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By late 2015, the chief executive officer of Devonian Coast Wineries in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia had invested in the business and had broadened the distribution of the wines he produced. His chief concern was growing sales beyond Nova Scotia’s provincial borders. Selling wines in other provinces was difficult because it required approaching the various provincial liquor control boards. He had three options: continue to engage with each provincial liquor board’s buyers, lobby for greater retail access, or pursue the removal of provincial barriers to wine trade within the Atlantic provinces. If all interprovincial barriers were removed, he would need to compete with other provinces’ larger wine producers, and they would likely gain market share at the expense of local wineries. What was the best strategy to expand Devonian Coast Wineries’ distribution beyond Nova Scotia?

Economic growth in developed nations relies on solving the productivity puzzle: How do we increase the amount of economic output produced for every hour of labour? In practice, labour productivity is calculated as gross domestic product divided by aggregate hours worked. Economy-wide productivity gains often rely on technological innovation, which can straddle various categories, including product versus process, radical versus incremental, and disruptive versus sustaining. This technical note considers four of the most popular strategies to drive productivity growth: intellectual property protection; geographic clusters; investments in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics; and fostering an entrepreneurial spirit.

Akhil Patel is passionate about his business idea: an innovative green technology fuel cell. He wants to dive in and commit to his startup, but Roopa Rao, his fiancee, is much more risk averse, his parents don't approve of the startup, and Akhil has an enticing alternative offer from a prestigious consulting firm. Should Akhil follow his dream and become an entrepreneur? Or should he acquiesce to the other forces in his life and take the "safer" consulting job?

On January 4, 2016, the co-founders of Forked River Brewing Company (Forked River), a small brewery in London, Ontario, revisited the company’s original business plan from 2012. Over the course of only four years, the founders went from home brewing enthusiasts to owners of a striving, award-winning craft brewery. Forked River beers were now offered in pubs, restaurants, and retail stores across the province of Ontario. In the past year alone, Forked River had expanded its production capacity by 50 per cent, hired an additional full-time brewmaster, and added a retail outlet to the brewing facility. However, business had recently become more complicated due to changes to Ontario retail liquor laws, increasing non-brewing administrative work, and looming decisions about the product portfolio and distribution strategy. Now, the three founders wondered whether Forked River was still on the right track or if a new strategic plan was needed to ensure its long-term success in the fast-changing craft beer industry.

Having teamed up to launch their own financial services business, Noah Gottdiener and Jacob Silverman soon discover a venerable brand and viable business in an established bank subsidiary. They then work for many months to acquire the business as a platform for launching their venture. Overnight, they add 100 employees in three U.S. offices. Just months later, late in 2004, they see the chance to buy another firm that is four times the size of their growing venture and that offers them the opportunity to expand into a new product category. The two entrepreneurs are considering the issues and opportunities this new acquisition may create for their small but rapidly-growing venture.

In September 2005, Duff & Phelps closed on a deal to acquire a much larger firm that quadrupled its size to 500 employees. Almost immediately, the company faced challenging integration issues. Gottdiener and Silverman realize that they must now turn away from the thrill of deal-making to grapple with issues of organizational structure and management.

Student spreadsheet for case W14598.

In 2012, TwinHills was a proposed community development project by a private land developer in Calgary, Canada. The developer's utopian vision was to create a community that met a “five bottom line” model of economic, social, environmental, technological, and spiritual components. This vision was not necessarily shared by the agencies involved in the development approval process, including those in city council. The landowner identified social return on investment (SROI) as a possible tool to use to demonstrate the value of the community and expedite approvals. Two students took on the task of researching SROI and recommending specific applications for the TwinHills project. However, they encountered problems that complicated the decision process. What recommendations should the students make regarding the use of SROI for this project? They would have to use skills including cost-benefit and stakeholder analysis, while absorbing and applying the new concept of SROI to suggest the most appropriate course of action.

Facing a decline in the company’s core camera business as a result of the aggressive entry of smartphones, Canon identified the network security industry as a potential growth market, with expected revenues of US$23 billion by 2020. Canon opted to pursue this kind of growth potential outside its core competency by acquiring Milestone Systems in 2014 and Axis Communications in 2015. Canon paid a 50-per-cent premium to acquire Axis in a cash-only offer, while choosing to allow its two acquired companies to continue operating as independent entities. Should Canon have instead created a strategic alliance with these two companies? Would these acquisitions allow Canon to achieve synergies and secure its goal of $1 billion in sales from the network securities market by 2020?

Hector Beverages reinvented the ethnic drinks category in the Indian market with its beverage brand Paper Boat. The brand had been successful since its launch in 2013, posting triple-digit growth in 2015. By the end of December 2015, Hector Beverages’ future seemed to be heavily dependent upon Paper Boat. With Paper Boat constituting 90 per cent of the company’s total sales, 2016 would be a critical year for Hector Beverages. Should the company add more variety to its line of products, or should it focus on a few best-selling variants? Would the Paper Boat brand remain strong despite the launch of a similar product by a major competitor? Could Hector Beverages maintain its hold on the Indian ethnic drinks market?

Alibaba Group (Alibaba) had grown from its founding in 1999, in an effort to help Chinese manufacturers and exporters reach global markets, to become a global leader in e-commerce, big data, and cloud technology. The company’s 2014 initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange had been the largest to date. The company’s founder and chairman, Jack Ma, had used the funds to globally expand Alibaba’s operations and its hold on diverse markets. Ma’s aim was to have Alibaba exist in three centuries and to not only generate profits but also improve lives and societies in China and beyond. How could Ma ensure long-term success for shareholders and prosperity for China and the world?

In September 2006, the general manager at Norwood Waterworks (Norwood) was faced with a difficult situation. Since his original employer, EMCO Corporation (Emco), acquired Norwood, he had been tasked with trying to turn around the new acquisition. Like Emco, Norwood was a distributor of building products and equipment in the waterworks industry. The company had three locations, all in Alberta. However, the general manager soon discovered that Norwood was suffering due to a poor organizational culture. Employees were unmotivated, overpaid, and complacent. He needed to communicate—clearly and effectively—that the Emco culture was here to stay, and that the Norwood employees needed to find a way to change the way they operated.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In the Introduction (15 pages), Cohen and Sharma review a few examples of the companies that inspired the authors to write about this topic and the sources they found useful in developing their argument.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 1 (32 pages), Cohen and Sharma describe the essential characteristics of successful entrepreneurial leaders and the unique challenges and opportunities in building these attributes in family firms.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 2 (28 pages), Cohen and Sharma discuss how next-generation members can take initiatives to grow their entrepreneurial leadership skills and how other members of their family can support such endeavors to nurture and grow entrepreneurs in every generation.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 3 (25 pages), Cohen and Sharma argue that success over time for a family business must satisfy two conditions. First, the family must persist, and second, the business must continue. For the former to happen, a meaningful involvement of the controlling family in business is critical for its continuity as a family business. For the latter to happen, the products and services offered must continue to evolve to meet the needs of changing markets.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 4 (20 pages), Cohen and Sharma argue that regardless of the form and focus of innovation, entrepreneurial efforts are necessary for the long-term survival of a family enterprise not only in older economies of Japan or Sweden but also in the emerging economies of countries like Argentina. Enterprising families embrace purposeful and focused change. Yet changing amidst a backdrop of generational success and powerful personalities needs collective familial buy-in and efforts. As the family and its enterprises grow, the family needs to create structures and systems that ensure open communication and accountability while still maintaining family harmony and unity.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 5 (22 pages), Cohen and Sharma discuss the fact that building a family business that can last past the founding generation by utilizing practices that sustain entrepreneurial thinking and action has its own extra challenges-and some potential advantages. In this chapter, they discuss what is known about design conditions that encourage entrepreneurial initiative from all areas and levels of the organization, thereby raising the odds of generating new products, processes, practices, and structures-and even new businesses. Then then authors apply this understanding to analyzing and improving family firms.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 6 (35 pages), Cohen and Sharma show that effective redesign of a successful family enterprise and implementation requires careful planning linked to the long-term innovation objectives, understanding the current state of the organization to be sure that changes take current conditions into account, recognizing that not just roles and reporting relationships have to change but also actual practices and policies, seeing that the right people-family as well as nonfamily members-are put in place, and working hard at communicating clearly at all levels and managing the transition. Redesigning a successful enterprise to accomplish new strategic objectives is hard. Enterprising families with a long-term orientation, determined to foster all levels of innovation while maintaining the core business find ways to accomplish this challenging goal.

Entrepreneurs in Every Generation: How Successful Family Businesses Develop Their Next Leaders is a seven-chapter book published by Berrett-Koehler Publisher in 2016. Entrepreneurs in Every Generation shows readers how success in family business means assuring next generation entrepreneurial leadership in three dimensions: the business, the owning family, and the organization that nurtures both. Applying the entrepreneurial mind-set to all three dimensions, professors Allan Cohen and Pramodita Sharma define the challenges and the role for leadership; applying the entrepreneurial mind-set in all three dimensions is what sets family enterprises apart. The book not only reviews best practices, but it also urges special attention to the uniqueness of context. It also guides the reader through work sheets on how to understand and adapt to context. In Chapter 7 (15 pages), Cohen and Sharma argue that only a small proportion of families in business achieve a successful balance between building strong family connections and making decisions that lead to strong financial performance. In other words, they aim for "warm hearts and deep pockets." Maintaining this ambidexterity over time requires wisdom, courage, and patience. Both the family and the business must have inbuilt renewal mechanisms so each can regenerate to remain in harmony with the changes in internal context and external environment. But, what to attend to when is a question of balance and timing. In this chapter, the authors attend to this perpetual dilemma that enterprising families face in their long journey to develop entrepreneurs in every generation.