Applying Theory to Practice: Implementing a Live Case Competition in a Capstone Strategic Management Course

Abstract

When facilitating large-scale instructional change, leaders face stakeholder tensions that arise from different institutional pressures. Over the past 4 years, we have created an innovative live case competition in a strategic management course as our college’s signature undergraduate experiential learning opportunity. This case has integrated the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business’ (AACSB) business knowledge and skill areas with grounded learning elements and course learning objectives. Each semester, over 350 students apply strategy concepts to analyze challenges provided by a local company. Course section winners present to executive judges in the final competition. We contribute to the literature by describing the live case competition created from a six-step collaborative process that managed stakeholder tensions as institutional pressures changed. Using distributed leadership and information-sharing approaches, our collaboration model helped us address different needs, share resources, adapt to institutional pressures and create sustainable experiential learning opportunities. With shared decision making and constructive dialogue, we developed high-quality student learning experiences that respected faculty autonomy, addressed resource limitations, and institutionalized business partnerships. We describe our motivation, context, and key stakeholders’ (faculty, students, executives, and administrators) challenges and solutions. We hope our collaborative model helps others successfully implement large-scale instructional change.