In 2011, The Walt Disney Company and other content owners aggressively lobbied Congress to pass the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). The intent was to prevent unauthorized copying and transmission of copyrighted materials. This had been largely eliminated on U.S.-based websites, but some copyright owners claimed it was prevalent overseas. SOPA (and its companion legislation "Protect IP Act," or PIPA), would allow the government or private companies to request court orders to bar any U.S. company from "enabling" alleged infringing sites. SOPA initially had bipartisan support, and previous efforts to strengthen copyright protection had faced little opposition. The bill supported the commercial interests of Disney and other content owners. However, many of the specifics of SOPA and PIPA had the potential to stir powerful opposition from a wide variety of sources. The case discusses copyright law and the impact of technology advances on protection of copyrighted materials. It also describes SOPA and aspects of the proposed law that might attract opposition. The case concludes by asking students to consider SOPA from the perspective of both Disney and potential opponents.
After a massive storm hit the northern Illinois service area of electric utility Commonwealth Edison on July 11, 2011, more than 900,000 customers were left without power during a hot, humid summer. ComEd crews and reinforcements from more than a dozen other states worked for days afterward to restore service. Meanwhile, the company's months-old social media strategy faced its first major test. The eChannels social media team, part of ComEd's customer operations division, worked around the clock to respond to posts from customers on social networking sites Facebook and Twitter. At a time when the company faced public debate and criticism over its plan to raise electricity rates, in part to invest in smart-grid upgrades, engaging directly through social media was a way to strengthen relationships with customers and the general public, consistent with an important corporate goal: "Keep the lights on and information flowing."
iLinko is a small-to-medium enterprise (SME) based in Hong Kong. It has two major lines of business: providing business-to-business sourcing and procurement services for its customers (mainly medium-size companies located in the United States and Europe), and distributing babies and children products under the brand name Bloom. Simon May, the protagonist of the case, is the founder and CEO of iLinko. Given the rapid growth of the company, the existing ERP system can no longer satisfy the operational needs and requirements at iLinko. Simon has to choose whether to upgrade the existing ERP system or replace it with a brand-new system altogether.
This case is set in April 2013, and discusses the key elements that have contributed to the success of Infosys Ltd's Campus Connect Programme (CC) in developing India's Information Technology talent over the past eight years. The CC programme is an industry-academia initiative that re-constructs the education experience of engineering students. The programme was launched in May 2004 with 70 colleges. By December 2012, the model had been successfully scaled up to cover 400 colleges, and more than 180,000 readers and 8,300 faculty members across India had benefited from the programme's technical and soft skills training, and exposure to industry practices. Since CC's launch, Infosys has experienced a measurable improvement in the quantity and quality of their new recruits. Infosys understands the value of creating a talent ecosystem, and this case explains just how, and why, Campus Connect has worked as a successful example of industry-academia partnership in the talent management space.
In mid-March 2011, the vice-chairman of National Bank Financial had to decide what price to recommend to his Maple consortium partners for the TMX Group Inc. (TMX). The TMX was the owner and operator of Canada’s leading cash and derivatives exchanges. The vice-chairman was leading a consortium of Canadian banks that was planning an unsolicited bid in response to merger talks between the TMX and the London Stock Exchange Group. The case allows for a discussion of mergers and acquisitions and the factors behind merger waves, the mechanics of a hostile bid for a publicly listed company, the changing landscape for stock and derivative exchanges, the valuation of a target company, and the distinction between strategic and financial buyers. An Excel spreadsheet for students is available.
Lack of candour stems from avoidance of difficult or uncomfortable situations. However, what begins as an attempt to avoid difficulty often turns into a series of bad decisions and bad consequences. Candour allows organizations to have better idea generation, faster problem solving through avoiding “beating around the bush,” and more efficient processes. The authors argue that candour requires character and that with character comes the judgment that ensures the appropriate expression of candour. Their research has shown that candour requires depth of character across eleven dimensions. <br><br>To understand candour in practice, the authors have interviewed General Rick Hillier, former Chief of the Defence Staff of the Canadian Forces. Hillier defines positive candour as that which focuses on a leader’s charges. He refers to leaders making comments for personal gain — such as in the case of certain whistleblowers — as an example of negative candour. He explains that if a leader acts candidly, then they must expect their subordinates to be equally candid and must not punish them for doing so. Arguably, being candid is the best way to treat people fairly. However, Hillier clarifies that candour is culturally bound and that leaders must be patient and polite in their interactions with foreigners in order to ensure effective communication.
In most free-market economies, restrictions exist to curb the activity of cartels — groups of otherwise independent businesses that collaborate to lessen or prevent competition. Between 1990 and 2008, the total known affected sales of cartel activity topped US$16 trillion. Although government bodies have committed substantial resources to battling illegal corporate activity, it still happens and many corporations reoffend after being sanctioned for crimes. The authors have conducted research using a database of all known international cartels between 1970 and 2008. They suggest four courses of action to curb cartel activity: 1) Remunerative practices should be designed with a better understanding of the environmental drivers of illegal activity. Compensation should focus on solid strategic behaviours rather than rewarding short-term performance. 2) More independent boards are associated, somewhat counter-intuitively, with more illegal activity. Thus, the call for more independent boards needs to take into account the tendency of independent boards to structure CEO compensation to be more output-based, which often leads CEOs to focus only on short-term financial metrics. 3) Regulators should introduce harsher financial penalties in order to incent “means-based” organizational behaviour and punish “ends-based” activity. 4) Organizations should be made to have a legal requirement to protect society.
Autonomous teams — work groups granted the organizational latitude to establish their own internal goals and work practices — have surged in popularity. This article discusses findings from a recent study that revealed a unique set of organizational dynamics that can be nurtured to fuel powerful autonomous teams. Three distinct dynamics were found to prevail in organizations with strong autonomous teams. 1. Firstly, an organization must be committed to using autonomous teams. Weak support from management can precipitate failure. Members of autonomous teams desire the ability to make decisions without significant managerial interference. However, too much autonomy can negatively influence team outcomes and result in increased stress levels in team members. 2. Secondly, strong teams require steady, upfront commitments to allocating resources for team use. Stating an upfront commitment to providing resources can be more significant in motivating team members than actual resource availability. 3. Finally, autonomous teams benefit from frequent face-to-face feedback from organizational leaders. While a plethora of team dynamics, ranging from internal conflict levels to demographic composition, influence the effectiveness of autonomous teams, the power of organizational dynamics to shape the implementation of these teams must not be underestimated.
The U.S. federal government has attracted increased criticism due to the government shutdown in 2013. This author, a former director of financial and enterprise affairs at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), recommends a reform of laws regarding political contributions and the way legislative districts are determined. Nonetheless, he argues that from a broad governance perspective, the United States still looks relatively attractive as a market in which to invest. He supports this view through a global-governance ranking he has developed of 44 countries as investment destinations, based on major comparative studies. These include the annual “Doing Business” ranking by the World Bank and IFC, where the United States ranked fourth and Canada ranked 19th out of 189 countries; the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Index, in which the United States ranked seventh and Canada ranked 14th; and the Corruption Perceptions Index by Transparency International, where the United States ranked 17th and Canada ranked ninth. In the author’s global-governance ranking of 44 nations, he places the United States in seventh and Canada in 14th. He argues that despite justified fears of America’s increasing governance failures, it remains a relatively strong investment destination.
Canadian businesses have fallen far behind their foreign counterparts in competitiveness. Private-sector enterprises should increase internal efforts to be more productive and compete internationally. But before this happens, managers must ensure that the organizational factors that nurture productivity growth are aligned. The Three Pillars of Productivity (3POP) framework presented in this article uses strategy, operations and technology as three pillars that stand upon a base of solid organizational culture. <br><br>Strategy, the first pillar, is usually given minimal attention by SMEs, who focus instead on tactical operations. However, SMEs that follow strategy-execution processes almost always outperform those that do not. After clarifying a company’s mission and performing strategic analysis, a firm should execute its strategy through its operations. This pillar is more flexible and open to continual adjustment, especially in smaller firms. Finally, using technology and collecting quantitative and qualitative data to support decisions is critical, but the wrong investment can make or break a business. While aligning the three pillars is key, the first step to significant productivity improvements is creating a supportive culture. Willingness to change, tolerance for failure and acceptance of calculated risk are almost always needed to realize strong productivity gains. Ultimately, culture characterizes a firm more than any other part of the framework.
Brand battles occur in every industry and in practically every product category. They consume significant managerial attention and consist of far more than marketing tactics — they are ultimately about winning customers’ cognitive resources. Brands make it easier for consumers to find the products they want and need. They also make markets more efficient by bringing buyers and sellers together at a lower cost than would otherwise be possible. In fact, the loss of a brand would often be more harmful to a company’s ability to continue business operations than the loss of its upstream assets. Consumers’ attention is finite, but available information is increasingly abundant, which gives rise to a principle of scarcity that makes brands particularly valuable. Moreover, cognitive economy states that because information-processing capacity is finite, customers often trade off accuracy of results and optimal outcomes for what is most accessible. This partly explains the high failure rate of new, novel products — and why Lexar, when it introduced memory cards for digital cameras, wisely packaged them in gold packages similar to those used for Kodak film. As this article shows, the battle between brands takes place inside the minds of consumers.
The Basque country, with a population of 2.1 million and covering 7,233 square kilometers, is an autonomous region located in the north of Spain, physically separated from it by the Pyrenees mountains. Presents the history of the region--highly prosperous at the turn of the 20th century, but nearing bankruptcy by the 1950s. By 2001, the Basque GDP per capita had risen to a level well ahead of Spain and most European countries. At the same time that the region was enjoying the spoils of admirably executed cluster initiatives, it was being threatened by the destabilizing violence of the Basque separatist extreme, a slowing global economy, and an always-precarious balance of power between the Basque's own government and the government of Spain.
The Wits Reproductive Health and HIV Institute (WRHI), a South African non-government organization, played a crucial role in turning the tide in the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa. The organization significantly influenced the national response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic through its credibility, research output and multiple stakeholder engagement. The collaborative multiparty relationships between WRHI's stakeholders were a key component of the organization's success. However, WRHI’s sustainability faced serious challenges in the rapidly changing operating environment, particularly since the organization was totally dependent on funders. What strategic initiatives should WRHI pursue?
Hillary Mallow, founder-CEO of ProLab, learns that her health-services company is two months shy of bankruptcy. She needs to act - immediately - but isn't sure where to begin. Prolab's client list and geographic presence have grown steadily over the years, so the recent downturn is quite unexpected. Most worrisome, ProLab's executive team is in major trouble; contentiousness has developed between Hillary's husband, ProLab's CFO, and Hillary's business partner, ProLab's COO, which now threatens to envelop everyone else. With her company at stake and personal relationships on the line, Hillary must scramble to resolve the complicated mess that could mean the end of her company, or worse.
In January 2009, Herry Zudianto the Mayor of Yogyakarta was reflecting on the apparent failure of his first effort to involve the private sector in the financing and provision of municipal infrastructure. Seven years earlier the City had awarded a 30-year concession to a local private company to build and operate an intercity bus terminal. Earlier that month, the company had sent the Mayor a letter announcing its intention to return the concession on the grounds that the City had not lived up to its commitments. This case is designed to introduce Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) to an audience that has limited prior exposure to them. The case brings out the various motives or goals for PPPs and the circumstances under which those goals are likely to be sensible and achievable. Case Number 1979.0
The author has examined common growth beliefs and the U.S. Growth Model and finds no support for them in any area of business research. He offers instead the Organic Growth Index, the result of ten years of research by the Batten Institute at the Darden School. Six keys to organic growth are presented and above-average growth companies that remained successful are linked to an internal Growth System called Smart Growth.