Describes the entrepreneurial leadership of Jack Manning Bancroft (JMB), a young Australian Indigenous university student who created the Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience (AIME), a nonprofit organization he formed to respond to the problem of Indigenous high school students completing high school at less than half the rate of non- Indigenous students. The case traces the strategic, organizational and cultural challenges JMB faced in building an organization that eventually offered mentoring partnerships to 8000 Indigenous students in 350 high schools throughout Australia. Furthermore, the AIME students were completing school and going on to university at the same rate as nonindigenous students. The case concludes as JMB contemplates taking his successful, sophisticated model to the United States.
Roush Performance manufactured and marketed factory-modified performance vehicles and high-end aftermarket automotive performance parts. Since its inception, Roush Performance had focused on building its engineering technology competency and diversifying its product portfolio to grow sales. Many of its engineers were proud to be on the forefront of technological innovations with the company. In contrast, Roush's marketing and sales divisions had a somewhat passive role. The sales culture was stagnant, and sales compensation, a key factor in motivating salespeople, had remained unchanged for 25 years. Sales compensation is one of the key elements in an organization's sales management strategy. It is used as a primary mechanism to motivate salespeople and represents the lion's share of a firm's expenditures. Sales organizations have to constantly update their compensation practices to continually motivate their salespeople as the firm's sales strategy changes to adapt to evolving market conditions. In 2018, Roush's growth was down, and its salespeople had become shortsighted and complacent. A new sales compensation plan seemed necessary to better align salespeople with Roush's goals. The case outlines the challenges of designing a new sales compensation structure that can better motivate salespeople. The case focuses on salespeople but can relate to other employees and, thus, applicable to general HR management.
In August 2017, AMC Networks Inc. (AMCN), a New York City-based cable television provider, faced a lawsuit from the creative talent behind the hit show The Walking Dead. The lawsuit charged that AMCN used its vertical integration into content development to reduce the profits available for distribution to participants. For AMCN, which was originally a content distributor, expanding into content creation through its AMC Studios had several benefits. However, the industry was changing with the advent of online streaming services such as Netflix Inc., Hulu, and Amazon Prime, as well as an industry-wide shift among cable networks to offer proprietary content. These changes had an impact on the relationship between the business and the creative side of the industry. AMCN's chief executive officer had to decide how to respond to the lawsuit.
In December 2017, the corporate vice-president of Microsoft Corporation's Devices division was considering two options to chart a strategic course for the next few years. Since first joining Microsoft Corporation in 2004, one of the vice-president's key roles had been to oversee the strategic direction of the personal computing hardware business. The company, which was headquartered in Washington State in the United States, had a multitude of products and services that presented both opportunities and challenges for its future. Microsoft Corporation had to decide between two project options that represented growth in different business areas in Asia Pacific. The first option was to launch new products from the company's Surface division in the Asia Pacific market. This could be Microsoft Corporation's opportunity to showcase its holistic devices ecosystem to prospective customers in the region. The second option was to intensify efforts to market and sell the firm's cloud solutions. This could further differentiate Microsoft Corporation as an early mover enabling enterprises to migrate to the cloud.
In December 2017, the corporate vice-president of Microsoft Corporation’s Devices division was considering two options to chart a strategic course for the next few years. Since first joining Microsoft Corporation in 2004, one of the vice-president's key roles had been to oversee the strategic direction of the personal computing hardware business. The company, which was headquartered in Washington State in the United States, had a multitude of products and services that presented both opportunities and challenges for its future. Microsoft Corporation had to decide between two project options that represented growth in different business areas in Asia Pacific. The first option was to launch new products from the company's Surface division in the Asia Pacific market. This could be Microsoft Corporation’s opportunity to showcase its holistic devices ecosystem to prospective customers in the region. The second option was to intensify efforts to market and sell the firm’s cloud solutions. This could further differentiate Microsoft Corporation as an early mover enabling enterprises to migrate to the cloud.
In August 2017, AMC Networks Inc. (AMCN), a New York City–based cable television provider, faced a lawsuit from the creative talent behind the hit show The Walking Dead. The lawsuit charged that AMCN used its vertical integration into content development to reduce the profits available for distribution to participants. For AMCN, which was originally a content distributor, expanding into content creation through its AMC Studios had several benefits. However, the industry was changing with the advent of online streaming services such as Netflix Inc., Hulu, and Amazon Prime, as well as an industry-wide shift among cable networks to offer proprietary content. These changes had an impact on the relationship between the business and the creative side of the industry. AMCN’s chief executive officer had to decide how to respond to the lawsuit.
This case study illustrates various incentives in the healthcare system using recent research in economics. Healthcare is important but it is difficult to objectively measure it from the perspective of providers, patients and third parties. Hence, incentives are used to motivate behavior in both providers and patients. The design of incentives is an enduring challenge and the case study tries to motivate managers to think through this problem in more detail.
Companies seeking to lead organic growth in their industry should start with a coherent, positive innovation narrative and reinforce it with action. Four innovation levers that organic growth leaders use to stay ahead of competitors are: (1) investing in innovation talent, (2) encouraging prudent risk-taking, (3) adopting a customer-centric innovation process, and (4) aligning metrics and recognition with innovation.
The biggest consumer goods companies shell out more than $1 billion a year for R&D but lately have seen no appreciable impact on their sales. That's troubling for companies whose growth has plateaued in recent years. In contrast, some smaller competitors that spend less on R&D - but do so more shrewdly - have seen a significant boost in sales. In this sector, innovators needn't bet big to reap returns.
Companies often treat social media as the conversation that represents what consumers are saying about any given brand. But research shows that online and offline conversations are different beasts. Even though they both drive sales, they need to be measured and managed separately.
While anonymous feedback in teams can sometimes be less than constructive, when used the right way, digital chat tools that provide anonymity can help managers gauge employee morale and drive change.
Digital customer service agents (known as virtual assistants, chatbots, or softbots) are typically used to sift through and process only the most straightforward customer inquiries, such as requests for basic information. At most companies, complex issues get passed along to human agents. In that regard, public sector agencies in Australia are ahead of the curve: They are using digital agents to handle complex inquiries from citizens, and businesses stand to learn much from these applications.
There are clear benefits for companies allowing website users to login with social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, and Google. But the ease of user access that social logins make possible comes at a price: The platforms learn a great deal more about users' buying and searching behavior via these agreements - information that could wind up helping the company's competitors (including the platform itself) down the line.
The world of hackathons brings the study of balancing high-speed, creative autonomy and administrative control to bear in many interesting ways for managers across different industries.
First National Healthcare (FNH) runs a large network of hospitals and has worked to systematically reduce waiting times in its emergency departments. One of FNH's regional networks has run a successful marketing campaign promoting its low ED waiting times that other regions want to emulate. The corporate quality manager must now determine whether to allow these campaigns to be rolled out and, if so, which waiting time estimates to use. Are the numbers currently being reported accurate? Is there a more accurate way of estimating patient waiting time that can be easily understood by consumers?
In September 2018, the leadership team of Agarwal Packers and Movers Limited (APML) gathered for a meeting at the company's headquarters, located in the heart of New Delhi, India. The founder was considering whether the company should go public by the end of 2019. Since APML's inception in 1987, the team had worked hard to create a healthy brand recall, establish customer loyalty, and build a robust financial base. However, in the 18 months leading up to the intended initial public offering, the founder needed to consider two key questions: How could the company create and maintain service differentiation in an industry characterized by low entry barriers and limited pricing flexibility? How could it deliver quality service to retain customer loyalty?
How Richard Taylor, an African-American real estate developer, created an opportunity for African Americans to invest in a downtown Boston deal to build a major hotel.