As part of the final week of orientation for full-time MBAs, members of the Robert H. School of Business Class of 2017 took part in the Northrop Grumman case competition. According to a press release on the school website, many first-year MBA students called the activity “a great way to prepare for the rigors of a full-time program and job search.”
The case competition was new to this year’s orientation and challenged teams of four incoming MBA students to propose new, forward-looking ideas that would help Northrop Grumman, a global security company, create future value in an increasingly competitive market.
The case competition took place over two days, through which 15 different NGC managers came to campus to present the case, support the student teams, conduct a Q&A session and judge the presentations. Students seemed to appreciate how hands on the Northrop Grumman managers throughout the competition.
“We all really appreciated Northrop Grumman’s participation,” said Jared Spier, MBA ’17, a student on one of the finalist teams. “We learned a lot about their business as a whole by analyzing their annual report and listening to their presentation. Being exposed to the language of business and the problems that they are facing gave us something to think about before we started classes. We’ve since covered topics in class that I can apply back to what I learned in the case competition.”