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When you enroll in an mba, you’ll spend rather a lot of time with cases—reading cases, discussing cases, packing (suit) cases..
However, there is an important case you may wish to prepare before you start a programme—a business case for your employer, forming a persuasive argument for company support of your MBA.
Before you get started, it’s useful to ask yourself some questions.
What are your reasons for choosing the Chicago Booth Executive MBA? Why is this school and programme a better choice (for you) than others on the market?
Will this programme help meet a specific need at the company (can a business challenge or issue be addressed by the content of the course)?
Does this programme fit in with my career development plan at the company? Does it address a need that has been identified in a performance review?
Is there a precedent for MBA support at the company? What level of support has been given in the past? Is there an in-house company training programme I need to compare the MBA against?
What am I prepared to commit to the company (ie, lock in periods, bonus or salary sacrifice, tuition refund in the event I leave)?
What do I want the company to commit? (be specific about funding and time off).
Who will make a decision on my request? This question will help you develop the right level of content for your case.
The important thing to remember is that your case, at least in the first two sections, should not focus on your needs . The case is an opportunity to highlight business needs that can be met by the Executive MBA, to outline the ROI and to create a persuasive recommendation that your company should provide support accordingly.
Like any other business case, your case should include sections on:
1. Identify Business Need (specific, current business challenges or needs faced by the company)
2. Analysis (ie, how the programme will help the company meet these specific needs. Think about the ROI from your company’s point of view, of the additional benefits the company gets from accessing the school network, intellectual capital, etc)
3. Recommendation (of yourself, as a suitable candidate. This section should focus on your commitment to the company, your dedication to meeting business needs and challenges, and your desire to take on further roles and responsibilities).
4. The Request (with specific details of the financial support and/or time support you require. You should also demonstrate the investment that you are prepared to make, via your own financial contribution, by sacrificing holiday time, by working overtime or by being available outside office hours).
5. Appendices (your audience may know very little about the school and programme, so include as much supplementary information as possible. It may also be useful to include specific info, for example, research articles or school press clippings relevant to your industry or company).
Good luck! We’re here to help, so please let us know if you need a hand.
Director of Recruitment and Admissions, London
Follow Rachel’s posts for information on admissions, particularly in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa regions. Rachel also chronicles women’s initiatives and Chicago Booth’s global network.
Be it any time of the year, an MBA degree has been most popular among students. This two years degree holds excellent value in the e-commerce world. Trending and out there, millions of students opt for this particular subject. Of course, if students have chosen this subject to be their major, time and again, they will be surrounded by several MBA assignments, thesis, or case studies.
Though assignment writing is an easy task to accomplish, writing a case study in MBA is something all the students dread to the next level. The in-depth analysis and research can surely take the sweet night’s sleep away. Hence, students search for an ultimate ready-made savior to help them. To write any kind of MBA case study paper is not every student’s work. Case study writing involves a lot of attention and energy. Moreover, if the course is MBA, then a student can easily double all the attributes of research writing like more energy and more attention.
With every hardship comes ease. Just like your worries related to MBA case study , our top tutors have collected some valuable points that can ease down your tension related to case study writing.
The list goes down as follows:
Proper Knowledge OF The Subject
The foremost thing while writing a case study in MBA includes knowing your subject well. The subject should be clear in your mind, like clean water. All your views and knowledge about your subject should be on point with nowhere close to any type of confusion, whatsoever.
Extensive Research
No case study can turn out to be an excellent piece without an extensive research process. Carrying out a lot of research for your case study in MBA is the crucial part of writing a flawless case paper. With proper research done, your case study can easily stand out among your peers.
Requires Too Much Study
To create an error-free case study, the most important factor is to master the art of studying. A lot of studying is essential to write an ideal MBA case study paper. The common domains for studying include books, blogs, journals, magazines, online, websites, newspapers, etc.
On-Point Writing
It’s equally crucial to make your case study in MBA on point. No unnecessary or confusing points should be added to your case study. Avoid as many fluffs as possible. The related information will always hook the reader while making it more and more engaging.
Conform To Your Subject
MBA holds a lot of sub fields in it. So, it is important to strictly stick to one sub field at a time. Like, if the discussion is about the finance subject, the writing should only focus on that. This aspect is one of the most useful tips to write an MBA case study that restricts jumping from one subject to another.
Say No To Plagiarism
It is one of the Vital aspects of case study writing . No plagiarized content should be there in your paper. Try to use an authentic and unique style of writing.
Add Up Diagrams And Examples
Always fancy your case study with diagrams and examples. Like swot analysis, Boston matrix, BCG matrix and supply chain management, etc.
Proofreading
It is the primary duty of the students to make their case studies classic by making them error-free. When the paper is finalized, proper proofreading is a must. Check for all the frequent grammar or spelling mistakes. Double-check the facts and figures stated.
Unique Ideas
The students mostly ignore this particular aspect. The common mistake is to repeat the ideas that instantly lose the grip of the case study. Always make sure to use authentic and unique ideas for every paper. Remember, repetition creates boredom.
Clear Formatting
When you are stuck with your case studies, the only thing that comes to your mind is to buy a case study assignment online. But, if you wish to write it on your own, one vital aspect of it is to format it as clearly as possible. It will later help the reader to get impressed with your work.
Proper Indexing And Numbering
It is also important to correctly index and number your case studies. Try to mention the page number at the bottom of the page. Hence, it will greatly help the reader to locate every topic properly.
Meet The Deadline
There is always a proper time frame for writing an MBA case study. Thus, the students should adhere to it. The whole case study should end within due time.
These workable tips will lend great support in gaining good grades in your class. Keenly follow these and make a remarkable case study.
Our platform thecasestudysolutions.com has been serving thousands of students worldwide with their impeccable writing assistance. These tips are specially crafted by our top tutors. As they believe in excellence, they leave no stone upturned in formulating the workable step-to-step guide for the students.
Since writing a case study is a tricky task to accomplish, our writers do make sure to provide easy and feasible help for it. The MBA case study does require extra effort and time to finalize. Luckily, with the help of our useful tips, any student can try to attempt writing it on their own. Moreover, we also provide a sample case study to the students. So, students can freely try working on their case studies with the help of the samples provided by our experienced writers.
So, next time whenever you feel helpless with your case studies, always keep our assistance in your mind. We have a pool of qualified MBA writers who can assist you in the best possible ways. You will find our prices reasonable also. We don’t believe in distressing the students with hefty amounts. Students can feel unburdened with our affordable pricing criteria.
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Case study interview | tips from bain, bcg & mckinsey.
Bain, BCG, or McKinsey, the case study interview is a key part of the consulting interview process ©Philip McMaster
If you want to work in consulting, you’ll have to sit a case study interview. Here’s everything you need to know about the case study interview with tips from experts at Bain, BCG, and McKinsey
Mon Oct 11 2021
The consulting case study interview might just be one part of the application process, but it’s where you can stand out to your prospective employer and show you’ve got what it takes to crack cases day in day out.
Whether you have your eyes set on Bain, BCG, or McKinsey, or a smaller boutique consulting firm , here’s everything you need to know about the case study interview:
The consulting case study interview requires you to solve a simulated problem for a client. There are two types of case interview: The interviewer-led approach and the candidate-led approach.
“We use a client-like problem such as how to reduce a carbon footprint, how to make a workforce more diverse, how to leverage technology, or how to grow a customer base, and ask you three questions that simulate the kind of problem-solving our teams do in a client engagement,” says Amy Ross ( pictured) , senior expert in McKinsey’s global assessment team based in New York.
The three questions aren’t in a set order, but you can expect to focus on identifying the issues, then doing analysis based on information the team collects (that McKinsey provide), then coming up with insights and developing a conclusion. The McKinsey case study interview is consistent across global offices.
The interviewer-led approach of the McKinsey case interview means you’ll be guided through the process by your interviewer. However, there’s a caveat, explains Eugene Goh, the cofounder of HR tech startup, HireQuotient, who worked as a principal for BCG for more than eight years.
“They’re expecting a lot more detail and depth,” says Eugene, who’s recently cowritten From the Interviewer’s Seat: The Insider’s Guide for Aspiring Consultants , a book on the consulting interview.
Candidate-led approach
The candidate-led BCG case study interview will similarly present you with a real BCG case from previous client work. You’ll then be presented with the client’s challenges and have 45 minutes to walk your interviewer through your solution, rather than being led question by question. The BCG case study requires you to build your solution step by step.
“They’re looking for people who can structure their approach from end to end,” Eugene explains.
The case interview is supposed to simulate the problem-solving approach of the firm you’re interviewing with, which at McKinsey involves a lot of back-and-forth between team members, says Amy. You'll need to tackle case study interview questions that mimic a real consulting case.
“Candidates should listen to the client context and think about what it means, rather than repeat back everything the interviewer says.
“If the case covers an industry that is unfamiliar, candidates might consider whether there is an analogous industry they are familiar with and see if that helps them think of good ideas.
You should ask questions to clarify your understanding of the data and the issues at hand. Amy advises that you take a moment before speaking to collect your thoughts.
“Listen carefully, making sure you consider the information provided and the meaning behind the specific questions. You’ll stand out by putting the client front-and-center and by sharing interesting insights.”
The Bain case study, like the BCG case study, is often candidate-led. To stand out, your interviewers are looking for your analytical skills; the ability to break down challenging problems into parts you can tackle in a sequence; strong communication skills; the ability to simplify complex concepts; teamwork; and the ability to work successfully among others. That's according to Keith Bevans, head of global consultant recruitment at Bain & Company.
He explains that tackling a Bain case study is akin to playing in a jazz quartet. There’s no script, so you’re going to play a bit, and improvise. Improvisation is a key thing interviewers are looking for when you're solving a Bain case study.
“I think some students want to be perfect and play classical music and don’t want to share their insight or preliminary analysis until it’s right," says Keith. "The truth is I need them to share because what they share may not be perfect, but it’ll spark something in somebody else. I need students who are comfortable in that sort of environment.”
That's why MBA and business master's graduates are so well placed to enter consulting. They develop the skills that the Big Three consulting firms are looking for through live consulting projects, and constant group work that tests their ability to manage and lead diverse teams of peers to solve complex business problems.
Skills that will help you stand out
The best thing you can do ahead of your consulting case study interview is prepare. Make sure you work with real case study interview examples.
Your business school will likely have a consulting club that offers consulting case study prep sessions, which will give you ample opportunity to work through mock case study interview questions. You may also have on hand a network of business school alumni who likely work in consulting, as well as professors—use them.
Amy from McKinsey recommends going to the website of the firm you’re applying to—McKinsey have case interview examples you can use to brush up on your casing. That way, you’ll know what to expect when you face your case study interview questions in real time.
She adds that there are many coaches and preparation services available to candidates, but the firm doesn’t expect you to use them.
“Frankly, we are worried there’s a lot of misleading advice out there so, again, we advise to consult our website, and feel free to ask your recruiter to arrange for you to meet one of our consultants who can be your interview coach,” she asserts.
Approach the case study interview like a McKinsey consultant
→ Make sure you understand the information provided.
→ Ask questions.
→ Collect yourself before diving into your answer.
→ Alongside logical ideas, challenge yourself to provide a few that are more ‘out there’, things you and a client team would want to test first. Sometimes, those bolder ideas are the best ones and often they really show McKinsey how you think.
Beware though, as you can see too many case study interview examples and overprepare. Angela Michalik, MBA recruiter at BCG, says that to avoid being overprepared focus on the quality not quantity of your prep.
Do one case, then get feedback, she says. At the end you should know where you were weak, and then in your next case go hard on the areas in which you’re weakest.
“I feel by doing that, students really improve,” she says. “You have to reflect on what you need to work on and practice.”
If you notice that you’re going straight into applying a framework to a case before you take the time to think, you might be overpreparing.
“Each client problem is different and deserves an initial approach that meets their needs. We realize interviews are filled with uncertainty, but the link between preparation and success in our process is not so strong,” Amy from McKinsey notes.
“Practice enough so you know what to expect, stay current with what’s new in the business world, and then bring curiosity and an open mind to your case interview.”
READ: Bain, BCG, McKinsey: How To Get Hired By The Big Three Consulting Firms
Granted, you need to be ready for ambiguity, something that can be hard to prepare for. But there’s a step-by-step approach Eugene says can help break away from the fixed framework approach:
- Define the objectives. What are you trying to do? Understand a bit about the client’s constraints. What’s the timeframe for the project, their budget, for example.
- Dive into the diagnosis. Why does the client have a problem?
- Option generation. What approaches could the client take?
- Option evaluation before coming to a decision
“It sounds generic but almost every problem, even in the real world, requires you to roughly go through those steps,” Eugene ( pictured ) says.
“That is a more helpful approach as it applies to all problems, therefore all cases.”
Case study interview prep is a key component of your overall application. But don’t stress. Focus on the quality of your preparation and lean on your business school network of MBA alumni in the consulting sector, as well as the resources available from your school’s consulting club.
Run through case interview examples from the firm’s you’re interested in and breathe before you approach a problem. That way, you’ll be best placed to ace your interview and launch your post-business school career as a consultant.
Where Do McKinsey, Bain, BCG Hire The Most MBAs?
Main image in this article is credited to Philip McMaster and used under this license
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New study finds that a guaranteed income does not guarantee benefits.
A man in a gray T-shirt holds dollars in his hands. Bank. Casino. Salary. Rates.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the idea of a guaranteed income (or universal basic income (UBI)) took off. Cities from Philadelphia to Compton partnered with philanthropists to conduct several experiments to examine the health and economic impacts of giving people money with no strings attached. The results of these and other programs have been mixed, providing support for both critics and fans.
A recent, comprehensive study that uses a randomized controlled trial provides new evidence that largely supports the critics who worry that a guaranteed income will undermine work and investment while doing little to promote healthy behaviors.
The study gave 1,000 people, chosen randomly from select counties in Illinois and Texas, $1,000 per month for three years. A control group of 2,000 people received $50 per month for three years. The $1,000 per month payment was approximately a 40% increase in total household income for the average participant. This substantial increase in income combined with the three-year time frame should have been enough to improve various outcomes, but that is not what happened.
The authors examined several health outcomes , including stress, mental health, and physical health, the latter measured via both self-reporting and clinical blood tests. Initially, the treated group reported improvements in stress and mental health relative to the control group, but by the second year the gap closed. Similarly, there was an initial decline in food insecurity for the treated group, but that effect also disappeared by year two.
The cash payments had no impact on physical health, nor did they induce better health behaviors such as more sleep or exercise. People in the treated group made more hospital and emergency room visits relative to those in the control group and used more dental care, but greater use of these services did not translate to better health outcomes.
Google confirms bad news for 3 billion chrome users—you will still be tracked, everything we know about tomorrow’s paris olympic opening ceremony—as lady gaga-céline dion duet rumors fly.
What about the economic impacts? One prediction from economic models of cash transfers is that recipients will work less and spend more time on non-work activities. Sure enough , the people in the treated group worked less than those in the control group and increased the time they spent on leisure activities. The decline in work hours led to smaller paychecks, which offset some of the cash transfer. For every $1 received from the program, total household income only rose by around $0.80.
One argument proponents of guaranteed income programs often make is that people receiving the cash can use it and their newfound free time to train for or find a better job that provides more benefits or greater flexibility. While possible in theory, the authors find no evidence that job quality increased in the treated group and only weak evidence that more people enrolled in post-secondary education.
No single study is definitive, but the scale of this study, its methodology, and its findings strongly suggest that guaranteed income programs are unlikely to dramatically improve people’s health. The findings also refute the notion that by providing a financial cushion, a guaranteed income encourages people to find better jobs. Instead, it appears most people respond by working less and spending more time doing other non-work things.
Despite these findings, I remain convinced that cash benefits are superior to in-kind assistance for mitigating poverty and improving people’s lives. In-kind assistance invites too much meddling from government officials, with different political factions arguing for or against different bans, such as a “junk food” ban in SNAP or the smoking ban in public housing. Cash empowers individuals to make decisions about what they need. Mistakes will be made, but mistakes are learning opportunities that help people improve their decision making over time.
Cash benefit programs should be means tested, however, to avoid the excessive taxation that is necessary to fund a $4 trillion nationwide universal income program. Targeting assistance to those who need it most is the fiscally responsible thing to do, even though phasing out benefits as income increases modestly discourages work. Ideally, there would be one means-tested cash benefit program to avoid the benefits cliff that arises when multiple programs with different eligibility rules and phase out schedules overlap.
This new study weakens the case for a nationwide guaranteed income program, but the case was never very strong to begin with. Such a program would be expensive, inefficient , and largely duplicative if layered on top of other programs. Even worse, it implicitly signals that as a society we think a significant portion of our fellow Americans are incapable of supporting themselves. A competently administered cash benefit program that targets those most in need is superior, and that should be our focus.
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Writing a case study can help you pitch your services to prospective clients. Learn how to write one by studying successful examples and using a free template.
If you can write a résumé, you can write a case study. Just as a résumé shows potential employers how your experience can benefit their team, a case study highlights an existing client’s success story to demonstrate your business or product’s value to prospective clients.
A compelling case study includes relevant data without overwhelming your reader, considers the customer’s perspective, and demonstrates how you handled a specific challenge.
The best way to learn how to write one is by reading a stellar business case study example.
A case study is a document business-to-business (B2B) companies use to illustrate how their product or service helped a client achieve their goals. A winning case study introduces the featured client, gives a brief description of their challenge or goal, and showcases the results they achieved with your help.
Businesses that provide software, tools, or consulting services often provide case studies to potential customers trying to choose between several options.
A company’s marketing team is typically responsible for writing case studies, but if you have a small business without a dedicated marketing team, don’t worry. Anyone can write a case study, and it’s a straightforward process if you use a template.
A case study brings your product or service to life for future customers with real-world examples. These success stories offer tangible results. Case studies are, thus, a form of social proof , but their power goes beyond a mere testimonial or review.
Since B2B services often are expensive and require approval from multiple decision-makers, typical forms of social proof often aren't enough to convince potential customers. Business customers want to be able to share compelling data with their teams, and that’s where the case study is beneficial.
You don’t necessarily need a template to write a case study, but it can make the process easier—especially if you haven’t written one before or need to write several at once.
You’ll notice that most business case studies take the same general format; after inputting the basics into the template, you can add your own personal flair. (That is, your branding and voice.)
The client or customer interview is the heart of the case study. Identify several current or past clients willing to chat with you about their experiences. Look for repeat customers and those who reached out independently to tell you how much they enjoyed your product or service.
A phone interview is the best way to get conversational quotes, but you can correspond via email if your subject is short on time. Not sure what to ask? When social advertising agency Biddyco interviewed the VP of Marketing at Fellow , they asked him the following questions , according to their case study:
The goal of the interview is to better understand your client’s experience with your product or service and grab a soundbite you can use as a testimonial in your case study. If you didn’t work directly with the client, you may also want to interview someone on your team who did to get more context.
Give context to your case study with a brief description of the client’s business and the desired outcome that led them to seek your product or service. You can follow this general formula:
[Client’s name] is a [type of business] with [unique feature]. [Client’s name] came to [your business] seeking [client’s desired outcome] while [requirement].
Here’s an example of a one-sentence situation summary in the case study for Sharma Brands ’ client Feastables:
“Feastables, a better-for-you snacks company, came to us in need of a team to take the DTC setup off their plate.”
Advertising company Adgile, which created moving billboards for the non-alcoholic aperitif brand Ghia , has a longer description in its case study that provides background on the marketplace, but the heart of it is this:
“Ghia was seeking creative ways to break through the clutter of a crowded—and big-budgeted—adult beverage market, all while managing customer acquisition cost (CAC).”
This section can vary depending on your field. Also described as “the action,” “the work,” or “the strategy,” the solution describes the strategic insights your company brought to your client’s problem or how your customer used your product to achieve their goals.
The basic formula: [Client’s name] partnered with [your business] to [service received].
Here’s an example from email marketing software Klaviyo’s case study featuring olive oil brand Graza:
“Graza uses Klaviyo’s granular segmentation tools to send automated flows and promotional campaigns to small, targeted groups of customers based on purchase frequency.”
This section describes exactly which of Klaviyo’s features Graza used (granular segmentation) and how they used it (to send automated flows to small, targeted groups), without getting into any outcomes or results yet.
This section is where you’ll win over prospective customers and build trust. The basic formula is:
[Client’s name] used [service received] to [desired outcome].
Share how your product or service positively affected the client’s business, whether that’s cost savings, more clients, or improved company culture. According to a case study from community platform TYB, the results it delivered for skin care company Dieux were as follows:
“Dieux was able to create thousands of authentic, personalized referrals ahead of its new product launch plus live out its brand promise of transparency.”
Depending on your product or service, your results may include quantifiable outcomes (like thousands of referrals), intangibles (like living out your brand promise), or both, as in the case of TYB.
Sharma brands for feastables, adgile media group for ghia, meta for lulus, tyb for dieux, biddyco for fellow, outline for heyday canning, klaviyo for graza, culture amp for bombas, kustomer for thirdlove.
A great way to write a case study is to look at a sample case study—or better yet, many. You’ll notice that wildly different businesses have case studies that follow roughly the same structure, which is why we recommend using one of our free case study templates to write yours. Learn from this mix of business, design, and marketing case study examples:
Sharma Brands is a branding agency founded by Nik Sharma , “The DTC Guy.” Sharma Brands keeps its case study featuring snack company Feastables short and sweet, breaking it down into three chronological sections: the situation, the work, and the outcome.
The Sharma Brands case study is a good example of how to incorporate meaningful results without sharing actual numbers (which the client may not wish to make public) or getting into an in-depth analysis.
Instead of metrics, Sharma Brands lists the tasks it executed:
It also lists some general achievements:
Adgile Media Group creates outdoor advertising by providing brands with mobile billboards. Unlike traditional outdoor advertising, Adgile also tracks the digital impact of its IRL campaigns.
Adgile’s case study featuring the non-alcoholic beverage brand Ghia is the perfect place to show off the metrics it collects, like:
Meta, the social media and digital advertising platform, does something in its case studies that every company can replicate. Instead of saving the numbers for the results section, Meta provides a brief overview near the top. This breaks up the text visually, provides a quick snapshot for anyone who doesn’t want to read the full case study, and intrigues those curious to know how they achieved those numbers.
Meta’s case study for the clothing company Lulus starts by teasing its most impressive stat:
“The women’s fashion ecommerce company compared the performance of a Meta Advantage+ shopping campaign with Advantage+ catalog ads versus its usual ad campaign setup and saw a 47% increase in return on ad spend using the Advantage+ products.”
It then presents three key figures in a visually appealing design, drawing clear attention to the impact it had on this customer.
TYB is a community platform that rewards fans for creating user-generated content . TYB’s case study for Dieux details how the skincare brand used its platform to involve customers in product testing.
It also does something small worth noting: Instead of sticking the call to action at the bottom of the case study, TYB places a “request demo” button at the top of the page. That way, anyone compelled by the results of the case study can take the next step immediately.
Advertising agency Biddyco took a unique approach to its case study for the coffee- and tea-gear company Fellow . Unlike other business case study examples that use the typical situation-solution-results format, Biddyco structured its case study as an extended testimonial, with a series of questions like, “What specific feature or thing do you like most about Biddyco’s services?”
In addition to client feedback, Biddyco also highlights a few key accomplishments under the heading “All You Really Need to Know.”
A branding studio like Outline won’t approach case studies in the same way an advertising platform like Meta would. What matters here isn’t cost per impression or ROAS, it’s how everything looks.
That’s why Outline’s case study for Heyday Canning is relatively light on words and heavy on imagery. If your work is more visual than numerical, your case study is a great place to show your behind-the-scenes process.
For example, Outline shows the label design alongside images of the cans on the shelf and provides a brief description of the design inspiration. This example shows how you can have a design-focused case study that still tells a compelling story.
Klaviyo , an email marketing software company, puts numbers front and center in its case study for the olive oil company Graza . If your product or service involves tracking metrics like email open rates, revenue, and click rates, highlight those stats in a larger font size, as Klaviyo did.
Klaviyo’s case study for Graza also shows you don’t necessarily need to fix a problem to create a great case study; you can also simply help your client achieve their goals. According to Klaviyo’s case study, Graza’s challenge was to create strong customer relationships.
How do you write a compelling case study if your service doesn’t involve tangible metrics or flashy design? For the performance management software company Culture Amp , it’s highlighting key statistics about the subject of its case study , sock company Bombas .
Like Meta and Klaviyo, Culture Amp highlights three numbers in large font. But these numbers are stats about their client Bombas, not Culture Amp’s services: “120+ employees,” “25M+ items donated,” and “$100M+ in revenue for 2018.”
Instead of showing off the results it achieved for Bombas, these numbers let prospective clients know that Culture Amp works with big, important companies on their performance management process.
Choosing a customer relationships management ( CRM ) platform is a big decision. Switching platforms—as bra company ThirdLove did in this case study from customer support platform Kustomer—can involve lengthy data migration, customization, and employee onboarding.
That’s why it makes sense that Kustomer’s case study for ThirdLove is a four-page-long PDF and not a blog post. If your case study involves a long, detailed analysis, follow Kustomer’s example and make two versions of your case study.
The first page is an executive summary, with about a paragraph each describing the challenge and results. If after reading the first page, you want to learn more, you can dive into the rest of the case study, but you don’t have to read the entire thing to get a sense of how Kustomer collaborated with ThirdLove.
How do you write a simple case study.
To simplify the case-study writing process, download a template. Shopify’s fill-in-the-blanks case study template can help you share your customers’ success stories in an easily digestible, well-designed format.
For the business reading a case study, the contents can help them decide between different products or services. For the business writing the case study, it’s a chance to connect more deeply with potential customers.
An example of a case study is a mobile billboard company’s overview of the services it provided to a client. The case study might include an overview of the client's goals and how the advertiser addressed them, plus a list of outcomes—increased website visits, decreased costs per visit, and a rise in brand awareness.
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Microsoft Windows powers more than a billion PCs and millions of servers worldwide, many of them playing key roles in facilities that serve customers directly. So, what happens when a trusted software provider delivers an update that causes those PCs to immediately stop working?
As of July 19, 2024, we know the answer to that question: Chaos ensues.
Also: 7 password rules to live by in 2024, according to security experts
In this case, the trusted software developer is a firm called CrowdStrike Holdings, whose previous claim to fame was being the security firm that analyzed the 2016 hack of servers owned by the Democratic National Committee. That's just a quaint memory now, as the firm will forever be known as The Company That Caused The Largest IT Outage In History . It grounded airplanes, cut off access to some banking systems, disrupted major healthcare networks, and threw at least one news network off the air.
Microsoft estimates that the CrowdStrike update affected 8.5 million Windows devices. That's a tiny percentage of the worldwide installed base, but as David Weston, Microsoft's Vice President for Enterprise and OS Security, notes, "the broad economic and societal impacts reflect the use of CrowdStrike by enterprises that run many critical services." According to a Reuters report , "Over half of Fortune 500 companies and many government bodies such as the top US cybersecurity agency itself, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, use the company's software."
CrowdStrike, which sells security software designed to keep systems safe from external attacks, pushed a faulty "sensor configuration update" to the millions of PCs worldwide running its Falcon Sensor software. That update was, according to CrowdStrike, a "Channel File" whose function was to identify newly observed, malicious activity by cyberattackers.
Although the update file had a .sys extension, it was not itself a kernel driver. It communicates with other components in the Falcon sensor that run in the same space as the Windows kernel, the most privileged level on a Windows PC, where they interact directly with memory and hardware. CrowdStrike says a "logic error" in that code caused Windows PCs and servers to crash within seconds after they booted up, displaying a STOP error, more colloquially known as the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD).
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In a Preliminary Post Incident Review posted on its website July 24, CrowdStrike confirmed some details about the incident that had previously been reported and added a few more. The code that failed was part of the Falcon sensor, which runs in the Windows kernel space. Version 7.11 of the sensor was released on February 28, 2024. According to CrowdStrike, this release introduced "a new [InterProcess Communication (IPC)] Template Type to detect novel attack techniques that abuse Named Pipes. This release followed all Sensor Content testing procedures..."
Three additional instances of the IPC Template Type were deployed between April 8 and April 24, without incident. On July 19, the company says, "two additional IPC Template Instances were deployed. Due to a bug in the Content Validator, one of the two Template Instances passed validation despite containing problematic content data." Those instances were deployed into production. "When received by the sensor and loaded into the Content Interpreter," the report continues, "problematic content in Channel File 291 resulted in an out-of-bounds memory read triggering an exception. This unexpected exception could not be gracefully handled, resulting in a Windows operating system crash (BSOD)."
Also: Who needs ransomware when a faulty software update can shut down critical infrastructure?
Repairing the damage from a flaw like this is a painfully tedious process that requires manually rebooting every affected PC into the Windows Recovery Environment and then deleting the defective file from the PC using the old-school command line interface. If the PC in question has its system drive protected by Microsoft's BitLocker encryption software, as virtually all business PCs do, the fix requires one extra step: entering a unique 48-character BitLocker recovery key to gain access to the drive and allow the removal of the faulty CrowdStrike driver.
If you know anyone whose job involves administering Windows PCs in a corporate network that uses the CrowdStrike code, you can be confident they are very busy right now, and will be for days to come.
When I first heard about this catastrophe (and I am not misusing that word, I assure you), I thought it sounded familiar. On Reddit's Sysadmin Subreddit, user u/externedguy reminded me why . Maybe you remember this story from 14 years ago:
"Defective McAfee update causes worldwide meltdown of XP PCs." Oops, they did it again. At 6AM today, McAfee released an update to its antivirus definitions for corporate customers that had a slight problem. And by "slight problem," I mean the kind that renders a PC useless until tech support shows up to repair the damage manually. As I commented on Twitter earlier today, I'm not sure any virus writer has ever developed a piece of malware that shut down as many machines as quickly as McAfee did today.
In that case, McAfee had delivered a faulty virus definition (DAT) file to PCs running Windows XP. That file falsely detected a crucial Windows system file, Svchost.exe, as a virus and deleted it. The result, according to a contemporary report , is that "affected systems will enter a reboot loop and [lose] all network access."
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The parallels between that 2010 incident and this year's CrowdStrike outage are uncanny. At its core was a defective update, pushed to millions of PCs running a powerful software agent, causing the affected devices to stop working. Recovery required manual intervention on every single device. Plus, the flawed code was pushed out by a public security company desperately trying to grow in a brutally competitive marketplace.
The timing was particularly unfortunate for McAfee. Intel had announced its intention to acquire McAfee for $7.68 billion on April 19, 2010. The defective DAT file was released two days later, on April 21.
That 2010 McAfee screw-up was a big deal, kneecapping Fortune 500 companies (including Intel!) as well as universities and government/military deployments worldwide. It knocked 10% of the cash registers at Australia's largest grocery chain offline, forcing the closure of 14 to 18 stores.
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In the You Can't Make This Up Department… CrowdStrike's founder and CEO, George Kurtz, was McAfee's Chief Technology Officer during that 2010 incident.
What makes the 2024 sequel so much worse is that it also affected Windows-based servers running in the cloud, on Microsoft Azure and on AWS. Just as with the many laptops and desktop PCs that were bricked by this faulty update, the cloud-based servers require time-consuming manual interventions to recover.
Surprisingly, this isn't CrowdStrike's first faulty Falcon sensor update this year.
Less than a month earlier, according to a report from The Stack , CrowdStrike released a detection logic update for the Falcon sensor that exposed a bug in the sensor's Memory Scanning feature. "The result of the bug," CrowdStrike wrote in a customer advisory, "is a logic error in the CsFalconService that can cause the Falcon sensor for Windows to consume 100% of a single CPU core." The company rolled back the update, and customers were able to resume normal operations by rebooting.
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At the time, computer security expert Will Thomas noted on X/Twitter , "[T]his just goes to show how important it is to download new updates to one machine to test it first before rolling out to the whole fleet!"
In that 2010 incident, the root cause turned out to be a complete breakdown of the QA process . It seems self-evident that a similar failure in QA is at work here. Were these two CrowdStrike updates not tested before they were pushed out to millions of devices?
Part of the problem might be a company culture that's long on tough talk. In the most recent CrowdStrike earnings call, CEO George Kurtz boasted about the company's ability to "ship game-changing products at a rapid pace," taking special aim at Microsoft:
And more recently, following yet another major Microsoft breach in CIS' Cyber Safety Review Board's findings, we received an outpouring of requests from the market for help. We decided enough is enough, there's a widespread crisis of confidence among security and IT teams within the Microsoft security customer base. […] Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. CISAs now have the ability to reduce monoculture risk from only using Microsoft products and cloud services. Our innovation continues at breakneck pace multiplying the reasons for the market to consolidate on Falcon. Thousands of organizations are consolidating on the Falcon platform.
Given recent events, some of those customers might be wondering whether that "breakneck pace" is part of the problem.
As part of its initial response, CrowdStrike says it plans to take additional measures to improve "software resiliency and testing." More importantly, it plans to implement a "staggered deployment strategy ... in which updates are gradually deployed to larger portions of the sensor base, starting with a canary deployment." The company also committed to provide customers with "greater control over the delivery of Rapid Response Content updates by allowing granular selection of when and where these updates are deployed."
Meanwhile, the United States House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee plans to call CrowdStrike's CEO up for hearings on what went wrong, and CrowdStrike's Chief Security Officer, Shawn Henry, posted an apology on LinkedIn , admitting "On Friday, we failed you. ... The confidence we built in drips over the years was lost in buckets within hours, and it was a gut punch."
It's impossible to let Microsoft completely off the hook. After all, the Falcon sensor problems were unique to Windows PCs, as admins of Linux and Mac-focused shops were quick to remind us.
Partly, that's an architectural issue. Developers of system-level apps for Windows, including security software, historically implement their features using kernel extensions and drivers. As this example illustrates, faulty code running in the kernel space can cause unrecoverable crashes, whereas code running in user space can't.
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That used to be the case with MacOS as well, but in 2020, with MacOS 11, Apple changed the architecture of its flagship OS to strongly discourage the use of kernel extensions . Instead, developers are urged to write system extensions that run in user space rather than at the kernel level. On MacOS, CrowdStrike uses Apple's Endpoint Security Framework and says using that design, "Falcon achieves the same levels of visibility, detection, and protection exclusively via a user space sensor."
Could Microsoft make the same sort of change for Windows? Perhaps, but doing so would certainly bring down the wrath of antitrust regulators, especially in Europe. The problem is especially acute because Microsoft has a lucrative enterprise security business, and any architectural change that makes life more difficult for competitors like CrowdStrike would be rightly seen as anticompetitive.
Indeed, a Microsoft spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal that it can't follow Apple's lead because of antitrust concerns. According to the WSJ report , "In 2009, Microsoft agreed it would give makers of security software the same level of access to Windows that Microsoft gets." That concern might be open for debate, but given Microsoft's history with EU regulators, it's understandable why the company hasn't wanted to get tangled up in that argument.
Microsoft currently offers APIs for Microsoft Defender for Endpoint , but competitors aren't likely to use them. They'd much rather argue that their software is superior, and using the "inferior" offering from Microsoft would be hard to explain to customers.
Nonetheless, this incident, which caused many billions of dollars' worth of damage, should be a wake-up call for the entire IT community. At a minimum, CrowdStrike needs to step up its testing game, and customers need to be more cautious about allowing this sort of code to deploy on their networks without testing it themselves.
Who needs ransomware when a faulty software update can shut down critical infrastructure, microsoft releases a crowdstrike recovery tool - here's how it works.
COMMENTS
Prepare for B-school admission rounds, with these MBA case study examples. It is common for B-schools to incorporate a case-based discussion in the group exercise round or give a case study in a personal interview. So, here we have presented two popular MBA case study examples, with analysis and solution.
3. Always Expect the Cold Call. The cold call is when the professor asks a student to start the discussion off. This would involve recapping the objectives of the case, setting up the key points for discussion and putting a stake in the ground regarding the answer.
Celebrating the Inaugural HBS Case. "How do you go into an ambiguous situation and get to the bottom of it? That skill - the skill of figuring out a course of inquiry, to choose a course of action - that skill is as relevant today as it was in 1921.". Jan Rivkin.
You'll thank me. 2. Read the case study, take notes. Make a key problems and issues document. Each time you read the case study, have a different goal in mind, a different way of looking at what's been written. This is more efficient than reading the case study many times and trying to remember everything in it.
Follow these easy steps to solve an MBA case study: Carefully read the case: Learn about the problem and the situation of the company. Analyze the facts: Find the important issues and information. Apply theories and ideas: Analyze the case by using what you've learned in class. Consider alternatives: Think of different ways to solve the ...
Broad Tips. We will begin our examination of the MBA interview case study questions with a few broad tips that will form the basis of your approach. First of all, begin by seeking time from the interviewer; you will need it to formulate your answer. Once you have time to work, break the problem down into as many dimensions as possible.
MBA or the Master of Business Administration is one of the most popular 2 years full-time post-graduation professional degree courses. There are some specializations in MBA like marketing, finance, Human Resource Management (HRM), systems management, operations management and many more. Writing case study assignment on various MBA subjects and specialization forms a major part of
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Identify the key problems and issues in the case study. Formulate and include a thesis statement, summarizing the outcome of your analysis in 1-2 sentences. Background. Set the scene: background information, relevant facts, and the most important issues. Demonstrate that you have researched the problems in this case study. Evaluation of the Case
Crafting Comprehensive Answers to MBA Case Study Questions. Once you've analyzed the case, presenting your findings is crucial. Here's a guideline: Structuring Your Response: Begin with a brief summary, delve into the core of the problem, present your recommendations, and then offer a conclusion. Incorporate Data: Use qualitative and ...
Case Study: UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School 2018-2019 Short-Answer MBA Essays. Question 1: Required (500 words) ... For that reason, applicants first should study the school's statement, Core Values in Action, and reflect on situations that had involved values defined in these ways. The prompt does not rule out interactions from one's ...
The above is an adapted abstract of Harvard Business School's teaching case study EbonyLife Media, written by Andy Wu, Feng Zhu, Wale Lawal and Pippa Tubman Armerding. The original 1921 Harvard ...
How to Analyse a Case Study | MBA Interview | Case Study Format. Common Admission Test (CAT) ...
Take time to analyze and think through the case. Weigh the pros and cons and various trade-offs between two or more choices. Break down the complex problem into small, distinct pieces to enable better articulation. Listen attentively, even to conflicting ideas, as they might provide part solution to the problem.
Go to the last page and read the last paragraph. This could be titled as 'Conclusion' in the case study. It could also be titled something else as per the context of the case or their simply may be no heading on this last paragraph. Get back to the first page and completely read the introduction paragraph.
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A traditional case study presents a management issue or issues calling for resolution and action. It generally breaks off at a decision point with the manager weighing a number of different options. It puts the student in the decision-maker's shoes and allows the student to understand the stakes involved. In other instances, a case study is ...
Case studies are real-life business situations or hypothetical business scenarios used in MBA course to facilitate some elements of experiential learning. A business case study will present you with a business issue, a conflict to be resolved, or an impending decision that needs to be made. In most cases, a case study focuses on a specific ...
Where to Find MBA Case Studies. The following business schools publish either abstracts or full MBA case studies online. Some of these case studies are free. Others can be downloaded and purchased for a small fee. Harvard Business School Cases - Harvard offers thousands of case studies on every business topic imaginable.
Like any other business case, your case should include sections on: 1. Identify Business Need (specific, current business challenges or needs faced by the company) 2. Analysis (ie, how the programme will help the company meet these specific needs. Think about the ROI from your company's point of view, of the additional benefits the company ...
The Case Analysis Coach is an interactive tutorial on reading and analyzing a case study. The Case Study Handbook covers key skills students need to read, understand, discuss and write about cases. The Case Study Handbook is also available as individual chapters to help your students focus on specific skills.
To write any kind of MBA case study paper is not every student's work. Case study writing involves a lot of attention and energy. Moreover, if the course is MBA, then a student can easily double all the attributes of research writing like more energy and more attention. The Helpful 12 Tips To Get Your Case Study Done in MBA
The McKinsey case study interview is consistent across global offices. The interviewer-led approach of the McKinsey case interview means you'll be guided through the process by your interviewer. However, there's a caveat, explains Eugene Goh, the cofounder of HR tech startup, HireQuotient, who worked as a principal for BCG for more than ...
The case study could examine how one can determine students' understanding of the concept and their ability to transfer this to other contexts and how feedback can be used to improve this. (e) Curriculum Design: The structure and the design of the MBA curriculum cause significant impact on the ability to practice learning transfer. Concerning ...
Key Takeaways. MBA interviews aren't intended to be intimidating. Most schools will let a candidate redo a bad interview. The interview usually doesn't make or break your application.
A man in a gray T-shirt holds dollars in his hands. Bank. Casino. Salary. Rates. A recent, comprehensive study that uses a randomized controlled trial provides new evidence that largely supports ...
The best way to learn how to write one is by reading a stellar business case study example. What is a case study? A case study is a document business-to-business (B2B) companies use to illustrate how their product or service helped a client achieve their goals. A winning case study introduces the featured client, gives a brief description of their challenge or goal, and showcases the results ...
In that case, McAfee had delivered a faulty virus definition (DAT) file to PCs running Windows XP. That file falsely detected a crucial Windows system file, Svchost.exe, as a virus and deleted it.