https://hbr.org/2021/12/what-the-case-study-method-really-teaches
Business Education
What the Case Study Method Really Teaches
by Nitin Nohria
December 21, 2021
Summary.
It’s been 100 years since Harvard Business School began using the case study method. The case study method excels in instilling meta-skills in students. Prof. Nitin Norhia, of Harvard, specially highlighted the seven skills: preparation, discernment, bias recognition, judgement, collaboration, curiosity, and self-confidence.
Alumni of Harvard, highlighted a personal quality or skill like “increased self-confidence” or “the ability to advocate for a point of view” or “knowing how to work closely with others to solve problems” due to case method.
Cases expose students to real business dilemmas and decisions. Cases teach students to size up business problems included in the case in the context of the broader organizational, industry, and societal context. Cases explain students how decision were made in the businesses and ask them to induce theory from practice. The case method cultivates the capacity for critical analysis, judgment, decision-making, and action.
Meta-skills are a benefit of case study instruction. Educators define meta-skills as a group of long-lasting abilities that allow someone to learn new things more quickly. When parents encourage a child to learn to play a musical instrument, the child derives the benefit from deliberate, consistent practice. This meta-skill is valuable for learning many other things beyond music.
In the same vein, seven vital meta-skills students gain from the case method:
1. Preparation
The case method creates an environment for students to prepare. Students typically spend several hours reading, highlighting, and debating cases before class, sometimes alone and sometimes in groups.
Learning to be prepared — to read materials in advance, prioritize, identify the key issues, and have an initial point of view — is a meta-skill that helps people succeed in a broad range of professions and work situations. We have all seen how the prepared person, who knows what they are talking about, can gain the trust and confidence of others in a business meeting. The habits of preparing for a case discussion can transform a student into that person.
2. Discernment
Many cases are long. A typical case may include history, industry background, a cast of characters, dialogue, financial statements, source documents, or other exhibits. Some material may be digressive or inessential. Cases have critical pieces of information that are missing.
The case method forces students to identify and focus on what’s essential, ignore the noise, skim when possible, and concentrate on what matters, meta-skills required for every busy executive confronted with the paradox of simultaneous information overload and information paucity.
3. Bias Recognition
Students often have an initial reaction to a case stemming from their background or earlier work and life experiences. For instance, people who have worked in finance may be biased to view cases through a financial lens. However, effective general managers must understand and empathize with various stakeholders, and if someone has a natural tendency to favor one viewpoint over another, discussing dozens of cases will help reveal that bias. Armed with this self-understanding, students can correct that bias or learn to listen more carefully to classmates whose different viewpoints may help them see beyond their own biases.
Recognizing and correcting personal bias can be an invaluable meta-skill in business settings when leaders inevitably have to work with people from different functions, backgrounds, and perspectives.
4. Judgment
Cases put students into the role of the case protagonist and force them to make and defend a decision. The format leaves room for nuanced discussion. Teachers push students to choose an option, knowing full well that there is rarely one correct answer.
Indeed, most cases are meant to stimulate a discussion rather than highlight effective or ineffective management practice. Across the cases they study, students get feedback from their classmates and their teachers about when their decisions are more or less compelling. It enables them to develop the judgment of making decisions under uncertainty, communicating that decision to others, and gaining their buy-in — all essential leadership skills. Leaders earn respect for their judgment. It is something students in the case method get lots of practice honing.
5. Collaboration
It is better to make business decisions after extended give-and-take, debate, and deliberation. People get better at working collaboratively with practice. Discussing cases in small study groups, and then in the classroom, helps students practice the meta-skill of collaborating with others. Our alumni often say they came away from the case method with better skills to participate in meetings and lead them.
Orchestrating a good collaborative discussion is attempted in each case study. It is an art that students of the case method internalize and get better at when they get to lead discussions.
6. Curiosity
Cases expose students to lots of different situations and roles. Across cases, they get to assume the role of entrepreneur, investor, functional leader, or CEO, in a range of different industries and sectors. Each case offers an opportunity for students to see what resonates with them, what excites them, what bores them, which role they could imagine inhabiting in their careers.
Cases stimulate curiosity about the range of opportunities in the world and the many ways that students can make a difference as leaders. This curiosity serves them well throughout their lives. It makes them more agile, more adaptive, and more open to doing a wider range of things in their careers.
7. Self-Confidence
Students must inhabit roles during a case study that far outstrip their prior experience or capability, often as leaders of teams or entire organizations in unfamiliar settings. “What would you do if you were the case protagonist?” is the most common question in a case discussion. Even though they are imaginary and temporary, these “stretch” assignments increase students’ self-confidence that they can rise to the challenge.
Speaking up in front of 90 classmates feels troublesome at first, but students become more comfortable doing it over time. Knowing that they can hold their own in a highly curated group of competitive peers enhances student confidence. Often, alumni describe how discussing cases made them feel prepared for much bigger roles or challenges than they’d imagined they could handle before their MBA studies. Self-confidence is difficult to teach or coach, but the case study method seems to instill it in people.
Nitin Nohria is a professor at Harvard Business School and the chairman of Thrive Capital, a venture capital firm based in New York.
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