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Faced with declining market share and sales, Natura, Brazil's second largest brand in the cosmetics, fragrances, and toiletries market, expanded its customer reach by moving from a direct-sales company to a multichannel company. In 2014, Natura added online catalogs, physical stores, and drugstores to its well-established direct-selling model, but the results were disappointing. Between 2014 and 2016, three different Natura CEOs attempted to lead the company in the strategic transition to focus less on the direct sales consultants and more on reaching the end consumers directly with multiple channels and touchpoints. On October 2016, the company's board appointed its former commercial vice president, João Paulo Ferreira, as the most recent CEO. Ferreira's challenge was to find the right balance between the direct-selling and other channel formats to market Natura, thus enabling it to thrive in the face of intense competition in the beauty and personal care market in Brazil.

This is a collection of four caselets that aim to provide a rich discussion around why experimentation in business is important and how it can be properly designed to improve short-term tactical and long-term strategic decisions. Specifically, this document presents four different business problems that could be resolved with proper experimentation techniques. The decisions range from the initial evaluation of whether an experiment is needed to how it can be designed, implemented, and evaluated to how it can be improved and sustained. This case would be best used alongside the technical note ""To Understand Consumer Behavior, Think Like a Marketplace Scientist"" (UVA-M-0950), as learnings from that note can be leveraged and applied to tackle the issues here. Ultimately, this reading allows MBA students and industry professionals alike an opportunity to practice being effective designers, analyzers, and proponents of experimentation.

CareMore Health System-a physician-founded care delivery system and health plan-had developed and refined an innovative care model for at-risk seniors enrolled in Medicare managed care (i.e., Medicare Advantage) plans. CareMore's President, Sachin Jain, and his colleagues believed their model achieved the elusive goal of improving outcomes while reducing costs. A key mandate for Jain was to scale the CareMore model beyond its current 75,000 Medicare Advantage members in California, Arizona, Nevada, and Virginia. One approach to scaling was to maintain a focus on Medicare Advantage but expand into new geographic markets. Alternatively, CareMore could focus on serving new populations. For example, CareMore had recently started serving Medicaid (i.e., younger, low-income) patients in Tennessee and Iowa. This case allows for a discussion of whether diversifying to serve these new populations was the key to ensuring CareMore's successful growth or a distraction from its core competency of caring for seniors.

This supplement to CareMore Health System (A) discusses the company's early experience introducing its managed Medicaid model in the Des Moines, Iowa market. It also provides an update on the Memphis program discussed in the (A) case.

In 2017, the owner of Onnie Jewellers in Leamington, Ontario, and her daughter were preparing for their annual summer promotion event. Held in mid-August, the invitation-only summer promotion event at the store had become hugely successful and very popular with Onnie' Jewellers' clientele. The owner and her daughter were reviewing data from the previous year's event and discussing potential changes that would improve the customer's shopping experience.

In 2016, the chief operating officer (COO) of InteraXon Inc., a Toronto-based technology start-up in the health and wellness sector, needed to put together a revised supply chain that was consistent with the company's new strategic plan. InteraXon's flagship product was a lightweight headband called Muse, aimed at measuring the wearer's brain activity. The COO needed to keep in mind two major requirements of the new plan: a) the company would be relocating the production of Muse from China to the United States and b) it needed to quickly scale up its manufacturing and marketing operations. What plan of action should the COO develop?

While income inequality between countries has declined significantly over the past 20 years, it has grown markedly within countries. A combination of technological change, global integration, domestic deregulation and immigration has been driving major changes in labour markets in most advanced countries-resulting in pressure on median wages and widespread insecurity. The authors-from the World Economic Forum-describe their 'framework for inclusive growth' and the Inclusive Development Index, which measures countries on three categories of KPIs, including Adjusted Net Savings; Median Household Income; Poverty Rate; and Healthy Life Expectancy.

Until now, diversity initiatives have focused primarily on fairness for legally-protected populations. But the smartest organizations today are embracing and harnessing a more powerful and nuanced type of diversity: Diversity of thought. The authors show that increasing diversity of thought at your organization entails three steps: Hiring differently; managing differently; and advancing differently. They describe how to go about each step to achieve an inclusive culture characterized by diversity of thought.

Senior executives from Deloitte, RBC, Manulife and the public sector describe their personal journeys as 'allies' for LGBTQ employees. Doing so entails standing up to those who use insensitive language in the workplace, listening to learn what the employee needs in order to thrive, and spreading the word about the benefits of inclusivity. In the end, they show that you cannot call yourself a great leader today unless you practice and promote inclusiveness.

The image of the 'ideal' worker and its attendant expectation of complete devotion to work has long been believed to be a key driver of workplace gender inequality. Scholars have mostly examined how women - and mothers in particular -navigate expectations that they devote themselves to work. Less attention has been paid to men's experiences, echoing the tendency to frame work-family conflict as a 'woman's problem'. Yet, the author shows that a majority of men and women in the workplace experience some conflict regarding the ideal-worker stereotype. Further, many men who are considered to be 'ideal' workers are actually simply passing as such; while many women reveal their true work identity and are punished for it.

Modern organizations continue to play a key role in perpetuating economic inequality in society. Despite the proliferation of equal opportunity and diversity initiatives, discrimination on the basis of race remains particularly pervasive in North American labour markets. The authors show that even companies that publicly espouse an inclusive environment continue to discriminate against candidates who appear to be from non-white backgrounds. Worse yet, many non-white job candidates are proactively 'whitening' their resumes in order to hide their racial identity.

Social class- defined as one's relative socio-economic rank in society - is one of the key factors shaping educational and economic trajectories in a powerful way. Whether defined by parental income or education, research shows that social class of origin affects a child's future educational, occupational and economic attainment, as well as their mental and physical well-being. But until now, research has neglected a vital dimension of economic stratification: employment. The author describes his study, in which seemingly 'high class' male applicants for a job received four times as many call-backs as other categories of applicants-despite having identical resumes.

In the business world, it's not common practice to look for strategy pointers from Black Lives Matter or the Idle No More movement; but it really should be. The author-who has worked with Microsoft, The Rockefeller Foundation and the Rainforest Alliance-argues that today's most successful companies have strong networks of highly-engaged people on their side, a strategy that social movements have been perfecting for decades. He describes three principles that enable social movements to foster such a high degree of engagement: shared purpose, clear roles and the right rewards.

Early in the 21st Century the United Arab Emirates (UAE) government estimated that their oil reserves could run out in a 150 years. They began efforts to diversify the UAE economy into clean industries--tourism, technology and renewable energy--and signal that the country was pivoting away from an oil-based economy toward one that would grow and thrive as an environmentally aware, sustainable, low-carbon economy. Masdar City, a UAE marquee initiative designed to be the world's first zero-carbon city, was an important pillar of this economic diversification. Dr. Al-Jabar, Masdar City founder, envisioned it as a commercially viable "green-tech" cluster including an economic free zone relying on solar energy and other renewable resources that could serve as a model for sustainable urban development regionally and globally. This bold effort was not as straightforward as anticipated and planned. The case documents the wide variety of surprises--technological, financial and environmental challenges--that obstructed the initiative's progress, as well as the invaluable learning that unfolded as the Masdar City initiative evolved. The case provides an opportunity to explore the UAE's business climate, the role of government in economic development, challenges inherent in building an industry cluster, and limitations due to scarce talent resources.

In March 2017 David Stevens was taking questions in an open meeting with a local school board to discuss tax abatements for a new chemical plant. Stevens was the project manager for a proposed new chemical plant. The chemical plant was a joint venture (JV) between U.S. based Allied Chemical and Arachem Group, a Saudi Arabia chemical company. Stevens and the JV partners had been working on the plant location decision for more than two years. A final investment decision would be made in 2017 or 2018. The partners initially looked at more than 50 sites, primarily in Texas and Louisiana. The partners had narrowed the decision down to a site in Louisiana near Baton Rouge. Before an investment decision could be made the JV partners required tax abatements from the local government commissioners and the school board. As the meeting continued, Stevens thought about how the various stakeholders in the project and how the community response should be incorporated into the project investment decision.

Two Australian entrepreneurs, Anna Amphlett and Andrew Ferris decided to start a new venture to produce, market and distribute high quality premium wine in Tasmania, an island off the southern coast of Australia. Amphlett and Ferris developed a business plan for a winery business based on a new brand to be called Kangaroo Tail. Amphlett and Ferris were retired executives each with more than twenty years of experience at Constellation Brands Inc. and Treasury Wine Estates. After a year of experimentation Amphlett and Ferris finally settled upon a blend that yielded wines with the right aroma, taste, and color. They negotiated a loan requiring them to provide the bank with a business plan and projected financial statements. They are unsure whether the wine operation will be a profitable use of their capital.

Supplement to case TB0499. Two Australian entrepreneurs, Anna Amphlett and Andrew Ferris decided to start a new venture to produce, market and distribute high quality premium wine in Tasmania, an island off the southern coast of Australia. Amphlett and Ferris developed a business plan for a winery business based on a new brand to be called Kangaroo Tail. Amphlett and Ferris were retired executives each with more than twenty years of experience at Constellation Brands Inc. and Treasury Wine Estates. After a year of experimentation, Amphlett and Ferris finally settled upon a blend that yielded wines with the right aroma, taste, and color. They negotiated a loan requiring them to provide the bank with a business plan and projected financial statements. They are unsure whether the wine operation will be a profitable use of their capital.

Supplement to case TB0499. Two Australian entrepreneurs, Anna Amphlett and Andrew Ferris decided to start a new venture to produce, market and distribute high quality premium wine in Tasmania, an island off the southern coast of Australia. Amphlett and Ferris developed a business plan for a winery business based on a new brand to be called Kangaroo Tail. Amphlett and Ferris were retired executives each with more than twenty years of experience at Constellation Brands Inc. and Treasury Wine Estates. After a year of experimentation, Amphlett and Ferris finally settled upon a blend that yielded wines with the right aroma, taste, and color. They negotiated a loan requiring them to provide the bank with a business plan and projected financial statements. They are unsure whether the wine operation will be a profitable use of their capital.

Supplement to case TB0499. Two Australian entrepreneurs, Anna Amphlett and Andrew Ferris decided to start a new venture to produce, market and distribute high quality premium wine in Tasmania, an island off the southern coast of Australia. Amphlett and Ferris developed a business plan for a winery business based on a new brand to be called Kangaroo Tail. Amphlett and Ferris were retired executives each with more than twenty years of experience at Constellation Brands Inc. and Treasury Wine Estates. After a year of experimentation, Amphlett and Ferris finally settled upon a blend that yielded wines with the right aroma, taste, and color. They negotiated a loan requiring them to provide the bank with a business plan and projected financial statements. They are unsure whether the wine operation will be a profitable use of their capital.

Rahama Wright and Shea Yeleen is the story of a young female social entrepreneur, Rahama Wright, who started a non-profit venture, Shea Yeleen, to train women in West Africa with a more lucrative livelihood by manufacturing shea butter to earn higher wages. The case describes the shea butter industry in Africa, the role of women in the industry, and Wright's background in non-profit and government as her rationale for starting a non-profit venture. The case outlines the different organizational forms that nascent entrepreneurs could start when creating a venture and ends with a decision point whether Wright should continue running a non-profit or if she should convert to a for-profit social venture. The case offers students an opportunity to understand the differences between non-profits and for-profit ventures from organizational, strategic, and personal perspectives.