Steps to Case Study Writing

Steps To Case Study Writing

By Professor Harvey B. Lermack

School of Business Administration

Philadelphia University, Philadelphia, PA

Revised August 25, 2008

The Assignment

You are the Senior Vice President of Strategic Planning for your assigned company.

You have been asked to review the current situation of your company, the industry in which it competes, and the competitive and external environment; to assess the likelihood of the company’s success in the future if no changes are made to its strategic direction; analyze the alternative strategies available to the company; determine which alternative(s) is (are) most likely to succeed; and recommend to the Board of Directors the best alternative(s) and an action plan for its (their) implementation.

You must write a comprehensive, professional report and deliver a 15-minute presentation of your key findings and recommendations to the board.

Academic Integrity

Print the document “Philadelphia University Academic Integrity Policy” from the Philadelphia University web page at

www.philau.edu/learning/AcademicIntegrityPolicy.pdf and read it carefully. You will be expected to adhere to these policies at all times during this course.

Thoroughly document your research in each written submission. Cite your resources in footnotes properly, using the Modern Language Association (MLA) style. At the end of each section, include a list of your resources for that section. Other citation resources are available at my web links page.

For help with MLA guidelines, consult the Philadelphia University web page at http://www.philau.edu/Library/researchguide/generalresearchguide/citation.htm.

Provide a cover page with each section of your paper, containing the following information: Title, date, your name, to whom submitted, course name and number. At the bottom of the cover page, write the following paragraph and sign your name. If this is not included, the paper will not be graded.

"By submitting this paper, I affirm that this work is my own, except for where the words or ideas of others are specifically acknowledged.

I also affirm that this work did not exist before the beginning of this course; and that neither I nor anyone else has submitted or will submit this paper (or one substantially consisting of the same information) for credit for this or any other course."

General Information

Be sure to thoroughly analyze all available data, and support your positions. Do outside research to augment the data in the case, and learn as much as possible about the industry and the company.

Numerous web sites provide information about report writing skills, such as documenting your work and writing executive summaries. Consult my web links page.

Report Structure

The paper will be composed of several sections, as outlined below. Use the following headings for the sections of your paper.

The chapter numbers are from Carpenter and Sanders, “Strategic Management.”

The questions under each heading provide guidance for your analysis. Be sure to address each of these; you may or may not opt to use them as subheadings for your paper.

When handing in each section of the paper, include a cover page and resources page (see above), number the pages and securely bind that section.

Please do not use heavy 3 ring binders, plastic paper protector sheets, or anything that will make the paper heavy or cumbersome.

As you receive back the graded sections, keep them together in an expandable 3 ring binder with tab dividers, so that as the semester progresses you will be building the entire company analysis paper.

For the last written assignment hand in the entire binder, with all previously graded sections as well as the final assignment.

With the final submission, include a complete list of all resources used throughout the paper. Compile the individual section reference lists and re-sort them as appropriate to make a single bibliography of your resources.

Part 1 – Executive Summary

Provide a single page executive summary. Write this last, and place it at the beginning of the paper.

The Executive Summary may be the only page of the report that your client or boss will read. Therefore, it should be a brief, persuasive document that persuades that person of your point of view.

You should clearly state your conclusions and recommendations, and provide supporting evidence acquired from your research, including key industry and company issues, trends, threats and opportunities, and why and how your recommendations will help the company to survive and prosper, create value, and attain a sustainable competitive advantage in the marketplace.

You should also explain how the company should go about implementing your recommendations, and what the financial benefits will be (including impacts on assets and liabilities, revenues and costs, and profits and cash flow).

Remember – this may be the only page your client or boss will read, so it should advance a succinct, compelling argument for your position!

Part 2- Company Financial Analysis

Provide a thorough financial analysis of the company.

Refer to the document "Steps to a Basic Company Financial Analysis" on my web site, and to the assigned readings, for direction.

Include a thorough review of the financial statements, comparative ratio analyses, and assessment of the financial value added by the firm. Analyze the company’s results over at least the last three (3) years, and compare them to the key competitors and industry averages.

In the body of the report, provide a detailed discussion of your findings, exhibits, and data pertinent to your discussion. Explain how this information relates to current and future strategic initiatives. Include the detailed data and calculations in the appendix.

Part 3 – Industry Analysis

(Chapter 4)

Provide a thorough analysis of the macro external environment and the immediate industry and competitive environment within which the organization operates. Refer to chapter 4 of the textbook, and to the Five Forces article (Porter), listed in the references below. This analysis should focus on the industry as a whole, not specifically on your company.

Consider the following points:

a) Define the relevant industry within which the organization operates.

b) Develop a thorough PESTEL analysis of the industry’s Macro environment.

c) Provide a five-forces analysis (Porter 79 to 88).

d) Identify the key competitors within the industry, and briefly describe each company’s competitive position (relative size, revenues, etc.) and likely future moves. You may summarize this data in a table. In what ways is the company stronger or weaker than key competitors, and what are the issues that management must address?

e) Project the future prospects for the industry and its profitability.

Part 4 – Corporate Structure, Governance, Leadership and Strategic Management

(Chapters 1, 2, and 13)

1. Describe the company’s leadership, corporate governance and overall business strategies.

a) How is the organization organized and governed? Is it publicly held, privately owned, or non-profit?

b) In what business does this company compete? Is this a single line of business, or does it compete in multiple businesses? If the latter, what is the relative significance of the various lines of business (in revenues)? What are the firm’s products? Who are the customers? What are the firm’s sources of competitive advantage (if any) and are they sustainable?

c) Does the company compete domestically, in a few countries, or globally?

d) Who is leading this organization in its drive to success? What role has the Board of Directors taken in running the company? What role has top management played in directing the strategic management process? Have those roles been appropriate? Should they be taking more or less initiative?

e) Who are the key stakeholders about whose interests management must be concerned? Complete a Stakeholder influence and importance map.

2. Vision, Mission, Strategies, and Competitive Advantage

a) What is the company’s stated strategic vision and mission? Are they appropriate? How would you change or improve upon them?

b) Describe the current overall corporate business strategies, and their key long term and short-term objectives. How would you describe their basic approach to the business, e.g. diversification, growth by acquisition, globalization / internationalization, low cost or differentiated niche, etc.? Do the strategies fit with the external environment and internal characteristics?

Part 5 – Company Analysis

(Chapter 3)

Describe and analyze the current situation of the company.

a) In what ways does the organization seek to add value to the shareholders, customers, employees, and other stakeholders?

b) How well have the company’s overall business strategies been working? Has the company been achieving its strategic and tactical objectives with these strategies? What is your evidence? Support your argument with strategic, performance and financial evidence.

c) Include a thorough discussion of the organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT analysis)

.

d) What are the company’s competitive advantages? What resources, capabilities or competencies lead to these, and which are sustainable?

e) Draw and explain the key components of the company’s value chain, including the domestic and international activities. Address the extent to which the organization has vertically and horizontally diversified its activities, and identify cost and strategic advantages and disadvantages identified by the value chain analysis. Consider each business operation, e.g. marketing, management, production, R&D, and technology.

Part 6 – Current and Future Success

Reflect on your analysis so far to determine:

• How well the current strategies are working

• How likely it is that the company will be successful in the future if they continue with their current strategies, and

• The case for modifying the future direction of the company.

Write a brief argument for your position, supporting it with evidence from your previous analyses.

Convey the seriousness of the current situation in your summary and the need for change in your write-up. Remember that senior management of the company will be reading the document, and will be reluctant to change from their current strategies (which they have put into place) unless they can be convinced that change is required for the organization to survive.

In order to make those determinations, following are some of the questions you will need to consider:

1. Will this be an attractive industry in the future? What is happening in the external macro- and competitive environments to change the competitive dynamics of the industry?

2. Does your company’s current strategy fit with the external environment? Are the firm’s activities and attributes appropriate for this environment?

3. Has the company’s financial situation been improving or deteriorating? How do investors feel about their future prospects, as indicated by their willingness to invest?

4. What are the firm’s areas of competitive advantage? Do they appear to be sustainable, given the changing conditions?

5. How are competitors reacting to the changing environment? Will they enjoy a relative advantage that may have an impact on your company’s ability to succeed?

6. Using the data gathered so far, assess and project the expected future performance of the organization if they continue with their current strategic direction. State whether or not you think a change is required. Provide evidence to support your position.

7. Should the firm change its vision, mission and business strategies? If so, provide a general statement about the direction in which you think the organization should move to best increase the likelihood for success.

Part 7 – Solution Analysis (Chapters 5- 10 and 12)

Develop and evaluate appropriate strategic alternatives, and recommend the best strategic direction for the firm, using the tools in chapters 5-7 to develop and support your analysis and arguments.

1. Strategic Alternatives - Using all the information you developed in the previous steps, identify the key strategic alternatives available to the company. Be specific. (See text chapters 5 -12.)

2. For diversified organizations, be sure to address both the corporate and key business strategies.

3. Alternatives Assessment - Assess those alternatives that you feel will be the most likely to move the organization forward, and will help them to attain a sustainable competitive advantage. Discuss each in detail, and use evidence to support why you think each will be effective.

4. Recommendations and Discussion – Based on your assessment, list your key recommendations. Be specific. General statements such as “The company should expand internationally” are not sufficient. Instead, you should state, “The company should offshore the manufacturing operations to Poland, the Czech Republic, or elsewhere in Central Europe.” Support each recommendation by explaining why you recommend it, how it exploits the key strengths and opportunities and minimize the weaknesses and threats, how it will help the company attain a competitive advantage, and why it is superior to the other alternatives.

5. Financial and Value Impact – Project the impact of your recommendations on the future economics of the firm and the industry. How will the changes improve the organization’s ability to add value to the shareholders, customers, employees, and other stakeholders?

Part 8 – Implementation Action Plan (Chapter 11)

Provide an attainable plan to implement your strategy recommendations. Address the key issues that must be addressed in order for the implementation plan to succeed (Thompson 361): organization, resources, policies and procedures, continuous improvement in value chain activities, information and operating systems, rewards, corporate culture, and leadership.

Part 9 – Resources, Appendices and Exhibits

1. Include a comprehensive list of your resources, compiled from all of the individual sections, using MLA format.

2. Attach appendices and exhibits as appropriate to support the discussion in your report. Be sure to include graphs of the financial data over time, and comparative data to other competitors.

References

Boardman, Anthony E., Daniel M. Shapiro, and Aidan R. Vining. “A Framework for Comprehensive Strategic Analysis.” Journal of Strategic Management Education 1-2LA1 (2004).

Porter, Michael E. “The Five Forces That Shape Strategy.” Harvard Business Review January 2008: 79-93.

Carpenter, Mason A. and William Gerard Sanders. Strategic Management: A Dynamic Perspective. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Person Prentice Hall, 2009.

© 2008 Harvey B. Lermack