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47-498: Until the late twentieth century, most decision games dealt with problems drawn from the realm of tactics. The exceptions to this general rule, moreover, were incidental rather than deliberate. That is, while authors of decision-forcing cases in such disciplines as business management and public policy would sometimes fictionalize their cases (thereby converting them into fictional decision games), these works were invariably (if erroneously) described as "case studies". Because of this,

94-572: A Leavenworth staff ride studied the ground associated with a battle or campaign that took place at some point in the past. The staff rides conducted by Major Swift were invariably those of the American Civil War . For example, in 1906, Major Swift led a group of twelve students on a staff ride to the site of the Battle of Chickamauga . In the 1970s, the U.S. Army revived the staff ride, replacing horses with buses and automobiles; expanding

141-605: A major share of the responsibility for thinking critically about the issues under discussion is shifted to the students, where it belongs." Case materials are often emblazoned with a disclaimer that warns both teachers and students to avoid the didactic, hortatory, and "best practices" fallacies. Here are some examples of such disclaimers: The case method is used in a variety of professional schools. These include the: University of Fujairah- MBA Program Staff ride The term staff ride describes three different types of military exercises and examinations, usually conducted on

188-416: A metaphor for a problem that students are asked to solve. A decision-forcing case in which one protagonist is faced with two problems is thus a "triple-decker case." (The bottom piece of bread is the background to the first problem, the second piece of bread is both the historical solution to the first problem and the background to the second problem, and the third piece of bread is the historical solution to

235-648: A particular future battlefield and/or area of operation for the purpose of preliminary reconnaissance, terrain study and tactical preparation. As the Classic Staff Ride , the Leavenworth Staff Ride and the Decision-Forcing Staff Ride have been subjected to modern military scholarly work, the idea and practice of battlefield examination and exploitation has been documented throughout history. As early as 500 years BC,

282-401: A reasonable solution, and communicate that solution to others in a succinct and effective manner. In the course of doing this, the case method also accomplishes a number of other things, each of which is valuable in its own right. By exciting the interest of students, the case method fosters interest in professional matters. By placing such things in a lively context, the case method facilitates

329-418: A single problem faced by a single protagonist at a particular time. There are, however, decision-forcing cases in which students play the role of a single protagonist who is faced with a series of problems, two or more protagonists dealing with the same problem, or two or more protagonists dealing with two or more related problems. A decision-forcing case conducted in the place where the historical decisions at

376-508: A variety times in the course of a decision-forcing case. Materials that provide background are distributed at, or before, the beginning of the class meeting. Materials that describe the solution arrived at by the protagonist and the results of that solution are passed out at, or after, the end of the class meeting. (These are called "the B-case", "the rest of the story", or "the reveal.") Materials that provide information that became available to

423-478: Is a teaching approach that uses decision-forcing cases to put students in the role of people who were faced with difficult decisions at some point in the past. It developed during the course of the twentieth-century from its origins in the casebook method of teaching law pioneered by Harvard legal scholar Christopher C. Langdell . In sharp contrast to many other teaching methods, the case method requires that instructors refrain from providing their own opinions about

470-499: Is also a kind of case study. That is, it is an examination of an incident that took place at some time in the past. However, in contrast to a retrospective case study, which provides a complete description of the events in question, a decision-forcing case is based upon an "interrupted narrative." This is an account that stops whenever the protagonist finds himself faced with an important decision. In other words, while retrospective case studies ask students to analyze past decisions with

517-404: Is argued that the case method puts too much emphasis on taking action and not enough on thoughtful reflection to see things from different perspectives. It has been suggested that different approaches to case writing, that do not put students in the ‘shoes’ of a manager, be encouraged to address these concerns. Every decision-forcing case has a protagonist, the historical person who was faced with

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564-481: Is asked "Your Majesty, what are your orders?") Other case teachers, such as those at the Harvard Business School, place less emphasis on role play, asking students "what would you do if you were the protagonist of the case." After discussing student solutions to the problem at the heart of a decision-forcing case, a case teacher will often provide a description of the historical solution, that is,

611-601: Is assigned the task of explaining the events of a particular time and place to the other participants. Since that time, army schools have used staff rides to enhance professional military education and training . It began at the United States Army Command and General Staff College (CGSC) and has continued at the War College and the various officer schools; however, staff riding is not limited to officers. Indeed, Non-commissioned officers , too, find

658-459: Is the art to which the problem at the heart of the game belongs, is open ended. That is, there is no inherent limit to the number of arts for which decision games can be created. Moreover, a given decision game can deal with a problem that belongs to more than one art. Thus, for example, a decision game designed for police officers may deal with both ethics and tactics. Common types of decision games include: Case method The case method

705-550: Is the world’s largest and most diverse repository of case studies used in Management Education, with cases from the world’s top case publishing schools, including, Harvard Business School, ICFAI Business School Hyderabad, the Blavatnik School of Government, INSEAD, IMD, Ivey Business School, Darden School of Business, London Business School, Singapore Management University etc. Its stated aim is to promote

752-603: The United States Army , while he was serving as assistant commandant of the General Service and Staff School (today's Command and General Staff College ) at Fort Leavenworth , Kansas. Like the classic staff ride, the Leavenworth staff ride was originally conducted on horseback. However, rather than studying the role that a particular piece of ground might play in a future conflict, the participants in

799-495: The 16th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps and an avid supporter of the applicatory method of instruction. Decision-forcing cases are sometimes described with a system of metaphors that compares them to various types of sandwiches. In this system, pieces of bread serve as a metaphor for narrative elements (i.e. the start, continuation, or end of an account) and filling of the sandwich serves as

846-613: The Chinese general Sun Tzu emphasized the rigorous study of the terrain. Notable military commanders, such as Hannibal , Napoleon or Frederick the Great have regularly studied the terrain and exploited to its full advantage. The classic staff ride (a direct translation of the German term Stabs-Reise ) is a technique made famous by Helmuth von Moltke the Elder in the second half of

893-554: The European Case Clearing House), headquartered in Cranfield University , Cranfield , Bedford , United Kingdom , and with its US office at Babson College , Wellesley , Massachusetts , is the independent home of the case method. It is a membership-based organization with more than 500 members worldwide, not-for-profit organisation and registered charity founded in 1973. The Case Centre

940-421: The aid of hindsight, decision-forcing cases ask students to engage problems prospectively. In recent years, following corporate scandals and the global financial crisis, the case method has been criticized for contributing to a narrow, instrumental, amoral, managerial perspective on business where making decisions which maximise profit is all that matters, ignoring the social responsibilities of organisations. It

987-427: The avoidance of standard formats for case materials; awareness of tropes and clichés; the use of case materials originally created for purposes other than case teaching; and the deliberate inclusion of "distractors" – information that is misleading, irrelevant, or at odds with other information presented in the case. The case method gives students the ability to quickly make sense of a complex problem, rapidly arrive at

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1034-505: The case method ("Because Wisdom Can't Be Told"), Charles I. Gragg of the Harvard Business School argued that "the case system, properly used, initiates students into the ways of independent thought and responsible judgement." While the case method can be used to accomplish a wide variety of goals, certain objectives are at odds with its nature as an exercise in professional judgement. These incompatible objectives include attempts to use decision-forcing cases to: Thomas W. Shreeve, who uses

1081-530: The case method by sharing knowledge, skills, and expertise in this area among teachers and students, and for this it engages in various activities like conducting case method workshops, offering case scholarships, publishing a journal, and organizing a global case method awards. The Case Centre Awards (known as the European Awards from 1991 and 2010) recognises outstanding case writers and teachers worldwide. These prestigious awards, popularly known as

1128-457: The case method community's annual ' Oscars ', or the “business education Oscars, celebrate worldwide excellence in case writing and teaching. The presentation of a decision-forcing case necessarily takes the form of a story in which the protagonist is faced with a difficult problem. This can lead to "the narrative fallacy", a mistake that leads both case teachers and the developers of case materials to ignore information that, while important to

1175-509: The case method to teach people in the field of military intelligence, argues that "Cases are not meant to illustrate either the effective or the ineffective handling of administrative, operational, logistic, ethical, or other problems, and the characters in cases should not be portrayed either as paragons of virtue or as archvillains. The instructor/casewriter must be careful not to tell the students what to think—they are not empty vessels waiting to be filled with wisdom. With this method of teaching,

1222-403: The case teacher must take care to avoid giving the impression that the historical solution is the "right answer." Rather, he should point out that the historical solution to the problem serves primarily to provide students with a baseline to which they can compare their own solutions. Some case teachers will refrain from providing the historical solution to students. One reason for not providing

1269-456: The decision game is a decision-forcing case, then the solution would be the decision made by the protagonist of the case, followed by the immediate results of that decision. The taxonomy of decision games is based upon two attributes. The first of these, whether the game is historical (real) or fictional (imaginary), is a binary attribute. That is, a decision game can either be real or imaginary, but it cannot be both. The second attribute, which

1316-401: The decision made by the protagonist of the case. Also known as "the rest of the story", "the epilogue", or (particularly at Harvard University) "the 'B' case", the description of the historical solution can take the form of a printed article, a video, a slide presentation, a short lecture, or even an appearance by the protagonist. Whatever the form of the description of the historical solution,

1363-416: The decision that students will be asked to make, complicates the telling of the story. This, in turn, can create a situation in which, rather than engaging the problem at the heart of the case, students "parse the case materials." That is, they make decisions on the basis of the literary structure of the case materials rather than the underlying reality. Techniques for avoiding the narrative fallacy include

1410-431: The decisions in question. Rather, the chief task of instructors who use the case method is asking students to devise, describe, and defend solutions to the problems presented by each case. The case method evolved from the casebook method , a mode of teaching based on Socratic principles pioneered at Harvard Law School by Christopher C. Langdell . Like the casebook method the case method calls upon students to take on

1457-617: The elder Hellmuth von Moltke in the middle years of the nineteenth century. To avoid confusion between "decision-forcing staff rides" and staff rides of other sorts, the Case Method Project at the Marine Corps University in Quantico, Virginia, adopted the term "Russell Ride" to describe the decision-forcing staff rides that it conducts. The term is an homage to Major General John Henry Russell Jr. ,USMC,

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1504-570: The fact that participants in these exercises were originally members of the Great General Staff. The Prussian staff ride evolved to an intermediate stage between table-top war games and army maneuvers. In this expanded form of staff rides, the commanding officers and staffs would deploy in the field as if at war, but without troops, with 'teams' for both sides. Reconnaissance and movement orders were given to umpires, who decided what and when units would be sighted or encountered and passed

1551-587: The heart of the case were made is called a "decision-forcing staff ride." Also known as an "on-site decision-forcing case", a decision-forcing staff ride should not be confused with the two very different exercises that are also known as " staff rides ": retrospective battlefield tours of the type practiced by the United States Army in the twentieth century and the on-site contingency planning exercises (Stabs Reisen, literally "staff journeys") introduced by Gerhard von Scharnhorst in 1801 and made famous by

1598-427: The historical solution is to encourage students to do their own research about the outcome of the case. Another is to encourage students to think about the decision after the end of the class discussion. "Analytic and problem-solving learning," writes Kirsten Lundgren of Columbia University, "can be all the more powerful when the 'what happened' is left unanswered. A classic decision-forcing case asks students to solve

1645-511: The history of the decision game was, until recently, very hard to distinguish from the history of the tactical decision game . Since the 1990s, decision games dealing with matters other than military tactics have made their appearance. Some of these exercises deal with situations, such as those faced by police officers, fire fighters, and first responders, that have so much in common with tactical military problems that they are accurately described as "tactical decision games". In other instances,

1692-402: The information back to the commanders and staffs. The exercise thus allowed the commanders to war game more realistically than on a table top. Critiques would take place at the conclusion of the staff rides. As an example, the Battle of Tannenberg was largely anticipated in one of Alfred von Schlieffen 's pre-war staff rides. The Leavenworth staff ride was introduced by Major Eben Swift of

1739-466: The learning of facts, nomenclature, conventions, techniques, and procedures. By providing both a forum for discussion and concrete topics to discuss, the case method encourages professional dialogue. By providing challenging practice in the art of decision-making, the case method refines professional judgement. By asking difficult questions, the case method empowers students to reflect upon the peculiar demands of their profession. In his classic essay on

1786-443: The life" case. Case materials are any materials that are used to inform the decisions made by students in the course of a decision-forcing case. Commonly used case materials include articles that were composed for the explicit purpose of informing case discussion, secondary works initially produced for other purposes, historical documents, artifacts, video programs, and audio programs. Case materials are made available to students at

1833-649: The nineteenth century. While serving as chief of the Great General Staff of the Prussian Army, Moltke took his subordinates on riding tours of areas where, in the event of war, significant military events (such as battles or the deployment of large numbers of troops) were likely to occur. These exercises served the double purpose of training staff officers to appreciate the operational and strategic significance of particular pieces of terrain and informing contingency planning. The term "staff" refers to

1880-487: The problem or problem that students are asked to solve. Thus, in engaging these problems, students necessarily engage in some degree of role play. Some case teachers, such as those of the Marine Corps University, place a great deal of emphasis on role play, to the point of addressing each student with the name and titles of the protagonist of the case. (A student playing the role of a king, for example,

1927-415: The problems are so different from those faced by military tacticians that the use of the term "tactical decision games" would be misleading. A decision game has two indispensable elements: In most instances, however, the instructor will add a third element, which is the presentation of a "wrap up" solution to the problem. If the decision game is fictional, this would be his own solution to the problem. If

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1974-429: The process useful to understand higher level decision-making , military tactics , and leadership ; they also benefit from a historical view of training. A staff ride differs from a guided battlefield tour: A properly conducted staff ride consists of three phases: Also known as an "on-site decision-forcing case" or a "Quantico-style staff ride", a decision-forcing staff ride is a decision-forcing case conducted in

2021-426: The protagonist in the course of solving the problem are given to students in the course of a class meeting. (These are often referred to as "handouts.") Case materials may be either "refined" or "raw." Refined case materials are secondary works that were composed expressly for use as part of decision-forcing cases. (Most of the case materials that are available from case clearing houses and academic publishers are of

2068-493: The range of battles and operations studied well beyond those of the American Civil War; and extending the opportunity to participate to soldiers of all ranks and specialties. In some instances, the Leavenworth staff ride consists of a guided tour of the battlefield, with explanations provided by military historians, park rangers, or others with expertise on the events in question. In other instances, each participant

2115-454: The refined variety.) Raw case materials are those that were initially produced for reasons other than the informing of a case discussion. These include newspaper articles, video and audio news reports, historical documents, memoirs, interviews, and artifacts. A number of organizations, to include case clearing houses, academic publishers, and professional schools, publish case materials. These organizations include: The Case Centre (formerly

2162-539: The role of an actual person faced with a difficult problem. A decision-forcing case is a kind of decision game . Like any other kinds of decision games, a decision-forcing case puts students in a role of person faced with a problem (often called the "protagonist") and asks them to devise, defend, discuss, and refine solutions to that problem. However, in sharp contrast to decision games that contain fictional elements, decision-forcing cases are based entirely upon reliable descriptions of real events. A decision-forcing case

2209-439: The second problem.) Similarly, a decision-forcing case for which the historical solution is not provided (and is thus a case with but one narrative element) is an "open-face" or "smørrebrød" case. A decision-forcing case in which students are asked to play the role of a decision-maker who is faced with a series of decisions in a relatively short period of time is sometimes called a "White Castle" , "slider" case. or "day in

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