Set in 2022, the case follows the sustainability journey of Jiu Zhen Nan, a 133-year-old Taiwanese pastry brand headquartered in Kaohsiung, the southern city of Taiwan. Jiu Zhen Nan specialises in gourmet traditional Chinese Han pastry, often consumed during major festivals, weddings, and religious celebrations. The century-old brand has an established stronghold at domestic airports, high-speed rail stations, and upscale department stores. Eric Lee, Chairman and the fourth-generation owner, had been at the helm of the family firm since 1996. Given the increased focus on sustainability issues in recent years, he had aligned sustainability priorities with the baked goods business, its core values, and its long-term purpose. Since the mid-2010s, he had led the firm to achieve considerable progress on several aspects of sustainability - food ethics, environmental sustainability, social participation, the promotion of Han pastry culture, and talent cultivation. Those efforts were duly recognised, winning the firm an Excellence in Corporate Social Responsibility award from the CommonWealth Magazine twice, in 2019 and 2021. Lee conceded that realising sustainability goals needed time, given that it would not be a short-term pursuit but rather an ongoing commitment. As he mulled over the options for navigating the prevailing challenges amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he recognised that, at the same time, there was mounting pressure to take even more action toward reducing the business impact on climate change. What more could a food manufacturing business like Jiu Zhen Nan do for the good of the planet, the good of society, and its future success?

After US materials science company Dow decided to renew its focus on inclusion and diversity (I&D), it opted to use its Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to enable its staff to embrace this cause and effect a cultural change across its locations worldwide. As this case focuses on Dow's efforts in Asia Pacific, it delves specifically into how Dow's ERGs in Greater China, Japan, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand have helped raised staff awareness about I&D issues in these locations. In particular, Dow staff were educated on areas such as disability, gender equality, mental health, inter-generational workforce, and the marginalised in society through the various activities organised by the ERGs.

In May 2015, Filip Daw, a human capital strategist with a leading consultancy, is hired by the Indian subsidiary of Semicon Inc (SI), an American semiconductor manufacturing company, to uncover the reasons behind the high attrition rate in the company. Established in 2005, SI is a design centre - a skill-intensive core business unit that directly impacts the parent company's competitiveness as a supplier to the end-user industry. India's low-cost and abundant talent was expected to add to the design centre's competitiveness but SI's high attrition rate proved otherwise and had started eroding its competitiveness and revenue. Daw must identify the turnover drivers and analyse how the company's HR policies influenced these drivers. Besides adopting a data-driven approach to diagnose the attrition drivers, Daw needs to examine assumptions held by various stakeholders. The case on Daw's hand requires finding a proxy metric for performance and then connect that performance metric with turnover, developing hypotheses, collecting requisite data and making insightful recommendations. This case documents a real-life analytics project in a semiconductor company that was later bought over by another company. The name Semicon India is used to disguise the identity of the original company. The project was helmed by the author Dr Fermin Diez, who was then its Regional Chief HR Officer.

Supplement to case SMU805 In May 2015, Filip Daw, a human capital strategist with a leading consultancy, is hired by the Indian subsidiary of Semicon Inc (SI), an American semiconductor manufacturing company, to uncover the reasons behind the high attrition rate in the company. Established in 2005, SI is a design centre - a skill-intensive core business unit that directly impacts the parent company's competitiveness as a supplier to the end-user industry. India's low-cost and abundant talent was expected to add to the design centre's competitiveness but SI's high attrition rate proved otherwise and had started eroding its competitiveness and revenue. Daw must identify the turnover drivers and analyse how the company's HR policies influenced these drivers. Besides adopting a data-driven approach to diagnose the attrition drivers, Daw needs to examine assumptions held by various stakeholders. The case on Daw's hand requires finding a proxy metric for performance and then connect that performance metric with turnover, developing hypotheses, collecting requisite data and making insightful recommendations. This case documents a real-life analytics project in a semiconductor company that was later bought over by another company. The name Semicon India is used to disguise the identity of the original company. The project was helmed by the author Dr Fermin Diez, who was then its Regional Chief HR Officer.

In April 2010, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Steelworks, a Singapore-based metals company recently acquired by an Indian conglomerate, embarked on a plan to realign the organization's structure and processes across its subsidiaries. However, he had difficulty getting the long-serving general manager of a plant in China to sign off on the current year’s audited financial statements. This led to a tense and bizarre confrontation between the CEO and the regional general manager. The restructuring project was taking autonomy from regional unit heads. Was that the problem? Was Steelworks mismanaging its subsidiaries? Had the general manager of the Chinese plant, a Singaporean expatriate, been seconded to China for too long? It was unclear how a member of the senior management team who had been with Steelworks for his entire career could behave this way and jeopardize his position. What could the CEO have done differently?

In April 2010, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Steelworks, a Singapore-based metals company recently acquired by an Indian conglomerate, embarked on a plan to realign the organization's structure and processes across its subsidiaries. However, he had difficulty getting the long-serving general manager of a plant in China to sign off on the current year's audited financial statements. This led to a tense and bizarre confrontation between the CEO and the regional general manager. The restructuring project was taking autonomy from regional unit heads. Was that the problem? Was Steelworks mismanaging its subsidiaries? Had the general manager of the Chinese plant, a Singaporean expatriate, been seconded to China for too long? It was unclear how a member of the senior management team who had been with Steelworks for his entire career could behave this way and jeopardize his position. What could the CEO have done differently?