Keeping it Real: Why Case Research Writing Conventions Need to Loosen Up

The case method remains the signature pedagogy in management education. Teaching case research is a form of qualitative research which has recently gained enhanced recognition by accreditation bodies as scholarly or intellectual contributions. As proponents of the case method, however, we are concerned that in the peer-review process case researchers struggle to publish cases that honor the desired learning outcomes and fully adhere to the standards of research trustworthiness. We believe this happens because several common case writing conventions of mainstream case publishing are impeding the publication of pedagogically valuable cases. The purpose of this essay is to describe and raise awareness about the conflict between accurately representing case data and these established conventions. Accordingly, we describe how the mainstream case publishing process works, including the case conventions researchers must follow, and explain how the strict adherence to these conventions can conflict with the trustworthiness of case data, as well as with pedagogical objectives. We conclude by suggesting that the case publishing community should allow more flexibility in how cases are written in recognition of their scholarly purpose, and we provide concrete suggestions for how to accomplish this cultural shift. Our aim is to keep case research real.