Revlon India was founded as a joint venture in 1995, pairing the industrial conglomerate UMG with the global beauty brand Revlon, Inc. to bring international color cosmetics to India. After growing rapidly and pioneering the Beauty Advisor (BA) model in India, the company began to struggle in the 2010s as it faced challenges in its sales and supply chain operations and started to lose touch with the market, all while competition rose, with new companies leveraging e-commerce platforms and international brands entering the market. In November 2023, Meghna Modi was tapped to turnaround the struggling venture. In the 5 months since her appointment, Modi had made enormous strides. She reorganized the head office, broke down silos in the sales organization, and reengaged with Revlon India's BAs. She completely revamped the company's e-commerce team, and began to collect data to understand its supply chain deficiencies. Modi also aimed to foster more accountability and learning in the company. Towards this end, she developed a Strategy Map and Balanced Scorecard (BSC) to articulate and evaluate Revlon India's business model. However, this unearthed a significant tradeoff between the company's online and offline operations. With pressure to breakeven by the end of 2024, Modi had to decide how to manage this tradeoff. Should the company emphasize either online or offline? Should it integrate them, or differentiate them? And how could the BSC be used to test potential solutions?
In summer 2021, School of Rock was a youth-oriented music education company with 291 franchise- and company-owned schools globally. Before CEO Rob Price's hire in 2017, School of Rock's nonconformist rock 'n' roll culture led to variability in teaching styles, educational outcomes, and risks for copyright violations. The previous administration's attempts to standardize curriculum and processes led to friction with franchisees. Price smoothed over the tension by better listening to franchisees and clarifying core policies while giving franchisees freedom in certain areas. One of Price's major initiatives was the Method App which provided a structure to empower and guide work at the school branches, featuring nearly 100 show programs and 1,000 copyright-compliant song choices tagged with the associated skill levels, musical concepts, and corresponding show programs. When the app launched as a minimum viable product (MVP) in October 2019, it struggled to gain traction. Some franchisees felt the MVP's functionality was flawed; others worried that the app threatened their pedagogical independence. Price's team considered several options to increase adoption: a listening tour to communicate the app's value and collect feedback for improvements; an exclusive marketing campaign for schools with a minimum level of app usage; and incentives based on School of Rock's balanced scorecard that measured performance and other metrics. Which one or more of these options would drive app adoption without reigniting tension between franchisees and the corporate office?
In 2005, Research In Motion's (RIM) BlackBerry smartphone was a sensation. After its launch in 1999, the groundbreaking BlackBerry had captured the hearts and minds of corporate America through its secure wireless email service. The device was so addictive and easy-to-use that many began calling it the "CrackBerry." Buoyed by Blackberry's success, RIM experienced exponential growth, surpassing $1 billion in revenues. But the Canadian tech firm was suffering from growing pains. Co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie (HBS '89) had managed RIM since its early days with only 14 employees-now, it had more than 3,500. The co-CEOs struggled with day-to-day responsibilities, leading to delays in product development, sales, and network infrastructure. Balsillie and Lazaridis needed a way to manage RIM more effectively. In 2001, they hired Larry Conlee as COO. Though he brought product development on schedule and helped RIM mature into a more coordinated and efficient company, many engineers chafed under his top-down management style. In 2005, Conlee requested that the co-CEOs promote him to president, which would position him to introduce more formal systems to the entire company. This could free up the co-CEOs to focus on strategic goals. However, Conlee's promotion might also stifle innovation. With competition encroaching, this decision could prove crucial to the future of RIM. Should Balsillie and Lazaridis give Conlee the promotion he wants?