The four words the standard turns on

The task

• AS91384 asks you to carry out, with consultation, an innovative and sustainable business activity — internally assessed, 9 credits, the largest standard at Level 3.
• A business activity is defined by the standard as the production of a good or service. You are actually making something and taking it to market, not writing about it.
• The work has four stages, and the standard names them:
  • planning for the business activity
  • consulting for the business activity
  • carrying out the business activity
  • evaluating the business activity

The grade ladder

Grade	Planning and consultation	Evaluation
Achieved	Plan, consult, and carry out the activity	Evaluate it
Merit	Sound planning and consultation	Sound evaluation
Excellence	Thorough planning and consultation	Thorough evaluation

• Note where the grade is decided: planning, consultation and evaluation. Carrying out the activity is required at every grade — a successful activity with thin planning and a weak evaluation does not reach Excellence, and a modest activity with thorough planning, real consultation and an honest evaluation can.
• This matters more than students expect. The grade does not depend on how much money the activity made.

The four words

• Everything in this standard is defined by four terms, and each has an exact meaning:
• Business activity — the production of a good or service. Something is made or delivered, and someone receives it.
• Innovative — originality, invention, commercialisation or improvement, with reference to business formation, functions, people, management and environment.
  • So innovation can be in the product, or in how the business is formed, run, staffed, managed, or in how it deals with its environment. It is not restricted to inventing a new object.
• Sustainable — an ongoing focus on economic, social, cultural (including ethical) and environmental outcomes.
  • Four outcomes, all four required, all four planned for and all four measured. "Sustainable" here does not mean "environmentally friendly".
• With consultation — engaging in consultation with specialist advisors in relation to the innovative, sustainable and ethical aspects of the activity.
  • Specialist advisors, and about those three things specifically. Asking your teacher's opinion is not consultation for this standard.

How this differs from the Level 2 activity

• If you did AS90848 at Level 2, the shape is different and assuming otherwise costs marks:

	Level 2 (AS90848)	Level 3 (AS91384)
Focus	A community well-being context	Innovative and sustainable
Structure	Two cycles, with a review and refine between them	One activity, planned and evaluated thoroughly
Guidance	"With guidance"	With consultation — specialist advisors
Evaluation	Against the plan	Against four outcomes, using a tool such as the quadruple bottom line
Extra requirement	—	A business pitch presenting the business case

Planning the whole thing backwards

• The activity runs over most of a year, and the commonest failure is starting the evaluation too late to have any data.
• Work backwards from the evaluation:
  • What will I need to have measured? Four outcomes, so four sets of measures.
  • When must measurement start? Before the activity does — you cannot measure a change without a starting point.
  • Who must I consult, and about what? Advisors need to be approached early enough to influence the plan, not to bless it afterwards.
  • What does the activity actually have to produce, and by when?