This document discusses the differences between story and plot in case analysis. It uses E.M. Forster's example of "The King Died, The Queen Died of Grief" to illustrate how introducing causality ("of grief") differentiates a story from a plot. A story is a simple sequence of events while a plot adds causal relationships. Understanding the difference is important for case analysis as it allows analysts to uncover the causal chains and situational elements within a case. The relationship between the raw case material and the structured narrative is analogous to the difference between discourse and narrative.

1. Story and Plot: Or, Causality in Case Analysis
INTRODUCTION
In the course of teaching decision making, the instructor and the case discussants
will have to generate options while discussing a case. Each option, to put it simply,
is a possible decision. The two important questions of relevance in this context
include the following: How much freedom does a decision-maker have in the
listing of options? What is the relationship between the listing of options and the
criteria of evaluation for choosing between options? Case discussants initially
work on the incorrect assumption that the list of options in decision-making is
endless and that they are supposed to draw up a long list. It is only when they
understand the role played by the criteria of evaluation in choosing between
options that they are able to narrow down the options in a case discussion to a
select few. Analogously, when case discussants are asked to state how many
different forms of cases they can think of, they come up with a large number
since they conflate the number of cases that have been written with the number
of generic forms that provide the formal conditions for defining a unit of
business narrative to be a ‘case.’ In other words, it is quite common in
managerial development programs to encounter a situation where the
participants have not been told, or did not bother, to ask their instructors a
simple question: What is a case? This is all the more interesting since the generic
form of a case is assumed to be something that speaks for itself. While some of
the thematic elements in the case do speak for themselves, it is not always the
case that the case will speak for itself. There is a good reason for this. The
relationship between ‘form’ and ‘content’ in any given genre of writing cannot be
taken for granted since a gap can always emerge; this is a common place in
literary criticism since the time of Aristotle. Furthermore, our understanding of
the case material is bound to be affected by the formal structure of a case since
most forms of writing have an in-built plot. It is therefore important in the
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2. context of a case to understand the role that is played by the two co-ordinates,
which can be termed ‘story’ and ‘plot.’ Differentiating between these terms then
will help us to develop a better understanding of the generic structure of not
only a typical Harvard Business School case but also a case discussion that is
generated in response to the case (Former and Ryman, 1999; O’Connor, 1999;
Contrado and Wensley, 2004).
E.M. FORSTER’S EXAMPLE
Here is a simple example of an elementary case narrative, which I have borrowed
from E. M. Forster’s study on the ‘aspects of the novel’:
The King Died.
The Queen Died.
These sentences, according to Forster, constitute a simple narrative that can be
termed a ‘story.’ But it is not clear though whether this story is complete. It is
also not clear what the spatio-temporal co-ordinates of this story are. Suppose,
argued Forster, we consider a simple improvement to the structure of this story,
and re-write it as follows:
The King Died.
The Queen Died of Grief.
Most readers will feel that the causal element introduced by the phrase ‘of grief’
is important here. Otherwise, it is not clear if the King and the Queen belong to
the same land, era, or even the same narrative. Forster used this elementary
narrative to differentiate between the terms ‘story’ and ‘plot’ (Forster, 1927;
Heath, 1996). This essay then will make the simple argument that unless a case
discussant knows at least the difference between a story and a plot, it will not be
possible to understand even the elementary forms of causality built into the case.
The focus however is not on these terms per se, but on the analytic differences
between them. So, for instance, we can re-calibrate the analysis to define a story
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3. as a plot or vice-versa; some theorists, for instance, use the term ‘discourse’ for
story and ‘story’ for plot (Chatman, 1980). What are of consequence then are not
the terms per se but the need to introduce the notion of causality in narrative
structures and delineate the generic parameters of a case. If we are not clear
about the constraints introduced by the notion of ‘genre,’ we will not be able to
differentiate between different types of cases. Forster’s attempt to differentiate
between story and plot made it possible for those working in literary criticism
and literary theory to build upon his work in the attempt to develop a theory of
narrative, which was then deployed in a varied set of contexts in the humanities
and the social sciences (Culler, 2002a; Culler 2002b; Hawkes, 2003; Eagleton,
2008; Culler, 2011).
CASE ANALYSIS
What made all this possible however was the initial differentiation between story
and plot. It is likewise necessary to make these initial differentiations in the
context of case-analysis, case-teaching, and case-writing as well. I am using the
term ‘case-analysis’ in two senses: case-analysis as a ‘process of intellection’ and
case-analysis as a ‘process of discussion,’ and the relationship between a case-
analysis and a case discussion. There is no difference between the two in the
classroom, but I am thinking of the term ‘analysis’ to include the sort of thoughts
that the case-writer will, no doubt, have in his mind when he is thinking about
the case in order to give it some sense of form and structure before having it
formally registered as a case in a business school or having it published in a
journal. A case then is a narrative unit of cognition in the context of documenting
and teaching the modalities of decision-making in firms. When a case is
introduced for analysis and discussion in the classroom, the initial set of
comments attempt to set out the broad parameters of the story, but subsequent
thinking-through attempts to uncover the plot that holds the story together.
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4. What is carved out in the form of a situation analysis is akin to the plot; it is a
strategic sub-set of concerns in the case.
SITUATION ANALYSIS
In other words, a great deal of so-called case-analysis is nothing more than a
situation analysis. The case is often not discussed in its entirety. Case writers
often pack-in or leave-out data in order to give the case discussants a chance to
make decisions on data-sufficiency and data insufficiency when they write a
decision essay. What is usually discussed at length is actually the causal-chain
that is uncovered in the situation analysis. This causal-chain then sets the stage
for a linearization of the case narrative. The basic challenge in responding to a
cold-call in the classroom is to find a way of demarcating a segment from the
circular structure of a case, flatten it into a line, and find a locus from within that
line from which the decision-maker can set out the task at hand. In order to do
this, the analyst must differentiate between the case per se and the situation in
the case that is deemed worthy of analysis. The closest analogue for this in the
context of narrative theory is the analytic difference between story and plot. This
elementary differentiation, if thought through systematically, will make it
possible to analyze cases with a better understanding of what is at stake in both
writing-up and analyzing cases. In the case of the former, the case-writer is
always asking whether the case is complete and well-structured. A generic
requirement for a well-structured case is that it should be possible for a case
analyst or a group of case discussants to work out the cause-effect relationships
that have to be identified in the situation analysis. It is only when the causal
chains have been worked out that it is possible to list options and then evaluate
the listed options with analytic rigor. This is done by invoking the criteria of
evaluation that follow the listing of options in the decision essay.
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5. THE EMPIRICAL & THE TEXTUAL
Theorists working on narrative structures and psychoanalysis, for instance, have
formalized the textual phenomena that are of interest in case-analysis as well.
The purpose of this essay then is to also ask how a psychoanalytically-informed
notion of narrativity can help us to analyze cases better in business schools. In
order to do so, we have to ask how a case is interpreted in psychoanalysis. I am
thinking here of cases as they emerge from the couch in the analytic situation
rather than a fully-developed case that is available in a written form. The case as
such does not exist in the analytic situation when the treatment begins. The case
is only written up after the treatment is over and is based on the notes taken by
the analyst. So unlike a business school case which is available in its entirety for
analysis, a case in psychoanalysis has to be written-up later (Freud, 1990; Freud,
1991; Greenwald, 1959). So the analyst is in the locus of the case-writer who is
doing field-work in a particular firm or in a group of companies (Katz, 2013).
Neither will know for sure whether the case will shape up; and, if so, in what
form. What they are dealing with is ‘emerging’ data rather than ‘emerged’ data.
The initial demand on their minds is to find a way of structuring this data into
causal sequences that can then be ‘emplotted’ into a narrative. The analyst and
the case writer then are both pre-occupied with two levels of consciousness: the
empirical and the textual. If they have already written cases before they will find it
easier to sort the data into the generic forms that they carry as cognitive
templates though, admittedly, they will not be able to anticipate the structure of
the case in its entirety until the analysis and the field-work are done with and
they have come to some conclusions, if only tentative, on how successful the
effort has been before publishing the results. The results however are not
findings that can be abstracted from the case narrative unlike conventional
empirical studies, but more in the form of a professional short-story. In some
unusual cases, the length might be closer to a novel than a short-story, but in
either case, the analytic difference between the terms ‘story’ and ‘plot’ remains
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6. relevant since Forster invoked these terms in the context of his studies on the
novel.
RETROACTIVE CAUSALITY
What is the difference then between story and plot in the context of the analytic
situation which must work with emerging data rather than with emerged data?
While it is easy to differentiate between story and plot in a written case, it is not
easy to do so with emerging data since the causal sequences are yet to be
determined. Furthermore, the retroactive notion of causality in psychoanalysis
makes it impossible to work out causal sequences in their entirety until the
analysis is over. It is only in hindsight that the patient understands the
significance of an earlier trauma; another term that is used to make sense of such
causal phenomena that are triggered off by later events in the life of the patient is
‘deferred action’ (Laplanche and Pontalis, 1973). This incidentally is what
happens in the fieldwork situation as well. The case writer is often haunted by
the idea that he has worked out the necessary causal chains, but finds it difficult
to ‘emplot’ the causal elements into a narrative. This is not because the analyst
and the field-worker have not thought through the data but because the structure
of causality will also be affected by the sequence in which the data is structured
and reported. This brings us to the second major distinction from narrative
theory: ‘discourse and narrative’ which is analogous to ‘story and plot.’ The
difference between these two terminologies pertains to the fact that the terms
‘discourse and narrative’ can be used outside the analysis of literature in the
forms of case writing that constitute professional writing in management and the
social sciences. Here is a simple differentiation between the two: If a case is
composed of hundreds of sentences each of which is complete from a
grammatical point of view but none of which is reducible to the case as such, in
what sequence must these sentences be arranged for it to become a case? Given a
hypothetical sequence in which these sentences are arranged and reported as a
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7. case, is it possible to re-arrange the sequence of these sentences? If yes, does it
change the case? Do we have a new case here? Or, is it just the same-old case in a
new form?
SPATIAL & TEMPORAL SEQUENCES
There is a difference then between the complete list of sentences that constitute a
case and the temporal sequence in which the sentences are arranged. This is
basically the difference between the discourse and the narrative. The difference
between the two sequences will decide how the case is analyzed and discussed.
The discourse comprises in its entirety the beginning, the middle, and the end.
But the case narrative, like a case analysis, can begin with the beginning, the
middle, or the end. The case writer then has the freedom to re-arrange the
discourse in the case matter to create different types of assignments. So, for
instance, in the specific context of decision making, the assignment can be
structured in any of these loci depending on whether the assignment is looking
forwards or backwards in time. The questions then will vary between the
following forms of decision-making:
What should so-and-so do?
What should so-and-so have done?
Why did so-and so-do-what-so-and-so did?
What should so-and-so do about any of the options given above?
The structural gap between the discourse and the narrative then is an
opportunity to generate new loci for case-analysis, case assignments, case
discussions, and case writing. Decision essays then do not always have to take
the form of ‘What should the decision-maker do?’ The assumption that this is the
only question that can be asked in an assignment stems from not differentiating
between the different levels of case reporting. Instead, in addition to this
question, case discussants can also be asked to analyze the case from different
loci that are temporally distinct to bring out the fact that causality is over-
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8. determined (i.e. it has more than one factor) and has a retroactive structure (i.e. it
is understood in hindsight).
CONCLUSION
A case analysis must therefore be able to differentiate between forms of causality
based on the locus that is at stake in a particular case assignment. The definition
then of a case is both generic and pragmatic. A case, for instance, can be defined
as a managerial or organizational narrative that is used to teach decision making,
but varies in its effectiveness depending on the loci that are invoked in a case
analysis, case discussion, or a written case-based assignment. A case analysis
often begins with a discussant wondering what he must do (i.e., decide). It often
ends with the discussant deciding from where he will decide. If the discussants
understand the structural inter-dependence between the ‘what’ and the ‘where’
in the context of the case analysis, they have internalized the rudiments of the
method; if not, they have at least thought-through a particular situation. The
success and the sustainability of the case method however depend on the ability
of the case discussants to both think-through and work-through the situation
that is carved out of the case (Rycroft, 1995). Generating insights in a case
analysis however is not a protection against the temptations of acting out
repressed conflicts in the decision maker’s psyche while making a decision
(Arnaud, 2002); that is why the decision maker must know where he is; only then
will he know whose desire is pushing him to the edge of his own consciousness
and understanding as a decision-maker; he will then be able to act decisively
without acting out. That then is not only the goal of teaching decision making,
but a reminder of the fact that by giving a decision maker a chance to work-
through his affects he is much more likely to make a sound decision that he will
not regret in hindsight (Laplanche and Pontalis, 1973b).
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9. REFERENCES
Arnaud, Gilles (2002). ‘The Organization and the Symbolic: Organizational
Dynamics Viewed from a Lacanian Perspective,’ translated by Louise Burchill,
Human Relations, June, 55:6, pp. 691-716.
Chatman, Seymour (1980). Story and Discourse: Narrative Studies in Fiction and
Film (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2011).
Contrado, Ianna and Wensley, Robin (2004). ‘The Harvard Business School Story:
Avoiding Knowledge by Being Relevant,’ Organization, March, 11:2, pp. 211-231.
Culler, Jonathan (1980). ‘Narrative,’ Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction
(Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 83-94.
Culler, Jonathan (2002a). ‘Poetics of the Novel,’ Structuralist Poetics: Structuralism,
Linguistics, and the Study of Literature (London and New York: Routledge), pp.
221-280.
Culler, Jonathan (2002b). ‘Story and Discourse in the Analysis of Narrative,’ The
Pursuit of Signs: Semiotics, Literature, Deconstruction (Ithaca: Cornell University
Press), pp. 169-187.
Eagleton, Terry (2008). ‘Structuralism and Semiotics,’ Literary Theory: An
Introduction (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press), pp. 79-109.
Forman, Janis, and Rymer, Jone (1999). ‘The Genre System of the Harvard Case
Method,’ Journal of Business and Technical Communication 13:4, pp. 373-400.
Forster, E. M. (1927). Aspects of the Novel (New York: Mariner Books, 1956),
passim.
Freud, Sigmund (1990). Case Histories I, translated by Alix Strachey and James
Strachey, edited by Angela Richards (London: Penguin Books).
Freud, Sigmund (1991). Case Histories II, translated by James Strachey, edited by
Angela Richards (London: Penguin Books).
Greenwald, Harold (1959). Great Cases in Psychoanalysis (New York: Ballantine
Books).
Hawkes, Terence (2003). ‘The Structures of Literature,’ Structuralism and Semiotics
(London and New York: Routledge), New Accents Series, pp. 44-99.
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10. Heath, Malcolm (1996). ‘Plot: the Basics,’ in Aristotle’s Poetics (London: Penguin
Books), pp. xxii-xxviii. Heath’s point is quite similar to that of E. M. Forster; he
too is preoccupied with what connects events in terms of causality. This has been
a preoccupation in literary theory since the time of Aristotle.
Katz, Montana (2013). Metaphor and Fields: Common Ground, Common Language,
and the Future of Psychoanalysis (New York and London: Routledge), passim.
Laplanche, Jean and Pontalis, Jean-Bertrand (1973a). ‘Deferred Action,’ The
Language of Psychoanalysis, translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith with an
introduction by Daniel Lagache (London: Karnac Books, 1988a), pp. 111-114.
Laplanche, Jean and Pontalis, Jean-Bertrand (1973b). ‘Working Through,’ The
Language of Psychoanalysis, translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith with an
introduction by Daniel Lagache (London: Karnac Books, 1988b), pp.488-489.
O’Connor, Ellen S. (1999). ‘The Politics of Management Thought: A Case Study of
the Harvard Business School and the Human Relations School,’ The Academy of
Management Review, 24:1, pp. 117-131.
Rycroft, Charles (1995). ‘Working Through,’ A Critical Dictionary of Psychoanalysis
(London: Penguin Books), pp. 199-200.
SHIVA KUMAR SRINIVASAN
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