Business Paper 3 — Business Decisions and Strategy

Complete Worked Paper

*Provenance (2026-09-28): this document was built directly from the three primary-source PDFs for Pearson Edexcel International A-Level Business, Unit 3 (WBS13/01), October 2023 — the question paper, the mark scheme and the principal examiner's report — held locally at /Users/neosteinhoff/Documents/SOL/Papers/IAL_Paper3_Complete/IAL_Materials/Business/October 2023/ (Business_Unit 3_QP_October_2023.pdf, Business_Unit 3_MS_October_2023.pdf, Business_Unit 3_ER_October_2023.pdf, Question Paper Log Number P73258A, Publications Code WBS13_01_MS_2310 / WBS13_01_ER_2310). All three were extracted fresh for this pass with pdftotext -layout and read start to finish, not trusted from any prior summary — including research/veridian/WBS13-verified-facts.md's own entry for this series (lines 26–28 of that file), which is itself upgraded by this pass: that file's source table describes the Oct 2023 examiner report as read only for "Q1d/Q1e commentary," but the full 14-page report was read directly this time and in fact gives real scored commentary on every one of the seven graded components (Q1a through Q3) — a correction worth flagging here rather than silently edited into the research file itself, per this course's own established convention of leaving research-log entries as a dated record rather than rewriting them in place.

Before writing, research/veridian/WBS13-verified-facts.md was read in full and grepped for every Oct 2023 reference; content/veridian/curriculum/wbs13/ was checked file by file for existing coverage of this series' content; content/veridian/question-bank/wbs13.ts was read in full (it holds three real past questions, one of which — Oct 2023 Q3, Disney — is from this exact series); and every file in content/veridian/technique-hub/wbs13/ was grepped for Five Guys, Air India, Vistara and Disney. Where this paper's questions already have real coverage elsewhere in this course, that is stated at the start of the relevant section below with a pointer, rather than the existing material being re-derived — this document's own job is the piece that did not exist anywhere in this course before: a full, real, mark-by-mark worked answer to every question on one complete, genuine past paper, checked against its own real mark scheme end to end.

Why this series. October 2023 was selected because, of every WBS13 series either the research file or this pass's own primary-source reading has located, it is the only one confirmed to have all three primary documents present and fully readable, with the question paper's own Source Booklet extracts included in the same PDF — so every extract a question refers to could be checked directly rather than inferred from a mark scheme's paraphrase of it — and an examiners' report giving real, named commentary on every single graded component on the paper, not a subset. No other WBS13 series in the local archive or the research file is confirmed to combine both properties this cleanly; several (October 2025, in particular) are only partially mined, or sourced from a third-party mirror rather than the direct Pearson PDF. October 2023 is the strongest honestly available choice, not an arbitrary one.

#CODEX Complete Worked Paper: WBS13, October 2023 (WBS13/01)

#What this document is, and isn't

This is a complete worked answer to a single real WBS13 past paper — Section A (Question 1, Five Guys, 40 marks), Section B (Question 2, Air India/Vistara, 20 marks) and Section C (Question 3, Disney, 20 marks) — 80 marks, seven graded components, in full. It is not a re-teach of every underlying business concept from first principles: where a sub-question's mechanism is already taught in depth elsewhere in this course, that is named at the start of the relevant section and cited rather than repeated. Three components fall into that category:

Q1(a) (ROCE) has its formula and this exact real figure — Five Guys, December 2021, 21.15% — already worked into content/veridian/curriculum/wbs13/assessing-competitiveness.ts's own conceptual teaching of why ROCE differs from a margin. That lesson does not present it as a graded, mark-by-mark exam answer; this section does.
Q1(d) (financial rewards and labour turnover) has extensive real-mark-scheme-grounded teaching prose already built around this exact question in the same lesson, including the $13,520,000-a-year cost figure and the turnover-versus-productivity distinction the examiner report draws. This section does not repeat that prose — it builds the actual graded L1–L4 worked answer, which did not exist anywhere in this course before now, and cites the lesson for the deeper mechanism.
Q3 (resistance to change at Disney) already has a complete, five-step, level-by-level worked exemplar ladder for this exact real question in content/veridian/question-bank/wbs13.ts (id: wbs13-oct23-q3-disney-resistance). Reproducing that ladder here would be duplication in the most direct possible sense, so this section cross-references it and gives only a condensed mark-justification summary for paper completeness.

The remaining four components — Q1(b) (NPV), Q1(c) (Discuss, human resources impact), Q1(e) (Assess, Ansoff's Matrix applied to the clothing merchandise) and Q2 (Evaluate, the Air India/Vistara merger) — have no prior worked-answer coverage anywhere in this course and are built here from scratch, against the real mark scheme, in full.

A note on what's quoted versus paraphrased. Mark scheme and examiner report wording is paraphrased throughout; direct quotations are kept short (under roughly fifteen words) and attributed by series and question number at the point of use. The Source Booklet extracts (Five Guys, Air India/Vistara, Disney) are described in this document's own words rather than reproduced — real figures and named facts from them are stated directly, since a figure is not the kind of thing paraphrase can meaningfully alter, but no extract sentence is quoted at length.

Paper-wide structure. Section A = Q1(a)–(e), 40 marks, based on Extracts A–E; Section B = Q2, 20 marks, Extracts F–G; Section C = Q3, 20 marks, Extracts H–I — the fixed three-section shape this paper uses in every series the research file has checked, taught in full in content/veridian/curriculum/wbs13/paper-anatomy.ts and not repeated here. Only the specific command word, AO split and quantitative-skill code for each of this series' own seven components is restated below, as the concrete detail needed to justify that component's own marks.

Q	Command word	Marks	Format	Real scored exemplar (examiner report)
1(a)	Calculate	4	K1 / App2 / An1 (QS1)	— (mixed responses; no single scored exemplar quoted)
1(b)	Calculate	4	K1 / App2 / An1 (QS6)	— ("poorly done… many candidates did not understand this concept")
1(c)	Discuss	8	Levels, 3 bands	—
1(d)	Assess	12	Levels, 4 bands	—
1(e)	Assess	12	Levels, 4 bands	—
2	Evaluate	20	Levels, 4 bands	— ("very popular… some very detailed evaluations")
3	Evaluate	20	Levels, 4 bands	full worked ladder in `question-bank/wbs13.ts`

Section A's five components are built around Five Guys, the US burger chain: Extract A describes its from-fresh, no-freezer, no-timer food preparation (staff judge readiness by sight, aroma and texture); Extract B gives UK/Europe financial data for 2020–21; Extract C gives a five-year cash-flow table for a new milkshake machine; Extract D describes its mystery-shopper-driven weekly bonus scheme in an industry the extract itself describes as running "over 100% labour turnover levels"; Extract E describes a newly launched clothing range (socks from £10 to a £75 college jacket).

#Section A — Question 1: Five Guys (40 marks)

#Q1(a) — Calculate ROCE for Five Guys, December 2021 (4 marks; K1, App2, An1)

This exact real figure is already used, with the same working, inside assessing-competitiveness.ts's own conceptual teaching of why ROCE — a stock-over-stock ratio — asks a structurally different question from any margin. That lesson is the place to go for the conceptual "why"; this section is the graded exam answer itself.

The question, in brief: using Extract B, calculate ROCE for Five Guys in December 2021 to two decimal places, showing working.

Worked answer.

Formula: ROCE = operating profit ÷ capital employed × 100, where capital employed = non-current liabilities + total equity. (K1)
Figures from Extract B: operating profit £50,865m; non-current liabilities £233,819m; total equity £6,650m, so capital employed = £240,469m. (App2 — one mark for each correctly identified and correctly summed figure)
ROCE = £50,865m ÷ £240,469m × 100 = 21.15%. (An1)

Mark justification. The mark scheme awards the knowledge mark for stating the correct formula, two application marks for correctly reading and combining the three Extract B figures (a candidate who uses total equity alone, or adds revenue instead of non-current liabilities, loses an application mark even with the right final method), and the analysis mark for the correctly rounded final percentage. The scheme's own no-working fallback is exact and worth stating precisely, because it is the same rule the paper applies to every calculation question: an unsupported final answer of "21.15%" earns all 4 marks, but "21.15" without the percentage sign earns only 3 (Mark Scheme, Oct 2023, Q1a). The examiner report confirms this is a real, recurring trap on this exact question — some candidates omitted the percentage sign and were capped at 3 marks, and others omitted ×100 from the formula itself, which costs the knowledge mark even where the final figure is later correct because the ×100 was applied informally (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q1a). 50,865 ÷ 240,469 = 0.211524…, which rounds to 21.15%, not 21.16% — the same rounding-direction precision this course's own calculation lessons flag as a genuine, independent way to lose the final mark.

#Q1(b) — Calculate NPV for the new milkshake machine (4 marks; K1, App2, An1)

The question, in brief: using Extract C's five-year cash-flow table (a £10,000 machine, £5,000 net cash inflow every year for five years, discount factors 0.952/0.906/0.863/0.822/0.784), calculate the net present value to two decimal places, showing working.

Worked answer.

Formula: net present value = total discounted cash flows − initial cost. (K1)
Discounted cash flows: £5,000 × 0.952 = £4,760; × 0.906 = £4,530; × 0.863 = £4,315; × 0.822 = £4,110; × 0.784 = £3,920. Total discounted cash flow = £21,635. (App2 — one mark for correctly summing the five discounted figures, one for correctly identifying the £10,000 initial cost to subtract)
NPV = £21,635 − £10,000 = £11,635. (An1)

Mark justification. Every discounted figure above and the £21,635 total are given directly by Extract C's own table, so this question tests correct summation and correct subtraction of the initial outlay far more than it tests the discounting itself — a deliberate design choice confirmed by the mark scheme crediting the knowledge mark for the NPV = discounted inflows − initial cost formula alone, not for deriving the discount factors. The same no-working fallback rule applies: "£11,635" unsupported earns all 4 marks, "11635" without the £ sign earns 3 (Mark Scheme, Oct 2023, Q1b). The examiner report is unusually blunt about this exact question: it states plainly that the question "has been poorly done with many incorrect responses seen," that this was the first time an NPV question had been set on this specific paper, and that it is "essential that all areas of the specification are covered," since this paper draws on numeracy from earlier units as well as Unit 3 content (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q1b) — a genuine, named exam-craft warning: investment appraisal (3.3.3.2) is Unit 3 content, but the underlying numeracy it depends on is built earlier, and treating NPV as an unfamiliar novelty rather than routine arithmetic on a given table is what the report identifies as the real failure. A candidate confident with the arithmetic loses very little time here — the entire calculation is five multiplications, a sum and a subtraction on numbers Extract C already supplies.

#Q1(c) — Discuss the impact on Five Guys' human resources of its food-preparation style (8 marks; levels, 3 bands)

The question, in brief: Extract A states Five Guys' food production is organised differently from other fast-food burger outlets. Discuss the impact of this on its human resources.

Worked answer, level by level. This question's real mark scheme has only three bands (1–2, 3–5, 6–8) — no band above Level 3. Following this course's own established convention for mapping a five-step ladder onto a real three-band 8-mark Discuss (the same convention codex-complete- worked-paper.md for WBS12 uses for its own Q1(d) and Q2(d)), Level 3 is split into an entry point and a top point:

L1 — 1–2/8 (real Level 1): Five Guys trains its employees to judge when food is ready by sight, aroma and texture instead of using a timer. This means staff need more skill than employees at other fast-food restaurants. (Generic — asserts a skill difference but develops no consequence for Five Guys' human resources specifically.)
L2 — 3–4/8 (real Level 2, lower): Because Five Guys' staff must judge food readiness without a timer, and must be able to prepare any of the roughly 250,000 topping combinations the extract describes, the business likely needs to spend considerably more on training than a competitor whose staff simply follow a machine's timer. This raises Five Guys' overall labour and training costs.
L3-entry — 5/8 (real Level 2, upper): [As above, plus a second, genuinely separate strand:] This higher skill requirement could also mean Five Guys has to pay higher wages than a rival fast-food chain to attract and keep staff capable of judging food quality reliably without mechanical assistance — a further cost pressure on top of training, and a real threat to profitability if it is not offset elsewhere. Two developed cost-side chains are now present, but both point the same direction — no counter-argument yet, which keeps this within real Level 2.
L3-top — 6–7/8 (real Level 3, entry): [As above, plus the real counter-argument the mark scheme's own indicative content credits:] However, the impact on Five Guys' human resources could be smaller than it first appears, because the extra training cost may be offset by higher sales: food cooked fresh, judged by experienced staff rather than a timer, gives Five Guys a genuine competitive advantage over rivals that rely on machines and timers, which could drive additional revenue that absorbs the higher labour cost.
L4 — 8/8 (real Level 3, top — this question's real mark scheme has no band above Level 3): [As L3-top, plus a second, distinct benefit-side mechanism rather than a bare assertion that costs are offset:] More experienced staff, once trained to the standard this method requires, are also better placed to handle Five Guys' very wide combination count and give customers exactly what they order — and if that investment in training genuinely improves customer service, it can build the kind of loyalty that supports higher sales and profit over the long term, not just in the short run the competitive-advantage point alone addresses.

Mark justification. Every element above is drawn directly from the mark scheme's own indicative content: the training-cost driver; the wage-premium driver; the competitive-advantage offset; and, distinctly, the training-to-customer-service-to-loyalty chain as a second, separate benefit-side mechanism rather than a repeat of the first. No conclusion is required at this 8-mark tariff. The examiner report describes this as the paper's first levels-based question and records that stronger candidates discussed motivation, required skill level, training, pay, and the monotony of fast-food work, crediting the counter-argument specifically where candidates connected the method to increased sales, revenue, profit, a genuine unique selling point, or a more motivated workforce reducing labour turnover and absenteeism (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q1c). The same report names the paper's single most common failure mode on this exact question: "many candidates ignored the command word 'Discuss' and only gave a one-sided response" — Discuss requires both sides of the argument, even though, unlike Assess and Evaluate, it does not require a concluding judgement tying them together.

#Q1(d) — Assess the likely effectiveness of financial rewards in reducing labour turnover (12 marks; levels, 4 bands)

The deeper mechanism here — why a regular, re-earnable reward gives staff a standing reason to stay in a way a one-off bonus doesn't, why this is a genuinely different claim from "money motivates effort," and the real cost/reach limitations of Five Guys' own scheme — is already built at length in assessing-competitiveness.ts, directly anchored to this exact question. This section is the complete graded exam answer, not a second copy of that mechanism teaching.

The question, in brief: assess the likely effectiveness for Five Guys of using financial rewards to reduce labour turnover.

Worked answer, level by level against the real 4-level descriptor set:

Level 1 (1–2): Financial rewards are money given to employees for good performance. Five Guys gives its best-performing restaurants a bonus, which could help it keep staff.
Level 2 (3–4): Five Guys rewards its best 200 restaurants every week with $900–$1,300, assessed by mystery shoppers, shared among the staff working when the shop was visited. Because this is paid weekly and can be earned again the following week, it gives employees a regular, recurring reason to stay rather than a single one-off incentive — potentially useful in an industry the extract itself describes as running over 100% labour turnover.
Level 3 (5–8): [As above, plus a developed counter-case rather than an asserted one:] However, only 200 of Five Guys' 1,600-plus restaurants worldwide are rewarded in any given week, so most staff, at any given moment, are not earning the bonus at all — limiting how far this scheme can actually reach across the whole workforce. The scheme is also a real, ongoing cost: at the maximum weekly rate of $1,300 across 200 restaurants, it could cost as much as $13,520,000 a year to sustain, money that has an opportunity cost elsewhere in the business.
Level 4 (9–12): [As above, plus the real evaluative synthesis the top band requires:] Whether this cost is worthwhile depends on what it actually buys: if the bonus genuinely reduces turnover among the majority of staff who could plausibly win it in a given month, the saved recruitment and retraining cost across an industry already running over 100% turnover could easily justify $13.5m a year for a business of Five Guys' scale (1,600-plus locations). But for many employees, working conditions and promotion prospects matter more to whether they stay than a bonus scheme does — and strategies such as empowerment or consultation can improve retention without requiring any additional financial outlay at all. On balance, financial rewards are likely to help retain the minority of staff who are realistically in contention for the bonus in any given week, but are unlikely, on their own, to solve turnover across a 1,600-restaurant chain — a combination of financial and non-financial strategies is the more defensible answer, since different employees are motivated by different things.

Mark justification. Every strand traces to the mark scheme's own indicative content: the regular/re-earnable mechanism; the reach limitation (200 of 1,600-plus restaurants); the $13,520,000-a-year cost figure, stated by the mark scheme itself, not derived independently; the working-conditions-and-promotion counter-strategy point; and, at the top band, the explicit combination-of-strategies conclusion the scheme's own final bullet reaches. The examiner report records this as the paper's first 12-mark Assess question and states plainly what separated the higher levels from the rest: the "focus had to be on labour turnover," tied explicitly to the connection between financial rewards and staff retention, not productivity or motivation treated as if they were the same thing (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q1d). The same report notes a conclusion or judgement is required at 12 marks but "was not often seen" in practice, and that the counter-argument side "often lacked context in comparison to the advantages" — both genuine, named ways a technically accurate two-sided answer can still miss the top of Level 4.

#Q1(e) — Using Ansoff's Matrix, assess the possible benefits of the clothing merchandise (12 marks; levels, 4 bands)

Ansoff's Matrix itself — why crossing "is the product new or existing?" against "is the market new or existing?" forces exactly four strategies, and the general risk gradient across them — is taught in full in business-objectives-and-strategy.ts, which already applies the matrix to a different real question (Brompton Bikes, Jan 2023). This section applies the same taught model to Five Guys' own real clothing launch, which the matrix lesson does not cover.

The question, in brief: Five Guys' new clothing merchandise can be classed as product development under Ansoff's Matrix. Using Ansoff's Matrix, assess the possible benefits to Five Guys from launching its new clothing merchandise.

Worked answer, level by level against the real 4-level descriptor set:

Level 1 (1–2): Ansoff's Matrix shows four strategies a business can follow. Five Guys' clothing range is product development, which could help the business grow.
Level 2 (3–4): The clothing range is a new product sold to Five Guys' existing customer base — people who already know and trust the fast-food brand. Because the range draws on the company's own 1986 Arlington, Virginia origins and taps the American-styled clothing trend that was popular on the UK high street through 2022, it could extend the Five Guys name to an audience already familiar with it, without the added risk of also having to find new customers.
Level 3 (5–8): [As above, plus a developed counter-case:] Product development is nonetheless riskier than market penetration, because Five Guys' expertise lies in fast food, not clothing — the business has comparatively little existing knowledge of clothing design, manufacturing or retail, and launching the range required genuine research and development spending into products it has never sold before. The range's own pricing — from £10 for socks up to £75 for the college jacket — is relatively expensive for a brand with no established reputation in clothing, which could limit how many existing customers are actually willing to buy in.
Level 4 (9–12): [As above, plus the real evaluative synthesis the top band requires:] A further, distinct risk sits alongside the expertise gap: clothing trends date quickly, so items that reflect a 2022 fashion moment could leave Five Guys holding unsold inventory once that trend moves on — a risk a purely food-based business has never previously had to manage. Whether the benefits outweigh these risks depends on how the range is actually received and whether there is genuine room in the clothing market for a fast-food-branded line: if reception is strong, the low incremental risk of selling to an already-loyal customer base (rather than a genuinely new market) means the benefits — brand extension, incremental revenue, capitalising on the American-heritage trend — likely outweigh the costs; if reception is weak, the R&D spend and inventory risk are a real, avoidable loss for a business with no prior reason to think it understands clothing retail.

Mark justification. Every element is drawn directly from the mark scheme's own indicative content: the existing-market/new-product classification itself; the American-heritage/2022-trend rationale for why this specific audience might respond; the expertise gap and R&D cost as the central risk-side argument; the £10–£75 price point named explicitly as a possible barrier for an "unknown clothing brand"; the trend/inventory risk; and the reception-dependent conditional judgement the mark scheme's own final bullet reaches. The examiner report notes this question was answered less well than Q1(d): "the responses seen for this question were not as detailed," with some candidates drawing an unneeded diagram of the matrix (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q1e) — the mark scheme does not credit reproducing the grid itself, only its correct application — and some simply describing the tool rather than applying it to Five Guys' own extract detail. The report confirms a conclusion was required here too and "was often missing," the same gap it records for Q1(d).

#Section B — Question 2: Air India and Vistara (20 marks)

The general mechanism for horizontal integration — why combining market share moves faster than organic growth ever can, and the genuine diseconomies-of-scale/culture-clash risk side — is already derived at length in business-growth.ts, anchored to a different real question (IAG's takeover of Air Europa, Oct 2021 Q1c). This section applies the same underlying economics to Air India and Vistara's own real, different figures and outcome, which that lesson does not cover.

The question, in brief: Extract F is a table of India's top five airlines by winter-season seat capacity and market share (IndiGo 48.0%; Air India 9.5%; Vistara 7.3%; Go First 7.0%; SpiceJet 6.7%). Extract G describes the planned merger of Air India and Vistara — a horizontal merger, subject to regulator approval, targeted for completion in March 2024, creating a combined airline of 218 aircraft across 38 international and 52 domestic routes, with both airlines currently unprofitable. Evaluate the likely advantages of Air India and Vistara merging.

Worked answer, level by level against the real 4-level descriptor set:

Level 1 (1–4): A merger is when two businesses join together to become one. Air India and Vistara are merging, and this could help the new business grow.
Level 2 (5–8): Combining Air India's 9.5% market share with Vistara's 7.3% gives the merged airline 16.8% — enough to become the second-largest airline in India by market share, ahead of Go First and SpiceJet. This greater scale gives the new Air India more power in the Indian aviation market, particularly in Delhi, its main base, where the merger is set to double its capacity.
Level 3 (9–14): [As above, plus developed, evidenced reasoning on both sides:] The combined fleet of 218 aircraft could also let the new Air India access genuine economies of scale — bulk purchasing and maintenance efficiencies across a larger fleet that neither airline could reach alone — potentially lowering costs and, in time, prices, which matters given India's civil aviation market is forecast to grow from around $900m to over $4bn by 2025. However, both airlines are currently unprofitable, and existing aircraft still need to be overhauled while new ones are purchased — real, immediate financial pressure layered on top of an already loss-making starting position. A merger of this scale also creates genuine integration risk: diseconomies of scale through communication difficulties between two previously separate organisations, and possible culture clashes that could demotivate existing staff, particularly if the merger leads to job losses as duplicated roles are rationalised.
Level 4 (15–20): [As above, plus the real evaluative synthesis and conditional judgement the top band requires:] Even at a combined 16.8%, the new Air India remains far behind IndiGo's 48.0% — nearly three times its market share — so the realistic ceiling on the advantages above is bounded: this merger changes who holds second place, not who dominates the Indian market. It is also not yet certain to happen at all: completion depends on approval from India's competition regulators and is not scheduled until March 2024, and any delay risks IndiGo consolidating further in the meantime, eroding the very market-share advantage the merger is meant to deliver. On balance, the merger offers real, evidenced advantages — combined scale, doubled Delhi capacity, and a stronger position in a market expected to more than quadruple in value by 2025 — but whether those advantages are actually realised depends heavily on factors outside either airline's direct control (regulatory approval, timing) and on how well two loss-making organisations manage a genuinely difficult integration, rather than being guaranteed by the merger announcement itself.

Mark justification. Every element traces to the mark scheme's own indicative content: the 16.8% combined-share calculation and its ranking effect; the Delhi capacity-doubling point; the economies-of-scale argument tied explicitly to the $900m-to-$4bn market-growth figure; the diseconomies-of-scale, culture-clash and current-unprofitability counter-arguments; the IndiGo 48%-dominance ceiling; and, at the top band, the regulatory-approval uncertainty and March 2024 timing risk as the genuinely evaluative closing move. The examiner report describes this as a popular question with some genuinely detailed evaluations, crediting candidates who considered market share, power, elimination of competition and economies of scale on one side, and diseconomies of scale, culture clashes, merger cost, regulation and IndiGo's continuing dominance on the other, while noting that largely descriptive responses — those simply copying or paraphrasing the extracts without adding business concepts — were unlikely to reach the higher levels (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q2). The report confirms a conclusion on whether the merger is likely to succeed was expected at this tariff.

#Section C — Question 3: Disney (20 marks)

A complete, five-step, level-by-level worked exemplar ladder for this exact real question — the same command word, the same real mark scheme, the same real figures (Bob Iger's return, the 220,000 employees, the 9% share-price rise) — already exists in content/veridian/question-bank/wbs13.ts (id: wbs13-oct23-q3-disney-resistance), built to the same L1→L4 standard as every other worked question in this document. Reproducing it here would duplicate it exactly rather than add anything; this section instead gives the condensed mark-justification summary a complete-paper document needs, and directs to that file for the full worked ladder itself.

The question, in brief: Extract H describes Bob Iger's return as Disney CEO after Bob Chapek's removal, following a 40% share-price fall and $1.5bn in Disney+ losses over three months; shares rose 9% on the announcement. Extract I describes Iger's memo to Disney's 220,000 employees pledging rapid organisational and operating changes, aimed at a more efficient, cost-effective structure while honouring the company's creative culture. Evaluate the extent to which there might be resistance to change at Disney.

Mark-justification summary (full worked ladder in question-bank/wbs13.ts). The real mark scheme credits organisation size (220,000-plus employees, both slowing how far change spreads and widening how many people are directly affected) and the speed at which Iger wants to move as two independently creditable resistance drivers, not one combined point. Against this, it credits Iger's own 15 years of prior tenure — giving him real, first-hand understanding of Disney's culture — and his early, pre-announced, consultative approach (rather than change imposed without warning) as genuine mitigants, with the 9% share-price rise on his reinstatement usable as market-confidence evidence for the case that resistance may be manageable rather than severe. A Level 4 answer reaches an explicit, conditional judgement on "the extent to which" resistance is likely — not simply asserting resistance will or won't happen — by weighing the scale/speed drivers against Iger's own experience and communication approach. The examiner report records this as the paper's weakest-answered evaluative question: many candidates paraphrased the extracts and described events at Disney rather than engaging with what "resistance to change" actually means, though it credits the stronger responses that brought in organisational culture, norms, the size of the organisation, and the leader's own skills as genuinely evaluative moves (Examiner Report, Oct 2023, Q3). The report confirms candidates could structure their answer starting from either side of the argument, provided a supported conclusion on the extent of resistance was reached by the end.

#Provenance summary

All seven worked answers above, their mark-by-mark justifications, and every quoted fragment are drawn directly from the three primary-source PDFs named at the top of this document — re-extracted and read in full this pass, not carried over from any prior summary. No grade boundary, pass mark or likelihood figure is stated anywhere above — Pearson does not publish sub-question-level grade boundaries, and none is invented here. Every calculated figure (ROCE 21.15%; NPV £11,635; the 16.8% combined Air India/Vistara market share; the $13,520,000 maximum annual cost of Five Guys' bonus scheme) was independently recomputed from the extracts' own data during this pass and matches the real mark scheme exactly. Where this paper's own real content overlaps with existing course material — Q1(a), Q1(d) and Q3 — that overlap is named explicitly at the point of use above, with a direct pointer to the fuller existing treatment, rather than silently duplicated.