After decades as a CEO and years as the Dean of the Richard Ivey School of Business, business students and other aspiring leaders often ask me what inspired me to become a leader. Was there a moment in my career when I decided that I was going to become the CEO? Did I have a boss who encouraged me or a role model that I wanted to follow? Did I have a plan - a clear path forward early on my career?
In October 2008, the president of Millbrook Estate Homes Ltd. is trying to determine if his firm should take on a new development called Whistle Hill Estates. Millbrook began as a builder of modest homes on a large scale, but the Whistle Hill opportunity would involve developing high-end custom homes.<br><br><br><br>The president’s decision will have a significant effect on Millbrook’s future strategy. Millbrook can stay within its comfort zone and continue building large numbers of entry-level or mid-level homes, purchasing supplies in bulk, and negotiating volume discounts with the trades, or the company can choose to move into the high-end custom home segment, in which it will have to manage more complex designs, source custom materials, and provide a greater level of customer service to clients. In the second option, Millbrook has the opportunity to earn higher profits per house built. If the president wants Millbrook to expand into the custom home segment, he needs to consider what changes will be necessary to position the Whistle Hill opportunity for success.
This negotiation introduces a situation full of opportunities for hard bargaining and out-of-the-box thinking about value-creating solutions. The American supplier Reed Oilwell views this business opportunity as a side door into the Petroecuador supplier network. The cross-cultural elements of the relationship are important, especially in the context of the various political aspects that shape the relationship between YPEC and its major customer, Petroecuador. The negotiation illustrates the potential for a cooperative approach but also offers the opportunity for a competitive outcome. The parties are instructed to reach a deal that satisfies their short-term goals, but their decisions will impact their ability to establish a preferred supply position in the new oil field operations.
This negotiation introduces a situation full of opportunities for hard bargaining and out-of-the-box thinking about value-creating solutions. The American supplier, Reed Oilwell, views this business opportunity as a side door into the Petroecuador supplier network. The cross-cultural elements of the relationship are important, especially in the context of the various political aspects that shape the relationship between YPEC and its major customer, Petroecuador. The negotiation illustrates the potential for a cooperative approach, but also offers the opportunity for a competitive outcome. The parties are instructed to reach a deal that satisfies their short-term goals, but their decisions will impact their ability to establish a preferred supply position in the new oilfield operations.
Bert took a position to teach English in South Korea after graduating with his business degree from a Canadian University. It was his second time teaching English in South Korea, and since he had a fantastic experience the first time, he took a second position without doing a lot of due diligence before arrival. Soon, however, he realized that a city tax was being deducted from his pay, and he had suspicions that his boss was making up the city tax, in order to deduct money from the English teachers' pay. Since Bert's visa to stay in the country was tied to his employer, he could not look for a new employer, nor could he effectively find legal recourse against his employer, because foreign teachers had few rights in South Korea. This case was designed to be used in an undergraduate organizational behaviour, business ethics or international management course. It was written using casual language and a first-person perspective because the main character is only a few years older than the students in a typical undergraduate classroom, so many of them will relate to the main character and his experiences in this situation.
The huge growth of information technology (IT) and information technology enabled services (TIES) businesses in India and, in particular, in Hyderabad, led to the establishment of Indian and multi-national companies. With large numbers of employees and thousands of square feet of office space, these companies recognized that maintaining their premises was not part of their core competence and outsourced their housekeeping requirements, thus creating a new industry. A single mother who was unable to make ends meet on her salary as the principal of a catering college grabbed a tiny opportunity to provide cleaning services at the Oracle office in the Cyber Towers at Hyderabad and, over 10 years, built up Golden Star into the third-largest housekeeping services provider in the city, with over 2,000 employees. While maintaining her strong personal ethical values, she built a young, professional team and maintained high standards of professionalism and quality of service. The case is set at the time when she is faced with the typical dilemmas of organic growth: to take on allied functions of office management, such as maintenance of electrical and mechanical equipment - a growing trend in the industry; to expand geographically to manage the offices of her clients in several cities; or to make a huge amount of money by simply selling the business she had built from scratch.
A summer intern student at 3M Health Care must analyse the health care division's logistics systems and report her findings to the vice president of 3M Health Care Markets. The vice president is most interested in the recommendations for the proposed changes to the existing method of distributing products to Canadian hospitals. This case provides sufficient information for students to assess the quantitative and qualitative issues relating to direct distribution versus maintaining its current supply chain structure of using valu-added resellers
Bob Williams, the CEO of National Public Broadcasting (NPB), was considering an unsolicited offer to purchase the company in the early spring of 2006. The company was a media underwriting representative for public television and radio stations throughout the United States. When Williams and his wife Linda Williams started NPB in 1996, they had imagined that it would grow quickly and be acquired by a larger media representation firm in a few years. But the business proved to be more complex than they had anticipated with slower growth and less interest from strategic acquirers and, as a result, Williams had been running NPB ever since. The unsolicited offer gave the Williams and their partners the potential opportunity to realize a significant cash payment for the business. The case explores the impact on the sale of the ownership structure decisions that were made when NPB was formed and the complexity of the sales process for small businesses.
A Lieutenant leading a platoon in Iraq must make a complex ethical, military, and leadership decision: whether to risk his life and that of other soldiers to reenter a home rigged with an explosive and save three Iraqis.
A Lieutenant leading a platoon in Iraq must make a complex ethical, military, and leadership decision: whether to risk his life and that of other soldiers to reenter a home rigged with an explosive and save three Iraqis. The (B) case describes the decision made and the rational behind it.
In January 2010, John Fahey, president, CEO, and chairman of the board of trustees' executive committee of the Washington, D.C.-based National Geographic Society (NGS), must decide how best to organize the 121-year old mission-driven organization for a world of accelerating digital convergence and decreasing magazine sales. Historically a proponent of evolutionary change, he is considering a radical move: creating a senior management position responsible for e-commerce to coordinate web-based offerings and outreach across the Society's various departments, transition NGS from its many disparate and independent direct mail efforts to a more integrated and strategic e-commerce strategy, and leverage the NGS relationship with its members-currently defined as magazine subscribers, since a subscription comes with Society membership. Putting the final touches on the position and its reporting arrangements has led to significant debate within the organization, and Fahey is torn about how to proceed.
Arcadia Biosciences is seeking to introduce genetically modified rice to China that will lower farmers' costs and generate environmental benefits through reduced greenhouse gas emissions. The case describes challenges facing this small agricultural biotechnology company, notably uneven enforcement of intellectual property in emerging market countries, and uncertainty regarding the provision and market value of carbon credits under international climate change agreements. In September 2008, Eric Rey, Arcadia's CEO, faces an inflection point concerning his leading technology, genes for nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in rice. He can determine a price to charge for NUE seed based on savings to farmers from their reduced use of expensive nitrogen fertilizers. Or he can advance a plan to earn revenue from carbon credits allocated under the Kyoto Protocol to China for use of Arcadia's rice, because reduced nitrogen fertilizer use will lower greenhouse gas emissions. The case provides context on the company; describes advances in seed technologies focused on climate change and the associated resource issue of fertilizer use; and presents the strategic choices facing a start-up company operating at the intersection of business, agriculture, and climate change agreements.
An HBS student is asked by his employer to misrepresent himself during the course of his summer internship in order to obtain data from industry competitors.
A securitized small real estate investment vehicle fails and the many individual owners have to decide how to manage or dispose of the asset. This case follows Ruby Collins, a small investor, through the logic of Section 1031 Like Kind Exchanges as well as the consideration of Tenant in Common ownership. Tenancy in Common has some attractive aspects but its regulation falls between a security and a real estate investment. The risk and control characteristics also vary. This case explores both the valuation of the property and the logistical issues around managing it, and also the relationships between individuals who now find themselves business partners with no prior familiarity with each other.