| Course | GB710 Contemporary Challenges in Business |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 9 |
| Paper type | Research problem statement |
| Length | About 1,100 words, 6 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | MBA |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for GB710 Unit 9
From Headline to Researchable Problem: A Unit 9 Research Problem Statement on AI and Graduate Hiring in Accounting Firms
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
GB710: Contemporary Challenges in Business
Unit 9 Research Problem Statement
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The candidate, the firm and every figure are composite and illustrative; the studies and theories cited are real.
General Business Problem
Professional services firms are reducing entry-level hiring as generative AI performs routine tasks that first-year staff once did, without evidence about the consequences for how future reviewers and managers are developed. Payroll records show the youngest workers losing ground in the most exposed occupations since late 2022 (Brynjolfsson, Chandar, & Chen, 2025), while controlled studies show that AI assistance helps inexperienced workers more than experienced ones on the tasks studied (Brynjolfsson, Li, & Raymond, 2025). Firms deciding how many graduates to hire are therefore acting on evidence that points in two directions.
Specific Business Problem
Some mid-size United States accounting firms, those with 100 to 999 staff, have hired fewer graduates once software took on reconciliations, draft workpapers and document checks, while others with similar characteristics have held intake steady and redesigned first-year work. Firms in this size range depend heavily on promoting their own staff to fill senior and manager roles, because they cannot easily compete with the largest firms for experienced lateral hires. If cutting intake reduces the firm's future supply of reviewers, the cost will fall on exactly the firms least able to absorb it. At the candidate's firm, intake fell from 40 to 26 in one year, and seniors' recorded hours on review tasks rose in the following busy season.
What the Problem Is Not
This study will not ask whether accounting will survive AI, or whether accountants will lose their jobs in general. Those questions are too broad for a doctoral study and are already the subject of forecasts that cannot be tested in the near term. Nor is the problem whether AI tools improve efficiency, which firms can measure for themselves. The problem is narrower and closer to practice: what happens inside a firm, to its first-year work and its senior staff, when it chooses to hire fewer graduates because of AI, compared with a similar firm that does not. That narrowness is what makes the problem researchable within a doctoral program and useful to the managing partners who face the decision.
The Gap
The integrative review in Unit 8 found three bodies of evidence. Task-level studies show that AI helps novices most. Occupation-level employment data show that young workers in exposed occupations are being hired less. Danish administrative data show small effects so far on earnings and hours. None examines accounting firms, none links a firm's hiring decision to changes in the work its first-year staff do, and none follows the consequences for senior workload or staff development. Task-based theory (Autor et al., 2003) and internal labor market theory (Doeringer & Piore, 1971) together predict that cutting entry-level hiring could shift work to seniors in the near term and weaken the supply of future reviewers later, but these predictions have not been tested in firms facing generative AI.
The gap is narrow and specific: the relationship between AI adoption, entry-level hiring decisions and the content of first-year work in mid-size accounting firms.
Everyone is arguing about whether AI is replacing graduates; nobody has looked inside the firms making the choice.
Research Questions
Question 1. Among mid-size United States accounting firms that adopted generative AI tools between 2023 and 2025, how does the timing and extent of adoption relate to changes in entry-level hiring?
Question 2. How does the work performed by first-year staff, measured by the distribution of their recorded hours across task types, differ between firms that reduced entry-level hiring after adoption and firms that maintained it?
The questions are worded so that they do not assume an answer. Question 1 allows for adoption to be associated with lower, unchanged or higher hiring. Question 2 compares task content without presuming which approach produces better outcomes.
Why the Problem Matters
The consequences fall on several groups. Firms risk a shortage of experienced reviewers several years after cutting intake, when the missing first-years would have become seniors. Senior staff absorb work in the meantime, which may raise turnover among the people firms can least afford to lose. Graduates face a narrower entry point to a profession already struggling to attract students. And clients depend on review quality that rests on a pipeline of trained staff. A study answering the questions would help firms choose between cutting and redesigning entry-level work on evidence rather than on assumption.
What a Study Would Measure
Answering the questions would require three kinds of data from each participating firm: graduate intake by year from 2021 onward, the date and scope of AI tool adoption, and recorded hours by staff level and task type before and after adoption. Firms already keep all three, though in different formats. A study could compare firms that cut intake with firms that held it, before and after adoption, and test whether the share of senior hours spent on review tasks changed differently between the two groups. Senior turnover and first-year promotion rates, which firms also record, could be added as secondary outcomes, giving the study a way to see consequences beyond hours alone.
Feasibility and a Disclosed Conflict
The candidate's professional network includes talent and human resources leaders at about thirty mid-size firms, several of whom have expressed interest in sharing anonymized data on hiring and time records by task type. Time records already classify hours by task in most firms, though classifications differ and would need to be mapped to a common scheme. The candidate must disclose a conflict: as talent director at a firm that cut its intake, the candidate helped make one of the decisions the study would examine. Including the candidate's own firm would require that data be handled by a second researcher, that colleagues not be pressured to participate and that results be reported without identifying the firm.
Framings Considered and Rejected
Three earlier framings were rejected. "Is AI replacing accountants?" was too broad, could not be answered by a doctoral study and assumed a conclusion. "Do firms that cut graduate hiring suffer?" assumed harm and lacked a measurable outcome. "How do partners decide intake numbers?" was interesting but shifted the focus from consequences to decision processes, which the literature has studied in other contexts. The final framing keeps the focus on the relationship the evidence leaves unexamined and on outcomes that firms already record.
References
Autor, D. H., Levy, F., & Murnane, R. J. (2003). The skill content of recent technological change: An empirical exploration. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 118(4), 1279-1333. https://doi.org/10.1162/003355303322552801
Brynjolfsson, E., Chandar, B., & Chen, R. (2025). Canaries in the coal mine? Six facts about the recent employment effects of artificial intelligence [Working paper]. Stanford Digital Economy Lab.
Brynjolfsson, E., Li, D., & Raymond, L. R. (2025). Generative AI at work. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 140(2), 889-942. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjae044
Doeringer, P. B., & Piore, M. J. (1971). Internal labor markets and manpower analysis. Heath.
GB710 Unit 9 instructions, in plain terms
The ninth GB710 assignment asks you to state a research problem drawn from your issue. Begin with a general business problem supported by citations, then narrow to a specific business problem with a defined population and evidence that it exists. Say what the problem is not, to sharpen its boundaries. State the gap in the literature narrowly, drawing on your review. Pose research questions worded so they do not assume an answer. Explain who is affected and why the problem matters. Describe what a study would measure and whether the data could be obtained. Disclose any conflict of interest. Note framings you considered and rejected. About four pages in your program's template, cited in APA 7, is common.
How the GB 710 Unit 9 example is put together
The general problem rests on two 2025 studies, one of payroll records for young workers and one of an AI assistant in customer support. The specific problem defines firms of 100 to 999 staff and explains their reliance on internal promotion. A section states what the study will not ask. The gap draws on the Unit 8 review and on Autor, Levy and Murnane and Doeringer and Piore, and the highlighted sentence says nobody has looked inside the firms. Two research questions follow. Consequences, the records a study would use, feasibility through about thirty firms and the candidate's disclosed conflict follow, and three rejected framings close the statement.
GB710 Unit 9 rubric: what earns full points
In GB710 Unit 9 the grade rewards a problem narrowed far enough to study yet still worth studying. A general problem supported by citations, and a specific problem with a defined population and evidence, earn heavy weight. Stating what the problem excludes sharpens it for a committee. A gap drawn from a systematic review rather than asserted shows command of the literature. Research questions that do not presume an answer demonstrate scholarly neutrality. Consequences for named groups show the problem matters. Measures a study could actually collect, an honest feasibility assessment and a disclosed conflict show readiness. Rejected framings and APA 7 citations complete the GB710 rubric.
GB710 Unit 9 help: mistakes that cost points
Many GB710 problem statements describe a trend without stating a problem a study could address. Others pose questions that assume the answer, such as asking how much harm a practice causes. A frequent gap is a population too broad to study or an outcome nobody records. Writers often skip feasibility or ignore their own conflict of interest when studying their employer. The gap is commonly asserted rather than shown from the review. State general and specific problems with evidence, define the population, say what the problem is not, draw the gap from your review, word questions neutrally, check the data exist and disclose conflicts. A free custom research problem statement is available through this page.
Get a GB710 Unit 9 example written to your instructions
Tell us the issue you have been developing, the gap your reading suggests and the Unit 9 problem statement template with its rubric. Expect a custom draft within 24-48h: the issue narrowed to a population, the gap stated within a documented search, and questions left open to any answer. No fee applies to a first sample. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Purdue University Global document.
More GB710 papers and MBA samples
- GB710 Unit 1: Discussion Board Post
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- GB710 Unit 3: Evidence Quality Appraisal
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- GB710 Unit 5: Comparative Case Study
- GB710 Unit 6: Seminar Reflection
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- GB710 Unit 8: Integrative Literature Review
- GB710 Unit 10: Scholarly Position Paper
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GB710 Unit 9 questions, answered
How specific should a GB710 problem statement be?
Specific enough that a reader can picture the study: a named population, an observable variation and outcomes that could be measured. Mid-size accounting firms and their entry-level hiring meet that test; AI and the workforce does not. If the population cannot be listed or sampled, the problem probably needs narrowing again.
Is it acceptable to study my own employer?
It can be, with care. Disclose your role, explain how you would avoid pressuring colleagues and describe how your firm's data would be handled. Many committees prefer the employer to be one site among several, which reduces both the conflict and the risk that findings reflect one organization's circumstances alone.
Should the problem statement propose a method?
Only in outline, if at all. The problem statement establishes what needs studying and why; design choices usually come later in the program. Mentioning the kind of data that would answer the questions, such as a firm survey, helps show feasibility without committing the study to a method prematurely.
Where can I find a free GB710 Unit 9 sample paper?
This page holds a full GB710 Unit 9 research problem statement on AI and graduate hiring in mid-size accounting firms, with general and specific problems, the gap, two neutral questions and feasibility.
Why disclose a conflict of interest in a problem statement?
Because a candidate who helped make the decision being studied may be tempted, or seen to be tempted, to favor one answer. Disclosure lets a committee require safeguards such as independent data handling.