Beat The Elite
Posted By Stefan Dam Andreasen on Feb 25, 2013
Week 9 is upon us. Once again, top universities around the world have assembled their best teams to compete for the title of CBS Case Competition. The teams compete to give the best solution for a business case, provided by a leading Scandinavian company, which requires skills beyond most students’ abilities; they are the world elite.
But CBS Case Competition is also your time to shine. You can show them how it’s done in the Beat The Elite case competition. You have 24 hours to solve the same case as the international teams and if you succeed, you will defend your solution to the same panel of judges, which counts BCG consultants and the case company CEO. This is an intense challenge that requires hard work, skills, and talent. The case is released on Wednesday, so you have a couple of days left to assemble your team and get ready. For help, we asked last year’s winner, Morten Schroeder, a few questions about his experience from last year:
What motivated you to participate in Beat the Elite?
On the last year of my bachelor degree, I applied to represent CBS in an international case competition. Luckily I was chosen and went through a training programme with around 10 cases and presentations from top tier consulting firms. This really opened my eyes to how much you can learn from these case competitions. Hence, with Beat the Elite taking place at my own university and free for everyone to participate, I thought I would give it a try.
How was your team put together?
This was actually a well thought-out decision. I put the team together with a close friend of mine who I had studied by bachelor degree with. We ended up with a team of only AEF students, which can be a dangerous move. However, it worked well since we had different strengths and knew each other well, and therefore we knew how to work together and what our roles would be. Also, we all had experience from jobs and internships, which meant we were used to making slides and working with Excel, which I believe is one of the most important criteria. If you are not used to working with PowerPoint, it can be difficult to make 10 great and good looking slides in just 24 hours.
How high is the level – is it even possible for first or second year bachelors to win?
Honestly I highly doubt that first or second year bachelors could pull a win. They simply haven’t got enough experience and haven’t been through the right amount of courses to get their hopes up for making a winner case. Perhaps, if they come up with an absolutely brilliant idea they have a chance. However, this should not put anyone off from giving it a try. The learning curve in case competitions is extremely steep and you learn a lot by feeling the frustration on your own body.
What do you think was the key to your victory last year?
I believe a lot of things influenced the result. First of all we had a good idea, which correlated with what Dong Energy was working with in the organization. It was also an idea that Anders Eldrup, former Dong Energy CEO, had strong faith in. More than that, we had a really good deck of slides and finally I think we nailed the presentation and following Q&A. I think especially inexperienced teams forget to practise their presentations, which is more important than they think.
What stands out as the most intense and best moments?
The most intense part of Beat the Elite last year, I would say, was the first 8 hours because you only have 24 hours and the case was very complex. We spent a third of our time just figuring out what we wanted to focus on and only then did we start on our slides. That was a tough process, but it was also very important since we ended up focusing exactly on the right thing. The best moment was our presentation and Q&A session, where the case company CEO was present, which I was really impressed about.
Any good advise for this year’s participants?
Make sure you have a clear direction in your presentation with few, but very clear conclusions and suggestions. Make sure to have a clear story – a red thread – through-out the presentation. A good idea is to draw all your slides on a board to get the big picture.
With these words of advice, we hope you are feeling confident and motivated to take up the challenge to Beat the Elite. You can sign up here to receive the case when it is released on Wednesday, but no matter what, be sure to visit Solbjerg during the week as there are many activities happening. Freebies are everywhere this week and who wouldn’t want that…