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In 1970 Xerox had a very progressive affirmative action program yet, once hired, black employees faced serious problems, due both to overt discrimination and to their exclusion from the informal networks of support, information and mentoring that the other salespeople shared. The black employees responded by establishing seven independent support groups around the United States. These black caucuses functioned as both self-help groups to prepare black employees for promotion and as pressure groups to push for policy changes within Xerox. In 1974 Xerox fears the caucuses are forming a national organization. Students must decide how to respond to this potentially dangerous situation.

Describes the compromise worked out between Xerox and the black caucus groups. The implications of this arrangement for Xerox and black employees over the next 16 years is also described.

Describes the development of a successful corporate strategy based on the acquisition and subsequent consolidation of low-technology manufacturing companies. Starting with a company history and discussion of current business segments, the case goes on to detail the innovation of corporate headquarters in strategy formulation and operations. Highlights the synergistic possibilities in alike acquisitions and addresses the issue of long-term value creation in acquisition-oriented firms. Emphasis is placed on the systems and procedures installed to implement the corporate strategy.

Spreadsheet supplement for case 391-095.

More and more managers today are changing their company's performance measurement systems to track nonfinancial metrics like quality, customer satisfaction, innovation, and market share. They believe these measures reflect a company's economic condition and growth prospects better than its reported earnings do. New technologies and more sophisticated databases have made the change to nonfinancial performance measurement systems possible and economically feasible.

The Plane Truth, a newspaper started by a group of flight attendants at the struggling Century Airlines, was considered one of the successes of the company's Century Spirit change program. With time, though, the Plane Truth began to run articles critical of management and of other work groups. Worried the paper was sabotaging the Spirit program, the president asked the human resources director to cancel it. Experts on organizational change and motivation analyze the situation.

How can manufacturing companies streamline processes to shrink the all-important time-to-market span? How can managers and team members learn useful lessons from past efforts? Getting R&D, manufacturing, and marketing to communicate is still the biggest hurdle. The Return Map answers these challenges by providing a graphic way to bring all functions together, first for estimating costs and time, then for tracking projects as they evolve.

Today technology is creating greater customer choice, and choice is altering the marketplace. Six principles define the new marketing: marketing is a way of doing business that pervades the entire company; companies must dispel their limiting market-share mentality; programmable technology promises to open up almost limitless choice for customers; a feedback loop is making advertising's one-way communication obsolete; the line between services and products is eroding; and the marriage of marketing and technology is inevitable.

Transforming Bell Atlantic from a bureaucratic, monopolistic company into an efficient entrepreneurial competitor meant creating a new mind-set and sense of teamwork for each employee. Raymond Smith credits his company's successful change to behavior established through the Bell Atlantic Way -- an improvement program stressing teamwork and accountability.

Many companies have embraced the Just-In-Time manufacturing method because of the zeal with which its successes were reported. But JIT is a simple idea, and therefore often complicated to implement. In its pure form, JIT emphasizes low cost, high quality, and the consolidation of the product line--a smaller number of products and fewer options. It does not mean recklessly slashing inventories without having inventory buffers in place.

In July 1991, South African president F.W. de Klerk announced the appointment of Hermanus Kriel to the cabinet post of minister of law and order. As the official responsible for oversight of the controversial national police force, the South African Police (SAP), Kriel would perhaps have the hardest job in a rapidly changing South Africa: a job made all the more daunting by recent revelations of a police role in fanning the flames of factional strife among blacks. The growing scandal had reinforced the SAP's reputation among black South Africans as one of the most hated symbols of white rule. For over four decades, the South African Police had been entrusted with enforcing the country's notorious and iniquitous system of apartheid--a task it had performed with what many regarded as excessive zeal and brutality. All this had been done by the SAP in the name of the apartheid system, which it was sworn to uphold. Yet as the 1980s drew to a close, the underpinnings of that system began to change dramatically and SAP's mission was no longer in force. This case details the changes that took place within SAP during the post-apartheid period. It should be paired with HKS830 (Part B). HKS Case Number 1095.0.

An antiquated airport jeopardizes a region's economic health but the county of Albany, New York, operator of the airport, lacks funds to undertake much-needed capital improvements. In this context, the county executive seriously examines privatization-selling the airport off to a private developer with a background in airport management. This case is designed to permit a full discussion of the potential merits and drawbacks of privatization of such a large public facility. It raises such issues as monopoly power and ease of access to capital. The decision to permit the Albany privatization is ultimately made by the Federal Aviation Administration, thus allowing the case to raise national as well as local issues. HKS Case Number 1024.0

An antiquated airport jeopardizes a region's economic health but the county of Albany, New York, operator of the airport, lacks funds to undertake much-needed capital improvements. In this context, the county executive seriously examines privatization-selling the airport off to a private developer with a background in airport management. This case is designed to permit a full discussion of the potential merits and drawbacks of privatization of such a large public facility. It raises such issues as monopoly power and ease of access to capital. The decision to permit the Albany privatization is ultimately made by the Federal Aviation Administration, thus allowing the case to raise national as well as local issues. HKS Case Number 1024.1

When the Seattle Solid Waste Utility, the department responsible for trash pick-up and disposal, moved during 1988-90 to introduce curbside recycling and other dramatic changes in garbage collection, director Diana Gale believed presentation of the utility's plans to the press would be crucial to their prospects for public acceptance. This case recounts the elaborate but successful strategies Gale employed, ranging from training sessions for utility employees run by former television news anchors, to the advent of the utility's own weekly newsletter to track problems and changes in the new garbage program. HKS Case Number 1058.0

Researchers at Merck & Co. believe that a drug they had developed for animals might be an effective treatment for human river blindness, a debilitating illness that affects hundreds of thousands of poor people in the Third World. The process of development and testing, however, will be enormously costly. Should the company devote critical resources to developing the drug, knowing that, even if it were medically successful, it would yield little financial return? The case presents background on economic and scientific constraints that shape the pharmaceutical industry. It provides a framework for discussing ethical aspects of product innovation and the risks and benefits of investments in research. It may be used in Strategic Management, Business and Society, and Ethics courses.

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).

Supplements Merck & Co., Inc.: Addressing Third-World Needs (A).

Chronicles three decades of a forklift truck company's industrial design strategy. Having grown rapidly from a small, pioneering niche-company to a leading, full-range, global producer, Crown is reevaluating its design services strategy. Discusses the company's long-term relationship with its design consultants and the pros and cons of establishing an in-house design department at this point in its history. Students need to decide whether Crown should opt for in-house design services, stay with its former design consultants, or look for new consultants.

Discusses the new, in-house design department at Crown and brings the story up to 1991.