Case method
HARVARD Business School (HBS) attributes a great part of its considerable success to the case method. At the start of the Asian Institute of Management about 1967, with the help of Ford Foundation, HBS took about a dozen of us to learn how to use this method of teaching and learning. Some of us took the two-year regular MBA while others only had a semester. It is a great method, and although I am not an expert in it, I will try to describe what I know of it.
The case method started in the study of theology, the casus conscientiae then in, passed to the study of law, as the precedent method of studying the law. Then it passed on to the business school especially promoted by HBS. The big difference was that in the study of theology, there was a correct answer and in law there was a preferred solution but in business school there was no correct answer. Instead its usefulness was in how you treated the case: Its objective, its parameters, its possible mutations and assumptions, its attainment of objective, and finally the possible repercussions, was what was important. Whether you knew how the case actually turned out, did not matter. What was important was how you analyzed and made your decision in business school.
The more recent school to try to adopt the case method is the study of medicine. Its big advantage is that instead of treating the patient according to the disease in isolation, the medical student considers the problem or disease together with its complications in the patient.
In the spring of 1968, I was in Boston for the International Teachers Program (ITP) in HBS. I remember the snow in February did not melt till after I left Boston in June. The bridge between Harvard Square and HBS was always slippery. We could audit any class we wanted but we also had classes in teaching methods. They took moving pictures of us practiceteaching. The professors were always gracious and often talked to us after the class. The classes were large, at least eighty. Then there were the lectures where hundreds attended. (We also remember the Asian heads of corporations who tried to match their American counterparts in the cocktails and as a result we once in while had to help them to their dormitories.)
Although I knew the theory of the case method, my first semester that I tried it was to the say the least a failure. I approached the successful teachers, like Mel Salazar, and they showed me some tricks. After studying the case, the teacher formed an outline of what he wanted to teach the class. But he did not put this immediately on the board or lecture to the class. He drew out of the class the points he wanted to teach. But then the class could come up with ideas which were not in his teaching outline. Then there would be additions to what he intended to teach the class. This opened the class session to a whole world of new ideas and innovations. Everyone is free to contribute to the learning.
The case method prescribed that there would be individual study by the students of the case, then a discussion in the can group of four, then finally the class discussion. The advantage of the can group is that everyone already had the opportunity to express what he learned and therefore ready to listen to what others have to say during the class discussion. Each class discussing the same case would treat it quite differently. The different members of the class make contributions to the learning process. The first advantage is the repetition: The individual study, the can group discussion, and the class discussion orchestrated by the teacher. In Jesuit education the principle was “repetio est mater studiorum” (repletion is the source of learning.) Then there is in the case method the possibility of new ideas being injected into the discussion. How this new idea is treated is important. Was there identification of the innovation and pursuit of its implications? What were the possible implications of wanted and unwanted results. What were the possible complications? One of the beneficial effects of the case method is the development of tolerance for the opinion of others and to respect it.
I was once challenged by a senior corporate officer for the conduct of our graduates. I asked him why he objected to our graduate disagreeing with the president of the corporation. My next question was whether the young executive was respectful. He said she was. I asked for identification and it turned out to be a student who as I remembered was rather silent in class. The Case Method of Teaching seems to profit even those who just listened to the discussion.
Just as medicine is starting to adopt the case method, the new Dean of HBS is praising the medical profession for its teaching/learning methods and wishes to borrow from their success. We all can learn from each other what the best methods are to improve our learning.