The course has four goals

• Teach students how to tackle complex, strategic problems by breaking them into key, manageable components
• Help students improve their communication & presentation skills by carrying out elevator pitches & steering committee presentations
• Allow students practice these skills via tackling a complex business case and finally
• Provide students with a relative competitive advantage vs. their peers during the early stages of their careers in consulting organizations (as most MBA students focus on securing an offer from a consulting firm and do not think about how to put their best foot forward once employed)

The course will accomplish these goals by

• Having teams of students work closely with the instructor over the initial three lectures to develop a growth strategy for a client and in the process learn how to establish hypotheses, develop a workplan, test their hypotheses, develop a storyline and turn it into a deck. During this phase, students will also practice elevator pitches and deliver a Steering Committee presentation
• During the fourth and fifth lecture, student teams will work independently to put what they have learned into practice and develop a strategy for a video games console manufacturer facing an existential threat by cloud-based video game streaming services. Each team will then present its finding to the Steering Committee
• After each Steering Committee presentations, teams will get detailed feedback on their performance focused on things that worked well & things that could be improved

Throughout the course the instructor will share practical tips with students on how to put their best foot forward during the early stages of their career in consulting