...A Framework for Case Analysis Case analysis is a problem solving process. You are demonstrating in a systematic way how you have defined a key problem/issue, identified plausible, realistic alternatives (not necessarily limited by those suggested in the case), analyzed these alternatives using common criteria, and finally developed a complete set of recommendations. This process challenges your organizational and communication skills as much as your analytical and quantitative skills. Step 1. Situation Analysis. The first step in systematically analyzing an organization's marketing problems is to conduct a situation analysis. This is not part of the written case brief but it is needed before you can begin the problem solving process. Step 2. Define the Problem/Issue. Once you have conducted a thorough situation analysis, you can identify the problem(s) facing the organization. Be careful not to assume that the characters in the case are objective or accurate in identifying the problem or make a rush to judgment about the problem. Step 3. Identify plausible alternatives. What are reasonable options for solving the identified problem? While you should at least initially consider the options discussed in the case, do not assume that these are the best or even appropriate alternatives, especially if these options are not consistent with the problem. Alternatives should be plausible, not "straw men" that are just knocked aside in order to make a bee line for some obvious solution...
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...Requirements for Written Case Analyses NOTE: Some requirements may seem demanding; however, they facilitate grading and enable papers to be returned in a timely fashion. Remember to put your name on the paper and you may used 2 sided print. 1. Answer the questions in the assignment in order. Number your answers to the questions to make it clear which question you are answering. No introduction or statement of the problem is required. 2. Use Tables and Exhibits to present quantitative analyses. Clearly show all calculations done to arrive at your answers and analysis. Where possible, use Tables and Exhibits to present calculations and quantitative analyses. You will be evaluated on the clarity of the presentation as well as the quality of the analysis. Font in Exhibits must be 10-point or larger; 12 point is preferable. This means the printed font (be careful if you use the “size” command!). 3. Don’t put case exhibits in your written case analysis. 4. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from case facts and your analysis. 5. Calculations are only the beginning of the analysis. You must interpret them and assess their managerial implications and significance for the decisions under discussion. Don’t be misled that your goal is just to solve the accounting problem. While you are expected to solve the accounting...
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...Ateneo de Davao University School of Business and Governance Entrepreneurship Department Progressive Insurance: A Case Study Submitted to: Mr. Rey Navacilla Submitted by: John Paul Dela Vega Jose Antonio Kintanar Clarence Mitchell Sy Dayle Lois Tulang John Way Keith Medina Table of Contents I. Introduction…………………………………………………..…… II. Statement of the Problem…………………………………..…... III. Objectives of the Case Study………………………………..…. IV. Methodologies and Approaches…………………………….… V. Analysis of the Case a. Qualitative Tool: Fishbone Diagram………….…. b. Quantitative Tool: Decision Tree Analysis……. VI. Alternative Courses of Action (ACAs) c. Alternative Course 1……………………………..… d. Alternative Course 2……………………………….. e. Alternative Course 3……………………………..… VII. Significant Findings…………………………………………….. f. Positive Findings…………………………………… g. Negative Findings………………………………….. VIII. Recommendations…………………………………………….... IX. Conclusions……………………………………………………… I. Introduction Progressive Insurance, an automobile insurer company, which is based in Mayfield Village, Ohio. On the year of 1991 Progressive Insurance had approximately $1.3 Billion in their sales. When the year of 2006 came that $1.3 Billion in sales suddenly became $14.5 Billion. What did they do to make this figures increase so high? Nothing. For 15 years Progressive insurance just did little advertising...
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...How to Approach a Case This is not the only approach that exists, but it’s a worthwhile one to try as you get started. 1. GETTING ORIENTED It’s useful to think of a case analysis as digging deeper and deeper into the layers of a 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. Digging deeper, Performing Analyses you identify information that exposes the issues, gather data, perform calculations that might provide insight. 4. Finally, you begin Action Planning to outline short-, medium-, and long-term well-defined steps. Typically, you’ll need to repeat this process multiple times, and as you do, you'll discover new analytical directions, evolving your assessment of the case and conclusion. a. Case Analysis Overview Analyzing a case is not just about digging. It’s also about climbing back out to examine what you’ve unearthed, deciding what it means, determining what to analyze next, and digging some more. Often your examination of information about a problem will change your idea of what the real problem is and about what to analyze next. The process is similar to when a detective investigating a crime shifts his or her opinion about the most likely suspect as more clues come to light. Gather your materials and tools. These include the case and any other related materials to supplement your reading...
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...QUALITATIVE METHOD OF CASE ANALYSIS EOPT THEORY INTRODUCTION Qualitative Case Analysis, as distinct from the Quantitative method, deals with organizational issues that impede or prevent companies from being effectively organized. Qualitative Case Analysis is typically used in Organizational Behaviour, Human Resource Management, Organizational Change, Industrial Relations or any venue that is significantly impacted by human interaction. This type of analysis identifies inconsistencies, incongruities and conflicts that are sub-optimal and allows the analyst to prescribe solutions that address both the acute problems facing the organization (the individual events or actions observed) and the chronic, underlying conditions that promote these sub-optimal conditions. 1. OVERVIEW The Overview is a 5 – 7 sentence paragraph that establishes the context in which any analysis or decision must be made for the case in question. This section of the report indicates to the reader that the analyst (You) understands the circumstances of the organization’s dilemma. The writer must identify the key people involved, most critical event or events the have happened and the situation that has resulted. Finally, the writer must detail the apparent decisions that must be made. Note: This is not an Introduction and absolutely no conclusions are drawn at this point. The writer is merely explaining what she perceives is the present situation. This is extremely important as the writer...
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...ISSUES IN ACCOUNTING EDUCATION Vol. 26, No. 3 2011 pp. 593–608 American Accounting Association DOI: 10.2308/iace-50038 Wiki Art Gallery, Inc.: A Case for Critical Thinking Fred Phillips and Brandy Mackintosh ABSTRACT: This instructional case requires students to provide advice to a client who is currently a co-owner of a for-profit art gallery. The client is planning to purchase his coowner’s shares at a price to be determined based on their company’s recent financial performance. The company’s financial statements, prepared by the client’s co-owner, contain accounting choices and judgments that students should identify and evaluate using critical thinking skills. This case is suitable for use in introductory and intermediate financial accounting, and in introductory auditing and assurance courses. Accompanying the case is a set of teaching notes and assessment rubrics for use by instructors. THE CASE The Setting Wiki Art Gallery, Inc. (WAG) is a privately owned business started in 2006 by two students. Rob Wilco combined his entrepreneurial business interests with Stephen Conley’s knowledge of artwork to create an online art gallery, which they named WAG. WAG’s start-up years were challenging. The owners contributed their savings to the company, but initially earned little return on their significant investments of money and time. Propelled by a belief that their work would pay off, they persevered. Now, it appears their luck is changing. WAG became profitable in late 2009 and...
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... It is concerned with the generation, use and interpretation of management and cost information and related data by managers under various organizational systems. This information is used for planning and control, decision-making, performance evaluation, and reporting purposes. The course also examines the impact of quantitative information on motivation and organizational communication. This class presupposes some basic knowledge of financial reporting, economics and organizational behavior. Management accounting is a dynamic field and reflects many of the changes seen in business today. We will often use product-based companies to initially discuss a topic, and then expand our discussions to the service and not-for-profit sectors. Financial accounting is externally oriented and governed by fundamental concepts of generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). In contrast, managerial accounting is internally oriented. Managerial accounting is very context driven. Management accounting is more intuitively understandable than financial accounting. However, the material cannot be learned by ‘thinking’. You must work through the mini-cases, cases and problems, which are assigned for each class. The concepts and techniques must be used to see how they are developed and applied. Discussion in each class assumes you understand the material covered in prior sessions. Therefore, you must not allow yourself to fall behind. If you are not keeping up with the assignments...
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...How to Solve a Case Study Cases are included in many courses in Administrative Studies to give students an appreciation of the hard realities of business and the constraints involved in decision making. By exposure to a variety of situations and diverse problems, the student can experience, to some degree, the challenges and dilemmas of the decision maker. Cases are usually based on real situations. For reasons of privacy and confidentiality, the persons, the companies, and the locations involved are typically disguised. When assigning case analyses, instructors expect that students will: • Study the information provided in each case, • Attempt to diagnose the nature of the problem or problems involved, • Search for alternative ways in which the problems can be resolved, • Recommend and justify the course of action that is most likely to be effective. The justification should rely, to a large extent, on theoretical principles. Sometimes students feel disappointed because the cases sometimes do not appear to be “dramatic.” However, because the cases do represent the realities of organizations, they are often likely to be somewhat mundane, at least to the outside observer. Most of the incidents are based on events that were actually faced by managers and their subordinates on a day-today basis. Very often, cases do not contain all the information that the student would like to have. This is often done intentionally, or at least knowingly, by the case writer. In real...
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...Cases are included in many courses in Administrative Studies to give students an appreciation of the hard realities of business and the constraints involved in decision making. By exposure to a variety of situations and diverse problems, the student can experience, to some degree, the challenges and dilemmas of the decision maker. Cases are usually based on real situations. For reasons of privacy and confidentiality, the persons, the companies, and the locations involved are typically disguised. When assigning case analyses, instructors expect that students will: • study the information provided in each case, • attempt to diagnose the nature of the problem or problems involved, • search for alternative ways in which the problems can be resolved, • recommend and justify the course of action that is most likely to be effective. The justification should rely, to a large extent, on theoretical principles. Sometimes students feel disappointed because the cases sometimes do not appear to be “dramatic.” However, because the cases do represent the realities of organizations, they are often likely to be somewhat mundane, at least to the outside observer. Most of the incidents are based on events that were actually faced by managers and their subordinates on a day-today basis. Very often, cases do not contain all the information that the student would like to have. This is often done intentionally, or at least knowingly, by the case writer. In real life, a manager must frequently make decisions...
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...Welcome to the Case Analysis Coach This tutorial is designed to start you down the road toward becoming an expert at analyzing business cases. You'll learn how to identify and define the business concepts raised by a case, as well as to develop analysis-based solutions, recommendations, and action plans. These skills will prepare you for class discussions and exams. You will have access to a complete real case, called Komatsu Ltd. and Project G., so that you can apply what you learn to a concrete example. You will also get other helpful resources, such as a Case Analysis Worksheet and samples of classdiscussion notes on the Komatsu case that were prepared by real students like you. In addition, smaller excerpts from other real cases are used to illustrate some of the steps in case analysis. 1 Introduction to Case Analysis Types of Cases The "case method" is an approach to learning that encourages students to extract useful lessons from the experiences of others ("cases"). Students study accounts of specific events in order to discover general principles that they can apply in other situations. Cases tend to fall into one of three categories that sometimes overlap: • • • Decision Cases describe a decision faced by the case protagonist. The student ultimately must choose among a finite set of distinct decision alternatives. Problem Cases require a student to diagnose a problem in a business case and to formulate possible solutions. Evaluation Cases illustrate a business...
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...MSIS604/OMIS378 Information Systems Policy & Strategy Spring Quarter, 2013—2 April/13 June Instructor: Dr. Darrel A. (Del) Mank dmank@scu.edu Cell Phone: 408-605-3983 Office Hours: By appointment Office: Room 321W Lucas Hall Class Days: TTh Class Period: 5:45pm—7:00pm Class Room: 310 Lucas Hall Text: Schilling, Melissa A.; STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT of TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION, McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 4th Edition, 2013 ISBN 978-0-07-802923-3 Cases* Hewlett-Packard Merced Division SAP America VMware Inc., 2008 IBM and Eclipse (A) Oracle vs. salesforce.com Enterprise IT at Cisco (2004) Google Inc. *All Cases are from the Harvard Business Review and are available at the SCU Bookstore Course Objectives: • To develop an awareness of the range, scope, and complexity of the issues and problems related to the strategic management of ISTs. • To develop an understanding of the “state of the art” of the strategic management of IST and IST innovation. • To develop a conceptual framework for assessing IST capabilities. • To develop insight concerning the skills necessary to be effective as an IST manager. • To offer some practice in defining and working out strategic management problems related IST innovation and implementation. Course Description/Perspective: The course focuses on the strategic management and deployment of information systems and technologies (ISTs) to improve business competitiveness. The...
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...Analysis of Business Issues, Writing In the Disciplines (WID) BADM 2003W (95440): BADM_2003W.SEC.12 Tuesday Combined Class: SEMESTER: Spring 2014 LOCATION & TIME: Duques 353, Tuesday 11:10 AM-12:25 PM PROFESSOR: Dr. Bret Crane Department of Management Office: Funger Suite 315N Email: bretdcrane@gwu.edu Office Hours: Tuesdays 1:00-2 PM or by appointment TEACHING ASSISTANTS: |Erin Vander Wall | | |Leigha McReynolds | | |Mark De Cicco | | |Tess Strumwasser | | |Daniel Berkhout | | |Sam Yates | | |Vicki Brown | | | ...
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...| Entrepreneurial Growth | | Fall Semester, 2013 Man 385.24 Unique #04780 | Professor John N. Doggett Class Days Monday and Wednesdays from 12:30 to 2:00 p.m. Class Room UTC 4.104 Office CBA 5.124k Office Hours Wednesdays, 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. or by appointment Phone 512-232-7671 E-Mail john.doggett@mccombs.utexas.edu Course Web Page via Canvas ------------------------------------------------- Teaching Assistants Grant Garlinghouse (grant.garlinghouse@mba14.mccombs.utexas.edu) Course Objectives I have taught this course since late in the last century. Today, as we approach a second global recession, helping people learn how to grow firms as astutely as possible will play a role in speeding the beginning of a new recovery. When companies like Cisco and HP abandon major market segments, it is even more important to think critically about how to grow a firm’s products. Given the chaotic period that we are entering, I have made several significant changes to this course. First, I have done away with the individual midterm. The “next” recovery will be a group effort. So will your midterm. Second, I have assigned three books. These are some of the best books out there on how to think about innovation, competition and how to grow a business. They will become “let me read that again” go-to books that you will use long after you graduate from UT. To compensate for the heavy reading load, I have eliminated...
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...Analysis of Business Issues, Writing In the Disciplines (WID) BADM 2003W (93752): BADM_2003W.SEC.11 Monday Combined Class: SEMESTER: Spring 2014 LOCATION & TIME: Funger 209, Monday 2:20 PM-3:35 PM PROFESSOR: Dr. Bret Crane Department of Management Office: Funger Suite 315N Email: bretdcrane@gwu.edu Office Hours: Tuesdays 1:00-2 PM or by appointment TEACHING ASSISTANTS & WRITING LABS: | | | |Section # |Begin |End |Day |TA |Email | |30 |08:00 AM |09:15 AM |Wed |Mark De Cicco |mdecicco@gwmail.gwu.edu | |31 |09:25 AM |10:40 AM |Wed |Mark De Cicco |mdecicco@gwmail.gwu.edu | |32 |10:50 AM |12:05 PM |Wed |Tess Strumwasser |tstrumwa@gwu.edu | |33 |12:15 PM |01:30 PM |Wed |Tess Strumwasser |tstrumwa@gwu.edu | |34 |01:40 PM |02:55 PM |Wed |Daniel Berkhout |berkhout@gwmail.gwu.edu | |35 |03:05 PM |04:20 PM |Wed |Daniel Berkhout |berkhout@gwmail.gwu.edu | |36 |04:30...
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...ARCTIC MINING CONSULTANTS Case Synopsis Arctic Mining Consultants is a mining company that deals with mineral exploration. In this case study, the project given is staking 15 claims in Eagle Lake, Alaska. The project Manager was Tom Parker, who has a wide experience and specialized knowledge in all nontechnical aspects of mineral exploration. He is a geological field technician and field coordinator for Arctic Mining Consultants. He assigned his previous field assistants John Talbot, Greg Boyce and Brian Millar to help him complete the project. The job required them to stake at least 7 lengths each day in order to be completed on time. However, the whole team has became very tense and agitated, especially Tom Parker, as the deadline was just around the corner and there’s still many to be finished within the limited time. The problem became worse with the way Tom managed and treated his team. The only motivation to the team was the $300 bonuses promised by the company when the job is done on time, otherwise, they might wished to give up already. This happened because working as a field assistant and in long-working hours only giving them low wages, which is considered unreasonable compared to what they have to do. During the eight hard days, everything had actually proved the strengths and weaknesses of each of the team members, including Tom. Case analysis symptoms 1) What symptom(s) exist in this case to suggest that something has gone wrong? The symptom(s) to suggest...
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