar with it now whether this is your first time using it or you’re an experienced user.

Step 5. Click on the “M1 BUS102 Exercises.xlsx” file under the Files tab. The first worksheet is the “ReadMe” worksheet. Look to see what information is there about the contents of the workbook. You should look through the worksheets that other students have added and check out the work that they have done. You can add something – either a comment or additional work – to an existing worksheet or you can add a worksheet of your own. For this module, just try experimenting. Play around with some of the features and explore what Excel has to offer. If you’ve used Excel before and have something you could copy into the workbook for others to see, that would be great. If you’re new, just try adding some numbers and some text or whatever else comes to mind. If you’ve created cool Excel workbooks previously for work or school that are shareable, you could also upload entire Excel files under the Files tab. Make sure to add something about the uploaded workbook on the ReadMe worksheet of the main workbook.

We will be using Microsoft OneNote as our note-taking app in this course. The main purpose is to collect and share resources that we are learning about together in the module. Microsoft Teams is connected to a Class Notebook. If you like, you can go access the entire notebook using the Class Notebook link on the Teams page for the course.

Step 6. Click on the Notes tab for the Module 1 channel. This is where we will share notes and resources as a class for Module 1. Within the Notes pane, there is a lefthand bar with an icon that looks like books on a bookshelf. Click on this icon. This will show you that there are at least two pages associated with the module. The original pages are labeled “Business Analytics” and “Excel.” If you click on the page label in the column of page names, it will open the notes page in the main part of the window. This is where you can post lengthier thoughts and resources related to the Discussion of Module Topic or Discussion of Module Exercises. You can also add your own pages if you think there is a category that would be important for class collaboration.

Step 7. Under the Files tab, click on the “M1 BUS102 Sessions.xlsx” file. This spreadsheet has slots where students can add their name to volunteer for different parts in the sessions. You can volunteer to open/close the session, introduce yourself, lead a discussion, make a presentation, or lead a workshop. The course sessions are designed for students to take leadership roles and learn from one another. For instance, presentations can be created using PowerPoint under the Files tab of Teams. Slots can also be filled by groups rather than individuals. For groups that want to work together, students can create a channel in the course that only includes the team members. A group channel has the same functionality of Posts, Files, and Notes. A file can be created by a group in their own group channel and then moved over to the module channel to share with the class.