The two-part case study describes two attempts to empower the crews of two nuclear submarines of the US Navy. The case highlights the challenges as well as the weaknesses and strengths of the empowering process. While not against the operational principle of command and control on board a submarine, empowerment is in contrast to the traditional leadership doctrine of the US Navy which relies on the leader-follower principle. The case is based on the personal account of co-author L. David Marquet, Captain, US Navy (Ret.) and former commander of the USS Santa Fe. He authored the bestselling book "Turn the Ship Around!" that provides a more detailed account of the events described in the A and B cases.
Supplement to case ES1751. The two-part case study describes two attempts to empower the crews of two nuclear submarines of the US Navy. The case highlights the challenges as well as the weaknesses and strengths of the empowering process. While not against the operational principle of command and control on board a submarine, empowerment is in contrast to the traditional leadership doctrine of the US Navy which relies on the leader-follower principle. The case is based on the personal account of co-author L. David Marquet, Captain, US Navy (Ret.) and former commander of the USS Santa Fe. He authored the bestselling book "Turn the Ship Around!" that provides a more detailed account of the events described in the A and B cases.
This case follows the financial-statement forecasting decisions of a Deutsche Bank research analyst for the natural and organic retailer Whole Foods Market in May 2014. Students evaluate the associated financial ratios with the forecast to ascertain whether the industry dynamics and company strategy are consistent with the forecast. The case expressly focuses on the asset side of the balance sheet as a preview for other cases using free cash flow forecasting. The forecast exercise exposes students to the mechanics of financial statement modeling and sensitivity analysis. Using a supplementary exhibit, the case can also be used to explore techniques in firm valuation with students debating whether the analyst should recommend a "buy" or a "sell."
The case is set in 2014, from the perspective of Pyra, a Singaporean subscription box company for beauty products. Subscription-box services are a fairly new business model that involves the delivery of product(s) to the consumer on a periodic basis. A more recent variant of subscription-box services personalises the selection of products delivered, by closely matching products with customers' preferences. The company, in essence, becomes a personal shopping assistant for the customer. Pyra falls squarely in this last category. Pyra relies on data analytics and proprietary algorithms to personalise its selection of products. Given that customer data is central to the operation of the business, a platform that provides ease and convenience to customers in the provision of their feedback and preferences is paramount. Pyra developed a mobile app for this very purpose. The fact that its target segments are millennials and centennials, consumers who are tech savvy and always connected, makes this a sensible move. The app also makes it easy for customers to share the curated boxes they received on social media. Pyra was launched in early 2013 and has had reasonable success in its first year of operations, with double-digit month-on-month growth in customer base. There are nagging doubts, however, about whether the business will continue to be viable in the longer term. For one thing, retention of customers might prove to be a challenge, as customers' interest in accessing novel products could wane with time. In addition, with the entry of direct competition becoming an imminent event, there are looming questions about the sustainability of Pyra's competitive advantage.
In your first year as chief executive officer (CEO), you will encounter a host of management challenges and opportunities-all of which can be navigated more skillfully if you can tap into the insights and perspectives of a handful of seasoned operators and investors. For this reason, your board can have a significant impact on the company's performance. Unfortunately, CEOs often get far less value out of their boards in the first few years than they might otherwise. The purpose of this note is to ensure that CEOs use their boards as effectively and efficiently as possible.
In 2016, JCDecaux was number one in the world in outdoor advertising. This was a far cry from the situation in 2003; at that time, JCDecaux had been unseated by Clear Channel from the number-one spot that it had held for decades, and it was fighting for second place with OUTFRONT (then owned by Viacom). Over the 12 intervening years, JCDecaux had doubled in size, building leadership positions in China, Japan, Latin America, Africa, and Russia, and in 2010, it had passed Clear Channel to lead the industry once more. Now, co-CEOs Jean-François Decaux and Jean-Charles Decaux were looking for new ways and new places to grow. After the company overtook Clear Channel in 2010, Jean-François had indicated that he believed that another doubling in size was feasible, but it would probably take a major acquisition to do so. And JCDecaux faced more pressing short-term issues. The contract for London bus shelters that the company had won with much fanfare in August 2015 was behind schedule. To make matters worse, the United Kingdom's June 2016 "Brexit" vote to leave the European Union cast a shadow over the project, and the markets reacted negatively. By the start of November, JCDecaux's share price had fallen 21% since the beginning of the year. Just what the economic uncertainty of Brexit would mean for global outdoor advertising in general, and U.K. outdoor advertising in particular, was not clear. Doubling in size in such an environment appeared a daunting task.
The case opens in November 2015, after the Turkish military's shooting down of a Russian military airplane over the Turkish-Syrian border. The incident threatened to undermine the countries' political and economic ties, and starting from late 2015, the dialogue between Ankara and Moscow was suspended for several months. The case explores the initial steps toward rapprochement in June 2016. The central dilemma is this: whether in light of the existing uncertainties companies operating in both countries can resume their investments and commercial activities, or should decisions be put on hold? What is the best strategy during such turbulent times? Can companies bet that a reunion would last?
This case study is organised into five parts, meant to be read and discussed progressively. Winston Mariota, a newly hired IT Architect at LGB Bank, had developed over his career a specialisation in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). Prior to joining LGB, Mariota had recent successes in a smaller regional bank where he had replaced its outdated point-to-point style of integration with a hub-and-spoke style of integration. This enabled the bank to better manage its existing applications, and to easily add new applications with minimal disruption to operations. Mariota was headhunted by LGB and offered a job based on his expertise in application integration and reputation as a problem solver. LGB specifically wanted him to review its current IT architecture and to propose a new architecture, similar to what he had implemented in the past. Even though LGB was a larger bank with larger integration problems, Mariota decided to take up the challenge. He accepted the job offer to join LGB's technology department based in Singapore.
Supplement to case SMU425. This case study is organised into five parts, meant to be read and discussed progressively. Winston Mariota, a newly hired IT Architect at LGB Bank, had developed over his career a specialisation in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). Prior to joining LGB, Mariota had recent successes in a smaller regional bank where he had replaced its outdated point-to-point style of integration with a hub-and-spoke style of integration. This enabled the bank to better manage its existing applications, and to easily add new applications with minimal disruption to operations. Mariota was headhunted by LGB and offered a job based on his expertise in application integration and reputation as a problem solver. LGB specifically wanted him to review its current IT architecture and to propose a new architecture, similar to what he had implemented in the past. Even though LGB was a larger bank with larger integration problems, Mariota decided to take up the challenge. He accepted the job offer to join LGB's technology department based in Singapore.
Supplement to case SMU425. This case study is organised into five parts, meant to be read and discussed progressively. Winston Mariota, a newly hired IT Architect at LGB Bank, had developed over his career a specialisation in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). Prior to joining LGB, Mariota had recent successes in a smaller regional bank where he had replaced its outdated point-to-point style of integration with a hub-and-spoke style of integration. This enabled the bank to better manage its existing applications, and to easily add new applications with minimal disruption to operations. Mariota was headhunted by LGB and offered a job based on his expertise in application integration and reputation as a problem solver. LGB specifically wanted him to review its current IT architecture and to propose a new architecture, similar to what he had implemented in the past. Even though LGB was a larger bank with larger integration problems, Mariota decided to take up the challenge. He accepted the job offer to join LGB's technology department based in Singapore.
Supplement to case SMU425. This case study is organised into five parts, meant to be read and discussed progressively. Winston Mariota, a newly hired IT Architect at LGB Bank, had developed over his career a specialisation in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). Prior to joining LGB, Mariota had recent successes in a smaller regional bank where he had replaced its outdated point-to-point style of integration with a hub-and-spoke style of integration. This enabled the bank to better manage its existing applications, and to easily add new applications with minimal disruption to operations. Mariota was headhunted by LGB and offered a job based on his expertise in application integration and reputation as a problem solver. LGB specifically wanted him to review its current IT architecture and to propose a new architecture, similar to what he had implemented in the past. Even though LGB was a larger bank with larger integration problems, Mariota decided to take up the challenge. He accepted the job offer to join LGB's technology department based in Singapore.
Supplement to case SMU425. This case study is organised into five parts, meant to be read and discussed progressively. Winston Mariota, a newly hired IT Architect at LGB Bank, had developed over his career a specialisation in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI). Prior to joining LGB, Mariota had recent successes in a smaller regional bank where he had replaced its outdated point-to-point style of integration with a hub-and-spoke style of integration. This enabled the bank to better manage its existing applications, and to easily add new applications with minimal disruption to operations. Mariota was headhunted by LGB and offered a job based on his expertise in application integration and reputation as a problem solver. LGB specifically wanted him to review its current IT architecture and to propose a new architecture, similar to what he had implemented in the past. Even though LGB was a larger bank with larger integration problems, Mariota decided to take up the challenge. He accepted the job offer to join LGB's technology department based in Singapore.
In October 2016, Nevzat Aydin, co-founder and CEO of Yemeksepeti, the Turkish online food-ordering company, was looking over the company's quarterly results and projections for the upcoming year with his management team. It had been almost a year and a half since Aydin had agreed to sell the company's shares to Delivery Hero, the Berlin-based global leader in online and mobile food ordering, for $589 million. In 2016, the company had had grown to include more than 13,000 member restaurants servicing six million users and achieved a 41% year-on-year growth. Yemeksepeti operated with an EBITDA margin of over 50%. Although the company had introduced other revenue streams over the years, commissions remained as the main source of income. Aydin believed that, while there was plenty of room to grow by taking market share from phone orders, much could be done by revenue diversification; the company simply had too much valuable data to be ignored. What should the company do to take advantage of its data analysis capabilities and the new technologies on the market? What kind of outside-the-box solutions could create additional revenue streams and vertical growth capabilities? What about the cohort analysis and data generated from order histories? He motivated his the management team to come up with new ideas to put the vast amount of transaction data to use. The case describes potential avenues for a company to monetize its data, illustrates the pros and cons of each option. The case will help students think about how to prioritize growth over diversification, and forward think with regards to new technologies and customer trends.
BIM, Turkey's giant retailer with a hard-discount model for the popular segments, must decide whether to launch a brand-new format challenging the modern supermarkets. Since its founding in 1995, BIM has adhered to a business model based on a relentless focus on costs and operational efficiency, built on private labels and an unswerving limit on SKUs. Unprecedented in Turkey, the success of this retail concept propelled BIM to an IPO in the Istanbul Stock Exchange and to being the country's largest retail company by market capitalization. Seeing an opportunity to pioneer the format internationally, the company was now also in Morocco and Egypt. While the hard-discount format was still growing, in 2014 Haluk Dortluoglu, the company's CFO, began to develop an entirely new retail model for Turkey- FILE, a discount supermarket. FILE would carry many more SKUs in larger stores and compete head-to-head with national and local supermarkets. Throughout the year, in their various executive committee meetings, the senior executives of the company have debated the many issues posed by a totally different retail format and the advisability of launching it. Finally, in its first meeting of 2015, the company's board of directors are set on reaching a decision on FILE.
In late 2015, South African telecommunications giant MTN was fined US$5.2 billion by the Nigerian authorities for a mass of improperly registered subscribers—the largest fine of its kind ever imposed in the industry anywhere in the world. MTN was an emerging-market multinational corporation with a track record of successfully operating in some of the toughest, riskiest emerging markets. Thus, it was surprising that MTN had been unable to avoid a fine of this magnitude. Three factors had preceded the fine and changed the business environment in Nigeria leading up to 2015: the first was the war against the Boko Haram movement in Nigeria, which led security forces to demand the registration of prepaid phone cards; the second was the economic crisis caused by the impact of falling oil prices; and the third factor was a change in government. In light of these political risks and government regulations, how could MTN recover and move forward from this difficult situation?
In late 2015, South African telecommunications giant MTN was fined US$5.2 billion by the Nigerian authorities for a mass of improperly registered subscribers-the largest fine of its kind ever imposed in the industry anywhere in the world. MTN was an emerging-market multinational corporation with a track record of successfully operating in some of the toughest, riskiest emerging markets. Thus, it was surprising that MTN had been unable to avoid a fine of this magnitude. Three factors had preceded the fine and changed the business environment in Nigeria leading up to 2015: the first was the war against the Boko Haram movement in Nigeria, which led security forces to demand the registration of prepaid phone cards; the second was the economic crisis caused by the impact of falling oil prices; and the third factor was a change in government. In light of these political risks and government regulations, how could MTN recover and move forward from this difficult situation?
Supplement to case KS1212. The case - Miami-Dade County and Sea Level Rise - focuses on the politics and economics of local adaptation to the threat of climate change impacts. Specifically it focuses on whether a jurisdiction -Miami-Dade County - should amend a draft consent decree to fix and upgrade the county's sewerage system by including investments in adaptation to climate change. The County has three sewerage treatment plants, all of which are built on the coast and thus vulnerable to possible sea level rise, particularly in an era of more intense storms. The case provides a basis to assess three key issues: 1. How certain are the possible impacts of sea level rise over the next thirty years?; 2. What are the political and economic challenges of allocating present financial revenues for benefits in the future that could be significant, but are uncertain?; and 3. If such investments are approved, who should pay for them?