NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF BUSINESS MANAGEMENT

Advanced Diploma in Business Management 20.1P

Business Analytics
Question 01

a) Define the following terms:

i. Population
 Population means a finite or infinite collection of items under consideration. This may
usually refer to people, events, objects, etc. In other words population can be an
aggregate observation of subjects grouped together by a common feature.

ii. Descriptive Statistics

 Descriptive statistics is a set of brief descriptive coefficients that summarize a given
data set representatives of an entire or sample population. Basically these are used to
provide basic information about variables in a dataset and to highlight potential
relationship between variables.

iii. Inferential Statistics

 Inferential Statistics is a set of statistical methods and techniques for inferring the
characteristics of a population when only a sample is given. Hypothesis testing,
correlation testing and regression analysis all fall under this category.

b) Every year the Department of Census in Sri Lanka conduct research to release the
population and housing report based on a survey of 5000 house-holds. The goal of
this research is to learn the demographic characteristic of all households within Sri
Lanka.

i. Classify the above research as descriptive or inferential. Justify your answer.

 This research is inferential.
 Since the Department of Census in Sri Lanka make inferences from the sample of 5000
house-holds and generalize them to the population and try to make conclusions about the
population that is beyond the data available, this research is inferential.

ii. Identify the population and the sample.

 Population – All households within Sri Lanka
 Sample – 5000 house-holds
c) Define the following terms:
i. Qualitative ordinal variable
 These are the variables with an ordered series. (E.g.: Blood group, Performance, etc.)

ii. Qualitative nominal variable

 These are the variables with no inherent order or ranking sequence. (E.g.: Gender,
Race, etc.)

iii. Quantitative continuous variable

 Continuous variables can be measured on a continuum or scale and these variables
can have almost any numeric value which can be meaningfully subdivided into finer
and finer increments. (E.g.: Length, Size, Width, etc.)

iv. Quantitative discrete variable

 These variables are also called attribute data. Discrete data is based on counts and
these data is information that can be categorized into a classification. (E.g.: No of
Parts damaged in shipment, etc.)

d) Classify the following variables as in (c):

i. Number of Audit firms in Sri Lanka : Quantitative discrete variable
ii. Monthly expenditure of Accountants : Quantitative continuous variable
iii. Relationship status : Qualitative nominal variable
iv. Occupation : Qualitative nominal variable
v. Birth order : Qualitative ordinal variable
Question 02

Mark (x) 0-10 10-20 20-30 30-40 40-50 50-60 60-70 70-80 80-90 90-100
No of
Students 10 20 30 40 50 50 40 30 20 10
(f)

a) From the table data, calculate

i. Mean

No of Mid-point
Mark (x)
fx x−x ¿ f ¿¿
Students (f)
0-10 10 5 50 -45 2025 20250
10-20 20 15 300 -35 1225 24500
20-30 30 25 750 -25 625 18750
30-40 40 35 1400 -15 225 9000
40-50 50 45 2250 -5 25 1250
50-60 50 55 2750 5 25 1250
60-70 40 65 2600 15 225 9000
70-80 30 75 2250 25 625 18750
80-90 20 85 1700 35 1225 24500
90-100 10 95 950 45 2025 20250
Ʃf = 300 Ʃfx =15000 147500

Mean=
∑ fx
∑f
15000
Mean=
300

Mean=50

ii. Median

Median=
∑ f +1
2

300+1
M edian=
2

Median=150.5

 Median Class is 50-60

 iii. Standard deviation

σ=
√ ∑ f ( x−x )2
( ∑ f −1)

σ=
√ 147500
(300−1)

σ =22.215

b) If the top 20% of high performers are given a special scholarship, what is the cut-off
mark for the eligibility to obtain the scholarship?
Question 03

Write short notes on the following topics

I. Use of correlation technique in research

The correlation of coefficient, which is a statistical measure that calculates the strength of the
relationship between two variables, shows the correlation between those two variables. When
the correlation coefficient is close to +1, it is positive correlation, and if it is close to -1, that
represent the negative correlation between the two variables. Also, the value is close to zero,
and then there is no relationship between the two variables. Correlational study is non-
experimental. Also correlational researches only looks back at historical data and observe
events in the past and the patterns between two variables from correlational research are
never constant and are always changing.

II. Primary data and Secondary data

Primary data is data that is collected by a researcher from first-hand sources, from methods
like surveys, interviews, or experiments while secondary data is data gathered from studies,
surveys, or experiments that have been done by others. The availability of secondary data is
highly dependent on the primary researcher’s decision to share their data publically or not.
When we consider about the data type, primary data is real time while secondary data is stale.
Researchers are usually very involved in the primary data collection process and secondary
data is already available and is quick and easy to collect.

III. Data visualization tools

Data visualization tools designers with an easier way to create visual representations of large
data sets. Some of the best data visualization tools are Google Charts, Tableau, Grafana,
Fusion Charts, etc. These tools solved the issue with drawing conclusions and discerning
usable information from large data sets with thousands and millions of data points. With data
visualization tools people can make information understandable for interested personal and
drawing conclusions become much easier. Data visualization is another form of visual art that
grabs our interest and keeps our eyes on the message.
Question 04

Consider the data set relevant to the two variables of marketing Expenses and the sales
revenue.
Marketing expenses (in million) Sales revenue (in million)
05 40
12 50
18 60
20 70
22 65
23 70
24 95
25 90
28 100

I. Draw the Scatter diagram and interpret

120

100

80

60 Sales Revenue (in million)

Marketing Expenses (in million)

40

20

0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

 In the above scatter diagram blue line represents the sales revenue and red line
represents the marketing expenses that have been carried out to increase the sales.
 As we can see there is a positive linear relationship does appear between the
marketing expenses and sales revenue. That is, as marketing expenses increases, the
sales revenue increases as well.
 II. Find the correlation coefficient and interpret the answer.

 Correlation coefficient

r=
∑ (x i−x )( y i− y )
√ ∑ ( xi −x)2 ∑ ( y i− y)2
r =0.908817

0.91 is a very strong positive correlation. That indicates that an increase in the marketing
expenses would correspond to an increase in the sales revenue, thus implying a direct
relationship between the variables. Since the value is close to +1. So if the marketing
expenses decreases, sales revenue also decreases.
Question 05

Use the following data set,

64, 59, 72, 68, 55, 71, 60, 49, 78, 72, 81, 55, 61, 56, 83
to calculate:

i. The Arithmetic mean

Mean=
∑f
n

984
Mean=
15

Mean=65.6

ii. The median

49,55,55,56,59,60,61,64,68,71,72,72,78,81,83
n+1
Median=
2

15+1
Median=
2

Medi an=8=64

iii. The mode

49,55,55,56,59,60,61,64,68,71,72,72,78,81,83
 There are 2 modes; 55 and 72.

iv. The range

range=83−49
range=34
v. The variance

x x x−x ( x−x )2
49 65.6 -16.6 275.56
55 65.6 -10.6 112.36
55 65.6 -10.6 112.36
56 65.6 -9.6 92.16
59 65.6 -6.6 43.56
60 65.6 -5.6 31.36
61 65.6 -4.6 21.16
64 65.6 -1.6 2.56
68 65.6 2.4 5.76
71 65.6 5.4 29.16
72 65.6 6.4 40.96
72 65.6 6.4 40.96
78 65.6 12.4 153.76
81 65.6 15.4 237.16
83 65.6 17.4 302.76
1501.6

variance(s )=
∑2( x−x )2
n−1

2 1501.6
s=
15−1
2
s =107.2571

vi. The standard deviation

s=
√ ∑ (x −x)2
n−1

s= √107.2571

s=10.3565