Every case — whether in real business or a case interview — is based on frameworks that help structure complex problems logically. "Decision-Making Cases" are especially important: your client has to make a choice, and you provide a well-founded, structured recommendation. Concepts like the 80:20 rule or the Pyramid Principle play a key role here.
While real business decisions may take weeks, in a case interview you only have 15 minutes. A good framework helps you quickly grasp the key aspects, organize your thoughts clearly, and provide a convincing recommendation. In this article, we will show you a simple method to develop your own decision-making framework and master every interview with confidence! 🚀
A yes-or-no decision is one of the most common scenarios in business situations. At first glance, it may seem simple, but behind a clear "yes" or "no" often lie complex questions. Examples of such decisions are:
And so on. The list can go on indefinitely.
The question arises: Why do so many cases fall under a single category? If you look in your case books, you will quickly realize that many of these questions ultimately lead to similar yes-or-no decisions. While there are cases where you need to generate many ideas or analyze reasons for declining profitability, these are not considered decision-making cases.
For many applicants, decision cases are more challenging than other case types because they require more than just analysis. They demand conclusions, inferences, and a logical evaluation of the analysis results. In other cases, like an assessment case, you might be asked to look for reasons for declining profitability —that's it. In a case where idea generation is involved, you need to develop possible ideas. But making a decision based on all the insights gathered is an entirely different challenge.
Let’s take a look at some decision-making frameworks to understand how they work. Once we go through these, we'll address a topic that's even more relevant for case interviews, but let's take it step by step.
The cost-benefit analysis is one of the simplest decision-making models. The decision-making process is as follows:
"Costs" and "benefits" are the overarching categories. How you break these down depends on the specific case. The type of costs and benefits can vary in each case—depending on the industry, company, problem type, and other factors. For example, in an investment case, the benefit might be the "Return on Investment (ROI)." In the implementation of a new initiative, benefits like profit, market share, or customer satisfaction could be considered.
The BCM analysis expands upon the cost-benefit analysis. The decision-making process might go as follows:
The BCM model goes deeper and acknowledges that costs (or whatever the opposite of benefits is) can be reduced through appropriate mitigation measures. For example, when launching a new product, a high initial investment could be mitigated by first running a pilot project on a small scale to test the market's response.
The SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) is another popular model, but it is often applied incorrectly or insufficiently. It must be adapted to each individual business scenario and may not be suitable for every decision-making situation. In a market entry case, the decision-making process in this framework might look like this:
If you can answer all of these questions with a "Yes," the decision is clear: Yes. If two or more answers are "No," in most cases, you should lean toward a "No."
If the answer is somewhere in between, you need to delve deeper into the matter, find a dealbreaker, or involve management in the decision-making process to proceed.
You see, decision-making frameworks aren't always black-and-white. There are gray areas that may depend on a dealbreaker or dealmaker. An example:
Amazon entered the Indian e-commerce market, even though it knew it would be expensive and time-consuming. The decision was based on the belief that the Indian market, with few local providers at the time, was growing rapidly. Early entry was critical for long-term success in the world's second most populous country. The decision was clear, it just required good preparation.
In contrast, Apple waited until 2023 to open its first Apple Store in India. The company realized that its high-priced products didn’t yet have the right market share or target audience in India. It was only in the past 2-3 years that Apple products gained popularity there. Apple's decision was based on the fact that their products only gained consumer acceptance later.
Don’t worry, these are not typos! These terms represent different variants of a model for evaluating opportunities that can help in decision-making. In the next section, we’ll explain what these terms mean (and note that there are different variations).
If I “remove duplicates”, I am left with the following unique parameters:
And I could call it “STEEPLED”!
This type of framework works different from CB, BCM, and SWOT in a number of ways.
First, STEEPLED (or its peers) are more suited to evaluating decisions through their impact on a broader or wider scale as opposed to only for a business. They are a perfect match for policy decisions. But they may not be so for an investment decision as much. It all depends on what are the focus parameters.
Second, one can think of STEEPLED as being transversal compared to CB or BCM. Let us look at this table below to understand what I mean. The STEEPLED framework provides pillars for your benefits and costs and makes your BCM analysis much more structured and comprehensive. We see that this is an example where 2 frameworks collide and work together to give you a holistic way to assess a business decision.
With some practice, you can adapt and apply any of the above-mentioned frameworks to your case interviews. However, in the business world, these models are sometimes too general. They are broad in scope and do not explicitly focus on business aspects. To better address concrete business situations that frequently arise in case studies, let’s examine another decision-making model.
FLOS considers financial, legal, operational, and strategic parameters. In principle, FLOS works similarly to PESTEL or STEEPLED by providing a solid basis for business decision evaluation. The key difference is that the parameters in FLOS are much more tailored to specific business situations. When combined with the cost-benefit or BCM analysis model, it becomes a highly effective framework for comprehensive business decision-making. Here’s what the analysis table would look like:
How the FLOS Model Meets Business Requirements:
To better illustrate the FLOS method, you can use the BCG Final Round Case "Stadium Naming Rights" from the PrepLounge case collection. This case revolves around the decision of whether NeuBank should acquire naming rights for a stadium.
Here are the key aspects of the case:
Question: Should NeuBank acquire the stadium naming rights?
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Agrim is a former Project Leader at BCG Dubai with nine years of consulting experience. Since 2017, he has mentored over 400 students and consultants on topics like case interviews, personal development, and consulting skills. His mentorship goes beyond interview prep, focusing on building lasting skills for career success, inspired by the guidance he once received from his own mentors.
