MK 201: From Research to Recommendation

1. Lesson Purpose

This 3-hour in-class lesson is designed to equip Gen Z freshmen and sophomores with the core consulting skill of transforming raw research into paid-consultant-quality strategic recommendations. Students often excel at gathering facts but struggle to connect them to meaningful business implications. This session bridges that critical gap by installing a repeatable, structured framework: Fact → Meaning → Decision. By the end of this fast-paced, workshop-driven class, students will have produced tangible, graded artifacts for their Submission 1 Situational Analysis, moving beyond simply listing data to generating evidence-based strategic insights. The lesson will demystify the process of strategic thinking, using relatable Gen Z metaphors and enforcing the discipline of evidence, ultimately preparing them for all subsequent submissions in the semester-long project.

2. Minute-by-Minute Agenda (180 Minutes Total)

Time (Mins)	Duration	Section	Activity	Professor Focus
0-5	5 min	Introduction	Opening: “The Most Important Skill of the Semester”	Set the stakes, connect today to grades and future submissions.
5-15	10 min	Core Concept	Lecturette: “Fact vs. Meaning vs. Decision”	Introduce the core framework with simple, relatable metaphors.
15-20	5 min	Live Demo	Professor Live Demo: From Fact to Decision	Model the thinking process with one strong and one “useless” fact.
20-40	20 min	Workshop 1	Workshop: “Evidence or Assumption?”	Teams sort statements, learn citation discipline. Competitive element.
40-45	5 min	Debrief 1	Workshop 1 Debrief & Review	Review common mistakes, reinforce “if it’s not cited, it’s an assumption.”
45-55	10 min	Core Concept	Lecturette: The Decision Checklist	Introduce the mandatory checklist (Change, True, Recommendation).
55-75	20 min	Workshop 2	Workshop: “One Fact → Two Decisions”	Teams take their own research and force two different decisions.
75-85	10 min	Gallery Walk	Peer Review: Decision Gallery Walk	Teams review and vote on the strongest decisions from other groups.
85-90	5 min	Debrief 2	Workshop 2 Debrief & Review	Announce winners, highlight what makes a decision strong vs. weak.
90-95	5 min	BREAK	Scheduled 5-Minute Break	Energy reset.
95-105	10 min	Core Concept	Lecturette: “Writing Like a Consultant”	Teach the one-sentence recommendation formula and professional tone.
105-125	20 min	Workshop 3	Workshop: “Writing Sprint”	Teams write a polished paragraph for Submission 1 using their insights.
125-135	10 min	Peer Review	Peer Review Scoring Protocol	Teams use the provided rubric to score another team’s paragraph.
135-140	5 min	Debrief 3	Workshop 3 Debrief & Review	Share high-scoring examples, correct common writing mistakes.
140-155	15 min	Core Concept	Lecturette: “Bridging to SWOT, PESTEL & STP”	Explain how today’s decisions become the foundation for future submissions.
155-170	15 min	Workshop 4	Workshop: “From Decisions to SWOT & STP Seed”	Teams map their decisions to SWOT/PESTEL and create a target hypothesis.
170-175	5 min	Debrief 4	Final Artifacts & Submission 1 Checklist	Review all artifacts produced, walk through the “Next Actions” checklist.
175-180	5 min	Conclusion	Closing Speech: “You’re the Consultants Now”	Reinforce the semester scaffold and the power of evidence-based strategy.

Part 1: The Core Framework

The skill of turning research into recommendations is what separates students who get B’s from students who get A’s. More importantly, it’s the skill that separates unpaid interns from paid consultants.

Think of it this way. Right now, your research folder is like your iPhone camera roll after a vacation—you have 1,000 photos, but you’re only going to post the 5 best ones. The rest are just noise.
Today, we learn how to find the 5 best photos. We’re going to learn how to go through those thousands of facts, delete the ones that don’t matter, and turn the ones that do into something you’d actually post—something that gets a reaction.

Right now, you are all working on Submission 1, your Situational Analysis. You’re digging through library databases, you’re looking at competitor websites, you’re finding facts.

As I'm sure you probably guessed, a list of facts isn’t a strategy. It’s a distraction. It’s just noise If you don’t know what they mean,
Clients do not paying you for a list of facts they can Google themselves. They are paying you for judgment. They are paying you for decisions.

This is what most first-year agency associates learn, its a system for making decisions. A simple, repeatable framework we used to call So/Show/Do but really all that means is Fact → Meaning → Decision.

This is also the foundation for the entire semester.

The decisions you learn to make today will become your SWOT analysis in Submission 2,
they will define your target customer in Submission 3,
and they will justify your entire marketing plan in Submission 6.

Get this right, and the rest of the semester gets easier. Ignore it, and you will struggle at every single stage.