What are the timeless truths of advertising? How can agency leaders manage their teams, creative talent, and clients? To answer these and other questions, the mythology of the "Golden Age of Advertising" is examined and analyzed herein. Specifically, using ad-man Don Draper-protagonist of the fictional but already culturally iconic television series Mad Men-as a mythic archetype, lessons are extracted for contemporary advertising practitioners. Ten timeless rules are proposed and explicated in the areas of managing intra-agency leadership processes, managing creative processes, and managing client relationships.
Following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, BP seeks to expand its assets and revenues, so it looks to Russia, but a planned alliance with a Russian state-owned oil company is thwarted by objections from another Russian oil partner. This case maps BP's strategic alliances and illustrates the importance of alliance management.
This case series is appropriate for undergraduate, MBA, executive education, and MBA Exec audiences but is specifically designed for decision analysis, a first-year MBA core course. In the Part I case, Osvaldo Correa, CEO of Salmones Puyuhuapi (SP), must decide how to respond to news that the ISA virus has infected a competitor's salmon farming site. The alternatives include harvesting SP's 900,000 salmon two months early, waiting for the fish to grow and risk losing fish to the virus, and vaccinating the fish. The "harvest now" alternative is evaluated using normally distributed fish weights. It is necessary to account for monthly growth of the fish and mortality to value the ends of the decision tree. Other alternatives, e.g. testing the water, fish, and marine life can be studied with the expected value of perfect information. Vaccination is an example of the value of perfect control.
This case presents a brief description of the decisions the company made regarding whether or not to pursue each of the four projects that are the basis of the (A) case.
U.S. Army Lieutenant Scotty Smiley faces the biggest challenge of his young life. What will he do after learning that the wounds he received from a car bomb in Iraq have left him permanently blinded? On April 6, 2005, Lieutenant Scotty Smiley was grievously wounded by a suicide bomber while leading his infantry platoon during a combat patrol in Iraq. This is a biographical case that outlines who Scotty was prior to this incident and asks readers to consider the following fundamental question: What does this tragic event mean for who he is and how he will lead his life? And by extension, what role do life crucibles play in helping to shape who we are and how we lead?
New Resource Bank was founded in San Francisco in 2006 with a mission focused on environmental sustainability. The case illustrates the opportunities and challenges of banking on values and the challenges of organizations defining a social and environmental commitment. The case also highlights the tension and potential synergies between social mission and shareholder value in the context of the crisis of 2008, the taken-for-granted expectations and norms arising from a commercial bank charter, and the distinct perspectives of bank regulators, founders, investors, and other stakeholders of the newly founded bank.
The world famous toymaker, The LEGO Group (LEGO), assembles an internal management team to create a strategic report on LEGO's different product lines and business operations. In recent years, numerous threats had emerged against LEGO in toy industry. The acquisition of Marvel Entertainment by The Walt Disney Company created major implications for valuable toy license agreements. LEGO also recently lost a long legal battle with major competitor MEGA Brands, makers of MEGA Bloks, with a European Union court decision that removed the LEGO brick trademark. Furthermore, new competition is preparing to enter the marketplace from Hasbro, the second-largest toymaker in the world, with the company launching a new rival product line called Kre-O. It is critical for the management team to identify where to expand Lego's product lines and business operations, in order to develop a competitive strategy to continue the organization's recent years of financial success and dominance in the building toy market.
In 2006, Mudra Communications (Mudra), the third largest advertising agency in India, is in the middle of an organizational transformation in which information technology (IT) is seen by the top management as an enabler. The IT set-up itself is witnessing a transition at Mudra from manual systems to an Enterprise System (ES) which has been developed internally by the eight-member IT team led by Executive Vice President (Technology) Sebastian Joseph. As he gets ready to implement the first module of ES, known as Mudra Business Operations Support System (mboss) covering 70 per cent of the activities of the agency, Joseph is facing some managerial dilemmas related to planning the roll-out, training the end-users and managing the change that the new system will bring to the agency. He is also making a choice between outsourcing the ES architecture and owning it and between outsourcing the development of the remaining seven modules and developing them internally, as before.
Three brothers that own and lead a second-generation family business in Hong Kong, encounter problems of nepotism and governance, and endure considerable conflict. The case asks how to resolve these family and business issues.
In 2006, Mudra Communications, the third-largest advertising agency in India, is in the middle of an organizational transformation in which information technology (IT) is seen by the top management as pivotal. The IT setup is undergoing a transition at Mudra from manual systems to an Enterprise System (ES) which has been developed internally by the eight-member IT team led by executive vice president for technology Sebastian Joseph. As he gets ready to implement the first module of ES, known as Mudra Business Operations Support System (mBoss), covering 70 per cent of the activities of the agency, Joseph is facing some managerial dilemmas related to planning the roll-out, training the end users, and managing the change that the new system will bring to the agency. He is also facing choices between outsourcing the ES architecture or owning it, and between outsourcing the development of the remaining seven modules or developing them internally, as before.
The world famous toymaker, The LEGO Group, assembled an internal management team to create a strategic report on LEGO’s different product lines and business operations. In recent years, numerous threats to LEGO had emerged in the toy industry. The acquisition of Marvel Entertainment by The Walt Disney Company created major implications for valuable toy license agreements. LEGO had also recently lost a long legal battle with major competitor MEGA Brands, makers of MEGA Bloks, with a European Union court decision that removed the LEGO brick trademark. Furthermore, the second-largest toymaker in the world, Hasbro, was preparing to launch a new rival product line called Kre-O. It was critical for the management team to identify where to expand LEGO’s product lines and business operations, in order to develop a competitive strategy to continue the organization’s recent years of financial success and dominance in the building toy market.
A final year student of a business school estimated the net present value (NPV) of his proposed business plan using three different methods and encountered different valuation results. He approached the professor who had taught him valuation concepts in a finance course and wanted to know the reasons for the difference.
Healthcare has traditionally focused on medical outcomes and financial performance. The big question is always, "How much is it going to cost?" What would happen, though, if healthcare also considered the question of "How does the patient feel?" This case looks at the Cleveland Clinic's attempt to answer the latter question by attempting to institutionalize empathy as part of its delivery of care.
Duke Energy, an American investor-owned electric utility, confronts multibillion dollar decisions about its future fuel mix. In particular, its leaders are considering building new nuclear capacity. Whether this is sensible depends, among other things, on demand growth, capital costs, fossil fuel prices, possible regulatory or other delays in constructing the reactors, and possible future restrictions on carbon dioxide. CEO Jim Rogers believes that nuclear power makes sense from a social standpoint but also must consider the perspectives of his ratepayers and his shareholders.
Vision 2020 aimed to achieve annual revenues in excess of $200 billion by offering innovative integrated solutions to major global challenges such as the availability of water, energy and infrastructure. To "dream the client's dreams," the plan required over 200,000 new employees worldwide, united by a common entrepreneurial bond. Such projections would have sounded extravagant for any other firm; for Odebrecht, these were simple linear extrapolations of the company's performance over the last 10 years, during which the firm grew its revenues at an annualized rate of over 21%... Odebrecht also aspired to become a model of sustainable development and socio-environmental responsibility. For this, it could already rely on its massive investments in "green" plastics and ethanol production facilities. It also rallied behind a colossal hydroelectric project, pioneering CSR practices and novel turbine and dam technology to reduce the impact of such facilities on sensitive Amazon ecosystems. These investments set the tune for the firm in the second decade of the century. For Marcelo, the issue was how to translate the vision into "a dream with a deadline." Could he depend on the old recipes for growth? Were historical clients the right ones going forward? Would the forces and culture that had created the opportunities in the past support the future? Was Odebrecht ready to handle another massive bout of growth? As Marcelo assumed sole executive leadership for the $23 billion family business at the age of 42, he was aware of his responsibility and challenges. He knew he was expected to build on his forefathers' successes, and they had set a very high bar for him, but he also knew he could rely on the entrepreneur-partners he inherited. Learning objectives: Managing growth, family business governance, succession, CSR, sustainable development, renewable energy, managing the value chain.
During its 50-year history, adidas had spent heavily to establish its three-stripe logo as a symbol for athletic achievement. When value-priced shoe retailer Payless ShoeSource started selling athletic shoes with two or four vertical stripes, adidas brought an action against Payless. adidas claimed Payless' lower-cost athletic shoes could dilute its famous logo in the minds of consumers and tarnish its brand by association with a lower-quality product. In 2008, the jury found in favor of adidas, awarding $305 million, believed to be the largest verdict in a trademark case. In this case students examine the histories and brand status of adidas and Payless as well as both companies' legal arguments before discussing consumer psychology, branding, and whether the jury made the right decision.
The president and CEO of a provincial auto club is assessing opportunities to grow his organization at the same time as industry consolidation and changes in the allocation of national operating costs. The auto club has diversified from automobile towing and travel services into insurance, package travel, automobile sales, and service. However, the president's vision for the upcoming board of directors' meeting calls for a 300 per cent increase in operating revenues over the next 10 years. Without more members, the auto club cannot support its allocated costs of branded national and international products. The CEO's challenge is to find growth opportunities.
The vice president of communications of Domino’s Pizza International faced a significant threat to his company’s reputation due to negative social media exposure. A video had been posted on YouTube two days earlier by a Domino’s employee that showed two Domino’s employees at a North Carolina franchise tampering with customers’ pizza and sandwich orders. The employee stuck cheese up his nose, sneezed on the food prior to boxing it up, and could be overheard in the video admitting that the orders would soon be delivered to unsuspecting customers. The video went viral; it had been reposted to Twitter and Facebook, and received almost a million views and many comments on YouTube. It was also receiving attention from both local and national media channels. The senior executive team of Domino’s was meeting with the vice president in a matter of hours, and Domino’s social media team would need to devise a plan to respond to the video to protect Domino’s strong brand image before it was too late.<p>You might also like: Abercrombie & #Fitchthehomeless, Abercrombie and Fitch, Mountain Dew: The Most Racist Soft-drink Commercial in History?