Waikato University accounting students win Ace the Case competition

Ace the Case: Waikato Accounting students were number one in the KPMG Ace the Case competition contest between Waikato and Auckland universities. From left to right James Chapman, Nick Carter, Rachael Alsemgeest and Rochelle Webb with Ann Tod from KPMG.

A group of Waikato University accounting students with a Massey ring-in won the Waikato-Auckland Ace the Case competition run by KPMG.

The event was one of a series being held around New Zealand by KPMG, designed to increase university commerce and business students’ analytical and presentation skills and give KPMG insight to the talent available for recruitment.

To be part of the case competition, students had to apply, just as they would for a graduate position, and were selected based on their CVs. There were seven Waikato Management School students chosen, and the team of James Chapman, Rochelle Webb and Rachael Alsemgeest were joined by Nick Carter from Massey in Auckland.

The five competing teams had a half day workshop learning analytical and presentation skills; they were then given a real business case which they had three hours to read, analyse and come up with a strategy for growth. They couldn’t work all night, because at the end of three hours all their information was taken away until the following day when they had to present their strategy to a panel of KPMG judges.

“You’d be amazed what those students achieved in three hours,” says Mary-Jane Richards, resourcing manager at KPMG. “And the presentation by the winning team was outstanding. The team structured its case beautifully, presented well and could justify all the decisions they’d made in their strategy. We were impressed.”

James Chapman, in his third year of a Bachelor of Management Studies degree, says the experience was useful. “We have a compulsory case competition for the BMS which we work on for several weeks, but in this competition everything had to be done and up to speed in a short time. I guess it’s a win-win situation. We get to work on our skills and KPMG get an idea of the calibre of students they may want to employ after graduation.”