How to choose a project and write a title ?

The purpose of the title is NOT to attract readers to read it.  Do not worry if the it does not look "short, sweet and attractive" like a magazine article title. A title can be even up to one page in length and must SIMULTANEOUSLY indicate 3 things 

1. FIELD WORK : What new and original  field work you will do in a specific and time-bound fashion. It is expected that you should spend at least 100 hours in doing this original work.  
2. BUSINESS BENEFIT : A statement of specific and time-bound business benefit your project will deliver to your employers in a way that the Business Managers can be excited about. It can be about increasing sales, getting better price, reducing cost, improving efficiency or effectiveness etc.
3. KNOWLEDGE CREATION : Your project should result into some knowledge getting created. Merely copying, stating what is already known is not acceptable. 

It is very likely that a project taken up by your company / department is NOT suitable. This may be due to  the fact that a project taken up by your company / department would need the effort of several people over a long period of time - whereas the project you choose needs to be based on YOUR effort over a period of 3-6 months.  

Examples of bad project titles

"Towards operational excellence in our quality control department".   It has no clear and specific business benefit, it does not indicate what original work you will do and it also does not say what specific new knowledge discovery will take place. This sounds like a good title for a magazine article but is poor project title.

"To increase the sale of XYZ in UK".  It spells the business benefit but not clearly. For example, to increase the sale of XYZ by 40% in 3 years will need very different actions than increasing the sale by 150% in 2 years. It does not indicate what is the original work. It also does not show what new knowledge will get created.

"To migrate the data from existing server to an outsourced data center" may be assigned to you by your company but it cannot become the subject of dissertation because it does not involve discovering anything original. It is a "doing" project and not a "learning" project.

“Building a chemical plant for a client at Nasik” is an important project for your company - but this is too large a project for you to take up - because the project will need contribution from many people from your company over a couple of years !

Examples of bad project titles converted into good

See the Nasik project mentioned above. If you want, you can take up a part of this project which you can attempt and complete individually over a few months.  For example your title can be "To conduct depth interviews of 10 site engineers to identify what causes significant delays (requiring payment of penalty) in the projects undertaken and then to study records relating to top 3 items mentioned by each, and finally to conclude what the company could have done at the policy level to minimize these delays”.  Why is this an acceptable title ? Because (a) it describes original work : interviewing engineers, sifting through records, making conclusions (b) it has a specific outcome : recommended policy changes based on research findings (c) it is linked to business : minimization of delays leads to reduction in payment of penalty (d) it is doable : you can plan and complete the project individually over a few months.

“Changing ill-performing distributors in UP within 3 months” could be an important project for your company but not acceptable as a project by us. The reason is that there is no originality, no research possibilities and no learning outcomes. On the other hand, “Structured interviews of  20 discontinued distributors and comparing their responses with 20 high-performing distributors in UP to create a checklist of criteria for appointing future distributors” is acceptable because (a)  Original work : structured interviews of 40 distributors in UP (b) Specific outcome : checklist of criteria for appointing distributors in future (c) Link to business : poor performing distributors bring down the sales growth rate.

Use the checklist of 5 items for titles

• Is my linked to business benefits in a time bound and specific manner? For example : "Policies that help reduce project delays reduce the penalties for late completion". Currently penalties eat away 15% of the net profit of the division.
• Have I done some work already before deciding on the title? For example : "I studied the profitability of my company vis-a-vis our competitors and found that  we are paying far more penalties due to late completion. As much 5% of the net profit of the division gets wasted as a result".
• Have I decided what original work I will do in the chosen area? For example : "I will study logged records of 10 projects done by the division to identify top 3 reasons fof significant delays  and then conduct ABC analysis to select "vital few" reasons which need to be tackled. From this I will select one reason and use root cause analysis to make recommendations at policy level."
• What do I expect to happen as a result of my findings For example : "My aspiration is that the penalties should come down from 15% of PAT to 5% of PAT.
• Have I considered what will my project report consist of ? For example : "My report will consist of (a) my workings of calculating the possible financial impact of what I am planning to address (b) my analysis of the records of last 10 projects done by the division (c) how I identified and ranked the reasons for delays (d) root cause analysis of one or two major reasons for delays (e) how I arrived at policy level recommendations based on "d".

In this particular case, an appropriate "title" will be "To try to bring down the cost of penalty for project delays from current 15% of PAT to 5% of PAT - through my original work of studying site logs of 10 projects done by my division and conduct an ABC analysis of the main causes of delays - and subsequently to conduct root cause analysis of main reasons - and make policy recommendations to management which will result into reduction of delays".