Tackling question 1

If you go to the P3 section of this site you will see a recent lecture dealing with how to tackle the P3 case study. There are several other, slightly older, lectures alsoon Question 1.

HTH

I suggest the following for the case study:

1 Take around 10 minutes to read and re-read the question, underlining, annotating and highlighting. This amount of study is needed to help you understand the question. It’s not wasted time: your answer will flow better and will contain much better analyses and points.

2 Always use the financial/quantitative data supplied (financial and quantitative data are always supplied). Sometimes the examiner asks you to “Carry out a strategic and financial analysis…”, but even if he just asks you to “Carry out a strategic analysis”, use the quantitative data. How could you carry out a proper strategic analysis if you ignore financial and quantitative data? Come on! You are studying to be accountants and numerical data should interest you. It often contains really important information.

3 Write in paragraphs with a different point being made in each paragraph. Don’t write one/two word bullets so that your answer looks like a shopping list. Have at least two sentences per paragraph to explain properly the point you are making.

4 Work hard to bring in models – but don’t bring in too many! If you bring in 5 – 6 models, each will be used at a superficial level and will not move your answer towards a conclusion of recommendation. You don’t have to laboriously go through an entire model. For example, if using PESTEL, the scenario might say nothing about four of the headings, but you might be able to write “An environmental analysis using PESTEL shows that the political and economic outlook should be favourable to this company”. This shows the examiner you know about PESTEL, and has used that model to move your answer forward in a structured way. Similarly, you can nearly always bring in part of the generic strategies. If the company has been successful it will have been using cost leadership or differentiation (with or without focus); if it has not been successful it might be stuck in the middle. You don’t have explain all the generic strategies. Use the relevant term to show the examiner that you know about the theory, and use the theory to move you on. For example “Historically, the company used a cost leadership strategy, but recently this has been unsuccessful because of cheap imports, which mean that the company is no longer a cost leader”