Teaching Approach and Performance Evaluation
Individual Performance
Final Written Exam (70%)
Team Performance
A) Practical Example (handout and presentation) 10%
B) Case Study (case analysis and discussion) 20%
Each component (exam, practical example, and case study) has to be graded positively (i.e., with the grade “4” or higher) in order to get an overall positive evaluation.
Individual Performance
There are two opportunities for taking the Corporate Strategy exam (see dates and registration period from the course schedule below).
Exam duration is 90 minutes and will consist of open and multiple choice questions. You need at least 50 % of the points to pass the exam.
In the theory part, you will be confronted with questions referring to concepts covered in the lectures and in the textbook. In the multiple-choice part, you will be confronted with questions that cover theoretical concepts you have learned in the lecture as well as practical questions. If you answer a multiple-choice question incorrectly, your overall score will be diminished by the number of points assigned to this question. If you decide not to answer a multiple choice question, you will receive zero points for this question.
In the case study part, you will be confronted with a company case in which you should transfer the knowledge you have gained in the lecture, the text book, the guest lectures, the case studies, and the team work presented.
Should you decide not to take the exam this semester, you may keep your case study and team grade for the next semester. In this case, contact the course assistant.
Team Performance
Every student attending the Corporate Strategy lecture has to be part of a team presenting A) practical example and B) a case study. Depending on the size of the class, teams are composed of 4-6 students. Students need to allocate to groups by themselves and have to sign in to their preferred team, topic and cases study session on ILIAS by 26th of September 11:00 a.m. The final team formation will be announced at the lecture on 27th of September.
While we encourage all members of a group to participate in the work of both the team presentation as well as the case study, you are free to decide who will work and/or present the team project and case study. It is not obligatory that the whole group or each team member respectively is presenting (but attendance in class is required from everyone during presentation time).
A) Practical Example
The course is structured along seven (7) topics (see course schedule). Each topic is followed by a short practical example, which summarizes the key content of the topic discussed the previous week.
In teams, students will describe and analyze an article about a corporation, which will be given to them two (2) weeks prior to the presentation day (Thursday after class). Each article refers to a specific chapter of the Corporate Strategy course. The objective of the passignment is to enable students to resume the content covered in class before. Further, students should demonstrate their ability to support their arguments through the application of a specific framework (students have to use frameworks of the respective chapter to which the team is assigned to).
The same article will be distributed to two teams. Each team will prepare a handout (max. 2 pages) and power-point presentation (max. 7 slides), which have to be uploaded on the Tuesday prior to the class until 11.59 p.m. on ILIAS. The team providing the most profound answer will be chosen to present on Thursday. Teams will be informed on the preceding Wednesday afternoon whether they are invited to present or not. Only the handout and power point slides submitted on Tuesday are going to be evaluated. The presentation in front of class will not be evaluated.
The presentation should summarize the topic of the previous lecture shortly, describe the content of the article in few sentences, and identify and highlight the elements of the article that reflect the topic of the previous lecture. The handout should explain the content of the presentation in full sentences. Students will be allowed to present 12 minutes, following a discussion of 10 minutes.
B) Case Study
The goal of the case study is to analyze a corporate strategy and corporate level decisions of companies through given case examples.
The students will assign themselves to one of the four sessions (duration 2 x 45 minutes). In each session, two cases will be discussed in a round table. Students are expected to prepare for their session by reading the cases and taking part in discussion is required. Furthermore, each team answers the same questions regarding one of the cases. Students will answer these questions by applying the frameworks learned during this course and present their solutions in the session. The presentation should include 4-8 slides (10 minutes). Note: There is a 20-minute discussion after two first presentations (Disney) and at the end of the session (after Danaher). Students are expected to prepare questions for other teams and be ready to argument for their own analysis of the value creation and strategic plan. The deadline to submit the presentation is on Nov 30, 6 p.m.
The grade will be based on the case analysis but also on the activity in the discussion (evaluation criteria will be available on ILIAS).
Detailed information regarding the case study and team project will be provided on September 20th at the “Introduction to team assignments”.
