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Following the uncertainty of regulatory reform under Brexit and the new Trump administration era, this installment of Accounting Matters explores the future of international financial reporting standards (IFRS). I interviewed Mr. Hans Hoogervorst, Chairmanof the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), and Mr. Michael Izza, Chief Executive of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW). The two give their opinions on what they see as the lasting impact of Brexit and the Trump era on their organizations and accounting standards internationally.

This article introduces a new concept, embedded ethics, to explain the subtle impact that complex systems and structures have on ethical outcomes. We define embedded ethics as the entrenched complex of networked structural indicators that subtly and silently direct actions in the form of normalized industrial, organizational, and/or functional-role behavior. We then describe two examples-one from the legal systems (corporate governance) and one from business (shareholder value)-to demonstrate the usefulness of this concept in helping to identify opportunities to improve unethical outcomes in systems in which actors otherwise are understood as just doing their job. The concept of embedded ethics is especially critical in our too-big-to-fail corporate environment and Post-Internet Age of technological innovation.

Despite considerable recent advances in big data analytics, there is substantial evidence that many organizations have failed to incorporate them effectively in their own decision making processes. Advancing the existing understandings, this article lays out the steps necessary to implement big data strategies successfully. To this end, we first explain how the big data analytics cycle can provide useful insights into the characteristics of the environments in which many organizations operate. Next, we review some common challenges faced by many organizations in their uses of big data analytics and offer specific recommendations for mitigating them. Among these recommendations, which are rooted in the findings of strategy implementation research, we emphasize managerial responsibilities in providing continued commitment and support, the effective communication and coordination of efforts, and the development of big data knowledge and expertise. Finally, in order to help managers obtain a fundamental knowledge of big data analytics, we provide an easy-to-understand explanation of important big data algorithms and illustrate their successful applications through a number of real-life examples.

The labor market has long included individuals seeking nonemployee, alternative work arrangements. Now, alternative work arrangements such as freelancing, independent contracting, and temporary contracts have entered the lexicon through the following terminology: the gig economy, the sharing economy, the YouEconomy, agile workforce, and contingent workers. There are currently an estimated 18.6 million independent contractors engaged in direct selling. This article reports the first attempt to empirically investigate and document both the economic and social impacts of direct selling in the U.S. Our findings suggest that direct selling has a consequential impact on the U.S. economy and that the direct selling experience fosters a variety of skills that benefit professional activities as well as the personal lives of millions of independent workers.

Strategy is an important tool for competitive success and how firms formulate and implement strategy is widely discussed in both the academic and practitioner literature. Historically, there has been a divide between strategy formulation and execution. Strategy formulation has largely been associated with top management teams, while implementation was assigned to middle and lower-level managers. Organizations can benefit from broadening the strategy formulation process to include a range of both external and internal stakeholders. In this article, we explore the promise and risks associated with open strategy and offer some suggestions for overcoming associated dysfunctions.

While previous studies and management conventions often adopted a finance-centric perspective of cross-border mergers and acquisitions (CBM&A or CBA), we demonstrate that CBA can be an effective platform upon which to build a global corporate social responsibility (CSR) program and that CSR initiatives can be customized for different locales. These CSR-CBA interconnections and customizations respond to a range of stakeholder interests associated with both national and societal institutional factors. We develop a managerial framework for the CSR-CBA setting and illustrate the framework with an exemplar of international expansion through acquisitions combined with the international development and implementation of CSR.

The purpose of this article is to describe how innovative organizations work beyond traditional overlays of rules, hierarchy, and process. This cultural context is best described as tribal and can be framed as seven key instincts: ambition, emergent structure, roles and responsibilities, trust, navigation, resolve, and sacrifice. This tribal approach provides a useful framework for organizations seeking to improve their predisposition for discovering extraordinary ideas.

It was March 2019, and Fermin Diez, Deputy CEO of the National Council of Social Service (NCSS), ran the Sun Ray scheme that had been launched in 2014 to mitigate manpower issues due to pay disparity and lack of career progression in the social service sector. Singapore's heretofore prosperity did not result in an even distribution of wealth, and with the changing demographics, Social Service Agencies (SSAs) required assistance in identifying and improving various programmes to support vulnerable groups. The government had recently announced plans to provide more support with the goal of building a more caring and compassionate society. NCSS had administered several leadership programmes to develop human capital and support organisations in the sector to strengthen the local social service ecosystem. However, the previous leadership programmes introduced experienced limited success due to low participation rates and the heavy workloads of staff in the social service sector. The newer Sun Ray scheme would instead centrally hire potential social service leaders under the NCSS payroll and second them out to SSAs. In return, the SSAs were required to pay a subsidised secondment fee to NCSS. This way, individual SSAs would benefit from good leaders at subsidised salaries while the impact of each Sun Rayz would not be limited to any particular SSA. Diez knew that the scheme had been successful, but sought to make improvements.

Stanley Cirano owns two retail shopping centers in suburban Chicago. With interest rates near all-time lows in late 2015, Cirano believed it was an opportune time to consider the debt financing of his properties. Although the properties were similar in many respects, the lenders willing to lend against each property were offering noticeably different terms. Cirano had to consider not only the interest rate and size of each potential loan but also the differing fees, potential prepayment penalties, and variations in recourse to make the best decision for each property.

Student spreadsheet to case KE1106

This case examines the transformation of the University of Virginia Health System (UVAHS) into a leader of operational excellence focused on both patient outcomes and health care team members' well-being with its signature quality improvement and safety program, Be Safe. The case provides opportunities for class discussions in several areas, including managing organizational change, understanding senior leadership in launching and implementing a major operational transformation, and applying Lean principles and methods in health care operations. It also exposes students to issues currently facing the health care industry, particularly from an academic hospital standpoint. It concentrates on the improvement activities led by Dr. Tracey Hoke, chief of quality and performance improvement for UVAHS, during the first two years of the Be Safe initiative to lay the foundation for future success in all aspects of patient care.

This case, a follow-up to "The University of Virginia Health System: The Next Generation of Quality Care and Patient Safety (A)" (UV7975) continues to follow the University of Virginia Health System's (UVAHS's) transformation into a leader of operational excellence focused on both patient outcomes and the well-being of health care team members with Be Safe, its new signature quality improvement and safety program. This case gives students an opportunity to engage more deeply in class discussions in several areas, including managing organizational change, understanding supportive leadership actions on multiple levels, and implementing Lean principles and methods in service line-structured operations. It also exposes students to issues currently facing the health care industry, particularly from an academic hospital standpoint. The case first follows UVAHS's realignment of hospital team members, physicians, and the School of Medicine into service lines for performance management. In the case, a closer look at a successful service line, Neurosciences & Behavioral Health, gives students an opportunity to examine key management decision points involved in executing a new organizational vision. The case then presents a current management challenge; how to improve Leader Standard Work (LSW) for 300 midlevel managers-assistant nurse managers, nurse managers, and medical directors-to provide mechanisms for reinforcing accountability during performance management in service lines.

Tessa Lyons was a rising star at Facebook. She had been the project manager in charge of news feed integrity for a little over a year, stationed at the front lines in the battle against misinformation and "fake news." However, in early 2019, she faced an ethical dilemma that could define her tenure at the company and perhaps her career: whether to ban Alex Jones and the content from his platform, Infowars, from the Facebook news feed.

Since its establishment in 1973, LUXOR SA had come to occupy a strong position in the international market. However, important changes were occurring in the international computer market which the company had to take into account. Increased market pressure and a more demanding clientele was drastically changing the role of salespeople; instead of selling ready-made products, they began working with the clients, identifying their specific product needs as well as advising them on appropriate market strategies. Salespeople had to have higher technical and scientific competences, financial and marketing knowledge, and negotiation skills. It seemed evident that LUXOR SA needed to design a program that would prepare and help people progressively handle organization and market changes. In late 2003, the new CEO decided that a structural reorganization and policy revision would be necessary to maintain a viable position in the global market. Keeping in mind the external changes in the business, LUXOR SA intended to take the steps needed to become an innovative, trend-setting, marketing-driven organization.

This short case provides an update to Elon Musk's strategy and tactical moves with Tesla, Solar City, and SpaceX from 2016-2019.

Launched in 2014, Amazon's Echo and Echo Dot smart speakers led the category's rapid adoption by households and enabled the penetration of artificial intelligence (AI) voice assistants into the everyday lives of millions of people. By 2019, Alexa the virtual brains behind Amazon's smart speakers was able to play music, create reminders, get weather reports, control lights and other home appliances, shop, and do much more in response to voice commands. Amazon had developed significant new capabilities for Alexa, developed an entire ecosysgtem around it, expanded Alexa's user base to more than 100 million users, and made significant progress in monetizing its digital voice assistant. However, Alexa's progress also created new challenges for Amazon, its Alexa-enabled customers, and society at large. Amazon needed to identify and address these challenges in order to encourage continued consumer acceptance and preclude detrimental government or regulatory action.

In 2015, Mauricio Macri became President of Argentina and declared solving the energy crisis as one of his top priorities. When Macri's administration attempted to raise utility tariffs, however, it faced loud protests from citizens. In search of solutions to growing shortages, the government seized on Argentina's still largely untapped, but potentially vast renewable energy sector and created an ambitious program called RenovAr (renew in Spanish). By 2016, the country's share of renewable energy stood at less than 2 percent of the power mix. RenovAr's goal was to raise that percentage to 20 percent by 2025. More renewable energy in the electric system was a welcome improvement, but seamlessly integrating renewables into electricity grids had proven challenging in many countries. Argentina's cash-strapped wholesale electricity market, which for the better part of two decades had seen few upgrades, would have to contend with a host of expected and unexpected bottlenecks.

This case challenges students to solve a riddle: How did Motorola's share in the Indian market fall so dramatically while cell phone adoption in India skyrocketed and Motorola was launching one of its most successful products globally? The case is set in the mid-2000s, when Motorola had just rolled out the Razr phone and the firm was approaching the ten-year anniversary of its entry to the Indian market. Motorola's market share in India had fallen from as high as 31% in 1998 to less than 5% in 2006. This dramatic downturn came at a time of immense growth in the Indian cell phone market.

Jonas Spangenberg, CEO of BoKlok, an entrepreneurial industrialized construction venture focused on providing low-cost housing to a sharply defined, relatively low-price market segment, must identify and manage forces within three contexts as he develops and guides BoKlok's growth strategy: the residential construction industry, and Skanksa and IKEA, BoKlok's parent companies. Students are asked to consider Spangenberg's strategic actions in relation to the external context-an industry beginning to feel the impact of information technologies (digitalization) in the design, manufacture and assembly phases of construction-and in relation to the company's internal context: parent companies Skanska and IKEA. Organizationally, BoKlok was nested within Skanska, one of the top ten construction companies in the world, and was dependent on Skanska for BoKlok's continued growth and development. Yet, historically, culturally, and from a brand perspective, BoKlok was patterned after IKEA, the low-cost furniture retailer. Spangenberg's most direct strategic challenges relate to fine-tuning BoKlok's business strategy in light of industry turbulence and, with the support of Skanska, developing a strategy for entering the U.K. market, and preparing his organization for executing the U.K. strategy. The first case can be used on its own to develop a deep understanding of the conditions that led to the founding of BoKlok and to clearly identify its novel business strategy and the success that it has been able to achieve by January 2018. The second case is set in September 2018, at the time that the Swedish housing market entered a downturn and BoKlok and parent company Skanska were dealing with the effects of contraction in their home market while preparing for BoKlok's expansion into the United Kingdom.

Uber Technologies, the privately held ride-sharing service and logistics platform, suffered a series of PR crises during 2017. As Uber's legal and PR turmoil increased, Travis Kalanick, cofounder and longtime CEO, was forced to resign as CEO, while retaining his directorship position on the nine-member board. His June 2017 resignation was meant to calm the uproar, but it instead increased investor uncertainty. In an effort to put the recent past behind the company, the directors of Uber scheduled a board meeting for October 3, 2017, to vote on critical proposals from new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi that were focused essentially on one question: How should Uber be governed now that Kalanick had stepped down as CEO? In this case, students are asked to consider the responsibilities of the Uber board of directors to the company's investors and shareholders, employees, management, and contractors as the company moves rapidly towards its long-awaited IPO. Included with the case text are board member roles for use in a role play simulating board discussion.