| Course | GB891 Doctoral Project II: Project Design and Implementation |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 4 |
| Paper type | Recruitment plan |
| Length | About 890 words, 6 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | MBA |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for GB891 Unit 4
Twelve Weeks Between Two Peaks: A Unit 4 Recruitment Plan for a Bakery Safety Study
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
GB891: Doctoral Project II: Project Design and Implementation
Unit 4 Recruitment Plan
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
Corliss Baking Company, its plants, agencies and calendar are composite and illustrative; the methods sources cited are real.
Who Is Eligible
Three groups are eligible. Associates assigned to any of the 24 study crews for at least two weeks before the baseline survey, whether employed by Corliss or placed by either staffing agency, are eligible for the pulse questions and surveys. Associates who join a crew during the study become eligible for pulse questions after their first full week on the crew and for the follow-up survey if they have been on the crew for at least four weeks. Shift supervisors of the 24 crews are eligible for interviews, though only the twelve intervention supervisors receive feedback.
The two-week rule for the baseline exists so that associates have formed some view of their supervisor before answering a question about the supervisor's priorities. The rule for joiners exists because the study is about crews with turnover, and excluding newcomers would remove the people the study most concerns.
The Calendar
The plan is laid out as a week-by-week grid running from late January to early May.
Week minus two. Supervisor information sessions at each of the four plants, one per shift, lasting thirty minutes. The research assistant explains the study, the consent protections and, at the intervention plants, the feedback sheet. Supervisors at comparison plants are told they will receive a summary of findings at the end.
Week minus one. The research assistant visits each crew at break to introduce the study and the posted observation notices go up.
Week zero. All three shifts at the four plants complete the baseline climate survey, spread over four days.
Weeks one through twelve. Pulse draws each Wednesday and Thursday, observations throughout.
Week twelve. The follow-up survey is administered on the same schedule as the baseline.
Week thirteen. Interviews with the twelve intervention supervisors.
Where the Plants and Agencies Moved Dates
The calendar was reviewed with each plant manager and both agencies, and four changes resulted. The Dunmore plant manager asked that the baseline survey not fall in the week of its quarterly sanitation shutdown, so Dunmore's baseline was moved two days earlier. The Brierly manager asked that supervisor sessions avoid the night shift's first hour, when the ovens are being brought up, so the night session was moved to mid-shift. One staffing agency noted that it begins its spring hiring surge in early May, when many new temporaries arrive; the follow-up survey was therefore held to the last week of April, before the surge would change crew composition sharply. And the other agency asked that its workers hear about the study from the research assistant before their agency coordinator mentioned it, so that the coordinator's involvement would not suggest the agency expected participation.
Languages
A language table, built from the plants' crew rosters with the agencies' help, records which languages each crew speaks. Nineteen of the 24 crews include associates who prefer Spanish. Two crews at Calder include several associates who speak Haitian Creole. All materials exist in English and Spanish. For the two Calder crews, the plan budgets a professional interpreter for the first contact and the surveys, and the pulse questions have been translated and back-translated, following the procedure Brislin (1970) described for checking that a translated item carries the original meaning.
Targets
The plan sets a target of 60 percent survey response for each crew, with a floor of eight responses for a crew-level climate score to be computed. Crews below the floor at baseline will be reported but excluded from the crew-level comparison. Pulse draws aim for four answers per crew per week, with the three-answer minimum from the protocol.
Scripts
Every script is attached: the supervisor session outline, the crew introduction, the pulse approach and the survey instructions, each in English and Spanish. The scripts were tested at the pilot plant, as Unit 5 reports.
Why Timing Matters for the Design
The calendar is not only a convenience. Shadish et al. (2002) note that events occurring during a study, which they call history, can produce changes that look like effects of the intervention. A holiday rush or a hiring surge would change crew composition and workload at all four plants, but not necessarily equally, and could swamp the effect the study is trying to detect. Fitting the study between the two production peaks reduces that risk. The intervention Zohar (2002) tested ran in a stable setting, and this study cannot make its crews stable, but it can avoid the weeks when they change most.
The twelve weeks were chosen because they are the quietest the bakeries have, which is the closest the study can come to holding the plants still.
Risks to Recruitment
Two risks are noted. If agency turnover is higher than expected in March, some crews may fall below the survey floor; the plan will report crew size and turnover every week so that this can be seen. And if a plant manager changes, the new manager may not honor the calendar; the letters of cooperation are addressed to the company rather than to individual managers for that reason.
References
Brislin, R. W. (1970). Back-translation for cross-cultural research. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 1(3), 185-216. https://doi.org/10.1177/135910457000100301
Shadish, W. R., Cook, T. D., & Campbell, D. T. (2002). Experimental and quasi-experimental designs for generalized causal inference. Houghton Mifflin.
Zohar, D. (2002). Modifying supervisory practices to improve subunit safety: A leadership-based intervention model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(1), 156-163. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.87.1.156
What the GB891 Unit 4 assignment asks for
The fourth GB891 assignment asks you to plan how you will recruit participants within your site's real calendar. State eligibility for each group and explain any rule, such as how long someone must be on a crew. Address people who join during the study if turnover is part of your question. Lay out a week-by-week calendar from first contact to final interviews. Review the calendar with the people who run the site and record every change they requested, with the reason. Build a language table and plan translation and interpretation for each group. Set response targets and minimum counts for unit-level scores. Attach every script. Explain why the timing matters for the design, not only for convenience. Close with the main risks to recruitment and how you will see them early. Eight pages with a calendar grid is a common format for this plan.
Inside the GB891 Unit 4 example
The plan sets eligibility for associates on any study crew for two weeks before baseline, admits joiners after their first full week and includes supervisors for interviews, with a margin note on why joiners matter. The calendar runs from supervisor sessions in week minus two to interviews in week thirteen. Four changes requested by plant managers and agencies are recorded, including holding the follow-up before an agency's May hiring surge. The language table finds Spanish speakers on nineteen crews and Haitian Creole speakers on two, with Brislin's back-translation applied. Targets set 60 percent response and an eight-response floor. A section on timing cites Shadish and colleagues on history and contrasts Zohar's stable setting, and the highlighted sentence explains the choice.
GB891 Unit 4 rubric: what earns full points
GB891 instructors award points on the recruitment plan for realism. Eligibility rules should be explained, especially any that affect the population central to the question. A complete calendar earns credit, and a calendar reviewed with site managers, with their changes recorded, counts for a great deal, since it proves the schedule survived contact with the people who run the plants. Language planning, including translation checks, shows respect for participants and protects data quality. Response targets and floors for unit-level scores should be stated. Scripts attached word for word let a board and a replicating researcher see exactly what was said. Linking timing to validity, not only convenience, demonstrates design thinking. Named risks with a way to detect them complete the plan, with sources cited accurately.
Common GB891 Unit 4 mistakes, and how to avoid them
Many GB891 recruitment plans list eligibility and a target number without a calendar, so the plan cannot be checked against the site's schedule. Others ignore people who join during the study, which in high-turnover settings removes much of the population. Students rarely review the calendar with site managers, and so miss shutdowns, peaks and hiring surges. Translation is often an afterthought. Response floors for unit scores are seldom set. Timing is justified only by convenience. Set eligibility with reasons, plan for joiners, build a week-by-week calendar, review it with the site and record changes, plan languages, set targets and floors, attach scripts and explain why the timing matters. If your site has a busy calendar, a writer can help you fit the plan into it.
Get a GB891 Unit 4 example written to your instructions
Share whatever you know of your site's calendar, the people you plan to invite and your relationship to them, then the Unit 4 prompt and rubric. A custom plan, delivered in 24-48h, maps every contact against that calendar and routes each invitation away from anyone with authority. The first one is free. 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 GB891 papers and MBA samples
- GB891 Unit 1: Protocol Document
- GB891 Unit 2: Consent Language Draft
- GB891 Unit 3: Review Board Application
- GB891 Unit 5: Pilot Test Summary
- GB891 Unit 6: Seminar Reflection
- GB891 Unit 7: Collection Log
- GB891 Unit 8: Fidelity Monitoring Memo
- GB891 Unit 9: Deviation Report
- GB891 Unit 10: Implementation Chapter Draft
- GB890 Unit 4: Closest Study Appraisal
- GB815 Unit 4: Study Quality Appraisal
- GB500 Unit 4: Financial Statement Reading
- GB794 Unit 4: Attribution Analysis
GB891 Unit 4 questions, answered
Why separate the workplace change from research participation?
Because workers cannot freely refuse something presented as part of their job. If an organization adopts a practice anyway, the research only adds data collection, surveys and interviews, and those are what participants can decline. Saying so explicitly protects voluntariness and answers a question most review boards will ask about workplace studies.
How do I check a recruitment calendar?
Take the draft schedule to the people who run the site and ask what else happens in those weeks: peaks, shutdowns, audits, hiring surges, holidays and shift changes. Record each date they move and why. A calendar showing those corrections is far more convincing than one drawn from the academic term alone.
What response floor should a crew-level score use?
Enough responses that a score means something and no individual can be identified, which depends on crew size and the measure. Many studies set a minimum before reporting a group score and treat groups below it as missing. The rule should be written before collection starts, so it cannot be adjusted after results appear.
Where can I find a free GB891 Unit 4 sample paper?
A complete GB891 Unit 4 recruitment plan is on this page, fitting a bakery safety study into the twelve weeks between production peaks, with a calendar, languages and response targets.
Why include workers who join during the study?
When the study's question concerns crews with high turnover, excluding newcomers would remove the very people the question is about. Clear rules set when joiners become eligible for each measure.