The Case Study Handbook: How to Read, Discuss, and Write Persuasively About Cases

I had been searching for a book to explain how to approach tackling a case to get the most learning from the experience. I happen to find this book and since acquiring it, it has become my companion as I prepare for cases. It is easy to read and understand. This book provides clear, concise suggestions for HBS type cases. I wish it was available in kindle version so that I would not have to travel with it. Great book.

This is an essential aid for drafting a response to all case study assignments in business school. This guide will walk you through the process for data gathering, analysis, and solution formulation.

Increases analytical abilityThe book is an excellent resource to increase analytical ability even though it focuses on the Harvard's famous case methodology. It does so by taking the readers through three important methods of analyzing the cases: decision. problem and evaluation. In analyzing each method the author uses some of the actual case studies of Harvard. He then shows to how to analyze the cases in terms of identifying the causes and then formulating a hypothesis about the case. He goes to explain how to find criteria and to analyze the causes against the criteria and then rank them so as to find an excellent fit for the case in hand. The book does not stop at only analyzing. Author goes further to explain how to write the case analysis and provides a format for each one of the methods. I found these templates really helpful. But again these are specific to Harvard's case methods but can be easily adapted to any other formats if the reader wants to use some different way. One drawback I found is that some of the cases used are very old. As authors explains the reason and is also obvious that the cases currently under use at their institute cannot be used in a general forum to determine best possible answer. Over all it's a good tool to enhance your analytical, and as I think of it now, to increase your writing abilities as well.

Ordered the book on 27th aug. Got it on 21st sept. Book itself is in excellent condition. Nothing more to be said. Went through my course without the book. And now that I got it, not quite sure what to do with it

The book is written by an accomplished professional who has significant experience in teaching and interacting with the MBA students in the classroom. William Ellet has composed this book with three clearly articulated objectives - reading and comprehending, discussing, and writing about cases.Unarguably, Harvard Business School has pioneered the case study based teaching in the MBA class. While more business schools have adopted this method later, still the method of teaching is unknown to many. Particularly, the students complete their Bachelor studies through lecture driven classroom learning, and subsequently case study based learning is a new phenomenon to them. Keeping this in mind, most of such business schools conduct preparatory sessions on case study based learning. This book can act as a good supplement to those sessions.There are three parts in this book - Analysis, Discussion, Writing. The first part describes how to read and comprehend each case. This part deals with how to understand the situation described in the case, and how to define the problem. Subsequently, how to arrive at various decision points, and what would be their evaluation process. Frankly speaking, this part was the most engaging to me. This section openly admits that one doesn't read the full case with equal intensity. It emphasizes how to read a case like a story to get an overall understanding, how to scheme through the data but not to burn the full energy into it right at the beginning, and how to selectively analyze the data provided in various exhibits for a robust understanding of the situation.The second part describes how to participate in a classroom discussion. The author candidly clarifies what are the typical student mentality during the classroom discussion session (e.g. impressing the instruction, etc.). It rightly emphasizes the fact that preparation before discussion is important, and listening to others is also participation to learning. Too much meaningless speaking dilutes the value of learning, the author indicates. This is a very short part of the full book, but useful indeed.The third part deals on writing about cases. In MBA class, case studies often require the students to write an essay to describe the problem, put forward the decisions, or evaluations. The author provides a structure to the students, in fact multiple structures, to assist the students in writing. At the beginning of the book, the author mentioned about a New York Times story with heading "What Corporate America Cannot Build: A Sentence". This part seems to address that writing part.The book contains five cases for study along with the main chapters for better understanding the points expressed by the author. Each of those are quite useful. I found an additional case referred in the evaluation section of the book (Rob Parsons at Morgan Stanley) which was absent the book itself. Since I already read that case before, I could read the book smoothly, but general readers may struggle in absence of that case to study.Overall good book. But the book is focused only for the students and to be applied in the MBA classroom. The corporate world today also reads a lot of cases for their internal learning. Many corporate trainings are built around the case study method, and the participants there are not MBA students but corporate executives. This book doesn't address anything for them in particular. Moreover, corporate world expects power point based presentations more than lengthy case writings. So applicability of bullet points would make the book more complete in the third section.I would suggest this book only to the MBA students who are enrolling to a business school and are expecting to learn through case studies.

I have gained and applied education concisely written in this handbook which was recommended to me by a former dean of a business school.

Purchased for school. Was exactly as expected.

Easy to follow and study from.