From university classrooms to business life...
One of the basic goals of business schools is preparing their students for business life. To achieve this goal, the “case study” method, which is based on sharing examples from real life and developing business practices through them, is commonly used in many business schools around the world. This method has numerous benefits in terms of improving students’ ability to examine complicated situations, analyze problems, and make decision. This method is one of the most preferred in several areas of education, including medicine and law.
Participatory and interactive education
Case studies are stories with a message, which can be fictional or relying on real life situations. Students, through active participation while working on cases, improve their skills on comprehending situations and solving problems that they confront. Thereby, the case study method encompasses a process where the instructor and student work together.
The case study method in business schools
The case study method which was first used in the 1920s in Harvard Business School, has become widespread all around the world. Through case studies, students have the opportunity to apply their theoretical knowledge, develop team skills, and develop solution-oriented decision making by correctly diagnosing problems in a frequently changing and highly ambiguous business environment. Thus they can adapt to business life after university with ease.
Case-Study Alliance Turkey (CAT)
The case study method is seldom used in Turkish business schools. Reasons behind this may be the lack of knowledge regarding the method and its educational benefits, case studies not being available in Turkish, the absence of cases suitable for the Turkish context, a lack of academicians familiar with the case study method who can write cases from local stories.
The CAT (Case-Study Alliance) Project, is a three-year project part of the Erasmus+ programme. It is coordinated by Istanbul Technical University Arı Teknokent with the collaboration of İstanbul Technical University Department of Management Engineering—GINOVA, Middle East Technical University Department of Business Adminstration--GIMER from Turkey, Rotterdam Erasmus School of Management Case Development Centre from the Netherlands, and SMART Partners from England to disseminate the case study method in Turkey.
CAT’s activities
CAT’s goals can be listed as follows:
- Dissemination of the case study method in Turkish business schools To improve students’ analytical skills and decision making processes and to better prepare them for business life after university
- Provide the required support to academicians for case writing and develop academicians who can train others
- Communicating success stories and problems of Turkish companies to national and international academic circles and thus contributing to both theory and practice
- Encouraging innovative training methods in Turkish universities
- Developing collaboration opportunities for future projects
In addition to preparing visual and written materials to achieve the above goals, workshops and other meetings will be organized regarding case study teaching and case writing in various Turkish cities.
CAT's outputs
CAT's outputs can be listed as follows:
- Case teaching guidebooks prepared to familiarize academicians with the case study method
- Case writing guidebooks prepared to support academicians in their case writing efforts
- Ten local case studies and their case studies developed in English and Turkish within the scope of the project
- Presentations from the Case Study Conference held in 2017
The aforementioned outputs are available under the Free Resources menu.