IB Business Management HLTopic 7 — Exam Skills and AssessmentPaper 3 (HL only)Exam skill~8 min read
What Paper 3 Asks For
Paper 3 is the strangest paper of the three, and the one students underestimate. Only 25 marks, but 17 of them sit in a single question. You are given a pack of resources about a social enterprise and asked to build a plan of action for the next five years.
📘 What you need to know
Paper 3 is HL only. It lasts 1 hour 15 minutes, carries 25 marks and is worth 25% of your grade.
There is one section and questions can come from any part of the HL syllabus.
Everything is based on a resource pack about a social enterprise — a business with a social or environmental aim as well as a financial one.
Resources usually include an overview, financial information, industry information, research and internal communications such as emails or meeting minutes.
The three questions are always 2 marks, 6 marks and 17 marks.
The 17-mark question asks you to recommend a plan of action, normally over the next five years.
What the resource pack looks like
Instead of one flowing case study, Paper 3 gives you numbered resources. One might be a background description, another a table of financial data, another an industry report, another an email from a manager who disagrees with the plan. They are deliberately written to pull in different directions.
The first two questions are a warm-up. Almost the whole paper rides on Question 3.
Question 1: two marks, use a theory
Question 1 asks you to use theory to describe a need the social enterprise meets for a named stakeholder. It is short, but the word “theory” matters: naming a model and applying it is what separates two marks from one.
WORKED EXAMPLE
Using a business management theory, describe one need that Rooted Grains meets for its employees. [2]
Rooted Grains is a co-operative bakery that trains and employs adults who have been out of work for over a year. Staff are paid above the local minimum wage and hold a small share in the business.
Step 1: name the theory
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Step 2: match it to the resourceAbove-minimum pay meets basic physiological and safety needsStep 3: go one level up for the second markHolding a share meets esteem needs by giving staff status and ownershipTheory named + applied to the resource = 2 marksTwo marks means two statements. Naming Maslow alone is one of them.
Question 2: six marks, real challenges
Question 2 asks you to explain specific challenges the social enterprise faces. “Specific” is doing the work in that sentence — a general challenge such as “competition” earns little. A challenge drawn from a named resource, explained in a chain, earns full credit.
Six marks usually means three developed points. Each one needs the challenge, a reason it is a problem for this enterprise, and evidence from a resource.
Question 3: seventeen marks, a plan
This is the big one. You are asked to recommend a course of action to help the enterprise reach a stated objective, usually over five years, and to justify it. It is marked against four separate criteria rather than a single mark scheme, and one of them rewards nothing more than putting your ideas in a sensible order.
Criterion
What it rewards
Marks
A — Use of resource materials
Evidence pulled from all of the resources, not just one or two
4
B — Tools and theories
Business models applied properly to the plan
4
C — Evaluation
The likely impact, and the trade-offs between areas of the business
6
D — Sequencing
A clear order of actions, with reasons for that order
3
Criterion D is three marks for organisation alone. A weak answer that says “do this first, then this, because…” still collects them. Never skip the ordering paragraph.
Timing
WORKED EXAMPLE
Plan how to spend the 75 minutes of Paper 3.
Step 1: reading comes first10 minutes reading all resources before writing anythingStep 2: clear the small questions quicklyQ1 (2 marks): 4 minutes Q2 (6 marks): 13 minutesStep 3: everything left goes to Q375 − 10 − 4 − 13 = 48 minutes10 read • 4 for Q1 • 13 for Q2 • 48 for Q3Spend five of those 48 minutes planning the three actions and their order. It pays for itself.
💡 Exam tip
Read every resource before you write. The email at the end often contradicts the cheerful overview at the start, and that tension is where evaluation marks come from.
Number your evidence. Writing “(Resource 3)” after a fact proves to the examiner you used the pack.
Remember the social aim. A recommendation that boosts profit but damages the social mission needs that trade-off spelled out.
Use a different theory for each action so Criterion B is covered three times over.
Write the ordering paragraph even if you are short of time. Three marks for one paragraph is the best rate in the paper.
Give the plan a five-year shape — what happens in year one, and what depends on it later.
⚠ Common mix-up
Treating a social enterprise like a charity. It still needs revenue, costs and a surplus — it just measures success on more than money.
Using only one or two resources. Criterion A rewards reference to all of them.
Recommending one action instead of a plan. The question wants at least three, ordered.
Describing what the enterprise already does rather than what it should do next.
Leaving evaluation to a final sentence. Criterion C is worth six marks — more than any other — so evaluate as you go.
Running Q2 long. Six marks does not deserve twenty minutes when seventeen marks are waiting.
Up next: The Skills Examiners Reward — the four assessment objectives behind every command term in all three papers.
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