HSC Business Studies: what actually gets examined

Better responses

• Applied operations theory to the particular business in front of them: naming the inventory approach (JIT, FIFO) that suited its products, or explaining how a given regulation changes what that business does.
• Treated visibility (customer contact) as something with consequences for the business itself, rather than describing what the customer experiences.
• Showed the interdependence between operations and another key business function as a genuine two-way relationship, with the flow of influence running in both directions.
• Explained resistance to change from both staff and management, saying who resists, how, and why, anchored in the situation described.
• In extended responses, built an explicit cause-and-effect chain from an operations influence or strategy through to business success or corporate social responsibility, with a case study attached to each.

Where marks were lost — and how to keep them

• Keeping the three syllabus categories apart. Influences, processes and strategies are distinct, and a question about one of them was often answered with material from another.
• Distinguishing goods from services when classifying what a business produces, before analysing its operations.
• Raising several distinct issues for a business adopting outsourcing as an operations strategy, rather than developing only one.
• Connecting an operations strategy to the specific elements of corporate social responsibility, instead of describing the strategy on its own.
• Covering both sides when a question on economies of scale names two parties: what the business gains and, separately, what its customers gain.

Better responses

• Recognised a product that had passed maturity in its life cycle from the features described, and explained how a niche market approach would lift sales for that particular business.
• Proposed two distinct forms of market segmentation, gave examples of each, and tied both to how the business could grow.
• Chose product strategies that fitted the stimulus business, linked them to gaining a competitive advantage, and gave a reason monitoring and controlling mattered for the issue in the stimulus.
• In the extended response, covered every marketing element the question named and showed how the target market shapes each one, with case study support throughout.
• Made a clear judgement about whether marketing influences helped or harmed business success, and sustained it rather than listing influences neutrally.

Where marks were lost — and how to keep them

• Separating the product life cycle from the economic cycle. The two were confused when a question asked about a phase of the product life cycle.
• Knowing the extended marketing mix precisely: 'people' means employees, not customers, and 'physical evidence' is not the same as branding or packaging.
• Treating market segmentation as its own strategy rather than blending it with other marketing strategies, and addressing the growth aspect when the question asks for it.
• Explaining the economic factors themselves and how more than one of them shapes customer choice, rather than describing customer choice alone.
• Understanding both monitoring and controlling as parts of the marketing plan, since responses frequently covered only one of them.

Better responses

• Worked the numbers given: calculating the current ratio correctly from the stimulus, and reading the expense ratio as a measure of efficiency using the figures provided.
• Matched strategies to the objective they serve and offered more than one per objective: liquidity was addressed through cash flow and working capital strategies, profitability through profitability management.
• Traced a single strategy through to more than one objective, such as factoring lifting liquidity while eroding profit, or expense minimisation freeing funds for later growth.
• Compared debt and equity in detail and then named one specific source of finance, with reasons it suited the expansion described.
• Explained how comparative ratio analysis helps a business act on a financial problem, and how global market influences bear on solvency, with the stimulus data in view.

Where marks were lost — and how to keep them

• Drawing strategies from the finance syllabus. Strategies from other topics, or routine tasks any business performs, were not credited as financial strategies.
• Naming one particular source of finance (a named debt or equity instrument) when asked to recommend one, since 'debt' or 'equity' on its own is a category rather than a choice.
• Defining finance concepts such as solvency precisely, and knowing the elements and purpose of each financial statement rather than making general statements.
• Linking each strategy to the objective it achieves, rather than describing the strategy and leaving the connection to the reader.
• Explaining cause and effect, for example how offering discounts changes cash flow and, through that, working capital.

Better responses

• Connected specific social influences to the participation-rate changes shown in the stimulus data, making the relationship between influence and figures explicit.
• Identified an appropriate stakeholder together with the part it plays in human resource management, and applied corporate social responsibility to the employees of the business described.
• Explained maintenance as a stage of the human resource process, with examples of how it is achieved in the business concerned.
• Gave two reasons an employer might discourage union membership and the impact of each, and used current legal concepts to show why practices in the stimulus were unlawful.
• Used concrete examples of technology changing human resource work rather than asserting that technology has an effect.

Where marks were lost — and how to keep them

• Using human resource syllabus terminology accurately, including stakeholder roles, the stages of the HR process and the current legal framework.
• Explaining the effects of corporate social responsibility for the business, not only what it means for employees.
• Making the link between an illegal practice and its consequences for human resources explicit, under the legal framework that applies now.
• Showing understanding of the human resource issues raised by the stimulus, with detail rather than general statements about employees.