Case Camp at the EuCA Summer School
An incredible experience, that’s how I would describe the business case training camp I took part in last weekend in Cambridge, during the 5th edition of EUCA Cambridge Summer School.
A 2-day full immersion into the business world, where we, students from different countries and different backgrounds, were challenged to think like company managers in a series of engaging and interactive activities, where maximum concentration was required.
What we had to do, after a very well done introduction to business case and a detailed explanation of how to do it, was to find an effective solution to two given cases, and to prepare a good presentation (with paper or digital slides) in order to convince the Jury. And it was not an easy job, considering that in the Jury there were persons like Gianluca Giovannucci, president of EUCA, Fabio Monti, director of Fondazione RUI and Istvan and Janka, expert trainers in the field!
The result was that a huge amount of good ideas, creative presentations, and convincing solutions, came out from different teams, and it was a difficult job even for the Jury to choose a winner!
The first case was about a company called SCANFIN, an ambitious international merger of four banks from Northern Europe, which, even if it was considered to be a sure success, didn’t really work… The managers weren’t able to accomplish a good integration process, and bad communication between employees from different countries led to disappointing results. After having analyzed internal and external problems of the new company (in 1.30h), the teams had to plan a completely new campaign in order to lift the company up again, and prepare a good presentation for the Jury (2.30h). In fact, good ideas were not enough in order to win, and, as I said, the most important thing was to convince the Jury! My team, the winning one, managed to do that successfully by adding to good slides and good ideas also a 1-minute amazing video at the beginning of the presentation. An eye-catching “trailer”, with an epic soundtrack, where we summarized our work, pointing out in a funny way the problems we had found and our solutions. It was a creative and brilliant idea to use it, because we were able to catch the attention of the Jury at the very beginning of our presentation.
The second (and smaller) case was about EUCA itself. In this case the teams, after having heard the present situation of the association, with her main concerns for the future, were given the possibility to ask a few detailed questions to the EUCA team, and after that they had 1.30h to prepare a presentation. This time the task was to use a flipchart instead of digital slides, and also in this case amazing ideas were pointed out! The teams did such a good job that the Jury decided not to choose one single winning team, and, in fact, every team won. Even here my team distinguished itself for its creativity: one of our ideas was to create a social media campaign online with videos and songs in order to reach as many students as possible, and at the end of the presentation we decided to give a funny example of an effective way to reach students. We presented to the Jury nothing less than an E.U.C.A. song, even with a dance based on a famous hit of the Village People! It was really amusing, believe me!
Some of the important skills required were creativity, public speaking, time management, teamwork, active listening, problem solving, conflict management, critical thinking, effective communication, confidence, and even more! It was amazing how we were challenged and motivated to practice all these competences in one single weekend! Of course the training required motivation, energy and concentration, but we had a lot of fun together and I think that all of us enjoyed the activities.
Last but not least, I shouldn’t forget one thing, the key skill of the whole experience, enthusiasm, useful not only during the case solving, but also during the pub quiz, when the teams were challenged to test their knowledge on different topics! It was a super funny after-dinner activity, full of surprises and amusement, where I discovered a lot of facts that I didn’t know (like the really engaging guesstimations) and I familiarized even more with my classmates. It was nice to blame the other teams when we thought that they didn’t know the answer, and there was even a prize for the winning team! And of course, after that, even if we were a bit tired, we all went to dance in a pub!
To sum up, this training was a wonderful experience. I have learnt many interesting things, had a good time getting on well with the other students, improved my skills, had a lot of fun, won everything I could (yes, I love competitions), laughed a lot, discovered how to behave like a good manager, and much more. Moreover, now I am definitely a richer person and a better problem solver.
I would suggest this experience to all those students interested in learning something new about Case Solving Competitions, improving their skills, not worried about hard work, but excited about teamwork, happy to share their ideas with other students, and highly-motivated to do well in competitions and to challenge themselves!
In conclusion, a huge thanks to EUCA, for the unbelievable opportunities that it has offered to us in Cambridge, and to the super Case Solvers Janka and Istvan for the excellent seminar you did for us: you are amazing persons, very clever in your jobs and it was really nice to meet you! I hope to see you again in the future, maybe somewhere around the world during one of your several journeys. You taught us a lot and, personally, I enjoyed a lot the time spent together. Keep up the good work 😉
Riccardo Paccagnella