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The PM begins with exploring the problem space, gaining an understanding of the larger context of the problem, namely the online bus travel sector in India and the challenges faced by the industry players. Then he conducts a deeper investigation of the actual user behavior data on redBus using Product Analytics (specifically, the method of funnel analysis) to identify the major scenarios when the platform users were not completing the ticket purchase. The PM uncovers that the users searching for bus tickets on the shorter routes seemed to drop off significantly more just after looking at the available bus options, as compared to the longer routes. Next, the PM formulates hypotheses to examine the reasons behind this intriguing behavior of short route travelers, and tests them using customers interactions and field studies. From the rigorous user research and hypotheses testing, the PM could confirm three categories of expectations of short route travelers which were not being fully met by the current features of the platform. Armed with this clarity about the problem space, the PM moves into the solution space, ideating feature solutions for the users. With inputs from various stakeholders, he finally designs a platform feature called 'Open Ticket' that could fulfill the three needs of their short route users. Then he worked with the engineering team to develop and launch the MVP of the solution using the Agile Scrum methodology. Finally, the post-launch user behavior was tracked to validate the efficacy of the Open Ticket solution. Unfortunately, the designed solution did not work as per expectations, leaving the PM with a decision dilemma that is critical in lean startups, i.e., whether to persevere with the Open Ticket idea by trying to fix it, or drop it completely and pivot to a new idea?

The "Moral Complexity in Leadership" series of cases and teaching notes help business instructors harness the power of fiction to prepare students for the moral and ethical dilemmas they will face throughout their careers. Meaningful fiction challenges students intellectually and emotionally; it reveals the inner worlds of human players and enables learning that can be difficult to access through case studies, commentary, or reporting. Through literature, students will wrestle with the kinds of problems they will face as leaders looking to make courageous decisions aligned with their moral codes. The works in this series represent a wide range of settings, viewpoints, and cultural frameworks; the characters are complex and contradictory, and the systems within which they operate (whether family, organizational, or cultural) influence them in varied ways. They have been taught to executive, full- and part-time MBA student audiences for many years. The series aims to increase students' understanding of moral frameworks and enhance their skills in facilitating and participating in healthy and productive dialogue about complex and provocative issues. This installment of the series examines Raymond Carver's "A Small, Good Thing," in which married couple Howard and Ann find comfort from an unexpected source after losing their son. In the story, their child is hit by a car on the morning of his birthday and later dies. As his parents grieve, they receive threatening phone calls from a baker who is angry that Ann never picked up the cake she ordered. Once the baker discovers their son has died, he apologizes and they talk into the morning of loneliness and grief. Carver's story examines how humans sometimes fail to communicate effectively due to misinterpreted context.

The case is set in November 2021 and traces the journey of a unique women-led collective-Weavers Resource Bridge (led by Talish Ray and her fellow handloom enthusiasts)-that provided much-needed financial support to a community of weavers across India during the COVID-19 crisis. These weavers hailed from different parts of India and were masters of their art forms, but due to lack of capital and patronage, were slowly losing touch with their art because they were forced to take up other work to sustain themselves and their families. In the short span of six months, this volunteer group raised a whopping INR 15 million (about US$198,642). Because it was a time-intensive undertaking, only a limited number of weavers could be supported directly by the Bridge. Though they had exceeded the preset goal and helped the weavers become financially stable once again, the women from the Bridge wanted to ensure that the weavers continued to produce irreplaceable art, which was their forte, and find buyers regularly. As Ray thought of scaling up this initiative, an idea for a nonprofit emerged, whose goals would be to bridge the skill gap among artists and ready them for the 21st century marketplace while simultaneously educating patrons. This meant that processes had to be put in place for long-term sustainability and weavers had to be taught the technical skills to use online platforms and sustain sales across borders. Even as Ray wondered about the fundamental values that would guide this nonprofit and the operating model necessary to foster its growth, she worried about the nagging problem of capital. What Ray had achieved was just a drop in the ocean. How could these artisans be provisioned with the much-needed capital support to sustain their craft and ensure that this invaluable inter-generational knowledge was transmitted, contributing to the country's intangible cultural heritage?

It was the autumn of 2022, and Payal Tekchandani, cofounder and partner of The Wedding Clinic (TWC), sat down with her operations team in Pune, Maharashtra, to discuss the plan of action for the upcoming quarter. She had established TWC in 2017. It was a unique offering in medical aesthetics that enabled brides, bridegrooms, and their families to enjoy the best of skin and hair treatments. Payal's entrepreneurial journey included managing operations for diverse and unrelated businesses. She had stepped in to take charge of her family business nine years ago. Three distinct business entities-TWC, Tender Skin Products Pvt Ltd. (TSPPL), and Tender Skin International Cosmetology Academy (TSICA)-operated under the umbrella of Tender Skin International (TSI), a multispecialty skin clinic founded by her mother, Dr. Sonia Tekchandani, in 2003 in Mumbai. TSI also trained beauticians in skincare and manufactured skin care products. Using company-owned clinics, they had bootstrapped the business without external funding. Each clinic required high capital expenditure for operating and purchasing, and installing the machinery. Since Payal took over, business service revenues had quadrupled. However, given the dynamics of the changing business environment, the pandemic, and changing consumer behavior, it was time for Payal to rethink the business interlinkages. She wished to scale the clinics' operations and was facing a dilemma: should she open another center in Mumbai or focus on other cities? The latter option would mean seeking funding and adopting the franchise store model across the country.

Tina Garg, founder and CEO of a creative agency, Pink Lemonade, reflects upon her entrepreneurial journey of establishing a brand, growing the business from a small to a midsized firm, and partnering and scaling up to become a global firm. While planning for growth and expansion, she was at the critical juncture of rethinking her strategy. Garg faced the dilemma of positioning her firm differently while scaling up consistently across pricing, people, processes, and operations. Case A discusses how Pink Lemonade transitioned from a boutique communication agency to a strategic brand partner. It delves into the decision-making dilemmas that Garg faced while growing the firm and the actions needed to reposition the organization during the pandemic. Having worked on prestigious projects, she aimed to grow the ticket size of business engagements with existing clients. Garg confronted several challenges in scaling the business, as well as the risk of diluting the distinct organizational culture she had created over the years.

In March 2020, the Government of India announced a nationwide lockdown to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Only organizations deemed to be working in essential services were allowed to continue operating. This lockdown lasted until May 2020, during which time companies faced transportation restrictions, supply chain issues, and staffing challenges, among others. Despite this, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd. (ONGC) managed to achieve crude oil production and profits similar to the previous year. However, the company battled crises both onshore and offshore as it fought to care for its employees and their families amid lockdown conditions.<br><br>Two years later, the organizational stress and personal toll exacted by the nation's lockdown still haunted the group. However, while the events had been traumatic and arduous, they also offered potential lessons for the company, something that the management team was interested in. What capabilities had aided the company during the lockdowns? ONGC's Human Resources Director, Dr. Alka Mittal, wanted to understand how employees had coped and managed during the lockdowns so she could formulate a future-oriented "People Strategy Plan" to combat potential similar future crises. However, she was also worried that revisiting such intense experiences could bring strong negative emotions to the forefront and increase employee stress, thereby decreasing morale and job satisfaction. ONGC's management needed to determine how best to handle the situation so that it could prepare for future crises without damaging its existing relationship with employees.

The managing director of Leosb Private Limited has to select a distribution channel for his factory-produced roti (a flat bread popular in India) in the city of Hyderabad, a large metropolitan city in India. In July 2022, he considered the best distribution channel, which would offer access to retail consumers, and be cost effective, easy to scale, and expandable to related product categories. His options were using one or more distributors, selling to modern trade outlets, developing a sales team to sell directly to retail outlets, or selling directly to the consumer through Leosb's website and mobile app. He was running out of funds, so his time was limited.

This case examines the 2020 pricing decision for the master recordings of Taylor Swift's first six albums in consideration of a sale of the recordings by music executive Scooter Braun to Shamrock Capital (Shamrock), an investment company owned by the Roy E. Disney family. Swift, the most listened-to musician in the world, had expressed displeasure with Braun's ownership of her masters and a desire to own the recordings herself-even threatening to rerecord new versions of the master recordings. Inez Reynolds, an analyst at Shamrock, has been tasked with estimating the value of the masters and recommending how to advise the partners at Shamrock regarding a bid to Braun. The case provides a context for introducing students to firm valuation using discounted-cash-flow (DCF), market multiples, and the perpetuity model for terminal value estimation. The case is intended to provide a bridge between project valuation and firm valuation in a corporate finance course. This case is designed to be taught at Darden in the core finance curriculum as an introduction to firm valuation.

In the spring of 2021, Raymond (Ray) Jefferson applied for a job in President Joseph Biden's administration. Ten years earlier, false allegations were used to force him to resign from his prior U.S. government position as Assistant Secretary of Labor for Veterans' Employment and Training (VETS) in the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). Two employees had accused him of ethical violations in hiring and procurement decisions, including pressuring subordinates into extending contracts to his alleged personal associates. The DOL Office of the Inspector General (OIG), headed by an interim inspector general, supported their claims. The Deputy Secretary of Labor gave Jefferson four hours to resign or be terminated. Jefferson filed a federal lawsuit against the U.S. government to clear his name, which he pursued for eight years at the expense of his entire life savings. Why, after such a traumatic and debilitating experience, would Jefferson want to pursue a career in public service again? The case explores Jefferson's personal and professional journey from upstate New York to West Point to the Obama administration, and how he faced and addressed adversity at several junctures in his life. The case allows instructors to discuss resilience, career pathways and derailment, leadership style, and the pursuit of passion.

This case focused on rapid prototyping in a startup company. Two students, Isaac Lewis and Nathaniel Herring, both suffered should injuries and had difficulty finding the right equipment for their rehab stints. As part of the Master's in Entrepreneurial Leadership degree program at Babson College, the two went into an extensive discovery and prototyping process to create a product to assist in that rehab. The case describes their process and ends with them having to make a launch decision.

In late 2021, Vahe Dombalagian, a managing director at Madison Dearborn Partners (MDP), contacted MoneyGram International Inc. (MoneyGram) chief executive officer Alex Holmes to discuss the middle-market private equity (PE) firm's potential interest in a transaction with MoneyGram. MoneyGram was a global leader in the cross-border peer-to-peer (P2P) payment market, working to transition to the fast-growing digital payment market amid the emergence of low-cost financial technology competitors.<br><br>The case provides a discussion about deal evaluation metrics used by leveraged buyout (LBO) PE firms and provides necessary information to construct an LBO model to calculate the internal rate of return (IRR) and multiple of invested capital (MOIC) to determine an appropriate offer.<br><br>MDP was granted access to internal MoneyGram information and met with firm representatives as it worked with its financial advisers to obtain a debt commitment letter. The banks agreed to fund a debt financing package, and MoneyGram notified bidders that definitive acquisition proposals needed to be received by January 24, 2022. The MDP deal team needed to work quickly to finalize their offer.

This white paper examines pricing strategy and methods to determine target customers' willingness to pay (WTP). It examines the role of qualitative research and quantitative research to identify market opportunities and to determine the price point that best matches the WTP. The note uses examples of different consumer products to demonstrate the pricing decision exercise.

In 2022, the Crocs Classic Clog was the best-selling item of clothing on Amazon, the brand was one of the fastest growing brands in the U.S., and global net revenue had increased to approximately $3.6 billion. By most accounts, Crocs had become the "it" shoe. Crocs shoes were spotted on high-fashion runways, collaborating with luxury brands and designers including Balenciaga, Christopher Kane, and Christian Cowan, and on the feet of massively popular celebrities such as Justin Bieber, Post Malone, Bad Bunny, and Luke Combs. Crocs was also considered a top preferred footwear brand among U.S. teens in 2023. Few could have predicted Crocs' meteoric success given the state of the brand just ten years earlier. Indeed, in the late 2000's and early 2010's, Crocs shoes were often mercilessly mocked for their hideous appearance, and the organization had nearly gone bankrupt. So how did Crocs clogs go from internet meme fodder to sought-after cultural sensation? Could the Crocs brand maintain its popularity and grow more globally, or was the brand destined to fall out of favor once the tides of fashion changed again? How should Crocs evolve its product portfolio and marketing strategy to ensure a stable and permanent place in consumers' wardrobes?

The case explores the challenges of revenue recognition and financial reporting for Stride Funding (Stride), a fintech startup that has disrupted the student loan market. Stride leveraged proprietary machine learning and financial models to underwrite alternative student loans via Income Sharing Agreements (ISA). Under an ISA, borrowers agree to share a portion of their future earned income with a lender for a set period of time. Stride has adopted a distinctive business model that is analogous to the Software as a Service (SaaS) business. Rather than issuing ISAs directly, Stride performed as a program manager and created lending platforms that enabled educational institutions and programs to fund ISAs using their own capital. As a fund manager, Stride was responsible for developing credit models, administering the ISA contracts, managing account status, producing the loan documents, and updating the platform and program structure. In return for their services, Stride charged various fees to the institutions and programs. Having successfully completed its Series A round, Stride experienced substantial growth and improved business performance. As the company grew, its executives recognized the need to change its current financial reporting based on cash accounting to comply with U.S. GAAP. They anticipated that this change would affect how to report some of its revenues which are important financial metrics for early-stage companies like Stride. The CEO of Stride Funding wanted to know the full financial impact of this change and its implications for the next funding round. Moreover, they needed to determine whether it made sense for Stride, with its innovative business model, to adopt the GAAP reporting at this juncture.

The Germany-based startup Vytal operated the largest digital-native reusable packaging-as-a-service network globally, having raised nearly €15 million, established a large network of restaurant partners, and prevented the use of millions of single-use take-out food containers. However, Vytal's growth was slower than expected, challenging its unique pay-per-use model and environmental goals. This case highlights Vytal's growth trajectory in the years leading up to 2023, outlining its business model, utilization of digital technology, strategies for acquiring partners and customers, and regulatory developments within Europe. It also presents several options that the founders are considering to reach profitability, prepare for a Series B financing round, and expand internationally, such as charging partners for unused containers, implementing consumer fees on single-use containers, launching a loyalty program, and franchising to expand more rapidly.

Clair was founded with a simple mission: to expedite America's workers access to their hard-earned wages. In the headwinds of the COVID-19 pandemic, the startup had successfully raised a seed round of $4.5 million, and within two years the earned wage access (EWA) FinTech had partnered with 10 human capital management system providers to access over 8,000 employers and over 300,000 employees. However, as the economic outlook plummeted and available external capital began to dry up, Clair's founders considered whether other business models offered more attractive prospects for the startup's long-term success. Should Clair stay the course or choose to pivot, and what tradeoffs would each pathway entail? With investors requiring a clear long-term vision and a viable path to profitability, this decision would determine Clair's ability to thrive and fulfill its founding mission.

In late January 2020, the chief executive officer and third-generation successor of BEZNOSKA s.r.o., a traditional Czech manufacturer of joint implants, was preparing for an annual shareholders' meeting with the family business owners. The annual report indicated that the company had experienced its worst financial year in its 30-year history. The company was also facing challenges from new competitors in the market and the need to comply with a new legislation. The chief executive officer was planning to stop issuing dividend payments from the company's profits to the three owners of the family business, who were his family members. The chief executive officer knew that his decision would be contentious, especially for his aunt who was not active in the company but had criticized his performance in the past. The chief executive officer decided that the best solution to the ongoing problems was for his aunt to sell her stake in the family business, which she would likely reject. But even if she were to agree, how should the ownership shares be restructured?

Trinity Earth, founded by Zhu Jinfu, was a Chinese data solution provider focusing on the film and television industry. Since its establishment, Trinity Earth had launched a mix of products and services and continuously created value for the whole industry. While its earliest products tended to be functional tools, the company proceeded to synthesize these products for empowering and then enabling its clients. It started by acquiring data as a potential resource and proceeded to tap into this valuable asset which it ultimately aspired to capitalize.In the same time, the business model of Trinity Earth also changed a lot. The value of its data services was not a monolith, but was derived from collaboration on four levels - data, computing, analytics and human-machine interaction - with their own ways to generate revenues whose significance varied as the company kept developing. In the initial stage, profits came from product sales. With the enrichment and refinement of products, Trinity Earth turned to building a comprehensive network and hence its unique competence. However, with the rapid development of the film and television industry in China, Trinity Earth found itself difficult to fit into the mainstream, or majority market. What were the reasons？What would Zhu and Trinity Earth do to deal with this challenge?

Companies frequently consider diversification to be a crucial strategic decision during their growth journey to mitigate business risks and pursue continued expansion. Nonetheless, when pursuing diversified expansion, companies must accurately identify the suitable industry or domain and maintain a balanced relationship between specialization and diversification. Failure to do so can have negative repercussions on their development. This case study centers around Adisseo, a well-established company specializing in animal feed additives, and examines their diversification efforts in addition to their primary operations, such as methionine, by accelerating the development of other businesses through various means. This case primarily addresses the following inquiries: How did Adisseo cultivate its core competencies throughout its eight-decade-long development? What is Adisseo's position in the global methionine industry and what strengths does it possess? Who are Adisseo's competitors in this sector, and what challenges does the company encounter? Additionally, the case examines the progress of Adisseo's other business ventures apart from methionine and identifies their competitors and challenges. It also evaluates the accomplishments resulting from the implementation of Adisseo's "two-business-pillar" strategy, as well as the problems the company faces. Adisseo's explorations and practices offer valuable insights for similar enterprises facing technical barriers and pursuing diversification.