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Executives need a more advanced tool for examining consumers' loyalty, one that provides a sharper, more precise view. this paper aims to introduce such a tool.

The paper looks at Bain's Net Promoter Score (NPS).

The paper finds that the tool needs to focus not on satisfaction and market share but on consumer advocacy, which is key to creating enthusiastic consumers who come back to buy offerings again and again – and are happy about doing it. Bain's NPS can reveal whether consumers identify emotionally with a brand and feel listened to and understood by the company that makes it. NPS scores help identify groups of consumers who feel well served by your product and groups that do not, whose needs you can then probe further. NPS opens a window into how well mass brands are actually serving profitable consumer segments, as opposed to catering to a statistically “typical” consumer who exists only in theory.

Because NPS scores help uncover determinants of future behavior, they provide a much better basis for spotting product weaknesses, evaluating a brand's health and helping gauge whether new products will succeed.

By producing and evaluating NPS data on a regular basis, organizations can institutionalize a cultural shift, making consumer metrics just as practical and auditable as financial metrics like profit and return on equity. They can make performance in the eyes of consumers just as critical a goal as financial performance.

This article outlines what other firms can learn from Kraft Foods' successful leadership training program.

This case study of leadership development at Kraft Foods identifies the key elements of the firm's program of schooling junior managers.

The five key best leadership development practices at Kraft are: give up and coming managers bottom line responsibility; allow broad leeway in how they meet their targets; school managers in the art of influence, as distinct from merely issuing orders; promote collective achievement, not the desire to be in the spotlight; and create significant roles for talented people who are not made to be leaders.

It may be possible for many companies to successfully adapt and adopt Kraft's basic approach. After all, any company can give young managers the chance to think and start taking on responsibility chief executives.

Kraft management alumni are much sought after by other firms looking for talented managers. This article analyses why they are successful and suggests ways other firms can emulate their approach.

This paper aims to deal with the human activity recognition using human gait pattern. The paper has considered the experiment results of seven different activities: normal walk, jogging, walking on toe, walking on heel, upstairs, downstairs and sit-ups.

In this current research, the data is collected for different activities using tri-axial inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensor enabled with three-axis accelerometer to capture the spatial data, three-axis gyroscopes to capture the orientation around axis and 3° magnetometer. It was wirelessly connected to the receiver. The IMU sensor is placed at the centre of mass position of each subject. The data is collected for 30 subjects including 11 females and 19 males of different age groups between 10 and 45 years. The captured data is pre-processed using different filters and cubic spline techniques. After processing, the data are labelled into seven activities. For data acquisition, a Python-based GUI has been designed to analyse and display the processed data. The data is further classified using four different deep learning model: deep neural network, bidirectional-long short-term memory (BLSTM), convolution neural network (CNN) and CNN-LSTM. The model classification accuracy of different classifiers is reported to be 58%, 84%, 86% and 90%.

The activities recognition using gait was obtained in an open environment. All data is collected using an IMU sensor enabled with gyroscope, accelerometer and magnetometer in both offline and real-time activity recognition using gait. Both sensors showed their usefulness in empirical capability to capture a precised data during all seven activities. The inverse kinematics algorithm is solved to calculate the joint angle from spatial data for all six joints hip, knee, ankle of left and right leg.

This work helps to recognize the walking activity using gait pattern analysis. Further, it helps to understand the different joint angle patterns during different activities. A system is designed for real-time analysis of human walking activity using gait. A standalone real-time system has been designed and realized for analysis of these seven different activities.

The data is collected through IMU sensors for seven activities with equal timestamp without noise and data loss using wirelessly. The setup is useful for the data collection in an open environment outside the laboratory environment for activity recognition. The paper also presents the analysis of all seven different activity trajectories patterns.

Founded in 1971 and acquired by CEO Howard Schultz in 1987, Starbucks was an American success story. In forty years it grew from a single-location coffee roaster in Seattle, Washington to a multibillion-dollar global enterprise that operated more than 17,000 retail coffee shops in fifty countries and sold coffee beans, instant coffee, tea, and ready-to-drink beverages in tens of thousands of grocery and mass merchandise stores. However, as Starbucks moved into new market contexts as part of its aggressive growth strategy, the assets and activities central to its competitive advantage in its retail coffee shops were altered or weakened, which made it more vulnerable to competitive threats from both higher and lower quality entrants. The company also had to make decisions on vertical integration related to its expansion into consumer packaged goods.

Understand how strategy needs to be adapted to new contexts. Understand how to manage tradeoffs involved in growth. Be able to identify possible threats to competitive advantage as a result of growth.

Upon completion of this case study analysis, the course audience is expected to achieve four learning outcomes. In particular, students should be able to conduct a comprehensive organizational diagnosis to uncover the peculiarities of managing a family business; analyze the specific challenges faced by family-owned enterprises in the context of emerging markets; evaluate the succession management practices in family organizations and design a profile of a successful successor; assess the effectiveness of managerial decision-making and provide recommendations for securing the sustainability of a family firm.

This case study unveils the tumultuous story of Vishwanath Shetty, an ambitious entrepreneur who transformed his small venture into a profitable family business with operations in Middle East, Asia and Africa. Since the early establishment of Qontrac International in 1989, he relied on the ownership and management participation of several members of his and his wife’s families. Over the years, Vishwanath was successful in pursuing a strategy of continuous growth and geographic diversification by taking advantage of the business opportunities in several regions and opening up branches in Oman, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Ghana and India. Yet, almost three decades after its launch, the company was confronted with a number of family, growth and succession management challenges that endangered its survival in the long run. The Shetty family experienced a serious rift due to financial reasons, the performance of the two branches managed by siblings declined, and the old firm structure and management style did not fit well with the newly enlarged and geographically dispersed Qontrac International. To deal with these organizational issues, Vishwanath was faced with an additional dilemma of securing the support of a suitable intra-family candidate who could join the family business and become his successor. By describing the strategic events and family dynamics that shaped the evolution of Qontrac International over time, the case provides an opportunity to assess the effectiveness of managerial decision-making in the context of family firms and provide viable recommendations for ensuring firm survival and longevity.

Upper-level undergraduate audience Graduate audience (in Master of Global Entrepreneurial Management program).

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

Strategy.

This research identifies the enablers for implementing circular supply chains (CSCEs) and analyzes interrelationships between them to quantify their driving and dependence power to understand the critical CSCEs.

Initially, 10 CSCEs are identified for the Indian apparel industries through an extant literature review and validated using the Delphi method by seeking experts' opinions. The identified CSCEs are subjected to a novel neutrosophic interpretive structural modeling (N-ISM) method to capture the interrelationships between CSCEs and compute the driving and dependence power of CSCEs.

The findings of the present research work revealed that “supportive legislative framework, awareness of circular economy's potential for revenue gain and availability of trained research and development (R&D) team” are the critical CSCEs that need to be considered while implementing a circular supply chain in apparel industries.

This study offers insightful implications to guide practitioners in implementing the circular economy in apparel supply chains.

This research work is one of the earlier studies to analyze the enablers for implementing circular supply chains. This study has explored CSCEs in the context of apparel industries. From a methodological perspective, the novel N-ISM method is worth highlighting as the originality of the work.

The learning outcomes of this case study are to identify the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in social upliftment of developing countries, understand the functioning of NGOs, understand the challenges faced by the NGOs in day-to-day operations and discuss the probable solutions for the same, appreciate the role of leader and leadership in an NGO, study the working style of NGO leaders, appreciate the importance of having a formal organizational structure for these informal organizations (NGOs) to ensure the sustainability of their ventures and design a sustainable organization structure having a proper succession plan for the NGOs.

The case study is about one NGO – Mahesh Foundation – located in a small town named Belagavi, nestled in the state of Karnataka, India. Mahesh Foundation worked towards the upliftment of poor children infected with HIV. Today, fighting against all odds, Mahesh Foundation is a safe shelter home for 45 HIV-infected children in the age group of 6–18 years and has reached more than 2,000 beneficiaries from the time of its inception (2008). In addition, Mahesh Foundation also provides skill-based education to the HIV-infected, slum and underprivileged children. The foundation also supported the livelihood of underprivileged women and till date has supported more than 1,500 needy women. Mr Mahesh Jadhav, the founder member of Mahesh Foundation, has been successful in overcoming different challenges faced by the NGO, may it be the requirement for funds or shelters or social agitation. However, Jadhav was worried about the succession planning of his organisation. Mahesh Foundation, being run as a one-man show, Jadhav was bothered about its sustainability after him. The case study therefore highlights and discusses the importance of having a formal organization structure for such informal organizations, thereby having a proper succession plan to ensure their perpetual existence.

This case study is best taught as part of a graduate and postgraduate Business Administration (BBA/MBA) programme, Management Development Programme or Executive MBA Programme.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.

This paper examines how accounting quality, as measured by earnings opacity, affects the stock market wealth effect, which in turn is shown to be linked to economic growth. Stock market wealth effect is negatively affected by earnings opacity. The data also indicate that the exogenous component of the stock market wealth effect — the component defined by earnings opacity‐ is positively associated with economic growth. The direct effect of earnings opacity on economic growth is, as expected negative, but insignificant.

The main aims of the paper were to explore the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in shaping the work-life balance of managers working remotely and to identify individual recovery strategies and organisational interventions to support digital managers. The theoretical background was based on the work-family border theory and the effort-recovery model.

A semi-structured individual in-depth interview (IDI) was used as the research method. The research group consisted of 13 managers from companies in Poland representing various industries. In all, 560 min of recordings and 201 pages of text were obtained and subsequently coded and categorised.

The results showed that remote managers struggle with the work-life imbalance and blurred boundaries between work and private roles, as well as difficulties in maintaining digital hygiene. The use of ICT enables high flexibility but contributes to work-life conflict. Managers who work from home experience a constant workload and suffer from impaired recovery. The use of ICT creates a need to recover and maintain digital hygiene. However, there are constraints that impede managers' recovery attempts. Many feel that their work does not allow to recover but requires to be “always on” to help their subordinates fulfil their responsibilities, even though they do not expect their subordinates to work after hours. Finally, managers perceive organisational support as insufficient or inappropriate for their needs. They admit that they do not participate in organisational interventions due to lack of time and do not believe that they help them to maintain or restore their well-being.

The role of ICT in blurring the boundaries between work and private roles was explored in depth, as was the “always on” phenomenon as a factor contributing to the tension between the need to recover and the inability to engage in recovery activities. The study has practical implications for integrating individual and organisational approaches to well-being and identifies solutions to encourage managers to maintain digital hygiene and mental health.