This case describes the thoughts and reflections of five MBA alumni on their way back to their alma mater for a 20-year reunion event. As invited speakers, they will advise the upcoming graduating class on what to expect after graduation. The case provides a brief background on the career trajectories and family circumstances of each of the five protagonists as well as their personal reflections on their accomplishments and their regrets. The case is an excellent starting point for thought and discussion on the goals and motivations of MBA students, and what they expected to achieve and how they would measure success over the medium to long term. This case would be appropriate either alone or in conjunction with the technical note "Are You Ready? Devising a Personal Strategy for Life after Business School" (UVA-S-0342) as an effective reinforcement exercise.
Risk reporting is often unconnected with business strategy and performance, and is considered merely as a matter of compliance, which defeats the purpose of risk management. This article describes four best practices of companies that have improved their risk reporting by strengthening the vertical and horizontal communication of risks, reporting near misses, and communicating risk digitally through apps. Better risk reporting involves simplification and incentivization. It enables organizations to improve risk management and risk culture overall.
Vigilant organizations excel at seeing looming threats and embryonic opportunities sooner than rivals, which prepares them to act faster when needed. Four drivers distinguish vigilant from vulnerable organizations, which can be used to design a roadmap to improve organizational acuity and preparedness. The fulcrum of these changes rests with the leadership team by demonstrating a strong commitment to vigilance at all levels, and reinforcing this by making targeted investments in foresight capabilities. These strategic moves also need to be supported by corresponding changes in the strategy-making process and by ensuring accountability and coordination of vigilance activities throughout the enterprise.
uBiome provided clinical tests that sequenced the DNA of human microbiome samples, providing data on health conditions directly to consumers or to prescribing physicians. Founded in 2012, the San Francisco-based startup raised $105 million from top-tier venture capital firms and recruited prominent biotech executives and scientists as board members and advisors. In April 2019, the FBI raided uBiome's offices to investigate claims that the company had repeatedly billed individuals without their consent to meet aggressive revenue targets. uBiome's cofounders/co-CEOs resigned soon afterward. The company declared bankruptcy later that year after a board committee concluded that management had indeed pursued policies of questionable legality, including improper insurance billing practices, improper use of a telemedicine physician network, overly aggressive marketing tactics, and the presentation of misleading information in fundraising pitches.
This case is written from the perspective of a decision-maker at a private equity investment fund. The case is set in India, where a large corpus of capital sourced from the United States was deployed from the early 2000s onwards. It looks at the manner in which a private equity real estate fund evaluates the implications of RERA in India, in particular, the continuation vs. exit decision when a project encounters obstacles that delay its completion.
This case studies the unique traits of a serial entrepreneur through the story of Indian entrepreneur G. M. Rao, Chairman of the GMR Group. It describes Rao's entrepreneurial journey from 1978 to 2003. He started his enterprising journey with small jute, diversified into many new business in the following decades. GMR infrastructure group grew to become the significant player in the energy, airports, highways and urban infrastructure sectors. In 2003, Rao had his eye on an ambitious opportunity. He wanted to make a bid for the Delhi airport modernization project that had been announced by the government. This idea sparked much debate among his senior leadership team. The case explores the challenges that an entrepreneur faces in convincing his team and the board of the company to subscribe to his vision and pursue goals that are based on his gut feeling. This case presents his decision dilemma on whether to bid for the Delhi airport project or not. It also presents the dynamics of Indian Airports sector and emergence of public private partnership policy. It was the beginning of the PPP in airport sector which is also the public utility under service sector. Entrepreneur Ecosystem was evolving, infrastructure financing was at nascent stage. Case presents the dilemma Rao faced who always wanted to create the national asset for India. It's a case presenting the passion and patriotism pushing GM Rao to go for next big challenge.
Moderna, Inc. (Moderna), a US biotech start-up, was a contender in the race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine. On November 23, 2020, Moderna announced success in the third-stage clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine, soon after larger rival Pfizer Inc. (Pfizer), partnering with BioNTech SE, had reported the successful clinical trial results of its own vaccine. However, large-scale vaccine production was a challenge for Moderna, and its chief executive officer acknowledged that scaling production would not be easy. The two other leading vaccine developers, Pfizer and AstraZeneca plc (AstraZeneca), had fewer challenges with manufacturing capacity; however, Pfizer's vaccine required extreme cold storage, and AstraZeneca's vaccine faced issues with its third-stage clinical trial results. On the consumer front, many Americans were unwilling to be vaccinated for COVID-19, leading to anti-vaccination protests on social media and in public. In November 2020, Moderna was planning to apply to the US Food and Drug Administration for Emergency Use Authorization of its COVID-19 vaccine. Vaccine manufacturers were racing to see whose vaccine was best. Could Moderna produce the most effective COVID-19 vaccine? Given the uncertainty in consumer demand for the vaccine, should Moderna plan its manufacturing capability based on end-consumer demand or focus instead on seeking government contracts?
This case describes the movement towards dual-class listings on Asian stock exchanges and the efforts of the Asian Corporate Governance Association (ACGA), a not-for-profit shareholder advocacy group, to discourage this trend. As a not-for-profit organization with no formal regulatory or incentive setting powers, ACGA had been successful in helping to elevate the governance standards in Asian capital markets through its advocacy work, educational efforts, and its biennial publication ("CG Watch") that rated Asian countries' corporate governance quality. With the 2018 decisions by Hong Kong and Singapore to allow for dual-class share listings, which ACGA and its members have previously strongly opposed, ACGA worried about how it could prevent corporate governance standards in the region from deteriorating. Was this a "race to the bottom" by Asian stock exchanges due to their desire to attract listings, or were the proposed safeguards effective in balancing shareholder rights against protecting managers from market pressures? What additional levers of influence should the organization pursue to ensure that shareholder rights were protected or to make corporate governance less of a compliance exercise but more of a value-add in the eyes of corporate managers in Asia?
The case is based on published sources and was written in 2019, before the announcement in April 2021 of a breakaway European Super League. The idea of different formats and financing models for competition football is not new, however. The case explores this from the viewpoint of FC Bayern Munich the best-known and most successful German football club and one of the elite teams in Europe - and its president, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, who has had a number of influential roles in the football world, in a career spanning more than five decades. Revenues from European football competitions have increased constantly over the last decades, with the UEFA European Champions League (UCL) constituting the largest piece of the cake. The big European football clubs, including Bayern Munich, aimed for a bigger share of the increasing revenues and debated a self-organized break-away European Super League (ESL) outside UEFA.
This series of case studies lift the veil of wellness tourism, a popular but relatively niche market. Case A describes how wellness tourism had become more mainstream in recent years. At the foot of the Alps, there is a low-key luxury resort called Grand Resort Bad Ragaz. The resort Group organically combines the tradition of a family business and Swiss innovation in its strategy. On the one hand, all group-level decisions put the protection of the spring with about 800 years history as a prerequisite, and on the other, the resort group explores business opportunities with an open and creative mindset. However, in Europe, where the market was mature and saturated while the population was aging, how could wellness hospitality businesses stand out? Should Bad Ragaz Group keep focusing on loyal European guests who had already visited multiple times, or should they focus on new guests from Asia, especially China who seemed to be willing and able to visit more frequently and spend more in the future?
It had been one year since Anita Basu joined the Grand Resort Bad Ragaz as the Director of the Medical Center and member of the Executive Committee. Basu believed that the Grand Resort Bad Ragaz differentiated itself from other high-end resorts because of the centuries-old thermal spring and five-star experience that integrated medical treatment and other facilities. However, would the diversification of the facilities lead to the dilution of Bad Ragaz brand? Did the concept of holiday recreation and healthcare services bring synergy or conflict with each other? How would the aging population of Europe affect the Medical Center of Bad Ragaz? Basu read reports that pointed out the huge growth potential of the Chinese and Asian markets, but the past year was her first time seriously considering business development with Chinese customers and partners. It seemed that a direct shift in target audience from Europe to Asia might help Basu to increase the performance of the Medical Center or even the resort, but challenges like lack of mutual trust, legal differences, mismatched expectations, and language barriers had to be taken into consideration as well. Basu had to report to the CEO but hesitated as to whether she should propose a greater focus on Asian guests. If she should, how?
This case study describes the simultaneous evolution of both Health and Happiness (H&H) International Holdings Limited (referred hereafter as "H&H") and the senior executive protagonist, Laetitia Garnier. The instructor followed the history of company as it evolved from a single-product company in China (then known as Biostime) to a global group encompassing multiple brands following a series of acquisitions. This expansion allowed H&H to gain synergies across their value chain and shared channels in different continents, leading to an impressive growth in revenue and profits. This rapid progression was not without its growing pains, however. The case reveals several problems that H&H was facing with regards to cultural integration, particularly following their largest acquisition of the Australian supplement provider, Swisse. Meanwhile, the company's founder and CEO, Luo Fei, also finds himself wondering whether he should stay on in the CEO role or if it is time for him to relinquish the reigns to someone new like Laetitia Garnier, a female leader with rich experience in business management who has been with the company for almost a decade.
Understanding the real reasons why racial equity initiatives provoke opposition can help you lead employees through cultural transformation. These efforts often lead to predictable responses as individuals seek to deny, distort, or distance themselves from the realities of systemic racism. This article presents strategies for countering those reactions and steering individuals toward a fourth common response: engaging actively with anti-racism efforts.
Early analysis of racial and networking data in 10 organizations highlights three behavioral drivers of inclusion: establishing ties with colleagues and stakeholders early on, building networks with diverse "bridging" ties, and seeking out mentoring. These behaviors were associated with faster promotions and longer tenures for employees of color.
Only certain details about job candidates are relevant for hiring decisions; knowing other details can undermine the fairness and accuracy of employers' assessments. Organizations can establish policies that "blind" decision makers to potentially biasing information, but this is rare. This article looks at when managers and other evaluators might choose to blind their own judgment and suggests ways they can foster less-biased decision-making in their organizations.
This case describes the journey of Gucci, a hundred-year-old luxury fashion brand, and how over the years it has reinvented its designs and marketing strategy to grow its market dominance world-wide. In 2015, Gucci's dismal performance over two successive years led the fashion house to rejig its top management, and bring in Marco Bizzarri, as the new President and CEO, and Alessandro Michele as the new creative director. By end-2019, the duo had achieved a remarkable turnaround, having tripled Gucci's sales and quadrupled its profits over 2015. In the process, they had redefined 'luxury', transformed the high-end fashion industry and contemporised the Gucci brand by being avant-garde and embracing new paradigms such as purpose-driven, gender-neutral, cross-generational and digital-oriented strategies. However, despite regaining its position as the world's fastest growing luxury brand, Gucci had clocked a much lower annual growth in 2019 than 2018 and 2017. Did this indicate that the brand was losing its relevance and needed to reinvent itself again? Could Gucci's recent foray into beauty products, making it more accessible and affordable, be diluting its brand equity? Additionally, the outbreak of the global pandemic Covid-19 in 2020 had plunged the luxury industry and the fashion house to new lows. The only silver lining was Gucci' strong digital capability, which helped the brand recover some of its lost ground through an increase in online sales. With the pandemic relenting in China, the luxury market in the country had begun to revive since March 2020. However, it was difficult to predict how other markets would behave post-pandemic. Would consumers be driven by the need to compensate for the lost opportunity to consume, or would the pandemic induce in them values that encouraged cutbacks in discretionary spending? Moreover, if the other markets did not pick up, what would be the effect of an increased dependence of the luxury brands on Chinese consumers?
People feel a need to belong and have an inherent desire for deep and meaningful connections. This is true both outside and inside of work. To facilitate connection, leaders can design what the authors call immensely human interactions moments in which social interactions are interwoven with empathy, curiosity, and humility. The authors offer six specific strategies for bringing these moments into organizations.