Developing a Business Case

Mentor’s Message: The Advantages of a Solid Business Case

As a manager, you may often spot opportunities to help your team, department, and even your entire organization meet important business goals. When you identify such an opportunity, you may quickly think of a course of action that you believe would enable you to seize the opportunity. And you may feel compelled to implement that course of action.

That’s understandable—but it’s also dangerous. It means you haven’t considered a wide enough range of alternatives for capturing the opportunity you’ve identified. This is where developing a business case comes in. A business case is a tool for identifying and comparing multiple alternatives for pursuing an opportunity and then proposing the one ...