Cancer Care Ontario, the organization that oversees cancer treatment in Ontario, is challenged with establishing an innovative approach to reducing wait times for breast cancer and prostate cancer therapy across Ontario after wait times increased to more than two months. The special advisor on cancer issues to the Ontario Minister of Health and Long-Term Care needs to report his recommendation to Cancer Care Ontario's board of directors, who manage all regional cancer centres in the province. The major challenge is to balance the needs and values of all the various stakeholders, while developing short-, medium- and long-term solutions to the wait list dilemma.
Thompson Asset Management (TAM) is a small investment advisory and asset management firm in Jacksonville, Florida, with about $100 million in assets under management in two different funds. Since starting the firm in 2009, the CEO and founder Allison Thompson has had a proven track record of beating benchmarks and managing the portfolio's downside risk. The firm's typical clients were high-net-worth individuals, and in 2014, Thompson is looking to expand her business by taking on institutional clients as well. She recently met with the investment officer of her alma mater and is considering taking on the university's endowment fund as a client. For her bid to manage the entire endowment of $20 million, Thompson must create a presentation that outlines her investment strategy. The case is ideal for an MBA-level or undergraduate finance course that covers asset management and/or portfolio theory.
OOCL is one of the world's largest integrated international container transportation, logistics and terminal companies, with a network covering Asia, Europe, North America and Australasia. The company is well respected in the industry with a reputation for providing customer-focused solutions, a quality-through-excellence approach and continual innovation. It has been listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange since 1973. In a volatile industry, it has to compete and form alliances. It has a history of investing widely with variable results.
Tata Cummins Limited (TCL), a leading manufacturer of diesel engines in India, faced a variety of challenges in meeting the October 2010 deadline for new automobile emissions standards. These standards are identified as Bharat Stage (BS) standards ranging from BS I to BS V. The subject of this case - the BS III standard - was introduced in 2005 for just 11 cities across India and then made mandatory for the entire country by October of 2010. At that time, the BS IV standard had already been implemented in a few large cities and it was this standard that was expected to exist nationwide by 2017. Reflecting on their successful experience with the transition to the 2010 automobile emissions standards, the vice-president of TCL hoped to make this next transition a smooth one by identifying the issues that the company would face in the near future.
More than a decade after the high-profile failures of several early online grocers, grocery remains the largest single U.S. retail category and one of the few that has not yet migrated online. Amazon began testing its grocery-delivery service, AmazonFresh, in Seattle, in 2007; five years later, the company has made significant progress. The case traces the evolution of AmazonFresh's business model and describes the operating capabilities necessary to compete with brick-and-mortar supermarkets like Wal-Mart and Safeway and with new digital grocery startups. Now Amazon needs to decide on AmazonFresh's next step. Should the company continue refining its business model in Seattle or expand to another city? What factors should it take into account when planning its next move?
Firms in Korea's securities and brokerage industries have experienced fierce competition in the domestic market, which has led to international expansion being considered a popular strategic alternative. The chief executive officer of Hyundai Securities Co., Ltd., a Korean securities firm, envisions his company becoming the "pan-Asian market leader." As a result, he is pursuing an international expansion strategy in Hong Kong and Singapore. However, given the popularity of international expansion in these areas, the markets are highly competitive. Has the CEO made an appropriate strategic decision?
A job candidate at Visa Inc., the technology payments company, prepares herself for her interview by considering what she can uncover about the company's marketing from the published accounts. She analyzes what the company spends money on and how revenue is generated. She considers how marketing is accounted for - specifically, how marketing assets, such as brands, are dealt with on the balance sheet. She considers the relationship between values in the accounts and the market value of the firm, and the problem of brand valuation is discussed. Finally, she tries to understand the impact of accounting treatment on common financial ratios.
In December 2011, the co-founder of Unbounce, a Vancouver-based software services start-up, is considering expanding into the enterprise user space. Unbounce got its start providing turnkey landing pages - web pages specific to current advertising campaigns - to the small and medium-sized enterprise market. Within 18 months, the company has achieved thought leadership in this space, has a list of paying customers and has built its support team from six to 25 people. The challenge is that since the entire company is focused on its core market segment, entering the enterprise user space means that different capabilities will have to be developed. Will developing the enterprise user market prevent the competition from invading this space or will it mean alienating and perhaps losing its current customers? What is the best plan for going forward?
Paramount Equipment, Inc., based in Fort Wayne, Indiana, is a large manufacturer of cranes and compact construction equipment, aerial work platforms, and food service equipment. Founded in 1987, Paramount now had manufacturing operations in 24 countries. However, it lost its competitive position because it took on too much debt in the form of bank borrowings relative to the risk level of its business. Now the company must seek funding and guarantees in order to restructure its debt. Paramount's future depends on whether existing lenders, management, and the government of Ontario-where the company employs more than 7,000-can reach a feasible restructuring and refinancing plan fast and whether Paramount was able to secure a capital injection from new investors. Students must determine the optimal capital structure policy consistent with competitive risks and assess available tools for financing a company in financial distress. The case requires students to perform only limited quantitative analysis and is ideal for use in first-year MBA courses in financial strategy or corporate finance. It would also work well in advanced undergraduate finance courses that cover capital structure and financial distress.
Visual merchandising (VM) plays an important role in hypercompetitive product categories. Though shoppers may be exposed to advertisements extolling the virtues of brands, they tend to get swayed at the point of purchase due to an attractive display or simply because of the prominence of a brand at the retail location. As such, companies must invest in processes and infrastructure to make effective VM possible.<br><br><br><br>Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting is among the largest fast-moving consumer goods companies in India and has a wide range of products across different categories. One of its sales development managers must choose between several options for making certain that the company’s strategic objectives are met through VM. There are four options, including two models where either the company or its channel partners manage the elements of VM, and two models where VM is outsourced to specialized agencies. All models have their pros and cons and the manager must use the available qualitative and quantitative information to compare the models across different parameters and make a choice.
In a quest to organize the unorganized secondary market for used computers, a team of three entrepreneurs attempted to develop a viable plan in a typical emerging market context. Identifying e-waste management problems and the digital divide as overarching social issues, they identified a potential market for empowering consumers through affordable access to information technology (IT) by re-harnessing the potential of used computers. In doing so, they identified emerging market characteristics through micro and macro analyses of the environment and the IT industry.
This article discusses the manner in which analytics-savvy companies achieve competitive advantage using Big Data. The LEAP study surveyed 430 companies around the world from a wide range of industries. Respondents were clustered into leaders (10 per cent), explorers (32 per cent), followers (38 per cent) and laggards (20 per cent). To date, only leaders have attained the analytic competency needed to significantly impact business results. Leaders deploy executive-level “champion practitioners” to carve out analytics mindshare throughout their organization. They also use predictive analytics to fuel innovation and growth, and often utilize pilots and rapid proof-of-concept deployment. While laggards remain focused on applying data for reporting, leaders use analytics to evaluate risks and tradeoffs, understand cost and revenue drivers, and predict trends. Leaders find champions at the very top of the organization, such as the chief operating officer or chief financial officer. Efforts at laggard companies are more typically headed by IT chiefs or business lines. But data and decision making can no longer reside in their own silos. Executives accustomed to “going with their gut” are likely to resist the change brought on by analytics, but this change is inevitable.
Many articles have been written about the comparisons between the workings of golf and the workings of business. Yet these generally make no attempt to correlate their conclusions with existing business research literature. This article provides four of the most common observations about what it takes to excel at golf as voiced by several of its finest players. It then relates these observations to the business world. 1. Use the proper equipment: Competence alone will not be converted into organizational performance. 2. Know thyself: Every golfer scores better when aware of his or her capabilities. 3. Point of contact: The most common and perhaps most serious mistake among amateur golfers is their tendency to take their eyes off the ball during their swing. During any implementation, one must focus attention and efforts on quality execution. Mergers are most likely to fail during the integration phase of execution. 4. Leave arrogance at home: Executives can improve their business game by recognizing the importance of remaining open to learning from others on and off the golf course.
In May 2012, Sanofi Canada was preparing to move hundreds of employees to a new corporate headquarters with an open-plan workspace. It initiated a 12-month change management campaign and ultimately met its three objectives of ensuring a smooth transition; transforming its corporate culture into one of greater collaboration, transparency and innovation; and minimizing turnover. In this article, the CEO offers four lessons for anyone hoping to replicate the firm’s success. 1. Communication is crucial: It is important to welcome ideas from all organizational levels. 2. Convert employees into change agents: Leaders cannot simply tell employees about change and expect them to get on with it. Sanofi Canada selected groups of employees to form sub-groups of Change Ambassadors. 3. Deploy cultural and behavioural training: Employees will not modify behaviours or learn new skills overnight. Sanofi Canada initiated an “Open Door” challenge and “Getting to Know You” sessions. 4. Surround yourself with the right people: A leader cannot do everything, and external expertise must be leveraged.
The increasing reliance on data-based knowledge is rapidly changing how business is done. But the current discussion tends to neglect the often poor quality of insights won through the use of data warehouses by firms that have often not adequately maintained their data storage solutions. This article focuses on the problems generated by proliferated data systems and their impact on decision making in large, complex financial services institutions. Factors that lead to the emergence of systems disparity include: 1. Product and Service Diversity: Any large organization is in fact an umbrella covering many internal businesses that have been aligned to specific markets. 2. Back Office/Front Office Division. 3. Technology Advance: New systems are rarely built on the same platform as previous systems. 4. Natural Development. 5. Geography. 6. Expediency: The most expedient system solution is often implemented instead of the optimum architectural solution, which may take longer and represent opportunity risk. 7. Budgeting and Downsizing. Ultimately, failure at any point adversely affects the chain of events at all stages beyond the point of failure. In a disparate environment, the number of dependencies is greater than the number of disparate systems; and the greater the degree of divergence, the greater the operational risk to the enterprise.
Examining texts by William Lewis Safire and Garth Stein, this article puts forward the value of persuasion and rhetoric for executives. A significant task of executives is persuading people to commit to a corporate plan. Shareholders must be convinced to buy stock. Lenders must commit to loans and debt. Customers need to commit to products. Employees and suppliers must give their best efforts. To get commitments from stakeholders, executives can use the power of their position, logic, charisma and incentives, not to mention fear and threats. But ultimately, when the goal is to persuade people, whatever an executive wants must be communicated. As this article shows, language and its delivery is at the core of persuasion and executives can leverage rhetoric to great advantage.
There is a growing cottage industry of superficial thought about corporate governance, and bad science has overwhelmed the process of clarifying the role and processes of a successful board. As this article states, there are features of governance and functions of governance. Regulators have forced boards into a compliance mode that places high value on features of governance as opposed to functions of governance, with grave penalties for non-compliance. The focus on features has led to a faulty evaluation metric for corporate governance. Indeed, counting features — such as separation of the chairperson and CEO, majority voting, and elimination of staggered boards — is the most common scale used when comparing boards. However, the verification of a board’s features does little for understanding and evaluating actual board behaviour. Understanding a board’s success or failure should be based on organizational theory, such as organizational design, culture, the personality and leadership of the CEO, and the quality of the board. How the functional relationships between the board and management work is likely far more important than board features to the growth, and sometimes survival, of an organization.
This case describes the second home market strategy of Tata Communications Limited (TCL) and its evaluation of Russia as a new market opportunity. Ahead of a July 2012 board meeting, TCL's Chief Strategy Officer had to decide whether to pursue an acquisition opportunity in Russia. The case traces TCL's transformation from an Indian public sector monopoly to a global challenger in the telecommunications market, its previous acquisition history and its foray into South Africa as a second home market. The latest opportunity - to create a third home market in Russia - was the possible acquisition of a Russian Internet Service Provider (ISP) which had a business-to-business (B2B) focus and product mix similar to TCL.