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In the fall of 1999 Garry Ridge, the newly appointed CEO of WD-40 Company, wanted to rejuvenate the company and stimulate its employees to look beyond the firm's relatively narrow focus of the last 43 years. The very nature of WD-40 Company's success in capturing the market had created its own limited growth opportunities. The A case describes the company's one-product business success, and Ridge's background. The B case reveals some of the challenges Ridge faced in implementing change. The B case tells how the new CEO helped WD-40 company achieve growth in both new products and markets through related acquisitions. Despite these purchases, though, the company's earnings failed to climb in the years between 1998 and 2001. Ridge concluded that he needed to do more than just buy more companies, so he framed a model of strong leadership and "learning theory" that he thought would enable the company outsmart its competitors. He built a framework that was demanding, yet forgiving, when individuals fell short. Ridge held employees responsible for their results, but he encouraged everyone to acknowledge mistakes and learn from them. The company's financial results suggest success for his leadership model. This case set lends instructors a valuable tool to conduct conversations in the classroom about leadership and leading strategic change.

Vivek Paul was hired to run the IT division of a global company that originally sold cooking oil. Paul was brought on board to develop Wipro Technologies into a leading provider of software services to the world's largest corporations. He was a native of India, yet was educated and had worked in the United States for many years. Paul faced a number of challenges in achieving this goal. His most immediate challenge was attracting, developing, and retaining key talent. Paul needed someone at the helm who had established relationships and held credibility with the employees at Wipro Technologies' Indian operation centers. He wanted someone who knew the Indian corporate culture and who had the cross-cultural sophistication that comes from extended expatriate experience to be the director of Wipro Technologies Europe. Sudip Nandy was the perfect fit for such an assignment. This story illustrates the cultural challenges of transforming an Indian company to enhance its global effectiveness. The A case discusses some of the methods Wipro used to leverage diversity in the workforce to create competitive advantage for the firm. The B case further describes some of Nandy's ideas for business growth. In the C case, Nandy reviews more strategies and updates the business situation to late 2002. The Wipro series illustrates the importance of national culture and ethnicity issues to everything a large corporation does--including its own culture of origin, the cultures of its potential customers, and the cultures of its employees. The cases lend themselves well to the unfolding of the Hofstede cultural model during class.

Vivek Paul was hired to run the IT division of a global company that originally sold cooking oil. Paul was brought on board to develop Wipro Technologies into a leading provider of software services to the world's largest corporations. He was a native of India, yet was educated and had worked in the United States for many years. Paul faced a number of challenges in achieving this goal. His most immediate challenge was attracting, developing, and retaining key talent. Paul needed someone at the helm who had established relationships and held credibility with the employees at Wipro Technologies' Indian operation centers. He wanted someone who knew the Indian corporate culture and who had the cross-cultural sophistication that comes from extended expatriate experience to be the director of Wipro Technologies Europe. Sudip Nandy was the perfect fit for such an assignment. This story illustrates the cultural challenges of transforming an Indian company to enhance its global effectiveness. The A case discusses some of the methods Wipro used to leverage diversity in the workforce to create competitive advantage for the firm. The B case further describes some of Nandy's ideas for business growth. In the C case Nandy reviews more strategies and updates the business situation to late 2002. The Wipro series illustrates the importance of national culture and ethnicity issues to everything a large corporation does--including its own culture of origin, the cultures of its potential customers, and the cultures of its employees. The cases lend themselves well to the unfolding of the Hofstede cultural model during class.

How does the new president of an IT division of a global company that originally sold cooking oil attract, develop, and retain key talent in the quick changing high tech business? The story illustrates the cultural challenges of transforming an Indian company to enhance its global effectiveness. The (A) case demonstrates some of the methods Wipro Technologies used to leverage difference in the workforce to create competitive advantage for the firm. The (B) case further describes some of Sudip Nandy's ideas for business growth. In the (C) case Nandy reviews more strategies and updates the business situation to late 2002. Wipro illustrates the importance of national culture and ethnicity issues to everything a large corporation does--including its own culture of origin, the cultures of its potential customers, and the cultures of its employees. The case lends itself well to unfold the Hofstede cultural model during the class.

Cisco Systems's company strategy was acquire, acquire, acquire during the 1990s. Along the way the firm tailored an integration process unique to each acquisition that Cisco consumed. From the day the intended purchase was announced, human resources and business development teams traveled to the acquired company's headquarters to familiarize themselves with the new acquisition. The day after the deal closed, the human resources arm of the business development department hit the firm with tailor-made orientation programs. Cisco's approach had worked well between 1994 and 2000 with over 70 acquisitions. By 2001, Cisco's buying spree slowed and acquisitions dropped to only two that year, causing public speculation that the firm had over-shopped. Yet in early 2002 John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems, announced he still intended to acquire eight or ten companies that year. What new post-merger integration challenges would the firm face? This case provides an opportunity to examine Cisco's post-merger integration (PMI) strategy that takes place in a fast time period in order to achieve cost savings, high earnings, and an integrated culture. Students will discover how Cisco realizes value from its acquisitions and the role of executives in the acquired companies. They will also be challenged to think about how Cisco's PMI strategy reflects their corporate strategy and culture.

This series of diversity caselets is designed to present short, quick vignettes of different workplace situations involving issues of gender, sexual orientation, race, disability, age, religion, culture, and ethnicity.

The mere mention of the term "merger and acquisition" (M&A) can send messages of misinformation or half-truths. Clarity about motives and intent, as well as timing the release of information during a merger, requires strategic information management. But when is the right time to tell employees about a pending merger? Who should make the announcement, and what communication channels should they use? A recent survey of managers conducted by the Darden Graduate School of Business explored communication practices that companies use to communicate internally during their firms' merger or acquisition. This note reveals the findings and makes communication recommendations.

Charles Grace and Jerome Hicks were seated beside each other at a meeting the president of Chase Manhattan Bank Delaware had called. Hicks and Grace were financial associates at Chase Manhattan and members of the Urban Bankers Coalition. As they listened to the president's speech they were staggered to hear him say, "...we need more people to become involved in our community enhancement programs-dedicated employees like Jerome Hicks and Charles Grace who helped Chase Manhattan be named bank of the year for two years straight." His sentence lay like an unexploded bomb between Hicks and Grace. They were aware that all eyes had turned towards them. They had already sensed that some of their colleagues and superiors were uncomfortable with the relationship they had developed with the president. Why did they feel like this would be the last step over the edge???This case opens the door to discuss relationship building and special challenges those in the minority face in building relationships.

Nathaniel Gatewood and Sean Daugherty were MBA students at the University of Virginia Darden Graduate School of Business Administration. They each held strong entrepreneurial desires and headed back to school with that in mind. Gatewood knew he wanted to purchase a manufacturing company but was not clear on how he should go about doing so. Daugherty just wanted to work for himself. The pair met in their neighborhood and quickly became friends. Within a short period of time, Gatewood and Daugherty tossed around the idea of becoming partners and exploring a joint venture to purchase a company. Once school started they met another classmate and partner, Eric Anderson, who acted as a catalyst for modeling their purchase plan into a Darden Business Project. In time, Anderson was offered a position in the private equity group where he had interned the previous summer, and he backed out of the partnership. After some soul-searching, Gatewood and Daugherty decided to proceed without him. The pair took many steps in the due diligence process. They assessed their personal skills and interviewed faculty, entrepreneurs, and alumni. Along the way, they explored the concept of a search fund. As they got closer to graduating, Daugherty and Gatewood were forced to decide between securing a search fund and continuing to look for an acquisition or applying for lucrative jobs, like their classmates, and looking for a business to buy later. The case illustrates the development process of two entrepreneurs and serves as an excellent introduction to the search fund concept. It also promotes a discussion of how to plan, manage, and make decisions in an uncertain environment.

Ruth Parks owns Top Resources, a temporary employment agency, with offices in Kansas and Missouri. She discovers an employee working at a big-box store. The employee is collecting workers' compensation (WC) for an injury she claims occurred while on assignment for Top Resources. The bigger picture paints Parks's concern that the temporary nature of employment agencies lends itself to greater risk of WC fraud. This case raises ethical issues concerning truth-telling, whistle-blowing, and workers' compensation. It raises questions concerning employee versus employer rights and the limited effects of regulations in adjudicating these claims.

This case and its B companion case explore the challenges facing an African American executive trying to manage organizational responses to diversity problems. Jeff Fairbanks, vice president for Strategic Human Resources at MOEX Corporation, had received a call the previous day from Jeri Caldwell, who related the details of what she called the "Friday blowout." She had been passed over for a promotion--the third time. During a meeting with her manager, she found herself yelling in frustration and then storming out of his office. She asked Fairbanks to meet with her to discuss what she should do next. Normally, Fairbanks would not meet informally with an employee at the center of such a volatile situation but instead would have one of his subordinates take care of it. However, Fairbanks didn't feel these were normal circumstances. Unfortunately, he didn't know how to handle the situation.

Katherine Mason is a program officer at InterExchange, a firm that administers academic-exchange programs with the former Soviet Union. After returning from an extended period of time in three of the former Soviet republics, Mason discovers that the finance department has instituted new reimbursement policies. She must decide how to interpret and react to the memos concerning expense-report reimbursement. The twist in the case is that because of a past incident, Mason does not have a positive relationship with either her division head or the controller. Mason is convinced that the new policies fail to take into account the individual nature of financial transactions conducted in foreign countries. How should she present her arguments and explain her position to the controller?

Judy Wiles, president and owner of First Impressions, Inc., needs new ideas to market her temporary-food-service employment agency to lucrative private accounts in suburban Detroit. In the A case, Wiles, a member of a minority group, encounters overtly racist behavior, which spurs her to implement changes to her marketing plan. The B case supplies a new twist: Wiles decides to hire a white front man to present the "public face" of her company. The A and B cases present an exciting forum to discuss the conflict between "values and profits," and the C case provides the dramatic epilogue. A teaching note is available to registered faculty, along with a video supplement to enhance student learning.