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Leaders with a cross-cultural mind-set are in high demand. Gaining that perspective takes great effort, but it also allows you to create value for your company. So argue Unruh and Cabrera, who chart a clear path for business leaders who aspire to join the global elite. The process starts with learning to think and act globally. It requires extensive study, foreign travel, cultural exploration, and interpersonal experiences that must be undertaken with an open mind and heart. Once you enter the global elite, there's no coasting. You'll have to suss out cross-cultural divergences and convergences--and build diverse networks--to give your company a leg up. But you should be inspired less by figures on an income statement than by a sense of global citizenship. That's what makes members of the global elite a rare, influential breed that achieves both measurable and ineffable results.

Stefan Konrad is the head of South Asia and Middle East business for the consultancy Leman Highlander, headquartered in New York. He's concerned about employee turnover in the Mumbai office, where the firm's star performer, Vijay Kumar, is doing a great job of attracting clients but also of alienating employees. Two years earlier, on one of Stefan's regular visits to Mumbai, he asked Vijay about some consultants who had abruptly quit. Vijay's response was to storm out of the office and send a letter of resignation to the firm's managing partner--who talked him down and instructed Stefan to keep Vijay happy in the future. But the problems are continuing, and on this latest visit, Stefan gets an earful from some of Vijay's colleagues. He must decide whether and how to raise the issue over dinner that night. Ishan Raina, the CEO of India's OOH Media, and Eric Olson, the global managing partner of leadership consulting at Heidrick & Struggles, offer commentary.

The acclaimed American writer Maya Angelou on the creative process, bridging cultural divides, and what makes a great leader.

Stefan Konrad is the head of South Asia and Middle East business for the consultancy Leman Highlander, headquartered in New York. He's concerned about employee turnover in the Mumbai office, where the firm's star performer, Vijay Kumar, is doing a great job of attracting clients but also of alienating employees. Two years earlier, on one of Stefan's regular visits to Mumbai, he asked Vijay about some consultants who had abruptly quit. Vijay's response was to storm out of the office and send a letter of resignation to the firm's managing partner--who talked him down and instructed Stefan to keep Vijay happy in the future. But the problems are continuing, and on this latest visit, Stefan gets an earful from some of Vijay's colleagues. He must decide whether and how to raise the issue over dinner that night. Ishan Raina, the CEO of India's OOH Media, and Eric Olson, the global managing partner of leadership consulting at Heidrick & Struggles, offer commentary.

Stefan Konrad is the head of South Asia and Middle East business for the consultancy Leman Highlander, headquartered in New York. He's concerned about employee turnover in the Mumbai office, where the firm's star performer, Vijay Kumar, is doing a great job of attracting clients but also of alienating employees. Two years earlier, on one of Stefan's regular visits to Mumbai, he asked Vijay about some consultants who had abruptly quit. Vijay's response was to storm out of the office and send a letter of resignation to the firm's managing partner--who talked him down and instructed Stefan to keep Vijay happy in the future. But the problems are continuing, and on this latest visit, Stefan gets an earful from some of Vijay's colleagues. He must decide whether and how to raise the issue over dinner that night. Ishan Raina, the CEO of India's OOH Media, and Eric Olson, the global managing partner of leadership consulting at Heidrick & Struggles, offer commentary.

This case presents organizational challenges facing a physician champion of the Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH). Dr. Julian Kuffler, working with his employer, the Mount Desert Island Hospital System (MDI), hoped to persuade the primary care physicians in the system to embrace the PCMH care model. Physician resistance was strongly opposed to some of the key principles of PCMH, such as managing the health of a defined population, standardizing chronic care management protocols, delegating patient care tasks to non-physician members of a care team, and to having strong physician leadership at the system level. At the same time, MDI was a small rural "critical access hospital" with declining admissions, predominantly outpatient-based revenues, and deteriorating finances. MDI leadership viewed high quality primary care to be essential for MDI to be able to attract the best health system partner with which it could affiliate to become part of a larger, more financially viable organization. MDI leadership also hoped to find a partner that could also support its participation in new population health arrangements such as accountable care organizations.

This article identifies and explores 13 analytical tools and techniques to understand the unique dilemmas and paradoxes faced by family firms. They are presented here as tools to better analyze family business cases and develop effective responses to family business situations. However, they are equally useful for families in business and advisors to family businesses as they seek to deal with the complex issues created by the conflict of family and business systems in family enterprises. Tools focused on understanding the family business system as a whole are separated from family-focused and business-focused ones. The six dual systems-focused techniques aid understanding of the key stakeholders, current status, past history, and desired future of the firm. The three family-focused techniques in the tool kit aim to better understand the relationships between and the perspectives of the key stakeholders, and the overall health of the family system. The four business system-focused conceptual techniques enable understanding of the nature and extent of the family's involvement in the business, its key directions, performance, and continuity. Careful application of appropriate tools will deepen understanding of the core issues being faced by a decision maker and assist in the development of effective and actionable recommendations.

Breezy Plains Acres began in 1927 as a small farming operation in Minnesota consisting of a section of land with a homestead. Now run by fourth and fifth generations of the Richter family, it was a five million dollar, complex agri-business that included both owned and rented cropland and pasture, five sites, several hog finishing units, and cattle. This was no simple farm with a cow in the pen, a pig in the sty, and a few acres as depicted in "Little House on the Prairie." Chuck Richter was in his early sixties and had begun to consider transitioning away from the day-to-day operations of the farm/ranch toward retirement. He realized that with increased complexity came increased challenges in relation to how to sustain the operation within the family for future generations. He had one farming son, seven off-farm children and fifteen grandchildren. He was concerned about who would sustain the farm, and how many of the non-farming children had the interest, and, equally important, the financial resources, to buy-in to the operation. As he considered estate planning, he recalled examples of farm families torn apart and farms being sold to strangers because of the children fighting due to how the estate was divided. Being fair to his children was of central importance. As he reviewed the challenges, he thought, "What can I do to help assure that future generations of Richters will still own and manage Breezy Plains Acres?"

The case relates the history of an Australian family transport firm from its foundation, through its expansion and diversification into agriculture and tourism, to a business and succession crisis nearly 90 years later. Rita Buchanan, youngest daughter of Noel Buchanan, the third generation owner, gave her father an ultimatum about the transfer of firm ownership. Noel's response, that he would sell the firm provided Rita remained the majority shareholder, brings interlinked family and business problems into focus: the owner's failure to plan for succession following a dispute seven years earlier with his son, who then left the firm; the discontent of his three daughters about how this lack of succession planning affects their futures; the owner's estrangement from his wife, Cherie, over the owner's ongoing extramarital relationship; Cherie's resentment of Rita's strategic role in the firm; and the firm's falling profitability, especially after a cyclone [hurricane] destroyed its farm and left many trucks idle. The case requires a decision about whether the youngest daughter should accept her father's offer, and what actions are needed to safeguard the interests of the other stakeholders and ensure the future of the firm.

What's in a signature? If yours is large, it's an indicator that you may be a narcissist. And if you're a CEO, that doesn't bode well for your company.

Today's organization must develop young, customer-facing employees who are (a) committed to the company's mission and (b) capable of taking decisions and initiative, not just direction.

Employees today will be asked to come up with solutions to problems that weren't even on the radar when they were hired.

On 10 May 2011, Microsoft announced that it would buy Skype for $8.5 billion. The price tag was undoubtedly high - roughly ten times Skype's revenues in 2010 ($860 million), around twice its recent valuation. In late 2009, eBay sold the majority of its stake in Skype to an investor group led by Silver Lake Partners at a valuation of around $2.75 billion. What makes this more interesting is that Skype itself had not been profitable since its foundation in 2003. So what was the reasoning behind the deal? How did Microsoft finally arrive at that price? Why was it willing to pay such a large amount of money? Was there something more? The brand, the networking, the technology, the possible strategic and product synergies...? Learning objectives: The case provides a good opportunity to discuss valuation issues in a fast-growing company in the high-tech industry. The acquisition was undoubtedly expensive. But how did Microsoft arrive at that price? Let us go back to valuation basics. What was the value of Skype at the time? Although it was a private business, Skype was ready to go to public in 2010 and therefore some inside information is available about its financial performance. Based on these documents as well as analysts' reports, participants can learn how to justify a firm's valuation by using the discounted cash flow method. Both Microsoft and Skype were large-sized companies operating in the technology sector. The case also provides a good opportunity to discuss the characteristics of the industry in general as well as the strategic/synergistic fit of these two companies.

The case offers a role-play simulation in which a team of up to 13 participants acts as a board of directors of a privately-owned national energy company. The board has to make decisions about 1) a foreign-country acquisition proposed by management, 2) a change in executive compensation. It consists of 3 types of directors - affiliated directors representing the mother company, executive directors, and independent directors. Four sub-committees convene before the board meeting to discuss the issues on the agenda and make their recommendations.

The case offers a role-play simulation in which a team of up to 13 participants acts as a board of directors of a privately-owned national energy company. The board has to make decisions about 1) a foreign-country acquisition proposed by management, 2) a change in executive compensation. It consists of 3 types of directors - affiliated directors representing the mother company, executive directors, and independent directors. Four sub-committees convene before the board meeting to discuss the issues on the agenda and make their recommendations.

An accounting firm has just informed the president of a 55-year-old, third-generation family-owned and -operated company that the family business is beginning to struggle financially. This news pushes years of simmering tensions and conflict within the family business into open conflict. The president has accused his sister, a vice president, of not doing her job. The sister is frustrated and needs to decide what action to take.

Carborundum Universal Murugappa International (CUMI) was a leading abrasives manufacturing company based in India with global operations in Russia, South Africa and China. In the global abrasives business, China held 50 per cent of the raw materials for the industry. China was also the largest market for abrasives worldwide and was expected to contribute to one third of the global demand for abrasives. CUMI had the vision to become a global leader in the abrasives industry within 10 years. It had successfully expanded operations in Russia and South Africa, where it was seen more as a partner than a conqueror in its acquisition strategy. In 2006, the company entered China through a joint venture with a Chinese state company but subsequently bought out the partner. However, the company was facing several problems with its stand-alone operation there, especially in terms of maintaining its workforce and hiring local managers. It was clear that winning market share in China was necessary, but the complexity of the Chinese market had proven to be a challenge. The managing director had to present a strategy for working successfully in China to the board.

International Oncology Services Private Limited initially had plans to start operations as a stand-alone facility offering cancer care to patients in Delhi, India, but escalating real estate costs combined with the capital intensive nature of the business were a big barrier. Moreover, the high gestation period in a greenfield project led the company founders to think of an alternative business model: a collaborative arrangement on a hub and spoke basis with an established healthcare provider in the city of Jaipur. This was a success. The company could leverage the infrastructure and in-patient facilities of the partner hospital, while adding its own medical, technological and research expertise to offer services at a cost-effective price. Though the company grew rapidly in its initial years, continued success was by no means assured. The management has to decide whether to expand with a single partner or adopt a multi-partner approach to take the business to the next level of growth.

In 2012, KiOR was in the process of starting biofuels production at its first plant in Columbus, Mississippi. This initial plant was to provide a commercial scale proof-of-concept of KiOR's production technology, and the company expected to build another set of plants in Natchez, MS using "copy exact" principles. These latter plants would be three times the size of the Columbus plants, and KiOR anticipated a number of improvements in its production methodology. Among these were (1) an increase in its conversion yield, or the volume of biofuel that it could produce from an inputted ton of biomass feedstock, and (2) a decrease in input costs. KiOR biofuels earned Renewable Identification Number (RIN) credits associated with the Renewable Fuel Standard 2 (RFS2) administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Since RINs had a market value, the RFS2 provided a subsidy to KiOR. However, it was unclear whether the credits would retain a value beyond 2022, and KiOR was in a race to realize the potential improvements in production technology and costs before RIN support vanished. This case examines the breakeven cost of the KiOR production technology, with and without cost improvements and with and without RIN support. It provides representative assumptions that students can use to analyze KiOR's business model and its sensitivity to policy support. The case package includes an Excel workbook that can be given to students to explore sensitivity analyses around technological and RIN value uncertainties.

Spreadsheet supplement for product UV1458.