個案總覽

Kinbor, a pioneer and top brand of creative planner journals in China, was launched in 2015 by Guangbo Group (Guangbo), a leading stationery manufacturer and worldwide exporter. In January 2022, Jessie Yu—Kinbor’s, founder and general manager— was facing several urgent issues in moving the start-up forward. Like many intrapreneurial projects, Kinbor was only contributing a small fraction to Guangbo’s total annual revenues, so pressure to boost sales and scale up the operation was mounting. In addition, Kinbor’s incongruence with the parent company’s business model was making integration a challenge. Externally, major stationery industry competitors were launching their own creative planner journal brands, thereby intensifying the market’s competition. Kinbor had to find the right strategy to address these issues.

On June 5, 2021, an eleven-story building developed by the BROAD Group was completed in Changsha, China, in just 28 hours and 45 minutes. This building, known as the Holon Building, had the advantages of a long lifespan, short construction period, strong earthquake and typhoon resistance, low cost, high comfort and energy savings, and global transportability. Because of its standardized installation and 100 per cent factory prefabrication of all modules, Holon was well suited to various types of buildings. However, as a newly emerging technology, the Holon Building needed time and great effort to gain wide acceptance. BROAD's chairman and chief executive officer, Zhang Yue, was wondering about the feasibility of Holon buildings’ global market expansion.

In April 2022, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Agilus Work Solutions (Agilus) was considering how to handle the future of work at the company. With the company’s employees having worked primarily remotely since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, he wondered if now was the time to bring them back to the office. If so, would employees return to the office full-time, or was a hybrid model preferable? With employees having conflicting viewpoints on the issue, the CEO knew that whatever option was chosen would need strong justification and to be skilfully communicated to Agilus’s employees from coast to coast.

On March 5, 2022, Ronni Kahn sat at her desk in Sydney, Australia, reflecting on what she was going to share at an international conference on leadership. Kahn was the founder and chief executive officer of the food rescue organization OzHarvest, a charity with the goal to nourish Australia through redistributing food and food waste to those in need. Kahn’s work involved a combination of running OzHarvest and being an international ambassador for and keynote speaker on sustainable food practices and living with purpose and meaning. As Kahn reflected on the work that had been done over the last eighteen years, what were the leadership lessons she had learned that she could share with others?

In early 2021, Kent Fawcett was a food entrepreneur facing typical questions around scaling his enterprise, Local Pulse. Driven by a personal passion for food as a means to heal both people and the planet, he developed a line of shelf-stable plant-based foods, including breakfast cereals and dehydrated hummus. Since 2018, he had been offering his products online and at the local farmers’ market in Kamloops, British Columbia. He started selling Local Pulse goods wholesale and was beginning to understand the scale at which he would have to produce the goods in order for his business to be financially sustainable. Fawcett was not sure if he was ready to take the financial risk of investing in new facilities to grow the business.

By the end of 2020, Ambuja Cement Foundation, the corporate social responsibility arm of Ambuja Cements Ltd., based in Mumbai, India, had been uplifting its communities through social development goals for the past 25 years. The specific focus of its activities had been water harvesting, agriculture development skills training, health, and education. However, the foundation faced the consistent challenge of measuring the impact of its corporate social responsibility projects with reference to the social development goals selected by the company in terms of performance or improvement at the village level. In December 2020, the vice-president of Ambuja Cement Foundation needed to determine which measurement the foundation should use to measure the performance of its community development programs and its alignment with the social development goals. Should it go along with the existing measurement tools or adopt a new model to measure performance and impact?

Ivan and Lana Kuznetsov are a dual-career couple and parents to four young children. Having immigrated to Canada from Russia in 2012, they are both in the process of rebuilding their careers. Ivan already has what can be considered a successful career, with local credentials, experience, and a good professional network, but he is not quite satisfied and considers making a change. Lana’s career in Canada is in its early stages. As a recent college graduate, she is only beginning to realize her dreams and is working in an entry-level part-time position. When Lana receives a full-time job offer that will require her full attention and energy, the couple need to decide whose career to prioritize, as one of them will have to focus on the family. Over a person’s lifetime, multiple career choices are made that are also related to their other life roles. Each spouse has different reasons and motivations for the vocational choices they make that affect both of their actions throughout their lives. In a situation of conflicting goals, where both spouses cannot work full-time, and one of them has to make a sacrifice, each option has potential benefits and risks.

In December of 2020, the head of product development at QualityKiosk Technologies Private Limited (QualityKiosk) was grappling with a significant issue. QualityKiosk provided application quality assurance, business automation, digital experience management, and data analytics services to financial services companies across India. Krishna had to recommend the way forward for the company’s latest product—Anabot, a new information technology (IT) journey analytics platform. The Anabot platform could provide its clients with quick insight about any IT incidents in the client’s technology services. It also provided around-the-clock intelligence to the client’s team handling those incidents. In its first year of sales, the customer journey analytics platform had been adopted by five major clients, generating over ₹20 million in revenues for QualityKiosk. However, between May and August 2020, none of over fifty potential clients who had expressed an interest in the Anabot product had proceeded to make a purchase. For the entire Anabot product team, anxiety was increasing about the future of their product. In an upcoming product review meeting with the company’s chief executive officer, the head of product development would be required to present his recommendations for the future of the Anabot platform.

In January 2022, MitiMeth was a Nigeria-based innovative social enterprise that produces handcrafted products made from natural fibres—agricultural waste and aquatic weeds—that are otherwise considered to be waste or a hazard to the environment. MitiMeth added value to this material by transforming it into well-designed furniture and home furnishings, storage boxes, lamps, kitchen and dinner ware, stationery, and souvenir items. Mitimeth’s initiative of transforming this environmental nuisance into marketable products provided work for more than 600 people from over twenty-five communities in Nigeria. Despite challenges in exporting from Nigeria, MitiMeth had made good progress in reaching international markets. MitiMeth had already gone through several challenges, and the COVID-19 pandemic only added to the difficulties the enterprise had experienced. Mitimeth needed a plan that ensured MitiMeth’s long-term sustainability.

This case deals with the challenges and learnings associated with the implementation of flexible work practices at TDC Group, Denmark’s largest provider of digital infrastructure and entertainment. The company has decided that most of its workforce should not return to the office as per normal before the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. The case examines TDC Group's vision of a new way of working and how it went about implementing the new program.

In March 2020, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted global supply chains. The spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus affected the entire world, including the scenic Prince Edward County in Eastern Ontario. Three co-owners of the boutique distillery Kinsip House of Fine Spirits (Kinsip) were inspired to contribute to their community’s efforts to limit further spread of the virus. As a distillery, Kinsip was aptly able to produce the principal ingredient of hand sanitizer—ethanol. The other two main ingredients—glycerol and hydrogen peroxide—were generally procured on the open market from North American suppliers. Obtaining the right packaging for the sanitizer as quickly as possible, including both the bottle and the cap, was one of the key challenges the three partners were facing. Another challenge was navigating Health Canada’s approval process. In addition, the partners needed to determine Kinsip’s capacity to supply hand sanitizer to the local region and the production schedule on which it could deliver the product.

Dietz and Watson (D&W), a family run business that had been operating in Philadelphia for over eighty years, was a key player in the deli meat product market. D&W was concerned about losing market share overall; it was dependent on the aging baby boomer segment and possibly not top of mind for a younger, more progressive demographic. In early 2019, the company’s vice-president of brand strategy had to consider various options for investing the brand’s resources and offer a credible plan to the chief financial officer. What tactics could the company employ? What were the risks of various marketing strategies, and how could the company mitigate those risks? Could a digital strategy help D&W make inroads with the targeted demographic? If so, what would such a strategy look like?

本個案主要以影像安全監控產業為例，探討小規模的A公司與大型集團B公司旗下智慧影像監控產品線，雖在甲區市場合作雙贏，但兩家公司下轄的不同區域團隊卻在乙區市場互相競爭。經反映後引發B公司安控線及更上層企業客戶事業群的關注。不僅雙方多年合作關係受到挑戰，在利、弊、得與失之間的權衡，考驗雙方團隊的智慧。A公司總經理應採取哪些行動方案來處理與B公司之間的競合關係?面對可敬及重要夥伴B公司的關切，A公司總經理Jack處在合與競的兩難之中，應提出哪些解決之道…。

In June 2021, a strategist in the Canadian offices of Summit Consulting’s products strategy group was contemplating how to improve her recognition and standing within the professional services organization. However, she believed that her ability to advance was hampered by a conflict in the relationship between her direct manager and her coach. The strategist wanted to strengthen her own relationship with her direct manager, which seemed to be suffering due to her close relationship with her coach. The products strategy group was expected to grow significantly over the next year, during which time the strategist hoped to be promoted to the position of manager. However, she worried that the conflict between her two managers would stand in her way.

A former investment banking professional had her eureka moment when she noticed instances of assaults on single women travelling alone in taxi cabs at odd times of the day. The prevalence of these instances led her to begin a safe cab service run by women for women—Taxshe Services Pvt. Ltd. (Taxshe), located in Bengaluru, India. In March 2020, the initial wave of the COVID-19 pandemic began in India, and a lockdown was announced as a preventive measure. Taxshe, whose customers mainly comprised working women and school-going children, faced a significant challenge, as the sudden changes and stringent restrictions brought on by the lockdown precipitated a substantial drop in the need for cab services. Taxshe’s founder contemplated the company’s dilemma and consulted people from across her wide network of personal and professional acquaintances. How could she keep Taxshe up and running in spite of the restrictions brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic? What value-added specialty services could Taxshe offer as a cab service during the pandemic that would benefit society at large?

Aftertaste Foundation (Aftertaste) was an organization that provided livelihood support to women living in the impoverished urban areas of Mumbai, India, who created sustainable handicrafts. Aftertaste was started in 2013 and initially employed three craftswomen. By 2021, the organization had expanded to two locations and had increased the number of craftswomen employed to 40. Aftertaste’s business model was focused on creating social impact by generating revenue through the sale of handcrafted items to corporate and retail buyers. For six years, Aftertaste was supported financially by the social impact organization Avanti Foundation. In September 2019, Aftertaste was registered as an independent entity. However, shortly after its transition, in March 2020, the foundation was confronted by the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. A nationwide order for temporary lockdowns soon forced Aftertaste to stop all in-person operations. When the country started reopening after pandemic lockdowns, Aftertaste’s owner struggled to maintain the financial sustainability of her organization. Surrounded by enduring pandemic uncertainty, she had to decide what strategy to pursue for the future of her organization. How could she overcome her venture’s losses and lead Aftertaste on a path of financially sustainable growth?

In January 2021, the chief data and analytics officer (CDAO) at Allianz Benelux SA (Allianz) spotted a possible opportunity to optimize cash flow with direct debit. Direct debit was a pre-authorized financial transaction between two parties where the amount due was directly and automatically collected from the payer’s bank account. Direct debit would allow Allianz to shorten payment processes, reduce risks by anticipating payments, and improve customer loyalty. Despite the clear advantages of direct debit for both clients and insurers, only a few of Allianz’s clients were currently making use of direct debit. It was not clear what drove Allianz’s customers or brokers to implement direct debit. This was where the CDAO and his data office team came in. The data office possessed a large amount of data on Allianz’s property and casualty insurance contracts and customers. Now the team needed to investigate how this data could be leveraged to determine the value drivers and develop a strategy to convert more clients to direct debit payments.

One of India’s leading stainless steel conglomerates, Jindal Stainless Limited (JSL) specialized in manufacturing flat sheets and coils, specific sections, pipes, and tubes. Abhyudaya Jindal, the managing director of JSL, was recently informed about the growing number of counterfeit products on the market that were adversely impacting JSL’s brand reputation and sales, as well as goodwill towards the company.<br><br>This case explores the challenges faced by Abhyudaya Jindal as he tried to address the issue of counterfeiting in the stainless steel pipes and tubes market. The case discusses various ways a company can battle counterfeit goods and how co-branding can be used as a market strategy. The case also examines how strengthening relationships with channel members can help a brand fight counterfeiting.

In January 2022, the leaders of the Canadian charity organization International Needs Canada recognized that individual child sponsorship had serious flaws and was not as impactful as it once had been. They sought to move donors from individual child sponsorship to the more beneficial group sponsorship model. The director of communications and marketing had to determine which donor group to target as he launched the program. As the new model could disrupt the industry. The organization also had to consider the reaction of much larger competitors. Furthermore, International Needs Canada was not replacing its own individual child sponsorship model with group sponsorship; instead, both programs would run simultaneously.

Mahindra Rural Housing Finance Limited (Mahindra Home Finance), a rapidly growing non-banking financial corporation (NBFC) in India, was on the cusp of a historic decision: Should the organization be among India’s first NBFCs to launch a machine-learning-led predictive platform that aimed to revolutionize the way loans were disbursed in rural India? Mahindra Home Finance had a strong focus on social impact, and the firm had to decide whether to take this giant leap. If successful, the project might become a beacon for many such businesses trying to create positive change across communities, as it would reduce the “risk” involved in lending to a segment that was traditionally shunned by the formal banking system. The decision was important—both to the company and to the industry as a whole. Was it time for the field of sustainability to embrace machine learning?