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In January 2022, Microsoft announced its $69bn acquisition of Activision Blizzard, a leading producer in the gaming sector, which has grown quickly during the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown. Activision was a main player in mobile gaming as well as cloud gaming, an emerging technology that allowed individuals to stream videogames via Internet-connected devices. In this case, students will learn about Microsoft's organic and acquisitive growth in gaming as well as discuss the strategic acquisition of Activision.

Many Chinese family businesses are facing a succession crisis due to the lack of succession planning. Contrary to this finding, Chen Koon-yaw, the fourth-generation owner of the Hop Lion Feather Works Corporation, had planned early and handed the leadership role over to the next generation well before his retirement age. Hop Lion is a supplier of processed down and feathers to well-known consumer brands specialising in beddings and winter coats, including Canada Goose, Moncler, The North Face, and many others. Founded in 1908 and headquartered in Taiwan, the century-old family business had faced multiple crises that threatened its survival in the early 1990s - family separation, employee betrayal, loss of major clients and a highly volatile business environment. Chen's experience of an abrupt takeover of the family business after the demise of his father had led to his decision of not leaving succession planning to chance, and grooming his son as the next leader well in advance. Even after officially handing over to his elder son in 2015, there were doubts on whether he would truly let go. At 61, he had stepped down earlier than most Taiwanese CEOs. Should he continue to exert control over his successor to influence decision-making?

OnlyFans, a paywalled platform primarily known for hosting adult content, had drifted towards sexually explicit content since COVID-19-related lockdowns began in March 2020. However, given pressure from its investors, in August 2021 OnlyFans announced it would ban sexually explicit content from its site later that year. Following the announcement, the company came under fierce criticism from its adult content creators, who maintained that OnlyFans owed its growth to pornography, an industry that had been evolving as technological advancements arose. On August 25, 2021, upon renegotiating with its capital providers, OnlyFans suspended the ban, though irreversible damage had been done. Considering the related information technology (IT) management and ethical issues, what should the chief executive officer of OnlyFans have done when OnlyFans’ different stakeholders pulled the platform in different directions and expressed opposing ethical views? How was an open platform like OnlyFans supposed to judge what was ethical and what was not? Was banning (or not banning) sexually explicit content ethical?

In May 2021, Asahi Group Holdings, Limited (Asahi), a Japanese global beer, spirits, soft drinks, and food company, shifted its focus to non-alcoholic beers. The shift was made after spending US$20 billion to acquire premium beer brands from Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV, a Belgian multinational drinks and brewing company.<br><br>The Japanese beer market had been shrinking for decades with Japan’s declining population, and more recently, the market had shrunk further because of restrictions imposed during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. In response, domestic beer producers were looking abroad for better market opportunities.<br><br>Asahi needed a strategy to compete against the Belgian beer giant. Considerations included whether to pursue growth in Asahi’s core beer business or diversify in the food industry, how to position a growing portfolio of products to minimize cannibalization, whether to shift focus from the premium to the lower-mass beer market, and how to approach the potential Chinese beer market. Regardless of growth strategy, Asahi needed to deal with a loss in share value, triggered by investors nervous about Asahi’s acquisition spree. To regain investor trust, Asahi needed to manage its financial leverage.

To Cédric Jeannot, leveraging technology to promote financial inclusion was personal. After no established financial institution would accept his technology platform to lower transaction costs for free, Jeannot launched FinTech company Be Mobile Africa in May 2020. Within a year, the company had reached over 35 countries with many potential users pending on its waiting lists. A 'for-profit with purpose', Be Mobile Africa aimed to lift 100 million people out of poverty by extending financial services to previously unbanked populations across the African continent. Racing towards its goal, the company needed a longer-term expansion strategy to fulfill Jeannot's mission. Should its growth strategy focus on starting afresh in new markets, or should it dedicate more resources to onboarding prospective users in markets where it already has a foothold? Would the tradeoff of temporarily pulling resources away from this mission to fundraise capital to fund greater long-term successes be worthwhile? Although "In Data We Trust" had served the company well so far, would "In Money We Believe" lead Jeannot to fulfill his ultimate vision?

This case traces the rise of John F. Kennedy from a wealthy family in Boston to president of the United States. The case describes how Kennedy, as a young man, lived a privileged life in the shadow of his older brother, Joe. When Joe was killed in World War II, Jack was thrust into politics, first running for a seat in the House of Representatives then as a senator for Massachusetts. As the youngest U.S. president in history, the case chronicles his rise to power, the changes he instituted as president, and his role in defusing the Cuban missile crisis. The case ends with JFK's legacy after he was assassinated at age 46.

One of the toughest challenges leaders face is managing diverse perspectives--and given heightened tensions over politics and movements such as #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, that's more difficult today than ever before. At the same time, productive disagreement and engagement with opposing views are crucial to high-functioning teams and organizations. So how can leaders both foster passionate debate and preserve collaboration and trust? Drawing from work conducted with scholars of psychology, sociology, and management, Harvard's Julia A. Minson and Francesca Gino offer advice for leaders on approaching disagreements productively and helping employees at all levels do so. Tactics include training that defuses fears of disagreeing (it's usually not as unpleasant as we expect); encourages people to cultivate a receptive mindset by, for instance, intentionally considering information from the opposing perspective; teaches people to choose words carefully, hedge claims, and emphasize areas of agreement; and fosters a culture of tolerance through actions and tone. Honing these skills takes time and practice, but the resulting decrease in frustration and negativity is well worth the effort.

In recent decades sweeping reengineering, digitization, and agile initiatives--and lately the move to remote work--have dramatically transformed the job of managers. Change has come along three dimensions: power, skills, and structure. Managers now have to think about making their teams successful, rather than being served by them; coach performance, not oversee tasks; and lead in rapidly changing, more-fluid environments. These shifts have piled more responsibilities onto managers and required them to demonstrate new capabilities. Research shows that most managers are struggling to keep up. A crisis is looming, say Gherson, a former corporate chief human resources officer, and Gratton, a London Business School professor. Some organizations, however, are heading it off by reimagining the role of managers. This article looks at three--Standard Chartered, IBM, and Telstra--that have helped managers develop new skills, rewired systems and processes to support their work better, and even radically redefined managerial responsibilities to meet the new priorities of the era.

Traditionally, responses to crises and societal problems--the Covid-19 pandemic, natural disasters, racial inequities--are considered the responsibility of the public sector and NGOs. But addressing the world's most critical problems requires leadership, resources, and skills beyond those of any single organization, industry, sector, or government. What's needed, the authors argue, is high-impact coalitions--an emerging organizational form that reaches across boundaries of business, governments, and NGOs. Although public-private partnerships have existed for some time in various forms, large cross-sector, multistakeholder initiatives are newly resurgent and not yet widely understood. They are more voluntary and relationship-based than formal organizations but more task-directed than networks. They connect otherwise disparate spheres of activity that bear on big problems by aligning powerful actors behind a purpose-driven mission. Once underway, they can harness and utilize capabilities quickly and flexibly. This article describes the features of high-impact coalitions and sets out five principles that make the difference between success and failure.

The ability to navigate workplace relationships can make or break your career. Though it's easy to view them as simply negative or positive, virtually all are a mix of both and require careful thought to manage. The trick is to step back and dispassionately analyze what type of relationship you're in--conflict, competition, independence, cooperation, or collaboration. Where on that spectrum you and your colleague fall will be determined by the degree to which your interests align--or clash. The more in sync interests are, the more positive a relationship is. Each type calls for a different set of tactics, but even the negative relationships, if handled appropriately, can still yield rewards.

Blackbird, a Delhi-based advertising agency, agreed to let a star designer leave to start his own firm and then became his first customer, enlisting his help as a contractor. Now other employees are asking for same arrangement--right in the middle of a crucial client project. How should Blackbird's HR director respond? This fictional case study by Rakesh Bohra and Jyotsna Bhatnagar features expert commentary by John H. Chuang, Craig Millon.

New takes on the class divide, from "Bridging the Divide: Working-Class Culture in a Middle-Class Society," by Jack Metzgar; "Fight Like Hell: The Untold History of American Labor," by Kim Kelly; and the podcasts "Working Class History" and "Working People."

The stand-up comic, actor, and author talks about how her TikTok lip-synching of Donald Trump began, her books about tricks for success in business, and more.