Case Study Instructions and Guidelines

Steps for Effective Case Analysis

Adapted from Harvard Business Publishing

It's useful to think of a case analysis as digging deeper and deeper into the layers of a case. You should make sure to follow these general steps in addition to answering the questions from the case.

1. You start at the surface, Getting Oriented and examining the overall case landscape.

2. Then you begin to dig, Identifying Problems, as well as possible alternative solutions.

3. This is the section where you will spend most of your time.

Digging deeper, Performing Analyses you identify information that exposes the issues, gather data, perform calculations that might provide insight. "Analysis" describes the varied and crucial things you do with information in the case, to shed light on the problems and issues you've identified. That might mean calculating and comparing cumulative growth rates for different periods from the year-by-year financials in a case's exhibits. Or it might mean pulling together seemingly unrelated facts from two different sections of the case, and combining them logically to arrive at an important conclusion or conjecture. Analysis usually doesn't provide definitive answers. But as you do more of it, a clearer picture often starts to emerge, or the preponderance of evidence begins to point to one interpretation rather than others. Don't expect a case analysis to yield a "final answer." If you're accustomed to doing analysis that ends with a right answer, coming up with a possible solution that simply reflects your best judgment might frustrate you. But remember that cases, much like real-world business experiences, rarely reveal an absolutely correct answer, no matter how deeply you analyze them. Typically, you'll do qualitative analysis based on your reading and interpretation of the case. Ask yourself: What is fact and what is opinion? Which facts are contributing to the problem? Which are the causes? Qualitative factors should be prioritized and fully developed to support your argument. Make notes about your evolving interpretations, always being careful to list the evidence or reasons that support them. Qualitative information in a case can be a mix of objective and subjective information. For example, you may need to assess the validity of quotations from company executives, each of whom has a subjective opinion. Reports from external industry analysts or descriptions of what other companies in the industry have done might seem more objective; no one in the case has a vested interest in this information. A company's internal PowerPoint presentation should be considered separately and differently from a newspaper article about the company. Cases mix firsthand quotations

and opinions with third-person narratives, so you need to consider the reliability of sources. As in real life, you shouldn't take all case information at face value. Quantitative data—such as amounts of materials, money, time, and so on-might be embedded in the text or provided in tabular form in the exhibits (often both). It can be difficult to know which calculations to do, what formulas to apply, and how to interpret the results. Don't sweat this. Try a few simple calculations such as ratios and growth rates over time. If some of those provide insight, great; if not, nothing is lost but a little time. Use simple calculations to determine what other things you might want to assess quantitatively. Quantitatively rich cases may seem intimidating; some people don't enjoy calculating or relying on math to reach conclusions. You might need to calculate, say, a net present value in a finance case, or the capacity of a production system to locate the bottleneck in an operations case. Don't be fooled into thinking that just applying those standard analyses is the point of a case. Be prepared if the professor asks, "How is that number relevant to this situation?" or "How would you incorporate it into your decision in favor of one approach over another?" or "Is that number even relevant in this situation?" As conclusions or evidence in favor or against certain alternatives begin to emerge, you might spot connections to principles, frameworks, and theories that you've already covered in your program of study. It's often worthwhile to try applying what seems like a relevant framework to the raw data or to data that have been transformed in some way by your analysis. Once you've begun interpreting your analyses in the context of a framework, you'll often start to see more opportunities for analysis, suggested by the framework itself. It's usually a good idea to follow these paths, although not all will prove to be fruitful.

4. Finally, you begin Action Planning to outline short-, medium-, and long-term well- defined steps.

Recommended action plans should state what would be objectively best for the case company given its goals, resources, and situation. But they should also outline possible implementation objectives and hurdles. Action plans should include short-, medium-, and long-term steps that will concretely carry out recommendations like these. Real-life situations often have hidden agendas and nuances that can affect how an action plan is crafted. These elements are also relevant in the analysis of a full case, except perhaps for cases that are purely or primarily quantitative. At some point, you might need to develop your favored case action plan in a degree of detail that exceeds that of alternative plans. If you're operating with space constraints (on a word-limited case exam, for instance), you may need to explore just one alternative in full detail, rather than developing all alternatives at the same level of detail. The following are important steps for your Recommendations section.

Step 1: Identify Tasks Brainstorm all of the tasks that you need to accomplish your objective. It's helpful to start this process at the very beginning. What's the very first action you'll need to take? What comes next? Should any steps be prioritized to meet specific deadlines, or because of limits on other people's availability?

Step 2: Analyze and Delegate Tasks

Now that you can see the entire project from beginning to end, look at each task in greater detail. Are there any steps you could drop without compromising your objective? Which tasks could you delegate to someone else on your team or to a freelancer? Are there deadlines for specific steps? Do you need to arrange additional resources?

Step 3: At this point, stop to list a few possible recommendations for the case and think

about possible action plans. These deliverables are, after all, the ultimate objectives of your analysis. Try not to restrict yourself to one solution. Let your conclusion emerge from the evidence; don't force the evidence to fit your conclusion. Remain open-minded as you proceed to the next step. List possible recommendations or actions based on your analysis of the case.

Typically, you'll need to repeat these four processes multiple times, and as you do, you'll discover new analytical directions, evolving your assessment of the case and conclusion.