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The Case Competition Toolbox About the Toolbox Disclaimer The Case Competition Toolbox is a collection of useful This Toolbox is a collection of useful tips, tools, advices guidelines and frameworks that will assist your case solving and frameworks that have proven useful for several process. Although its primary objective is to be used for Beat the different case solvers and winners in the past. The Case Elite, you may also find it useful for other case solving exercises, Competition Toolbox is developed by past case team such as in classes or in job members and winners and therefore all material rights interviews. belongs to The Case Competition. Much of the content in the Toolbox is meant to serve as a For further information, please visit: foundation for non-experienced case solvers. Thus, the Toolbox www.thecase.hk does not contain a certain right way to solve a case. It does however contain a lot of useful tips and tricks. It is not intended to be a winning formula, but by reading through this collection of frameworks and guidelines the team might be one step closer to be able to Beat the Elite. Enjoy. 2018 2
presentation Introduction Content • • Problem solving: Problem solving pp. 4-8 This section describes how to structure the problem • Presentation pp. 9-24 solving part of your solution. • Practicalities pp. 25-27 • Presentation: This section describes how to set up your presentation • Industry overview pp. 28-36 and ensure the output looks nice, neat and professional. • Additional reading pp. 37 Practicalities: • This section describes some of the practical things that can be done before the case launch, as well as some insiders tips from previous participants. Industry overview: • This section highlights the key traits for a wide range of industries. It is intended to enlighten people with limited knowledge of business on what areas to focus on during the case solving. Additional reading: • External sources and readings.
Problem Solving Introduction Content Structuring of the problem solving process is very important. • Hypothesis-driven problem solving The teams are only given 24 hours to solve a complex problem and hence a systematic approach will help prioritize • MECE approach and structure the task at hand. This section is about exactly • Issue tree how to do that. • Sanity check Hypothesis-driven problem solving: This section describes one of the most time efficient ways to approach a problem. MECE approach: The MECE approach is widely used within the management consulting industry and for a good reason; This framework ensures that the whole problem solution space is tested. Issue tree: Issue trees are often combined with the MECE approach in order to prioritize and break down the problem. Sanity check: This section describes the importance of doing a sanity check. 2018 4
Hypothesis-driven problem solving Description Stating initial Research, Confirm or refute Formation of Hypothesis-driven problem solving is, as the hypothesis analysis and next step name states, all about forming a hypothesis conclusion hypothesis and then testing whether one is right or New wrong concerning the initial hypothesis. hypothesis /final conclusion As an example look at the figure on the right. Data This example describes the hypothesis that Confirm changing the quality of the product will lead No additional profit hypothesis to an increase in the price and thus the can be found by changing quality. Analysis profitability of the product sold. or Hypothesis conclusion First the initial hypothesis is stated, this is or Refute then followed by an analysis which can lead hypothesis to either confirming or refuting the initial New Analysis hypothesis. hypothesis / After this, a series of new hypothesis can conclusion then be formed, here are two examples: After analysis we Do not look for profit by changing quality Increasing quality Looking at price Reducing quality by refute the of the product by sensitivity, 20% will lead to 5% since the analysis shows that neither in- or hypothesis. 5-10% will lead to a consumer demand, increase in volume decreasing quality will change profitability. Increasing quality 2% increase in capital investments and 10% increase will not increase Or check if reduction of quality instead will profit pr. item. needed and uptake in price pr. item. profit pr. item. lead to increased profitability. rates. 2018 5
MECE Description A non-MECE issue tree Total possible solution space MECE stands for Mutually Exclusive and Collectively Exhaustive and is a tool commonly Sub-issue #1 used within the management consulting industry. Sub-issue #4 The framework makes it easier to break complex problems down into smaller, more simple problems. If the ”breakdown” is MECE the team Sub-issue #3 Sub-issue #2 ensures that all the sub-issues collectively exhaust the total solution space (no grey area is left uncovered) and that the sub-issues are A MECE issue tree mutually exclusive (no sub-issues are overlapping) as seen on the right. By structuring a problem this way the team ensures that they do not miss any Sub-issue #1 Sub-issue #4 possible solution options. It will also be possible to distribute the work among the team members without duplication of any work, thus the limited time will be used more efficiently. Sub-issue #2 Sub-issue #3 2018 6
A MECE issue tree Description The issue tree deconstructs an issue into its sub- issues and the sub-issues into its sub-issues and so forth. A complete issue tree makes identification of possible solutions easier and guides the problem solving process. In this example an issue tree is constructed around a profit problem in a company, so in order to know how to fix the profit problem, a MECE issue tree can be constructed. The overall issue is profit. On the next level, profit is deconstructed into revenue and cost. Please note that revenue and cost are the only drivers of profit and they are not overlapping -henceforth the issue tree is MECE at this level. Looking at revenue this is deconstructed into ”price / item” and ”volume,” again this is two MECE elements of revenue. This issue tree is MECE but all branches are not fully developed. Note: No issue tree is the only right way to structure a problem but many are wrong, which is why making it MECE must be top priority. 2018 7
Sanity check Description Early on in the process it is important to do a sanity check of your solution. As seen in the figure, the sanity check is supposed to make sure that the proposed solution is both creative, has sound analysis to back it up, is feasible and has impact. If all these four elements are in place the team could have a winning solution. The sanity check is also a good opportunity for the team to stop working, take a step back and ask the question: ”Is this solution something that the company might actually consider?” Again, there is not one way to get it right, but many ways to get it wrong. An example of a creative, but non-feasible solution, could be to open a store on Mars. An example of a solution that have all elements but creativity, could be to optimize all current operations by 2%. Neither solution are winning solutions due to their complete lack of one of the four elements. So make sure that at least these four are somewhat present. 2018 8
Presentation Description Content This section entails everything you need in order to convey your • Storyline pp. 10-15 solution in a compelling and convincing way. – Structure of content There are two major parts of a good storyline: – Structure of argumentation 1. Structure of content – telling the right things. – Inductive vs. Deductive 2. Structure of argumentation – telling it the right way. reasoning If you have these two elements you have a good storyline. – Putting it all together This section first describes and exemplifies a logical way to • p. 16 The executive slide tructure the content of your presentation. • PowerPoint do’s That is which analysis and finding to present in which order. Then, this section describes the two most used argumentation and don’ts pp. 17-24 structures, the inductive and the deductive which is then exemplified. Lastly, in the final part of this section everything is put together in an example of a good case solution storyline. casecompetition.org
How to structure your content in a logical way The four major elements Description Setting the Identify Solution Impact An often used structure of the content in the stage problem resentation is based upon what the reader • Arg. 1 expects to come next. • Arg. 2 On the right is an example of how to structure the • … different parts of your solution. This flow ensures that the structure of the solution is easy to follow for the reader/listener. These four parts are based upon what you are telling the reader, as seen on the right. First the overall situation of the company is presented. Logic of structure - we are telling you… Then, the implication (problem) of that situation is identified. 3: What is our solution 1: Where are we now? In the third part of the story, the solution to the to the problem? problem is presented. In the solution part it is also 2: Why is this a problem and 4: What is the impact what is the problem? vital to present the arguments as to why the team of our solution? has settled on that particular solution. Lastly, the impact of the solution should be presented. 10 2018
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