Workshop on Reference Management Software

On 19 November 2025, MBA students of the Embark College also participated in a very practical academic skills workshop conducted by Dr. Bidur Dhungel on Reference Management Software. The session, placed in a key step of the learning process of the students, where assignments, reports and future dissertations require strict application of sources, was aimed at unveiling the mystery of citation and bibliography management. Dr. Dhungel, who is a veteran researcher and academic advisor, started by positioning reference management as a non-technical supplement to any postgraduate student, and in particular, to those students who seek to publish, continue their education, and/or employment in research-focused organizations.

During the workshop, he took students on a tour of the logic and workflow of a current day reference manager and demonstrated how tools like Zotero, Mendeley, and EndNote could make what is otherwise perceived as a boring aspect of scholarly work a bit easier. He showed me how to import articles directly, databases, websites, add PDFs, add notes and tags, and sort literature according to themes, modules or research topics. Students especially were interested when he demonstrated how with a few clicks, one could drop citations into Word files and have them automatically formatted in APA, Harvard or Chicago styles – hours and hours of formatting could now be put in with just a few clicks of the mouse.

One of the main areas of focus of the session by Dr. Dhungel was the relationship between reference management, academic integrity and critical thinking. He pointed out that plagiarism may be less likely to occur accidentally when reference software is used systematically, arguments will be more credible, and it will be easier to trace the idea of the original authors. Simultaneously, he warned students that software is not a replacement of judgement, and that the fundamentals of postgraduate work are to learn the sources, their quality and how to critically approach them. By doing so, the workshop went beyond the principles of how-to clicks and shortcuts to solidify the principles of honesty, transparency, and scholarly rigor that the Embark College is known to be.

The workshop ended by a practical practice part, but in this, the students installed or opened their selected tools, created libraries to their existing modules, and attempted to add citations to sample documents under the supervision of Dr. Dhungel. Some of the questions included the selection of the correct tool to use with various operating systems, linking libraries with other devices, and using collective folders on group projects. At the close of the session, the MBA students would not only have acquired new technical knowledge but also experienced a clear understanding that using reference management software will help them save time and lessen stress levels, as well as contribute to better quality of their academic writing. The workshop was also one step in ensuring that the graduates of Embark College are not just good in content knowledge but also equipped with all those research and writing tools anticipated by an international business graduate.