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The founder of Toronto-based Able Translations has grown the company since 1990 from a single-man operation that did on-site interpreting to a firm of 100 staff in 2014. The firm provides a range of interpreting and translation services on three continents by more than 3,500 qualified language professionals in more than 100 languages. Although an industry leader, the company faces both strong global competitors and a myriad of microbusinesses and freelancers. Moreover, the language service providers industry is experiencing rapid technological change. The founder wonders whether to pursue international growth of his established translation and interpreting businesses (on-site and telephone) or to focus on its emerging capabilities in software development in the North American market — a strategic choice that will have a profound effect on the future of the firm.

In early June 2014, the chief executive officer of Canadian Western Agribition, a not-for-profit organization, is reviewing the results of its 2013 agricultural show, a fair that takes place every November in Regina, Saskatchewan. The week-long event includes the largest livestock show in Canada, an extensive agribusiness tradeshow, a large marketplace of home products, a rodeo competition, and entertainment and educational programs that have a focus on First Nations. After bouncing back from major financial problems three years earlier, Agribition had generated almost $4 million in 2013. How can management ensure that it will continue to grow as a world-class event? Which customer segment — rural, urban or international — should be targeted? How can more visitors, ranchers and breeders be attracted to pay the admission, entry and commission fees that account for 90 per cent of the organization’s budget? How can corporate sponsorship and government grants be increased? To maintain its status as one of the best beef shows on the continent, management must implement a marketing and operations strategy that will meet the needs and interests of many groups, a key element for growth and profitability.

No challenge derails managers from the goal of sustainability more than trying to understand what it means for an organization to be sustainable. Some people think sustainability is all about environmental issues. Others see it in terms of the bottom line. Still others use the term synonymously with corporate social responsibility and shared value. This article explains why business sustainability is none of these things — rather, it is about time. Sustainability is about balancing resource usage and supplies over time and assuring intergenerational equity. There is no question that many CSR initiatives are effective at balancing competing demands made by shareholders and other stakeholders. To do this, however, many firms borrow resources and capital from the future, which can magnify the imbalance in the distribution of resources between the short and long term. Securing short-term success should never risk long-term survival. As this article states, business sustainability is the ability of firms to respond to their short-term needs without compromising their ability to meet future needs.

Achieving desirable shifts in workplace habits and routines can be extremely tricky, even baffling. Part of the problem involves a lack of understanding of what makes some good ideas and innovations catch on, while others struggle to gain traction. This article addresses a specific barrier to achieving returns on investments aimed at changing behaviour in the workplace, where a leadership blind spot has too many organizations attempting to improve performance via long-term behavioural changes while neglecting what it takes to really make behaviour change happen. Importing new behaviours into an organization can prove more useful for achieving an energized work environment than any strategy or process. Applied behaviour analysis offers tools to improve the performance of leaders, organizations and employees. The disciplined use of these tools is called behavioural leadership, which underpins a reliable, replicable technology for managing behaviour and implementing change.

Character has often been described as the difference-maker in sports, business and life. The importance of character in the workplace, especially leader character, has proved all too easy to forget in recent years. Events in 2014 involving Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, radio broadcaster Jian Ghomeshi and NFL running back Ray Rice helped demonstrate the important role that character plays in the success and failure of organizations. As this article states, effective performance requires competencies and commitment. But without the support of good character, the strengths that come from having competencies and commitment can be seriously undermined, as shown by the 2008 financial crisis. While anyone can cross the line of acceptable behaviour, leaders cannot expect forgiveness. Ensuring good character in leaders and top performers is not about reputational risk, as ignoring bad behaviour is always bad business in the long run, especially when the business in question involves role models. The long-term benefits of a healthy work environment with happy, productive employees are far greater than anything a star talent with questionable judgement can provide.

As Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist Victor Frankl noted, the space between stimulus and response creates an opportunity to engage the moment in a way that can be transformative. However, engaging the moment is difficult because attention on the task at hand can be drawn away by past experiences, as well as expectations for the future. The ability to engage the moment is developed over time and anchored in competence, character and commitment, which are only developed in everyday moments. These three qualities work together to deliver strong performance, which is realized through the string of present moments. Indeed, for great athletes, the ability to engage the moment is not reserved for grand competitive occasions — it is a habit. Being fully present during everyday moments provides the foundation for tackling the big moments. As this article explains, great athletes and leaders alike understand that fear of failure is a distraction that can cripple performance, which is why they focus on process rather than outcome. It is easy to get rattled under pressure, but trusting one’s preparation helps to ensure commitment to the moment.

The $20 billion nanotechnology sector is a disruptive force that is expanding rapidly. Deploying materials from the atomic and molecular scale spawns innovations across applications and manufacturing processes and allows industries to add unique properties and immense added value to commercial and consumer products. Unfortunately, awareness of how to best manage the risks associated with nanotechnology is not expanding as rapidly as the industry. Nanoscale particles may cause toxicity in a different manner than traditional particulates. As this article explains, the industry must ensure the safe usage of nanomaterials throughout the supply chain. To do this, all industry stakeholders (ranging from risk managers to regulators and investors) must understand that the novel nature of nanoscale properties has fundamentally shifted the manner in which we must approach toxicity assessment. Indeed, given the dynamic formats of nanoparticles at various points in their lifecycles, proper industry risk assessment requires a specific expertise that is currently in limited supply. Although the nanotechnology sector offers significant promise across a range of industries, it is time for stakeholders to take more proactive measures to avoid adverse human, environmental and economic consequences.

Nine meetings involving 786 directors and would-be directors were held at the Institute of Corporate Directors with the objective of facilitating a discussion on leader character with people experienced in the practice of corporate governance as well as with individuals interested in becoming directors. Following the sessions, a survey of attendees was conducted. This article presents what the authors learned and offers six recommendations for improving the director search, evaluation, performance review and renewal processes: 1. Be explicit about search criteria and include the character dimensions along with competencies. 2. Ensure that whoever does interviewing is, in fact, a good interviewer. 3. When multiple interviews are done sequentially, ensure that each interviewer has a set of questions so that the sessions are comprehensive but not repetitive. Furthermore, schedule a session of all involved in the process to share their observations. 4. Task the search consultant, if one is used, with developing a comprehensive list of referees who actually know the potential nominee. 5. When asking a referee whether they “know” someone, care must be taken to understand the context of this knowledge. 6. If a candidate resists or resents discussion about character, then you should resist the candidate.

Speculation that a move toward normalization of relations between Cuba and the United States might be imminent has been a recurring theme for decades. While the actual move toward normalization took many years longer than expected, President Raúl Castro has reformed Cuba’s moribund economy more along market lines. And on December 17, 2014, Castro and U.S. President Barack Obama jointly announced a historic agreement to begin normalizing relations between their nations. This paper examines whether or not the related anticipation of new business opportunities is warranted, while taking a fresh look at the investment and trade potential and risks that a more market-friendly, post-embargo Cuba presents to foreign investors and traders. Existing business partners must be prepared to modify or change their strategies to fit with an open and more competitive Cuban market. Even if the long-awaited market opening happens as announced, it will be done “a la Cubana,” which means existing and potential business partners must have patience and nerves of steel — in addition to capital.

A vast literature seeks to explain the barrier to female advancement widely known as the “glass ceiling,” which is regarded as “an egregious denial of social justice” by the U.S. Department of Labor. But the two primary strands of this literature — one using experimental methods and the other using data gleaned from sports events — offer very different conclusions. Three key findings from the experimental literature are that women respond less positively than men to the incentives associated with competitive settings; are more easily discouraged than men by random adversities; and are more likely than men to avoid competitive settings. Recently, however, economists have turned their attention to whether male and female athletes respond differently to tournament incentives. And the findings of this literature generally contradict experimental results. This essay examines what these studies have added to our understanding of the glass ceiling and points out the limits of the methods that they employ.

Doctors have the Hippocratic Oath and lawyers have the Bar, yet bankers have nothing but their word. And that just isn’t enough anymore. The economic costs and fines related to irresponsible banking activity between 2008 and 2015 total almost US$8 trillion. In this article, the former president of BMO Capital Markets offers recommendations on how the industry can earn back public trust. First, bankers need to realize the importance of their actions. They have responsibilities as leaders within an industry that is the lifeblood of both the global economy and society. Second, consistency and a demand for high standards across all asset classes and markets must be expected at a bare minimum. Third, bankers need to remember that larger forces continually shape their industry and should help more to deal with the contagion caused by volatile markets. Fourth, while bankers must be transparent about the industry’s challenges, they should also highlight its successes. Finally, bankers should make sure to leave the industry in a better condition than they found it.

In early 2015, Target announced that its Canadian operation would seek bankruptcy protection and abandon all the retail locations that it had acquired from the Zellers discount chain less than two years before, a move that would eliminate 17,000 jobs. This article examines how management strayed from the company’s founding principles when planning the expansion, which led Target to enter Canada with mutated brand DNA. <br><br> In the 20th century, Target staked out a niche for itself in the United States by catering to value-oriented shoppers seeking a high-quality experience. At that time, it carefully selected locations that fit its business plan and practiced industry-leading inventory management. When Target Canada first opened its doors, inventory control issues cooled the excitement of many Canadian consumers. Pricing was problematic, especially for cross-border shoppers who did not find the same deals that Target offered in the United States. The plan to open so many stores in a short period stemmed from an opportunistic, aggressive takeover of Zellers. In Canada, Target lost the ability to take things slow while compromising the ability to get locations right. As a result, management gave up control over the Target experience that had won the company so much goodwill.

The C&D Hotel, the first five-star deluxe hotel in Xiamen, a coastal city in China, needs to improve its service delivery process. In particular, the hotel’s customer service manager needs to present her plans for handling some recent customer complaints and decide how to compensate hotel guests for errors that have occurred during service delivery.

The chief executive officer of Fluitec Wind needs to devise a strategy for using predictive analytics to provide gearbox services to wind turbines operated by energy companies. As gearboxes have a 10 per cent chance of failure each year and replacements are costly, predicting and preventing such failure is a constant source of stress for wind farm owners. Fluitec Wind has access to a wealth of untapped data resources that could be used to diagnose gearbox health using existing wind turbine data without the need of additional monitoring and sensor hardware. However, the company faces many technical challenges in improving the accuracy of the predictive analytics and thereby commercializing the product.

CoCubes.com, (CoCubes) an entrepreneurial firm, instituted a paradigm change in the way campus recruitment occurred in India. In a paradoxical environment of the high availability of a formally educated yet not readily employable talent pool in a growing economy, CoCubes offered unique value propositions to its dual set of customers (colleges and companies). It was critical for CoCubes to effectively manage engagement with the recruiting companies and attempt to change their mindset regarding recruitment from non-established, non-premier institutes. Conventionally, colleges have not paid to have their students placed. Getting colleges to see the value in this and to pay for it was critical for CoCubes to succeed and grow in the face of increasing competition.

Beijing Xiaomi Technology Co. Ltd. (Xiaomi) had grown into the third-largest cell phone brand in China and the sixth-largest in the world. The company solely deployed online channels, which contributed to its success. In the initial stage, Xiaomi depended on its own online channel to interact with consumers to develop user-friendly products and sell products. Three years after its inception, the company successfully established its flagship store on the largest business-to-consumer e-commerce platform in China. However, Xiaomi was facing a series of challenges, such as competitors’ imitation and consumer complaints regarding services. Xiaomi was at a crossroads: should it stick to its online channels or develop online-to-offline channels?

Within a few years of its establishment in 2010 by four young engineers in Pune, India, BlazeClan Technologies had prospered as a cloud solutions delivery company by providing true value to its customers in India and around the world. By 2014, though, the company was facing a long and slow sales cycle in the Indian market where businesses were hesitant to give up in-house data control to the cloud. Though the company invested a lot of marketing dollars in educating this potential segment through events, webinars, social media campaigns and talks at important industry forums, the customer base was not building and market penetration was not gaining ground. The momentum that was badly needed to push cloud adoption to the next level was also affected by external factors such as the availability of the Internet, regular service outages leading to network disruptions, resistance to change and unclear licensing issues. The company worked hard to reduce these fears, but it had a number of decisions to make to go forward.

In September 2012, the vice-president of Internal Audit at Prashanti Technologies, a multinational corporation headquartered in Mumbai, India, was reviewing an external audit team’s report before a meeting of the company’s ethics committee. The committee had only one item on the agenda: a sensitive case involving a company vice-president, the head of its financial services division, who had been accused by an anonymous whistleblower of conducting a workplace affair with a subordinate. Further, it was alleged that he had unfairly promoted her by giving her additional undeserved responsibilities and that she had taken undue advantage of her workplace romance by giving orders to the rest of the team. The ethics committee was required to decide what action, if any, should be taken against the vice-president and the junior manager.

The director of Edible Agro Products Limited (EAPL) was reviewing the production figures for Gujarat Til-2, a variety of white sesame that EAPL had introduced to West Bengal in 2008. He had hoped to bring about a revolution in sesame production with this superior new variety and to create higher value for West Bengal farmers and for EAPL. However, his plan had yet to achieve the outcomes he had anticipated. The year 2010 was the third consecutive year in which EAPL had received less than 20 per cent of the expected quantity of harvested produce. Should he quit sesame production and focus only on the oil trading business? Should EAPL change its communications policy/strategy for promoting the value of white sesame to farmers who are not formally educated? How should he address the growing concerns of the farmers? How can he prevent malpractice among vendors and farmers, such as selling the harvested produce to other traders at a higher price? Should he change the pricing policy?

The successful rise of Ferns N Petals, a branded flower boutique, coincided with the post-liberalization retail boom in India, a period of rapid growth for organized modern retailing, including online retailing. As the economy grew, disposable incomes rose, driving demographic and lifestyle changes and fuelling aspirations. The Ferns N Petals chain tapped franchisees aggressively. In a predominantly unorganized and localized market, the company successfully convinced potential franchisees to become part of the chain of nationwide branded stores. However, Ferns N Petals’ unique franchising business model faced many challenges — including creating and sustaining volume growth for franchisees while continuing to widen and deepen its retail footprint and replicating its model in the high-priced, highly skill-oriented and competitive wedding segment.