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Tom White, President of Wildcat Solutions (WS), a student run business and for-credit experiential learning class at the Inland Empire University must decide if they should keep secret shops, a challenging and unpopular product among the student associates that is nevertheless an important source of revenue for the class. To make this decision, White must wrestle with the multiple missions that WS has adopted. The case can be used in a later undergraduate Business or Marketing Strategy class when discussing corporate missions or when evaluating dual/multi mission organizations and social enterprises because the case hinges on evaluating the organization mission in the context of WS revenues sources. WS is a dual/multi mission organization, which are popular with students today, and the case highlights the natural tension or contradiction such organizations have within their mission statements.

This article initiates a discussion with the guardians of the case method to make teaching cases more "DEI-friendly." It outlines how instructors, case writers, and other case stakeholders can consider the principles of diversity, equity and inclusion in the cases they select, write, review and publish. For instructors, a DEI case teaching toolkit along with other useful resources are provided. For case writers, DEI guidance for writing cases and instructor manuals and suggested exemplar cases are offered. The article concludes with a compiled list of contemporary resources about DEI teaching considerations in business schools.

Doctors' efficiency and patients' health outcomes stand to benefit from employing technology to resolve pain points. However, it is challenging to increase technology adoption rates in healthcare, especially in developing countries such as India where it is the need of the hour. This case provides in-depth discussions among company executives to highlight the challenges faced and to engage students to think critically about solutions for HealthPlix, the company which focuses on how target users (i.e., doctors) are encouraged to adopt AI technologies. It also provides an overview of Indian healthcare market, challenges and possible future opportunities for health tech firms.

As a traditional retailer focused on selling home appliances, Suning.com Co. Ltd. (Suning) grew quickly and became a leading retailer in China, dominating the market until the 2000s. By 2021, however, Suning was facing challenges, including fierce competition from e-commerce giants such as Alibaba Group Holding Limited, Jingdong, and Pinduoduo Inc. and from its upstream brand manufacturers. It also faced financial pressure in its core business due to aggressive expansion. Suning's revenue, assets, and equity declined, and its net income, which had significantly declined since 2018, had been in the red since 2020. Should Jindong Zhang, co-founder of Suning, change the company's current business strategy? How could Zhang use an omnichannel structure to ensure Suning's sustainable growth?

This case investigates LaCroix sparkling water and its connection to perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), as a study of chemical compounds in carbonated beverages has captured the public's attention. At the time of this case, PFAS were not heavily regulated, but the media coverage and body of research surrounding this class of chemicals suggested state and federal rules were on the horizon. The protagonist is Josephine Hudson, a fictional character with the title of president of customer satisfaction for National Beverage, LaCroix's parent company. She must address many questions including: Was there anything that could be done to remove the PFAS in LaCroix? If so, would this increase costs for production as well as the price for the end-customer? Was the company at risk of any legal challenges?

Set in September 2021, the case traces the digital transformation of FoodXervices Inc, a Singapore SME operating in the food distribution industry. The case essays the challenges faced by Nichol as a leader helming the digital transformation and how the transformation helped the company redefine its value proposition to the stakeholders. To customers, it pivoted from being a distributor to a solution provider; to the labour market, it had become a foodtech company attracting savvy university graduates as employees; to the F&B community, it had become an incubator fostering innovations. However, Nichol wanted more value to justify the company's investment in digital technology and futuristic application. In addition, she wanted the technology to improve the business metrics by improving sales and margins.

Machine-learning (ML) models have become a common tool used across a multitude of industries to help people make decisions. As these models have increased in predictive power, many have also grown in complexity. The pursuit to improve the accuracy of predictions has diminished the interpretability of many models-leaving users with little understanding of the model's behavior or trust in its predictions. The field of eXplainable artificial intelligence (XAI) seeks to encourage the development of interpretable models. Google Cloud Platform offers two Explainable AI functions in BigQuery ML that allow users to examine the attribution of model features, which aids in model behavior verification and bias recognition. One of the functions available in BigQuery provides a global perspective on the features used to train the model, while the second function examines local feature attribution associated with individual predictions in more detail. This note offers an overview of Explainable AI in BigQuery ML, using as an example a (fictional) realtor's linear regression model that predicted a home's latest sale price based on predictor variables such as the total tax assessment from the year of the last sale, the square footage of the house, the number of bedrooms, the number of bathrooms, and whether the condition of the home is below average. After training the linear model, the feature attribution can be studied from a global and local perspective in BigQuery.

This case focuses on Ferrero SpA's sustainable palm oil sourcing strategy in light of its acquisition of Nestlé's U.S. confectionery brands, which in many ways does not comply with Ferrero's sustainable sourcing commitments. The case reviews Ferrero's rich family history, provides an overview of the confectionery industry, explains the environmental and social problems associated with palm oil production, discusses the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certification and whether it is truly sustainable, provides a competitor analysis of palm oil sourcing strategies, and reviews Ferrero's sourcing strategy. Adding complexity to the case, while the RSPO is a common standard among competitors for sustainable palm oil sourcing, there is discussion over whether it is truly sustainable, and if palm oil use in general can ever be sustainable. Overall, this case grapples with how the Ferrero Group should deal with their sourcing strategy in the midst of this dilemma between their acquired and native brands.

The case focuses on a family feud that started with a property dispute and became public news in 2017. Gautam Singhania (chairman and managing director, MD, of Raymond Limited, India) and his father, Vijaypat Singhania, are involved in the dispute. The case narrates both sides of the story. It provides an opportunity to discuss succession management, as well as "family feuds", their reasons and their repercussions on a family business. The case offers interesting insights into the overlap of family, business and ownership dimensions in a family business. The case ends with the speculation of whether such disputes could ever be settled.

Lionheart Agrotech Limited, the holding company of Lionheart Farms is developing a large-scale sustainable hybrid coconut plantation with integrated processing and manufacturing capacities in the Philippines. The case describes the idea of the founders, their journey, the challenges they met and how they solved them. The case explores the key challenges and principal constraints that the company faced - and continues to face - during the development and execution of its sustainable agricultural project.

Lionheart Agrotech Limited, the holding company of Lionheart Farms is developing a large-scale sustainable hybrid coconut plantation with integrated processing and manufacturing capacities in the Philippines. The case describes the idea of the founders, their journey, the challenges they met and how they solved them. The case explores the key challenges and principal constraints that the company faced - and continues to face - during the development and execution of its sustainable agricultural project.

Schneider Electric is a multinational company providing energy management and automation. The case briefly outlines the company's history and describes the progressive integration of sustainability efforts into its overall strategy. This 20-year journey culminates in 2021 when Corporate Knights ranked Schneider Electric No. 1 worldwide for its sustainability performance. The protagonist, Gilles Vermot Desroches, who spearheaded the effort, looks back at how this remarkable achievement came about and how he is now confronted with the difficult task of imagining the company's next steps.

In June 2018, the government of Canada passed the Cannabis Act, paving the way for the legalization of recreational cannabis cultivation, acquisition, possession, and consumption on October 17 of that same year. This move set off a flurry of activity as existing companies, investment firms, and entrepreneurs sought to establish an initial position within the burgeoning industry. Mīhī Cannabis and its chief executive officer needed to navigate the complex patchwork of government regulations and other market factors to establish a launch strategy for the company that would differentiate it from the anticipated competition and support the normalization of the industry in the eyes of the communities in which it operated.

Tableau is a powerful visualization software that supports the data analysis process. The program allows users to create custom visualizations from datasets of all sizes and types using a simple drag-and-drop interface. This note introduces new users to Tableau by providing guidance on connecting to data, exploring the interface, and creating a number of common visualizations.

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) offers Cloud Storage, a popular cloud computing resource for data storage. This note provides information about uploading data to Cloud Storage, creating BigQuery tables from data found in Cloud Storage, previewing files in Cloud Storage, and sharing Cloud Storage buckets.

Set in 2008, the A case portrays the first 134 years of Aikon, a US multinational based in Minnesota. It is presented to participants as the baseline case, and they are told that the B and C cases (which will cover the next 14 years) will be handed out in class. The case depicts the rich history of the company, which succeeded in reinventing itself several times. Aikon progressively emerged as a key player in the ice-making industry before becoming a producer of household appliances, such as refrigerators, and then transforming itself into a major player in the medical device market (e.g., pacemakers). In 2007 the company had a record year in terms of both sales and profit, and the CEO is now considering what steps should be taken to ensure continued growth. In reality, there is no B or C case. The A case is a disguised version of the growth history of Company X, up to its final record year in 2007. When participants study the growth of Company X, they already know what has happened. It is then easy to blame Company's X's top team for a lack of foresight and strategic vision - "How could they not have ...?" Clearly, it is a great example of hindsight bias. However, the situation looked very different from the perspective of Company X's CEO in 2008. The key questions are: Were there already warning signs of the company's demise, any weak - or not-so-weak - signals? And, perhaps most importantly: What does it say about participants' own situations? Could their company be the next Company X? (The identity of Company X is revealed in the teaching note.

When analyzing a business case, MBA students tend to extrapolate by concluding that whatever a successful company did was effective, and whatever a failed company did was wrong. At the heart of the problem is the classical confusion between correlation and causality. This case demonstrates the pitfalls of such thinking through a parable, in which an alien who descended to earth concluded that lying on a hospital bed causes a person to die. It then provides several concrete examples of business analysis so students can discuss whether we can attribute commercial success to various practices or "visions" of a company. Finally, it suggests a choice-centered approach to case studies on how to draw a meaningful conclusion through observations (as opposed to rigorous statistical analysis). The suggestions include clarifying the purpose of case analysis, framing the central question as a choice, considering trade-offs, identifying external conditions, and going beyond a particular company. The final part is an appendix, which goes beyond business cases by discussing similar confusions in war, art, health, and education, and scientific methods in natural sciences and economics.

VH1, MTV, and LOGO were all popular television channels owned by the Paramount television network. One of the most successful shows on LOGO was RuPaul’s Drag Race, a reality television show featuring drag queens. Paramount was considering moving RuPaul’s Drag Race off LOGO to a different platform within the Paramount portfolio in 2017. Before deciding where RuPaul’s Drag Race would air, Paramount needed to determine whether the show could be successful on another platform given its current fan base, how the potential move would affect the show’s ratings, and whether the positioning or targeting strategy for the series would need to change if it were moved.

When the pandemic shifted many people to remote work, long-held attitudes about the practice shifted as well. Now, as many organizations are adopting hybrid work arrangements, it's imperative that leaders end the tendency to overlook remote employees' contributions and aspirations. The authors offer recommendations for both leaders and employees to help them work toward equity and access for both in-person and remote personnel.

Interface has been a leading innovator in the carpet industry, specializing in the manufacturing of carpet tiles for commercial flooring. This case describes the history, context, and technology behind the company's development of its newest sustainable innovation-carbon negative carpet tiles. Interface began pursuing a path of bold sustainable initiatives in 1994 when Founder and CEO Ray Anderson, confronted by an employee, had a realization of the company's negative environmental impact. The company then began moving toward a carbon neutral future, through carpet recycling and leasing programs, transparent emissions reporting and new carbon storing materials. This case uses Interface's story to: explore the context and motivations for companies pursuing environmental goals such as carbon negativity; present the transparency and reporting dynamics within the realm of carbon accounting; and contemplate the stakeholder dynamics created by these decisions. The primary dilemma is whether Interface made the correct decision in launching its carbon negative carpet tiles, given these different factors.