| |
Case Competition MBA Students A Success for Student Iniciative
| |||
 Students from the Richard Ivey School of Business. This year's winners |
 Robert Crooker, Arthur D. Little; Eduardo Martínez Abascal, IESE; Josep Ros and Philippe Abloing, Arthur D. Little; Brian Subirana and Brian O'C. Leggett, IESE |
The Case Competition was the dream child of Nizar Jalbout who invited teams from five business schools, Chicago, Manchester, Rotterdam, IPADE and Ivey (formerly Western Ontario) to IESE to compete in an academic exercise on the analysis of a business problem. In fact, it was quite similar to an exercise from our Analysis of Business Problems class. Nizar secured the financial backing of Goldman Sacks, Argentaria and Mercer to fund the event. With the success of the first year event behind them, last January Michael Quaine and his team of Kathleen Dolan, David Barry, Ramis Zakarni, Jacobo García-Palencia, Víctor López and Thomas Siebert began to organize this year's event.
After securing the financial support from Arthur D. Little, four teams, each consisting of 4 full-time MBA students, from Michigan, Chicago, Ivey and Rotterdam, were invited to participate. IESE, on the grounds of impartiality, did not enter a team. A case from general management written by Prof. Jordi Canals, &laqno;Indo International», was selected. Three representative of Arthur D. Little, Philippe Alloing, Director for Human Resources, Europe, Robert Crooker, Senior Manager, Cambridge (USA), and Josep Ros, Associate Director, Madrid, and one IESE professor, Brian Subirana, were then invited to form the panel of judges. On Tuesday, 15th. April, the teams arrived in Barcelona, and on Wednesday, after a short address by Dean Cavallé, they met with both Professor Africa Ariño for a briefing on the case and with Michael Quaine on matters of procedures. By Friday afternoon each of the four teams had submitted their written analysis and recommendations, which were then distributed to each of the judges who had arrived in Barcelona that afternoon. On Saturday morning, individual teams made oral presentations of their findings lasting up to 30 minutes. Each presentation was followed by a question and answer period.
One intriguing point that most of us who attended as observers watched with great curiosity was how Kathleen Dolan was going to manage to have the winner's plaque completed and ready for presentation with the winner's name engraved on it an hour after the judge's deliberations had terminated. Remember it was Saturday afternoon and shops had closed and most of us doubted whether it could be done. Well, it was just towards the end of the Competition lunch and a series of short speeches had been delivered by Professor Kathleen Slaughter from the Ivey School, Philippe Alloing, Robert Crooker and Dean Cavallé, when Josep Ros from the Madrid office of Arthur D. Little stood up to announced this year's winner. Yes, he was holding the Competition winner's plaque with the beautiful engraving of the name of the 1997 International MBA Case Competition, The Richard Ivey School of Business on it. Well done, Ivey, but also an "A" plus for Kathleen and the team for Logistics.
The reader may justly remark at this point that it is an interesting event, it gives IESE some publicity and it gives students like Michael Quaine a chance to show their leadership and organizing qualities. This is true. But it is far more. Now with this experience behind us and with the solid support of Arthur D. Little, the development of the case competition can be taken one step further with the incorporation of a team from IESE in the 1998 competition. We have agreed that Arthur D. Little will provide the case for the 1998 competition, which will ensure the impartiality of the event. In this way, we hope to generate a greater appreciation for case analysis, report writing and oral presentations among our own students here at IESE. The event will provide us with a yardstick to measure the ability and skills of our own students against those from some of the best MBA programmes in the world.
Portada | En 10 minutos | A
fondo | Tendencias | Reflexión
Es noticia | Agrupación
de Miembros | Ultimas noticias | Servicios
REVISTA DE ANTIGUOS
© IESE 1997