I see students writing abstracts before completing their research studies, and it gets me wondering a lot. How did they get findings and recommendations before data analysis and interpretation? Or is there any such thing as pre and post abstracts? If there is any, please feel free to share your ideas by commenting below because, this one is killing me. An abstract is meant to be a summary of your entire work; hence it should be after you have conducted your study.
Below is a perfect example of an abstract:
ABSTRACT
This study was intended to evaluate the extent to which strategic planning affects organizational performance. The study was guided by the following objectives; to identify the various components and phases of strategic planning used in company ABC, to find out other factors affecting organizational performance other than strategic planning and to find out the relationship between strategic planning and organizational performance.
The study employed descriptive and explanatory design, questionnaires in addition to library research were applied in order to collect data. Primary and secondary data sources were used and data was analyzed using statistical package which was presented in frequency tables and percentage. The respondents under the study were 30 employees of ABC, DEF branch. The study majorly focused on phases and components of strategic planning and how they affect the organizational performance.
The study findings revealed that there is lack of information gathering, where strategic planning does not begin with collection of the necessary information, there is strong review of the past performance where by past performance is considered to make the strategic plans. Pearson correlation coefficient is 0.692 significant at 0.01 level (2-tailed), 0.00 indicates the significance of interaction between two variables an indication that the significant is under the range of 0.0 and 0.05.
Using the above findings, it implied that there is a strong relationship between strategic planning and organization performance. According to the study, strategic planning contributes 69.2% towards performance in banking services and this implied that other factors contribute 30.8%. Improvements should be made in the information altering systems and information should be gathered first before making the strategic plans. Company ABC should involve all the employees in decision making so as to improve on the performance.