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It had been ten years since M. V. (Raja) Rajamannar became the chief marketing officer of Mastercard in 2013, and set out to transform marketing at the company from transactional to transcendental. He built the framework for Marketing 5.0 and propelled Mastercard to one of the top 10 most valuable brands in the world and the world’s number 1 audio brand four years in a row. Rajamannar now must decide what Mastercard’s future marketing strategy should be.

This case addresses the challenges surrounding residential long-term care (LTC) in Ontario, Canada, through the lens of a fictional Chinese Canadian family coming to terms with placing their family member in a LTC home. The case protagonist is Henry Chan, a middle-aged health-care executive who is determined to ensure his mother, Kimberley (Kim), who has late-stage Alzheimer’s disease, is placed in a LTC home that is medically and culturally appropriate. The case follows Henry as he navigates Ontario’s complex LTC system with his father, Joshua, and Kim’s care coordinator, Omar, and addresses the important context of the LTC sector in Ontario, including the sector’s current state, its history, and the policy choices that have led to the challenges it faces today.

Two years had passed since Jazwares Limited Liability Company (Jazwares) acquired Squishmallows—a plush toy business—and Jeremy Padawer, the chief brand officer of Jazwares, was challenged in how to ensure that the Squishmallow plush toys would be more than a passing fad. As Squishmallows expanded, so did its leadership team. In November 2022, Padawer promoted Crystal Pizzullo to the role of vice president of the brand’s Global Business Unit. Pizzullo’s role was paramount to ensuring the ongoing success and protection of the brand identity of an extraordinarily successful business. Squishmallows enjoyed strong brand recognition and offered a meaningful unique selling proposition, but there were still many questions about the company’s next steps, including which growth strategy would be the most suitable for Jazwares.

In late 2019, the Mississauga, Ontario–based NetDynamic Consulting Inc. (NetDynamic) faced intricate challenges related to aligning and standardizing enterprise resource planning (ERP) processes on a global scale in a large multinational enterprise while simultaneously safeguarding the distinctive operational nuances specific to each of the company’s local subsidiaries. <br><br>NetDynamic had undertaken the challenge of integrating the operations of its client, SodaStream Canada, into a unified ERP system. SodaStream Canada was a subsidiary of SodaStream International Ltd. (SodaStream), headquartered in Israel. While SodaStream was part of the food and beverage multinational PepsiCo Inc. (PepsiCo), it was also a multinational in its own right, with 10 global subsidiaries under its purview. NetDynamic’s leaders needed to make crucial decisions regarding how to roll out the new ERP system, how to efficiently address end-user concerns, and how to learn from the ongoing integration to serve future clients better.

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ganesh Thummer, chief executive officer of Friday Engineering, faced a daunting challenge. Friday Engineering, which is a multinational manufacturer of medical devices, had recently partnered with a European firm. But the Indian and European teams, collaborating for the first time, were encountering significant conflict. Thummer decided to intervene but was facing resistance from his Indian office staff who wanted to maintain their traditional practices and beliefs. Thummer had to figure out how to bring the teams together while respecting the values of both teams, encouraging collaborative efforts, and providing inclusive leadership to foster a harmonious and motivated workforce.

In June 2024, Will Jackson, the founder and chief executive officer of Engineered Arts Limited (EA), faced a dilemma: How could his company balance commercial sustainability with ethical and regulatory compliance? EA was a UK-based designer and manufacturer of humanoid robots, most notably the Ameca robot, which had been installed in museums, science centres, and other public venues around the world where it greeted visitors and answered questions. Although EA was in a financially comfortable position, the company wanted to increase production of its humanoid robots, as this could help it achieve economies of scale. To date, EA had grown via the business-to-business model; should it now also embrace the business-to-consumer model? EA already had considerable ethical obligations to its customers and would face serious legal problems if its robots did not comply with regulations. And by producing robots that replaced employees, EA was taking jobs away from real people. Now EA also had to confront the privacy issues and potential data theft implicit in robot deployment. How would these ethical challenges affect EA’s business model and its own functioning as a profitable business?

TTK Prestige (Prestige), the leading brand in the Indian pressure cooker market, was facing several challenges that threatened its dominance. After witnessing unprecedented growth during the COVID-19 pandemic, Prestige’s sales declined somewhat in 2023, although it showed a modest 5 per cent increase in 2024. Prestige’s long-standing reputation, safety credentials, and iconic advertising campaign had served it well, but it may not have been enough in this rapidly evolving market landscape. Managing director Chandru Kalro assessed the key issues facing Prestige: the Indian market was maturing fast and competitors both new and established were attacking both the low and high ends of the market; the organization had become complacent and had not responded swiftly to market conditions; and more importantly, it lacked a comprehensive growth strategy. Bold strategic moves were needed for Prestige to sustain its market leadership.

In December 2023, Ryan Mitchell, account manager at Prosperity Bank, was reviewing a request for an $80,000 long-term loan for the Château Lafayette (“The Laff”), the oldest tavern in Ottawa, Ontario. Jill Scott, president and CEO of The Laff, was seeking the funds to finance three investments that she believed would help the tavern increase its revenue from food sales during lunch hour: a kitchen update, a patio renovation, and point-of-sale (POS) software.<br><br>Mitchell knew The Laff had demonstrated strong financial performance and cash management historically, but she had reservations about this new strategic shift toward food sales and understood that the restaurant and bar industry was subject to significant risks.

The Green IT Program was an initiative of Schneider Electric’s (Schneider) Enterprise IT department, which had proactively identified opportunities to contribute to the company’s sustainability program. Initiated in 2015, the program had made appreciable progress, first by identifying internal opportunities and then by devising a data-driven approach to measure the carbon footprint of Schneider’s information technology assets and enable year-on-year reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. It had grown into a global initiative, with an integrated communications program launched to build stakeholder awareness, collaboration, and commitment throughout Schneider’s organizational hierarchy. For Zach Nimboorkar, senior vice-president, Technology Services and Operations, who led the project, and core Green IT Program members, Austin Brunero and Jaroslaw Richert, the aim was to build the strategic blueprint covering the next three years; one that could further galvanize the large and complex global ecosystem of internal and external stakeholders and deliver results on the ground.

This exercise introduces the L.E.A.R.N. dialogue process, a structured method for creating a psychologically safe space in which people with diverse experiences, knowledge, skills, and perspectives can discuss the complex challenges facing organizations today. During the session, students are introduced to the method, learn how to work through the five L.E.A.R.N. stages—Launch, Explore, Acknowledge, Reflect, and Notice—and are given the tools to craft and facilitate their own L.E.A.R.N. dialogues. The exercise includes an example of the L.E.A.R.N. dialogue process in which participants explore the question “How much access should employers have to monitor employees working remotely?” The L.E.A.R.N. process allows the company executives in the example to hold dialogues with employees to further understand the challenges and, over time, find solutions. Having conversations about difficult topics with people with diverse lived experiences is challenging, so this exercise provides a set of tools to guide these conversations.

In April 2024, Shantanu Deshpande found his company embroiled in a controversy on social media, the origin of which was a print advertisement by the company in support of a young girl who was getting bullied online for her facial hair. Bombay Shaving Company had been accused of using the girl’s bullying to promote their female grooming brand. In an attempt to address the controversy, Deshpande shared the advertisement on his LinkedIn page, proclaiming the genuine intention of the company to stand by the teenager. But this attempt only escalated the reputational crisis. Which strategic communication choice should Bombay Shaving Company have made in the wake of social media backlash, regarding the issue of imposing beauty standards on women?

The Indian Institute of Technology started with two locations in 1958 and eventually grew into an educational network with over 23 institutions across India. Graduate and Ph.D. students were the torchbearers in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. However, on February 12, 2023, an 18-year-old student from the Scheduled Caste community committed suicide at the student hostel for Indian Institute of Technology Bombay students. His death spurred students and social organizations to advocate for justice. Exclusion based on caste injured their well-being and had a direct involvement in leading individuals to undertake the extreme step of suicide, which raised a question about the role that higher education institutions such as Indian Institute of Technology played in fostering a culture of inclusivity among key stakeholders: students, faculty, and administrators. Could an educational institution uphold its tradition of excellence in education while fostering an inclusive environment for students from marginalized backgrounds? How did caste-based bias create a challenge for an institution that hoped to build an inclusive culture to support learning and well-being for all students?

In March 2023, the owner and managing director of PrintOxe struggled to find a way forward that would help the business recover from its declining profitability. PrintOxe was among the longest-standing e-commerce sellers of compatible printer accessories in Canada. For several years, PrintOxe reached millions of dollars in revenues and six-figure profits. But fierce competition due to the market’s ease of entry, coupled with the harsh supply chain issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, caused PrintOxe to see its first unprofitable year in 2022. As a result, PrintOxe considered replacing its floundering 3D printer filament product line with a new product and utilizing advertising to improve the company’s visibility and revenues.

In the dynamic landscape of continuous strategic and organizational transformation, execution has become increasingly intricate, requiring everything from real-time monitoring to crisis management and decision support. Unfortunately, the most common solution for delivering on key initiatives—a program management office (PMO)—remains static and staid, focused on reporting over dialogue and on process over collaboration. At the heart of today’s successful transformation journey lies the next frontier of the PMO—the transformation office with a “mission control” function. As a nerve centre, it drives execution, ensures alignment and coordination across initiative workstreams, and forestalls risks to delivering results. The objective of the transformation office is to maximize the impact of strategic projects and initiatives through an integrated approach to project management. To accomplish this, it plays the following five roles: 1) project management steward (ensures that project management practices are not only standardized but also optimized for better outcomes); 2) initiative effectiveness situation room (tracks progress, identifies bottlenecks, and swiftly responds to changes); 3) program and portfolio decision support (monitors initiatives’ health and adjusts the trajectory if necessary); 4) transformation-level change management and communications hub (facilitates consistent messaging, aligns various change efforts, and ensures that communication resonates with the transformation’s vision); and 5) executive steering navigator (highlights critical decisions and focal points for executive leadership).

Generative AI is promising to be the most disruptive technology since the internet. According to Accenture, 44 per cent of working hours in the United States fall within the scope of automation or augmentation with this technology. However, security is a major consideration impacting the adoption or implementation of generative AI, and CEOs are rightly concerned. While generative AI is democratizing access and driving productivity, it is also leading to insecure deployments, security breaches, and AI-powered threats such as deepfakes. To fully realize competitive gains, businesses must elevate their cybersecurity strategies to address gaps and vulnerabilities—both within and outside their organizations. As generative AI intensifies the competition for labour productivity, it is also opening new vulnerabilities that can be exploited by bad actors, including insecure deployment of generative AI, excessive accessibility, and lax experimentation. Companies can employ the following strategies to bolster their cyber-resilience: 1) modernize their security setup at the same pace as business innovation; 2) heighten employees’ awareness of the potential risks associated with generative AI; and 3) innovate from a trusted foundation by securing the underlying cloud foundation and implementing strict controls.

CVS Health Corporation (CVS) had historically been one of the leading competitors in the retail pharmacy industry. Since its founding in 1963, the company had continued to grow across the United States, fuelled, in part, by its acquisitions of other drugstore chains. It had also diversified into insurance and pharmacy benefits management. The company remained one of the largest pharmacy retailers in the industry. In September 2024, CVS’s current chief executive officer and her top management team needed to carefully analyze growing political, economic, legal, and competitive threats in order to successfully navigate an increasingly challenging competitive landscape. Even with the company’s number-three competitor, Rite Aid Corp., in bankruptcy reorganization, the question that remained was whether the company could maintain its dominant competitive position in the face of changing macro-economic, industry-level, and competitive trends.

Despite Tims China already operating more than 800 stores, the coffee company was still at a disadvantage in terms of store numbers. An urgent issue that the chief executive officer and his management team needed to resolve was how to rapidly expand to achieve economies of scale: Should they stick to company-owned stores to maintain absolute control over quality, or open up to franchising to rapidly expand their footprint?

Spreadsheet to accompany product W37845.

Established in 1986, Bikaji Foods International Ltd. (Bikaji) began making traditional Indian snacks and became a leading producer of ethnic namkeen and sweets, boasting over 300 diverse products. With a 9.5 per cent market share and INR 19.6 billion in revenue, it ranked third in India. Operating in 23 Indian states and 25 countries globally, its exports contributed 4 per cent of total sales. Since March 2024, Bikaji has aimed for a 12 per cent market share over three years, focusing on capacity optimization, rural market penetration, and profit margin improvement. Bikaji targeted untapped Indian regions, alongside exploring options like quick-service restaurants, healthy snacks, and export expansion. Expanding in India’s diverse culinary landscape demanded careful strategy to meet financial goals.

In 2023, Kaushik Roy, the managing director of PCBL (formerly, Phillips Carbon Black Limited), unveiled an ambitious plan to propel the company’s profit before tax to ₹20 billion in Indian rupees by 2029, a more-than-threefold level of growth. Emphasizing capacity-expansion and strategic-rebranding initiatives, PCBL aimed to fortify its status as a global industry leader and as India’s largest carbon black manufacturer. Despite global economic uncertainties, the company’s robust financial performance and strategic dividend declaration underscored its resilience and market dominance. Central to its strategy were innovative product development and enhanced customer engagement, which were crucial for penetrating new markets and sustaining its growth momentum. However, with the company’s focus on high-margin specialty chemicals, Roy pondered the alignment of this strategy with its broader branding efforts and the potential impact of the strategy on both domestic and international markets. As PCBL navigated these challenges, agility and strategic alignment were identified as pivotal for achieving its ambitious growth targets.