The case presents the founding vision and early days of a young startup that seeks to empower delivery drivers with tools and transparency. The company's flagship mobile app has been taken up by tens of thousands of delivery drivers across major U.S. cities who use it as a single-point to accept or reject gigs from multiple sources and map their routes. At the same time, the app has sparked the ire of major delivery services, who are concerned Para disintermediates drivers from their platforms. Para's founders look to the future and believe that there is a win-win outcome.
Midway through construction, a hotel developer realised that costs had risen too much to be feasible for equity capital. They repositioned the asset as a ResiTel wherein each suite would be sold as a condominium unit to retail buyers. This called for setting up two separate entities: one (PropCo) for asset management and the other (LeaseCo) for operating the hotel. Unit owners would earn a regular share of hotel income. The lenders protected additional sale-risk by more conservative loan terms. The developer must analyse the feasibility of the repositioned asset.
On June 25, 2021, Professor Pratik Modi, chairperson of the postgraduate program at the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA), attended a meeting with the director and chairpersons of different academic areas and programs, where it was decided that the upper limit on the number of elective courses offered by each area should be done away with, considering the requirements of students and faculty members. Although the decision to remove the upper limit seemed to be beneficial to all parties, it would pose a challenge in terms of scheduling classes, given the number of constraints involved. Modi was determined that a solution could be found using the tools and techniques of operations research, which was taught as one of the core subjects at IRMA.
In July 2022, a portfolio manager for an investment company was considering adding the Coca-Cola Company (Coca-Cola) stock to its flagship global blend fund, which invested in firms with neither predominant value nor growth characteristics. Her initial task was to develop an investment thesis by first gathering qualitative and quantitative information related to Coca-Cola and its peers. Her thesis would consider what long-term trends might play out in the industry, as well as any short- and medium-term considerations related to the economy, the industry, and Coca-Cola itself. She wondered whether an analysis of recent financial performance coupled with expectations of future performance could provide any clues as to the suitability of current investments. Recognizing that further analysis would follow (such as an in-depth discounted cash flow analysis), the portfolio manager needed to know whether the fund should consider investing in Coca-Cola's stock based on her preliminary analysis.
Leaders must know how to deliver bad news to employees and outside stakeholders. Whether an organization is responding to a complaint, communicating about a crisis situation, or notifying employees about a change in company policies or downsizing, its executives and managers must focus on creating an appropriate response while maintaining goodwill for the organization. This note addresses how executives can do just that. Where exactly do companies go wrong in their responses to crises? How can executives more effectively take responsibility in a disaster while at the same time crafting a positive image for the company? How can all leaders better communicate bad news of any kind?
The sports events agency Maïenga, owned by two French women, operates off-road motor rallies in the Sahara Desert of Morocco. Its flagship event, the annual Rallye Aïcha des Gazelles du Maroc, is the foundation on which Maïenga has, over 30 years, built a reputation for being a socially and environmentally responsible company operating in a fragile desert ecosystem. Maïenga's unique brand image centers around the Rallye Aïcha participants, who become known as Gazelles, "a tribe of modern women", willing to push themselves to the limit in a challenging physical environment. Students are asked to examine the intersection of key marketing decisions (segmentation, targeting, positioning, company reputation, brand management, and promotion) with considerations about diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), corporate charitable operations, and the critical need for environmental protection and responsibility in the locations of Maïenga's rallies. National DEI policies and laws in the agency's home country, France, differ from those in the United States and the United Kingdom, which are large parts of Maïenga's target market for recruiting participants. A key issue is whether segmentation based on gender (women) is exclusionary or justified by Maïenga's celebrated Gazelle brand image and its operation as a French company. Students must determine how this positioning might affect the agency's corporate image and options for growth.
Businesses' past involvement or complicity in atrocities and human rights abuses such as slavery and genocide is a pressing concern for stakeholders today. Managers who meaningfully engage with their companies' past actions can address historic harms while simultaneously contributing to their companies' future success. The authors examine the factors that are pushing companies to take action now, and they offer guidance to help leaders begin the process of moving forward.
The case, which is set in the period 2014-21, provides an overview of Karma Primary Healthcare's origin and growth story. It also explores the unfolding growth opportunities, some of which emerged as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic. Karma was founded by Jagdeep Gambhir to deliver quality healthcare to communities in rural India. As of 2021, Karma clinics were present at 25 locations in semi-urban and rural India. Nurses at these clinics used a teleconsultation-based care model to connect the patient with doctors located remotely. The case suggests that Karma has been reasonably successful in progressing toward its original mandate of delivering care to rural communities. However, opportunities for further growth opened up. The case presents the prospects for growing the organization's nascent B2B business, given the broad acceptance of, and high demand for, tele-consultation-based care models across India during and after COVID-19. Further, the case discusses in detail the opportunity for Karma to utilize its experience and capabilities to enter urban India, and touches upon the critical factors that would determine the decision whether or not to enter this market.
The vision of Anand Mahindra, Chairman of the Mahindra Group, in spearheading climate leadership in India, focusing on the proactive steps taken in steel manufacturing by Mahindra Sanyo Special Steel Limited (MSSSPL) through science-based targets is presented. Case set in 2021, when businesses in India and countries around the world were recovering from the unprecedented setbacks caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. At the October 2021 COP26 Glasgow Summit, India had committed to achieve net zero by 2070, further reinforcing the need for corporates to take massive steps in reducing their carbon footprints. Anand Mahindra and Anirban Ghosh, Chief Sustainability Officer at the Mahindra Group, believe that there is an opportunity for the Group to do more to mitigate the impacts of climate change. The case illustrates the risks posed by climate change to businesses and the business benefits of setting science-based targets that can spur increased innovation potential, greater resilience against regulatory uncertainties, improved credibility among the new generation of investors, customers, employees, and other stakeholders, as well as better competitive advantage. Three years after committing to the SBTi, climate-induced challenges had become even more critical, necessitating swifter action to cut emissions across the value chain. The case discusses GHG emissions across 3 scopes, highlighting the value chain activities that contribute to Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 emissions. MSSSPL has committed to reduce their emissions by 35% by 2030. Some of the measures adopted by MSSSPL to meet their GHG emissions reduction commitments to the SBTi such as improvements in raw material usage in various manufacturing processes, energy-efficient technologies to cumulatively reduce specific electricity and oil consumption, water use management, and waste management measures through a circular economy strategy. What more needs to be done by the company to keep up the momentum?
This case reviews Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter's decision to involve the community in the process of hiring his cabinet members. Rather than relying on an executive recruiting firm or choosing cabinet heads from his own network, Carter recruited 100 community members and asked them to vet, screen, and interview candidates for ten city directorships, with Carter reserving the right to make final decisions. While his choices aligned with the panels for seven positions, they diverged for the remaining three. In January 2018, as Carter prepared to announce his decisions, he hoped his choices would not undermine belief in the participatory hiring process and his credibility as a mayor who valued community voices.
Fernando Rios, CEO of RIMAC Seguros y Reaseguros (RIMAC), a leading insurance company in Peru, had been driving an intensive digital transformation at the company since 2018. By modernizing its IT infrastructure and support applications across critical business units, Fernando sought to deliver a superior customer experience through faster response times, enhanced security, and improved business continuity and resiliency, especially throughout the pandemic. By 2022, the company had built a strong foundation from which to scale up its advanced analytics and AI capabilities to enhance its value propositions beyond insurance and focus on delivering well-being. This was in line with its newly articulated corporate purpose, "We protect your world; we promote your well-being." Two questions remained uppermost in Fernando's mind: How can RIMAC accelerate the democratization of the benefits of AI and advanced data analytics? / How will AI capabilities drive the company's well-being agenda in the next three years?
Dupe--slang for duplicate--influencers are individuals who persuade buyers to purchase counterfeits using social media platforms to drive a brand message intended to confer legitimacy on the purchase decision. Dupe influencers sell fake luxury goods online to their cadres of followers, who relate to the influencers' fashion savviness and who trust their judgment of products' quality. In this article, I provide a synopsis of a case Amazon settled against two dupe influencers who used social media to promote the sale of counterfeit luxury products. I highlight the persistent challenge of luxury counterfeits sold online, the consumer complicity of obtaining luxury fakes, and the problem of discerning a knockoff from a counterfeit product. Dupe influencers leverage trust with their followers and use social media tactics, such as unboxing videos and designer haul promotions, to peddle luxury fakes. Recommendations to combat dupe influencers center on monitoring and working with e-commerce platforms to shut down social media posts that infringe a company's intellectual property, raising consumer awareness of the illicit activities of counterfeiters through education campaigns, leveraging legitimate social influencers to debunk the dupe influencers, and pursuing legal remedies.
Who doesn't love a magic trick? When we watch magicians perform, we enjoy being fooled by their manipulations and sleights of hand. But when leaders in our workplaces use the same techniques as magicians to further personal agendas, they engage in a special and unique form of falsity. This can be useful in furthering organizational goals and performance, but it can also lead to frustration, dysfunction, and even the collapse of the organization. Drawing on research on the psychology of magic, we explain how business leaders construct "magical processes" that can be used to mislead and manipulate workers in the same ways that magicians trick their audiences. We propose a typology of magic tricks in organizations and introduce the acronym CARD to summarize the four steps in these processes: concealing, attracting attention, retaining attention, and directing behavior. We describe each step, provide illustrations, and explain how managers and employees might detect and defend against each one. Finally, we identify structural conditions that may make organizations vulnerable to magical processes. We hope to improve readers' ability to detect magic and CARD tricks, and to pierce through to the agendas hidden behind these false facades.
Influencer marketing has become a dominant and targeted means for brands to connect with consumers, but it also brings risks associated with influencer transgression and reputation damage. In recent years, virtual influencers have gained popularity and given rise to falsity, or artificially created and manipulated influencers that are revolutionizing the field of influencer marketing. A virtual influencer is an entity--humanlike or not--that is autonomously controlled by artificial intelligence and visually presented as an interactive, real-time rendered being in a digital environment. As brands increasingly seek to engage virtual influencers to connect with and sell to audiences, we take a step back and discuss the opportunities and challenges they present for firms and managers. To help marketers understand this emerging field, we first document the rise of virtual influencers. Then, we discuss consumer reactions to virtual influencers before unpacking their associated opportunities and challenges for brands and marketers. Finally, we conclude with an overview of implications and future considerations.
This case study tells the story of Ambienta, an Italy-based asset management company that was an early entrant in the field of sustainable investing. From the very beginning, founder and managing partner Nino Tronchetti Provera saw sustainability as a "mega-trend" with broad implications for the national economy. By contrast, Ambienta's competitors - a category that now includes some of the world's largest asset managers - apply ESG-based investment criteria that often present more questions than answers about how environmental sustainability can drive financial returns.