Citing Business Resources & Creating Bibliographies

You should name each author in the signal phrase beginning the sentence or in parentheses each time you cite the work.

Example:  In the book by Jones and Smith (1979) we learned that ......

Example: (Jones & Smith, 1979)

List all of the authors in the signal phrase or in parentheses the first time that you cite the information. In any further cites, only use the first author's last name followed by "et al." in the signal phrase or parentheses.

Example: (Martinez et al, 1999)

If this creates ambiguity with another in-text citation, then type out as many author names as need to distinguish between the references.

Example: (Martinez, Johnson, Kapoor, Allen-Jones, Li, and Hill, 1999)

                (Martinez, Johnson, Becker, Montez, Portman, Sato, and D'Costa, 1999)

Both references shorten to (Martinez et al, 1999)   To distinguish between them cite them as follows:

               (Martinez, Johnson, Kapoor et al, 1999) and (Martinez, Johnson, Becker et al 1999)

Because et al ( "and other") cannot stand for one name, when only the final author is different, include all author names in each instance the work is referenced.

If the author of a cited work is unknown, use the first word or two of the title and the publication year. Book and report titles are italicized; titles of articles, chapters and web pages are in quotation marks.

Example: ("The Business Case," 2006).

If you are citing two authors with the same last name, include the first initial to distinguish between them.

Example: (B. Cross 2003, W. Cross 2007)

In-text citations are used to refer to other's work in your report or paper.  The following show examples of how to do in-text citations.

If you are directly quoting from a work, you will need to provide the author's last name, year of publication and page number.  The page number needs to be preceded by a "p".

Example: Katzenberg (2004) states that a good business plan is essential to success (p. 86).

Example: He stated, "A good business plan is essential to success" (Katzenberg, 2004, p.86), and people need to know how to write one.

If the quotation is 40 words or longer, place the quotation in a free-standing block of text and do not use quotation marks. Begin on a new line and indent 1/2 inch from left margin.

Example:

Katzenberg's (2004) work tells us the following:

   A good business plan is essential to success. Every business person should know how to write one correctly.  This enables the beginning business owner to communicate to the prospective investor the value of the fledgling enterprise.  This is knowledge that can be gained not only through classroom instruction, but also through quality books and agencies such as the Small Business Administration. (p. 86) 

Katzenberg (2004) states that a good business plan is essential to success (para. 5).

In an analysis of the data (Table 10), Katzenberg concludes that the majority of successful business owners are proficient in gathering needed information for their business plan.

According to Katzenberg (2004), successful business owners know how to research information for their business plan.

Successful business owners are proficient in researching information for their business plan (Katzenberg, 2004, p.42).