This disguised case presents the situation confronting the new VP materials supply chain as "HungryPet". Newly arrived in the role, the VP realizes that the ambitious new project to implement an end-to-end planning system neglects the key bottleneck of materials supply between the HungryPet factories and their packaging and ingredient vendors. In response to this situation, the VP conceives a new, innovative cloud solution to improve collaboration between HungryPet and its vendors. The solution would improve and streamline the information flow, saving planner time and propagating supply requirements and confirmations faster. This would protect and enable the expected benefits of the new planning system project. Ideal as an exam question for MBA or Master students, a Teaching Note is provided. This contains a grading guide as well as sample submissions considered exemplary.

This case describes a business opportunity for B+L, a German firm that forecasts demand for construction materials. China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a large infrastructure building program, could allow B+L to broaden both its product range and its client base. The protagonist is Martin Langen, the founder and chief executive officer of B+L. His firm produces forecasts for a range of construction materials in particular geographies. The forecasts are based on publicly available data. B+L adds value by creating models that contain a variety of factors and adjustments to produce forecasts that are standard and directly comparable across regions. This kind of forecast is unavailable elsewhere, and is highly valued by construction materials makers. When China announced the BRI, a plan to build infrastructure along the old silk routes through central Asia, Martin believed B+L could create new forecast products to estimate demand for construction materials in BRI affected markets. Since these markets were not always well developed, and there was a high degree of uncertainty surrounding the BRI projects, B+L would have to develop new techniques to create the new forecasts.

PremiumSoft, a Hong Kong-based software company, relied heavily on its creative workforce to drive new product delivery, manage product upgrades, and incorporate customer feedback in its products. As founder and Director of Software Development, the core responsibility of Ken Lin was setting up strategic goals for the organization and identifying new products and opportunities for innovation to ensure the company's growth. In addition to this role, Ken had been the company's human resource (HR) manager since its founding. He alone handled all the HR-related activities including recruiting and retaining talent, and ensuring a healthy work environment. This role, however, had become more challenging over time. Demand for good developers was at an all-time high, and just across the border, Chinese companies such as Alibaba and Tencent were willing to provide Silicon Valley-like salaries and benefits to attract developers.

Yalia, a Chinese tech company that is experiencing rapid expansion overseas, has been sending more expatriates on assignment in recent years, but its approach to global mobility has not caught up. Managers are not strategic about the expatriation process. Existing mobility policy guidelines are unclear and has not been adjusted to address the company's expansion needs. Xiao Jing, the new human resources director at Yalia, is becoming frustrated with the outdated approach as she deals with a recent complaint from a Chinese mid-level manager, Fan Kewen. Fan, the head of Dubai's office, thinks it is unfair that his housing budget is lower than that of his US colleague from a newly acquired cloud solutions company, and he threatens to shorten his assignment. As she investigates further, she uncovered the difficulties of Fan working in a foreign culture, as well as differences in cultural and policy practices at Yalia and the acquired company. Jing suggests to Liu Hong, head of global strategy and managing director about a policy overhaul, but Hong dismissed, and instead asks her to use monetary incentives to keep assignees happy. What should she do? The case demonstrates how global mobility policies need to consider operational needs, business strategy and talent strategies. It breaks down the components of an expatriate package, and shows how culture can play into its design. It also shows the impact of having a well-structured, strategic approach to managing mobility programs.

The case examines the strategy, impact, and sustainability of a boutique philanthropy with a big goal: change the way people donate to charities. Epic Foundation was founded to support a portfolio of children's charities. Now, its leadership was considering taking on a broader role: to reshape the very nature of charitable giving-in the U.S., France, the United Kingdom and globally. Its wealthy, charismatic leader, Alexandre Mars, thought that Epic could be at the forefront of a movement to transform the global culture of giving. But there was an open question among the fundraising, communications and marketing teams at Epic about how to jockey between the management and growth of its portfolio and this new advocacy orientation. It was unclear whether Epic could simultaneously pursue both. Should Epic continue to grow and possibly diversify its portfolio of charities, or should it focus more on an advocacy model? Mars wanted to advocate for "making giving the norm"-a call for citizens to make frequent charitable donations through work, point-of-purchase and online channels. But were Epic's ideas truly innovative when it came to fostering this giving norm and was it positioned to advocate for it?

The case recaps the development of a contemporary online furniture brand in China, and the path of development to ride on the wave of digital retail. From an art store in Beijing's 798 Art District to becoming an online furniture brand on Tmall, Uvanart has positioned itself as an "affordable and artistic" furniture brand and built quite a following in the last few years. But China's home furniture market is fiercely competitive. Traditional custom-furniture brands Oppein (欧派家居), Soufeiya (索菲亚), and Homekoo (尚品宅配) have all gone public. Internet giants Alibaba and Tencent have teamed up with retail mall operators Easy Home (居然之家) and Red Star Macalline (红星美凯龙), to gain a foothold in the growing market. Online furniture design brands like Zaozuo (造作) and Ziin (吱音) have won the hearts of China's millennial consumers as well as venture capitalists seeking high growth investment opportunities. Growth and scale are critical to Uvanart in the coming years. Was the "affordable and artistic" brand strategy a sustainable differentiation?

MP Maintenance was a social enterprise composed of several micro-businesses (landscaping, window cleaning, pressure washing, graffiti removal, litter pick up, etc.) offering transitional employment to individuals previously living on the streets. Like many budding social enterprises, MP Maintenance needed to carefully balance the organization's social mission and the financial competitiveness of the services that it offered. In May 2016, Matt Smedley, executive director and chief executive officer, and David Greaves, general manager, sat together in the company board room awaiting the arrival of the four college students who had agreed to help them develop a marketing strategy. Their common goal was to enable the social enterprise to continue to deliver on its mission - supporting the employees of Mission Possible - while generating an unrestricted flow of revenue. After seven years spent establishing and growing the business, a fresh set of eyes was welcomed.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II suggests mechanisms, tools, and techniques to help embed to excellence as the foundation of value that the organization delivers. Both contain practical examples used by well-known companies; both also contain a self-assessment diagnostic tool that enables organizations to identify where they have built significant strengths in terms of service excellence and where opportunities to enhance their operations exist. In the first volume, the first chapter introduces the distinction between customer service and service excellence and some of the drivers behind this. It also outlines the benefits of a systematic approach to service excellence.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II suggests mechanisms, tools, and techniques to help embed to excellence as the foundation of value that the organization delivers. Both contain practical examples used by well-known companies; both also contain a self-assessment diagnostic tool that enables organizations to identify where they have built significant strengths in terms of service excellence and where opportunities to enhance their operations exist. In the first volume, the second chapter considers how the brand entices by drawing the customer into a relationship. It addresses questions such as: the role branding plays for company, staff, and customer and its link to service excellence; how to develop engaging brands; how to use the brand throughout the consumer decision-making process to strengthen the customer relationship; what the role a company's core values play in brand development; and how to surface those core values.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II suggests mechanisms, tools, and techniques to help embed to excellence as the foundation of value that the organization delivers. Both contain practical examples used by well-known companies; both also contain a self-assessment diagnostic tool that enables organizations to identify where they have built significant strengths in terms of service excellence and where opportunities to enhance their operations exist. In the first volume, the third chapter considers the importance of quality, both of product and service, to establishing the customer relationship. It considers the costs both of achieving quality and of having to put it right when it has gone wrong. It provides suggestions for gaining a deeper understanding of the customer perception of quality and some consideration of evaluation tools that are available to support this understanding.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II suggests mechanisms, tools, and techniques to help embed to excellence as the foundation of value that the organization delivers. Both contain practical examples used by well-known companies; both also contain a self-assessment diagnostic tool that enables organizations to identify where they have built significant strengths in terms of service excellence and where opportunities to enhance their operations exist. In the first volume, the fourth chapter explores the importance for consumers to be able to trust the brands that they buy. It examines the role of trust in the decision-making process, in building loyalty, and its role in customer relationship marketing into the future, as customers become more involved in the development, production, and feedback of services, as well as marketing communications around services. It also considers how business processes support trust in the relationship and deliver the brand promise. Finally, It challenges companies to ask for feedback, deal with it constructively, rather than being defensive about it-own it and do something with it.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II suggests mechanisms, tools, and techniques to help embed to excellence as the foundation of value that the organization delivers. Both contain practical examples used by well-known companies; both also contain a self-assessment diagnostic tool that enables organizations to identify where they have built significant strengths in terms of service excellence and where opportunities to enhance their operations exist. In the first volume, the fifth chapter explores why customer needs are paramount and discusses customer needs versus customer desires-what do customers really want? It looks at customer expectations and satisfaction. How should organizations manage customers when things go wrong-what are the effects of fade or walk away versus active strategies that re-engage customers back into the fold? It also examines what makes service delivery fun for customers and staff alike.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II focuses on approaches that will embed excellence, promote loyalty and advocacy, and ensure freshness of a product or service offering. These are all aspects that help to deliver sustainability for the organization, representing some of the robust strategies available to organizations, building on earlier robust strategies of outside-in thinking, branding, segmentation, quality, and trust building explored in the first volume. In the second volume, the first chapter explores ways in which drama and excitement can provide a more rewarding role for staff, resulting in added value and relevance for the customer, and helping cement the relationship, and promote loyalty.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II focuses on approaches that will embed excellence, promote loyalty and advocacy, and ensure freshness of a product or service offering. These are all aspects that help to deliver sustainability for the organization, representing some of the robust strategies available to organizations, building on earlier robust strategies of outside-in thinking, branding, segmentation, quality, and trust building explored in the first volume. In the second volume, the second chapter explores the shift from transactional marketing to relationship building and ways in which this can be made part of the genetic make-up of the organization, rather than superficial window dressing.

Service Excellence in Organizations, Eight Key Steps to Follow and Achieve It, is a two-volume book published by Business Expert Press in 2019 and written by Fiona Urquhart, who leads Durham University's MBA module on service excellence and has consulted for an array of service and manufacturing organizations. Volume I deals with the basic tenets of service excellence, while Volume II focuses on approaches that will embed excellence, promote loyalty and advocacy, and ensure freshness of a product or service offering. These are all aspects that help to deliver sustainability for the organization, representing some of the robust strategies available to organizations, building on earlier robust strategies of outside-in thinking, branding, segmentation, quality, and trust building explored in the first volume. In the second volume, the third chapter considers how innovation in products and services, but also in systems, can ensure that the organization maintains its relevance for staff and existing customers, whilst also presenting them with new and exciting alternatives.

A doctor in the Department of Pediatrics at Riverdale Hospital, an Australian hospital affiliated with the faculty of medicine at a leading nearby university, reported directly to the chair of the department. The doctor received funding for his research in the amount of $380,000 per year, but because he was not a tenured faculty member, he was not able to directly control the contributions. Instead, the fund was administered by the department chair, under the doctor’s supervision. While checking the accounting of the fund in December 2010, the doctor discovered an irregularity that made him doubt the chair’s administration of the donations. As more clues and irregularities emerged, the doctor became convinced that the fund was being mismanaged and that this mismanagement was being covered up. When he eventually confronted the chair, he found himself in a stressful and difficult situation, with little support. In 2018, the dean of medicine circulated an external audit that claimed there had been no wrongdoing, and the doctor found himself facing a much larger, stronger opponent. Should he take action, pursuing civil or criminal charges? Should he leave the institution and take the donations with him? Should he stay where he was and deal with the consequences?

In 2017, the German grocery chain Lidl Stiftung & Co. KG (Lidl) opened its first 20 U.S. stores in the southern states of Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Key target segments of Lidl were budget-conscious customers, middle-class families with children, and elderly customers on a fixed income. Lidl offered lower prices than its competitors and quickly gained a strong advantage in the marketplace. Despite high early consumer demand, however, Lidl struggled to hit the correct target market for each of its different locations in terms of tastes and demographics. With plans for 100 U.S.-based locations by the summer of 2018, Lidl had set its sights high. What could Lidl do to meet its U.S. market goals and expand into the future?

In 2012, Griffiths Energy International Inc. had secured the land leases needed to begin drilling for oil in Chad and was preparing for an IPO. During the due diligence, the company’s lawyers found consulting contracts that appeared to be payments to a public official to gain a business advantage. While bribing officials was not uncommon in Chad, it was a criminal offence in Canada. The company’s senior executive team was new, and the founder and former chairman, who might have been able to explain the contracts, had died in a boating accident. The directors needed to decide what to do: continue with the IPO and deal with disclosure if the matter did surface at some point later or report the findings to the authorities now and bear the consequences.

Supplement for product 9B18C031.