QUESTION 3 Study the information provided below and answer all questions that follow. As an organisational researcher, you suspect that operations management competence may be a significant predictor of the performance of manufacturing firms. After an extensive review of the extant literature, you have noted that the interplay of operations management competence and organisational performance has received little attention by researchers. In the field of operations and supply chain management, as in many other professional or research fields, it is still not clear what is the required set of contemporary competencies for a successful professional performance (Bauer, 2018 D'Orazio, Schiraldi & Vincenzi, 2019 Schallock, 2018 Wienbruch, 2018). At a fundamental level, competences are intended as professional human behaviour abstractions and can be described as human qualities which are connected with skills, knowledge, ability, talent, and employee engagement (Abele, 2015 Bedolla, 2017 Miranda, 2017 Gronau, 2017). In this regard, you are embarking on a study with the aim of empirically examining the impact of operations management competence on the performance of manufacturing firms across the Southern African Development Community (SADC). You have gathered data from 160 manufacturing firms across SADC. You measured the average OMC (out of 100 points) of the employees in the operations department of each firm. Furthermore, organisational performance was measured using the Balanced scorecard (out of 100 points). Table 3.1, below, is an excerpt of the data collected. Table 3.1: Excerpt of data collected from 160 manufacturing firms across SADC # Firm Operations management competence Organisational performance 1 62 59 2 73 77 3 55 55 4 68 70 5 66 62 6 54 60 7 60 63 8 76 72 9 59 65 ... ... ... 160 57 60 The data analysis was conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics version 25 and the output depicted in Figure 3.1 to Figure 3.4 was obtained: Figure 3.1: Tests of Normality Kolmogorov-Smirnova Shapiro-Wilk Statistic df Sig. Statistic df Sig. Organisational_performance .173 160 .000 .780 160 .000 a. Lilliefors Significance Correction Figure 3.2: Model Summary b Model R R Square Adjusted R Square Std. Error of the Estimate 1 .899a .809 .807 3.399 a. Predictors: (Constant), Operations_management_competence b. Dependent Variable: Organisational_performance Figure 3.3: ANOVAa Model Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig. 1 Regression 7710.12 1 7710.12 667.265 .000b Residual 1825.66 158 11.55 Total 9535.78 159 a. Dependent Variable: Organisational_performance b. Predictors: (Constant), Operations_management_competence Figure 3.4: Regression Coefficientsa Model Unstandardized Coefficients Standardized Coefficients B t Sig. Std. Error Beta 1 (Constant) 12.750 2.130 5.985 .000 Operations_management_competence .810 .031 .899 25.831 .000 a. Dependent Variable: Organisational_performance 3.1 Formulate a suitable title for the study. (3 marks) 3.2 Specify the independent variable (IV) and the dependent variable (DV) in the study. (2 marks) 3.3 Formulate the null and alternative hypotheses for the study. (2 marks) 3.4 Why was the test whose output is depicted in Figure 3.1 conducted as part of the data analysis? (3 marks) Based on Figure 3.2 to Figure 3.4, identify the main inferential test conducted and explain why this inferential test is appropriate for the study. 3.5 (3 marks) Provide a meaningful interpretation of the output in Figure 3.2 to Figure 3.4. Your interpretation should adhere to the standard reporting format.