(ThatKidInTheCorner :: The Worst Class At Business School)

« Torture-People-Until-They-Talk City | Main | Habemvs Papem! »

April 19, 2005

The Worst Class At Business School

In which I describe the most excruciating genre of classroom experience encountered in business school

So this is it. My final week of graduate school. Whoa. Full adulthood beckons. I figure it's a time for reflection, contemplation, and examination of the 22 months I've spent as a grad student. And I suspect at some point there will be time for all of that. But right now I'm having some bandwidth issues in re: all-the-work-that-I-should-have-done-all-semester-but-didn't-because-
I-mean-really-it's-my-last-semester-of-grad-school-and-I-have-a-job. So. I don't suspect I'll be doing much posting on the electric internet over the next week or so, save for some repurposings of class projects that fit with the overall theme and tone of thatkidinthecorner.com (said theme and tone being "whatever the hell it is I choose to think and/ or write about at that moment").

All that said, I can't let the final week of b-school pass without some summary comments; let's start with what is consistently the most painful classroom experience at business school....

In the casual conversations you may have had regarding business school, perhaps you've heard someone make reference to the "business school case study." The case study (or just "case") is a big part of the b-school experience. It's typically a 7-10 page document that describes a recent real-life business situation (though sometimes they change the names to protect the innocent!) for the purposes of framing a class discussion. Essentially, you read a little story that's supposed to capture some complex and poignant business dilemma, and then you talk through it to uncover the fundamental themes and recommend some conclusions/ actions.

As a pedagogical device, the case works pretty well. It allows for a discussion of concepts and techniques in the context of an actual business situation -- instead of just pulling it out of a textbook or lecture. You ground the conversation in a narrative and humanize the larger business issues: which is essentially how you encounter any sort of business issue. On the flip side, the cases writers too often boil the narrative down to a single (usually coded) insight -- the observation or analysis that will "crack" the case. Unfortunately, this style usually leads to a discussion that chases its own tail for a while until we all get to learn the Big Secret, handed down from on high by a professor with a teacher's edition of the case. Pretty beat. Though, in all fairness, cases only constitute about a quarter of class content at my school; at some places, the curriculum is almost exclusively cases. I can't even imagine.

An important distinction in a case-driven class is whether or not the students have handed in an assignment related to the case (as opposed to merely reading it and thinking about it beforehand). Obviously, if you have to hand in a couple pages of analysis (that will be read and evaluated by the professor), you're going to read the case a bit more closely than you would if you're just showing up and talking about it. More importantly, if you have to complete an assignment on the day's case (typically by answering a few questions in memo format), you're going to have a distinctive perspective on what the issues are, what's important, and what the big secret/ answer is. An assignment definitely guarantees that everyone in the class will have read the case; it also guarantees a very divisive class discussion.

The perfect storm of case discussion (aka "The Worst Class at Business School") arrives when (a) the class has completed a written analysis (that will be graded) prior to the session and (b) the class discussion mirrors the assignment. That is, the questions discussed in class are exactly the same questions that each of the students has already answered. At length. In a paper that (gasp!) will be graded.

The discussion typically starts innocently enough. The first moments of any case discussion are almost always devoted to establishing key facts for the discussion. So people raise their hands and offer the little tidbits of information that they think are key to the conversation. Fair enough -- this part is rarely contentious. Most people can handle this part without agita. But pretty soon, the discussion must enter its next phase: the part where you start to dig into the more substantive elements of the case. What are the key issues? What's the big problem? What sorts of recommendations would you make? We've now crossed the border from "fact" to "opinion" and it turns out that not everyone has the same opinion. Tensions rise. Tones change. Disagreements surface. The professor begins to bless certain opinions as more correct than others. Anxieties begin to crescendo -- this assignment is graded, after all! This is my future we're talking about! Did I not do it correctly?

And that's when it happens.

Concerned that he might have gotten the answer "wrong," some poor Type-A schlub succumbs to his neurosis and unburdens himself in front of 85 people. That is, he begins describing his ENTIRE PAPER in front of the ENTIRE CLASS. In detail. It usually includes phrases like, "Well what I did was...," "Is it okay if I said...," or "Is is still correct if I wrote that...." It is, in a word, unbearable. Total car wreck. For people who are otherwise capable and people-savvy, it's remarkable how shamelessly they will monopolize the time of the entire class. Unreal. It's as if the rest of us have disappeared, and the class session exists as a one-on-one confessional in which this student can beg for the professor's reassuring blessing on their inconsequential homework assignment. The lack of shame is astounding.

And once one person crosses the line, then the rest of the neurotics quickly follow suit, all offering up detailed descriptions of their individual homework assignments while jutting their brow upward and smiling: simian code for desperate obsequiousness. It's really tough to get the class back on track at that point, though some professors are more skilled at dealing with the situation than others. At the same time, the only professors who end up in this situation in the first place are the ones who (a) are of the "there is a right answer to every case" school and who (b) make the mistake of talking through the questions from the assignment during the class.

And, really, the students should know better. I wouldn't write about it if it didn't happen, oh, every single time we have to turn in a case assignment. I actually feel some pity for the folks who sit beside me while it happens; I tend to lose a bit of self-control and start nervously clicking my pen while whispering, "This is the worst class in business school; this is the worst class in business school." Bad behavior (by this I mean "people being rude") is a big problem in general at my b-school, and though this isn't as bad as showing up to class late holding breakfast and noisily bulldozing your way to a seat, it's still rude and selfish. At the very least, it's unprofessional.

(This is another reason why no one likes MBAs.)

Posted by thatkid at April 19, 2005 7:34 PM under MBAwesome!

April 19, 2005

The Worst Class At Business School

Comments

Post a comment