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Spreadsheet Supplement for INS364

Case A offers an overview and Case B explores specific aspects of a major Indian construction firm which seeks to use corporate social responsibility as a strategic tool in its quest for rapid growth at home and abroad. Source materials include on-site interviews of the firm's executives, line managers and workers in Delhi, Mumbai and Lavasa, as well as corporate reports, scholarly articles, and domestic and international press articles.

Case A offers an overview and Case B explores specific aspects of a major Indian construction firm which seeks to use corporate social responsibility as a strategic tool in its quest for rapid growth at home and abroad. Source materials include on-site interviews of the firm's executives, line managers and workers in Delhi, Mumbai and Lavasa, as well as corporate reports, scholarly articles, and domestic and international press articles.

In the spring of 2011, JPMorgan Chase realised that their synthetic credit portfolio (SCP), which represented less than 1% of the bank's total assets, had grown to become more than half of the bank's total risk. An article in the WSJ would soon make it public knowledge that the bank was in a difficult situation. How could an institution known for its diligence, which had survived the global financial crisis, and was led by a highly respected CEO (Jamie Dimon), end up in such dire straits?

"Duxton Asset Management, a specialist agro-business investor, is evaluating an investment in rice farming in Tanzania, Africa. Duxton has a business strategy of investing in operating farmland assets, many of which are in developing or even frontier markets. The case discusses the complexities of investing in an atypical multidimensional asset. "

SoundCloud is one of the world's largest audio-share websites and a recent example of successful entrepreneurship to have come out of an unexpected place: Berlin. The case discusses how SoundCloud has flourished by identifying the type of 'place surplus' important for it to derive competitive advantage and succeed.

An Estonian success story, this case examines why Skype's Scandinavian founders chose Tallinn to establish their hi-tech start-up. We investigate the factors that contributed to their choice of location and the subsequent success of the venture. Skype's journey is discussed against the backdrop of post-Soviet Estonia's economic and industrial resurrection.

A two-party negotiation between a successful female manager in the private banking industry and her male boss about her bonus, her performance, and her potential for promotion competing against a male colleague, laden with gender issues.

A two-party negotiation between a successful female manager in the private banking industry and her male boss about her bonus, her performance, and her potential for promotion competing against a male colleague, laden with gender issues.

The case represents a role-play simulation in which a team of up to 7 participants acts as a board of directors of a privately-owned company. The board has to discuss and make decisions about its Chairman's resignation. The latter asked to step down after an internal crisis unfolded following the Chairman's media interview in which he criticized the country's President. The board comprise two company founders and 5 independent directors including the Chairman.

The case represents a role-play simulation in which a team of up to 7 participants acts as a board of directors of a privately-owned company. The board has to discuss and make decisions about its Chairman's resignation. The latter asked to step down after an internal crisis unfolded following the Chairman's media interview in which he criticized the country's President. The board comprise two company founders and 5 independent directors including the Chairman.

By covering information technology (IT) management at Air Canada over two decades, this case illustrates the process of alignment between IT and business over time. During the 1990s, the focus was on efficiency and the IT department supported business through both the centralization of the IT function and the outsourcing of most of the IT activities, with the explicit objective of reducing costs. Twenty years later, at the time the case takes place, Air Canada had two key strategic objectives: operational excellence and customer proximity. In order to help meet these two objectives, IT now supported business through a hybrid structure and an innovation-based, "best-of-breed" sourcing strategy. Also, over the years, the IT department at Air Canada had developed processes aimed at ensuring efficient delivery of services by suppliers, as well as in-house processes to scan, identify and implement innovative IT solutions both for operational excellence and customer proximity.

Two friends have launched tentree (TT), a Canadian entrepreneurial venture that sells an environmentally sustainable and trendy brand of apparel. For every product sold, TT plants 10 trees in locations around the world. Although TT is still in its infancy, it is already experiencing huge growth. The entrepreneurial founders now face several challenges: how to keep pace with the growing demand; how to plant as many trees as they can while staying true to their sustainable, environmental philosophy; how to break into the U.S. and other markets; and where to source their product.

This note introduces a framework for analyzing value capture (through bargaining and pricing) and bargaining advantage (or value capture advantage), i.e., a firm's (superior) ability to capture a share from the value it helps create.

This note introduces a framework for analyzing the sustainability of competitive advantage. (While it applies more broadly, it was developed as a component of the PVA framework.)

"Setting Aspirations-Mission, Vision, and Values" introduces students to the concepts of organizational aspirations and the links between mission, vision, and values with strategy. The main Reading presents a framework for analyzing aspirations. It also discusses the differences between mission and vision, and it uses industry examples to explore how mission and vision form a firm's strategy and contribute to its strategy process. In addition, it addresses general misconceptions about organizational aspirations and the perils of misusing aspirations. A supplemental Reading.

This note introduces a concise but comprehensive framework for analyzing value creation and value creation advantage, i.e., a firm's superior ability to increase the spread (or gap) between its offering's customer value (or WTP) and supplier cost (or WTS). (While the framework applies more broadly, it was developed as a component of the PVA framework.)

Enrique Peña Nieto, the presidential candidate of the old Mexican ruling party elected in 2012, passed the most fundamental reforms in at least two decades. They included allowing private competition in the energy sector, including with the state-owned oil company, Pemex; strengthening competition in the telecoms industry; promoting private-bank and public development-bank lending. Also, political reforms allowed re-election (formerly prohibited) to all legislative posts, and gave key regulatory agencies independence from the executive. Would these reforms actually be implemented on the ground? Would they achieve good growth for more jobs and better income distribution? Would they finally make Mexican democracy work, or partly restore the hegemony of the old ruling party?

The founder of a bricks-and-mortar kitchen accessories retail store, Jill's Table, is considering the expansion of her existing information-based website to an e-commerce presence, but wonders whether the factors that have led to her current success can be replicated in the virtual world. Students are asked to make decisions related to translating brand values from the real world to the virtual world; overcoming technological hurdles; addressing design issues in terms of the user experience; developing a content marketing and digital promotions strategy, including social media and email marketing; determining a pricing strategy; planning for fulfillment and returns; handling customer service and measuring performance.