Finding Case Studies

Business case studies are summaries of real or fictional business situations. Case studies are frequently used to analyze the events that led to a particular company's success or failure and may also be used to illustrate theories studied in business and management classes.

Case studies in journal and magazine articles can be found in UMUC library databases. Print books in catalogUSMAI and online books in NetLibrary may contain case studies as well. There are also some case studies available on the free Web, but most publishers or clearinghouses charge for access to their case studies.

Finding Case Studies in Databases

ABI/Inform Global

You may also want to add a command to ensure that the case studies that your search retrieves are a certain length, so that it'll be more likely that the case studies that you find will be useful for your research. For example, to find case studies of 4,000 or more words, type words(>4000) in a blank search box.

Business Source Complete

 

You may want to use the Number Of Pages option (listed under the Document Type option) to ensure that the case studies that your search retrieves are a certain length (e.g., greater than 4).

Other databases

You may be able to find case studies in other UMUC library databases by conducting a keyword search for your topic, along with a keyword search for "case studies" (e.g., ford AND marketing AND "case studies").

Finding Case Studies in Print Books

You can find case studies in print books in catalogUSMAI by clicking on the advanced search link at the top of the page and then following the directions shown in the screen shot below:

Finding Case Studies in Online Books

You can find case studies in online books in NetLibrary by clicking on the Advanced Search link towards the middle of the page and then following the directions shown in the screen shot below:

Finding Case Studies on the Free Web

As mentioned above, many publishers or clearinghouses of case studies charge a fee for access to their case studies. Although you may search their Web sites for case studies on particular topics, you will generally need to pay a small fee in order to access the entire case study. Some of the best known commercial vendors of business-related case studies include: There are, however, a few noteworthy Web sites that provide free online access to case studies, including: