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Leadership and Health Care management and Organisational Development and Talent Management.

Postgraduate level for honours or master’s programs in courses on public health, executive leadership and management, organisational development and public administration leadership.

The case study offers an account of Ms Xolani Ngumi’s Chief Director, Enola District Health Services, South Africa, who was driving from her newly constructed modern district hospital to one of the municipal clinics that she was overseeing. It highlights the dilemma of the general practitioners (GP’s) that refused to be relocated, leading to many clinics being without clinical support.

Expected learning outcomes are as follows: Identification of stakeholders in a particular dilemma to aid leaders’ decision-making; developing the competence of balancing conflicting needs of stakeholders by juggling complex systems; and analysing staffing issues and offer recommendations to enhance talent management.

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

CSS 7: Management Science.

Illinois Superconductor Corp. a technology start-up, came up with an innovative new superconducting filter for use in cellular base stations. It needed to estimate the demand for its filters. The manager came up with a simple chain-ratio-based forecasting model that, while simple and intuitive, was too simplistic. The company had also commissioned a research firm to develop a model-based forecast. The model-based forecast used diffusion modeling, analogy-based forecasting, and conjoint analysis to create a forecast that incorporated customer preferences, diffusion effects, and competitive dynamics.

To use the data to generate a model-based forecast and to reconcile the model-based forecast with the manager's forecast. Requires sophisticated spreadsheet modeling and the application of advanced forecasting techniques.

The learning outcomes of this study are as follows:

1. the benefits of differential pricing over uniform pricing;

2. the differences between second- and third-degree price discrimination;

3. the rationale for charging different prices for segments having different willingness to pay; and

4. how different prices for the same product can lead to perceptions of unfairness and how companies might manage such an issue.

This case outlines the decisions that Adar Poonawalla, the CEO of Serum Institute of India (Serum), had to make in late April 2021 concerning its pricing for the COVID-19 (Covid) vaccine. Serum was the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines, and its Covishield vaccine had received regulatory approval, but faced an unusual challenge and opportunity. In most countries, governments had procured Covid vaccines from manufacturers and then delivered the vaccines to consumers free of cost. But in India, there was a three-tier pricing system. While the Government of India had committed to free vaccines in government-run public hospitals, it also allowed vaccine makers to directly sell vaccines to state governments, as well as private hospitals, who were at liberty to charge consumers for the vaccines. This created an interesting pricing dilemma for Serum: as different customers had different willingness to pay, should Serum use differential pricing? Would such a tiered pricing system be considered fair? How many different price points should Serum maintain? By exploring these and related decisions that Poonawalla had to make, the case is intended to teach price discrimination.

The case is intended for graduate-level courses in marketing, pricing and economics. This case illustrates the principles of differential pricing/price discrimination. More specifically, it highlights pricing strategies motivated by second- and third-degree price discrimination in an emerging market’s health-care context. From the information in the case, the student can learn to apply the concepts of second- and third-degree price discrimination in marketing. After working through the case and assignment questions, instructors will be able to help students understand the following concepts:

Teaching objective 1: the benefits of differential pricing over uniform pricing.

Teaching objective 2: the differences between second- and third-degree price discrimination.

Teaching objective 3: the rationale for charging different prices for segments having different willingness to pay.

Teaching objective 4: how different prices for the same product can lead to perceptions of unfairness and how companies might manage such an issue.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing

This case study is best suited for courses in career management, stress management, work–life management or science of well-being in organization behavior (OB) or human resources management (HRM). This case study is targeted at the MBA or executive development programs. The learning outcomes of this case study are as follows: to analyze the challenges in balancing Suraj Kumar’s (the protagonist) work–life balance situation and identifying the main causes of such a conflict. What are some strategies that could be used to address these issues? To develop a plan to balance work responsibilities with family and personal life. What specific actions could he take to achieve this balance? To design a training program for employees that addresses work–life balance issues. What topics would you cover in the training, and what methods would you use to deliver the content? To create a proposal for a flexible work arrangement program that an organization could offer to its employees. What would be the benefits of this program, and how would it be implemented and managed? To develop a business case for why an organization should prioritize work–life balance for its employees. What are the potential benefits of doing so, and how can the organization measure the impact of its efforts?

This case study discusses conflicts due to competitive priorities that people face in balancing the pressures, roles and responsibilities between their professional life (careers) and their personal life, and the trade-offs that they make across these multiple aspects of their lives. This case study revolves around Suraj Kumar, a successful consultant, who was offered a promotion as the executive director for the social sector. This promotion would require extensive travel and time away from his family. Kumar was struggling to balance his work responsibilities with his family life and his involvement with the Smile and Shine Foundation, which supports the education of children from economically weaker sections of society. He was reflecting on his past and present and trying to figure out how to prioritize his commitments while also achieving his personal and professional goals.

This research has shown that a case discussion and role-play can be effective for a less experienced audience. Instructors can provide multiple perspectives to stimulate reflection and debate. For executive MBA or executive development programs, a self-reflection exercise is recommended. Participants in these programs may have personal experience dealing with or may know others who have dealt with work–life balance issues, making self-reflection a valuable tool.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 6: Human resource management.

Corporate entrepreneurship; Intrapreneurship; Human Resources.

MBA students in Human Resource, entrepreneurship and/or PhD students in the areas of Human Resource, Corporate Entrepreneurship and/or on Intrapreneurship studies.

This case reveals that progressive change originated from individual’s positive deviance approaches, opportunistic sensitivity, ability to learn, evaluate and the ability to develop ideas on how to exploit or pursue identified opportunities (intrapreneurial behaviour).

The student will learn to deal with the complex nature of organisations and the tendencies of institutional processes to be uncertain, unpredictable, and uncontrollable; appreciate the internal workings of an organisation, the external environment; and understand the role of generative leadership, positive deviance, novelty ecosystems and intrapreneurial behaviour and the fact that connections and interactions in a social network are non-linear or non-proportional. This means that complex system predictions can be much more than simple regression predictions. They will be able to apply both bottom-up and top-down influences from proactive leadership or generative leadership events and benefit from positive results and the emergence of innovation.

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

CSS: 3 Entrepreneurship.

The case, while acknowledging the difficulty of managing a family business in view of the accompanying human issues, emphasizes that sound business practices and procedures, and clarity with regard to the goal, remain the key; a firm is a complex, interconnected system and management needs a systems viewpoint; and technology can only support underlying business processes if there is clarity with respect to these.

SomPack had survived low-cost Asian competition starting the mid-1990s, a revolt by some extended family to try and bring it down with the help of a competitor, the Turkish banking crisis of 2001, and the global economic crisis of 2008 all the while watching its suppliers, competitors and customers collapse. A focus on cost-cutting and internal discipline by the successor, who had been promoted to CEO in 2004, had exacerbated internal discontent somewhat and had led to issues with production planning, but everyone understood that times were tough. Several large customers who had left were asked to return because the alternatives had been worse. By 2012, SomPack was considering expansion into new products in collaboration with its international partners. Then one day, in July 2013, it suddenly collapsed. Could the entire approach have been wrong? What should management have done instead?

Undergraduate, graduate business management.

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

CSS 7: Management Science.