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To evaluate a difficult career choice under compelling organizational circumstances. To analyse a complex organizational culture to understand the nuances of career decisions. To relate career dilemmas to relevant conceptual and theoretical strands of organizational behaviour. To interpret the leadership style and its interaction with organizational culture. To determine possible strategic recourses to deal with the dynamics of destructive leadership and toxic cultures.

The case is about the experiences of Raamit Pell, a Middle-level Executive at Accadia Management Services, and his encounters with a new boss, Pret Sohn. Raamit Pell had joined Accadia at a time when the organization was undergoing some political and cultural turmoil. When Pret Sohn came in as the new Chief Executive Officer six months later, there were a lot of expectations. But, Pret Sohn too began following Accadia’s existing political culture, indulging in unhealthy organizational practices. He caused mental harassment to many executives. One such executive was Raamit Pell. Despite Raamit’s excellent performance, Pret Sohn denied him a well-deserved promotion. Sohn justified it by saying that performance alone did not matter. Raamit felt deeply disturbed and considered quitting Accadia. He was reluctant to leave as a defeated man. Subsequently, he received an offer from another subsidiary of Accadia’s holding agency. As he was undergoing a three-month mandatory notice period for his release, Raamit became concerned about his decision to leave Accadia. Deep in his mind he longed to redeem his hurt pride at Accadia. So, he was pondering whether he had taken the decision to resign in haste.

Level: Post-graduate/doctoral and executive education programmes in management and allied subjects. Courses: Courses in Career Decisions, Organizational Behaviour, Leadership, Organizational Culture and Organizational Ethics.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 7: Management Science.

The case is positioned in the domain of building, managing and communicating corporate reputation. It discusses the entry of Lenovo in the Indian market where the company faced reputational challenges. Definition of a corporate reputation strategy which was aligned to the overall strategy of the company, helped Lenovo traverse difficult terrains. The case would be relevant for courses on corporate reputation, communication and strategy.

The case is targeted at MBA students, corporate and PR professionals. The case can be used for MBA courses or management development programmes on corporate reputation, communication, and strategy.

The case brings out key elements of entry into an emerging market flooded with international, well-positioned players and discusses the entry of Lenovo in the Indian market where the problem was compounded by perceptions of Chinese origin. How does Lenovo bring about a turnaround in positioning, building, communicating and managing reputation, how does it steer stakeholder opinion in its favour? Will Lenovo India be able to replicate the success model in China? The case presents the challenges and discusses the strategies adopted by Amar Babu, MD Lenovo to bring about a change in the existing perceptions of stakeholders.

To discuss strategies for building corporate reputation.

To critically examine and analyze the strategies adopted by Lenovo India to build reputation and gain market share.

To analyse links between strategy generation and reputation management.

Teaching notes are available, please consult your librarian to access these.

Marketing, strategy.

This case is suitable for post graduate and executive development students.

The case provides perspectives of customer centric practices of Yes Bank which has the objective of becoming the best quality bank of the world in India. The case study outlines how Yes Bank has become the fastest growing bank by its strong focus on customers through its committed and innovative employees. The customer centricity develops strong existing relationships and focuses on providing exceptional customer service, leading to better financial performance.

These include: highlighting the characteristics of customer centric organizations; discussing how Yes Bank practised customer centricity despite the limitation of being a new bank with no experience; describing the key differentiators and comparing with those of other banks; and establishing the relationship between customer centric practices with financial performance.

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

The learning outcomes of this case study are as follows: Students will be able to comprehend and visualize the initial hiccups and operational hurdles faced by digital start-ups in an emerging market. Students will be able to evaluate the importance of digital marketing for promoting start-ups dealing with sustainable products in the service industry, thereby helping them to develop digital marketing strategies to organically promote a service. Students will be able to perform strategic positioning of a start-up based on perceptual mapping methodology. Students will be able to identify the various aspects for identifying and creating a viable business model. Students will be able to use Osterwalder’s business model canvas for identifying the important operational aspects of the start-up. Students will be able to visualize the entrepreneurial challenges in an emerging market.

This case study highlights the dilemma the protagonist, Prerna Prasad, faced in her travel start-up venture, Ecoplore. Ecoplore is an aggregator platform that onboards only eco-hotels. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, Ecoplore is India’s only platform that promotes and onboards only those hotels made up of mud, wood, bamboo, stone or any local architecture and that maintain at least 30% green space on their premises. Ecoplore has been recognized by the United Nations Environment Program for fulfilling Sustainable Development Goal 12 and has also been bestowed with the Gold Award by Indian Responsible Tourism Awards 2019. Prasad had already identified her target market. Prasad took conscious steps towards reaching her target audience, and her first step towards that was designing Ecoplore’s website. Being aware of the importance of content marketing, Ecoplore’s content was curated with fresh and quality write-ups, pictures, blog posts, etc. Ecoplore’s website was also optimized for mobile and desktop versions to deliver a great user experience. Features like easy navigation and the website's speed were also taken care of. Being active on social media platforms, Prasad made sure that the pages of Ecoplore across various social media platforms were well connected with her website. Despite doing so much, it was found that the number of visitors was few after a span of two years. Conversion on the website was low, which ultimately affected the return on investment. Prasad was befuddled as to why the conversions were low despite having a great website that was considered a window to the organization. She faced the challenge of reaching her target audience despite being present online. Upon detailed analysis, Prasad found that Ecoplore was showing up in the search engine research pages (SERP) in only a few keywords, meaning the keyword density was low. Also, the website lacked backlinks, which would eventually help them to rank high on search engine optimization (SEO). This means that Ecoplore will need to revisit its SEO strategy if Prasad wants to promote her organization organically. Now, to increase visibility and ranking on SERP, Prasad had two options before her; first, she could do it organically via SEO or through search engine marketing. She was keen to build the traffic organically, knowing its long-term benefits. As a marketer, what should be Prasad’s strategy? This case study can be used for class discussion purposes for the students pursuing the courses on digital marketing, SEO and digital marketing optimization.

This case study is suitable for students learning the fundamentals of digital marketing (basic and advanced) course, marketing management students and digital marketing workshops. The level of difficulty is medium. The knowledge pre-requirement is marketing management.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing.

The case helps learn various aspects of entrepreneurship, startups and startup-ecosystem in India. It also talks about challenges that a startup entrepreneur faces that others or people potential to enter business can learn. It develops one to identify diverse and holistic solutions for overcoming these challenges. Apply and explain strategies suitable to business management.

After facing lot of difficulties in personal life, Mr Mitesh Shethwala started an e-commerce business named Alagrand.com. This Ahmedabad city-based startup for selling apparels and accessories for all age group is doing so well that the valuation of company has gone beyond Rs. 20 crores. In spite of the high valuation, company is facing problem of funds and investments. The protagonist of the company has lot of plans for growing business and taking it to next level that can happen only if he gets funds for the business. The case talks about issue of investment and funding of this startup company. The company also has issues in the area of setting standard operating procedures and marketing.

Teachers can discuss this case study for various subjects like Strategic Management, Retail Management, Digital Marketing and Product and Brand Management that are taught to the students of management courses at graduate and post-graduate levels. Academicians and students should read current information and data regarding setting up startups, investment and capital budgeting related to startups and funding methods.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

The learning outcomes of this case study are to develop an understanding of informal business practices (IBP) from an economic and a behavioural perspective, identify the pros and cons of IBP and how they can hinder the realization of entrepreneurial aspirations, use the effectuation perspective to understand the entrepreneurial journey of the protagonist and apply the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis and effectuation theory to understand the need for transition from informal to formal business practices.

KSN Iyengar Catering Services (KSNICS) had gained popularity for cooking and serving traditional “Iyengar” cuisine during festivals, ceremonies and other auspicious occasions. With the passage of time, KSNICS slowly diversified into offering food carrier services, corporate catering and preparation of sweets/savouries during the Diwali festival. The enterprise managed to sustain itself without additional investments from external sources. KSNICS was managed in an informal manner by the protagonist, Krishna Kumar. After almost 30 years of KSNICS’s existence, in 2021, Kumar felt that they should diversify into the restaurant business by establishing an authentic “Iyengar” restaurant. In spite of the unpredictable market and the challenging times due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he had somehow managed to sustain his catering business. However, given the informal methods through which he operated his catering services and in the post-COVID-19 pandemic scenario, would it be prudent on his part to establish a restaurant?

This case study is suitable for post-graduate- and executive-level instruction in courses such as managerial skills, entrepreneurship and human resource management. In managerial skills course, it can be used for applying SWOT analysis from a particular perspective for effective decision-making. In entrepreneurship-related courses, it can be used to introduce aspects such as entrepreneurship orientation, effectuation and decision-making. In organizational behaviour and HR-related courses, it can be used to highlight how employees can be trained and motivated and how businesses can be sustained within the scale, especially during challenging times. Irrespective of the course, the IBP discussion would remain a constant point of reference because that was the context under which the current business was operating.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

This case is taught in Darden's Investments elective but could be used in introductory Finance classes to explore the concept of diversification of investments or in a portfolio management course as a means to explore optimal portfolio allocation. It is accompanied by several teaching tools including a teaching note for instructors, student and instructor spreadsheets, student and instructor videos, and a PowerPoint deck for class debrief. The case would work well in a module sequenced between CornerStone Partners (UVA-F-1677) used before and Pravda Asset Management (UVA-F-1602) used after.

The global head of investment research at the World Gold Council (WGC) has finished his presentation “The Strategic Case for Gold as an Asset Class” at the 2012 Bloomberg Precious Metals Conference in New York. As a result of the market collapse in 2008 and the ongoing euro-area crisis, investors worldwide have safety and security on their minds, and many in the room were wondering whether gold would provide capital preservation and improve the overall risk-return tradeoff of their portfolios. At the same time, the sustained run-up in the price of gold since 2001 that was mentioned in the presentation was a cause for concern. Was gold the safe haven that it had proved to be in 2008 and 2009, or was it an asset class at the peak of a bubble? The investment case for gold deserved closer examination.

The various learning outcomes of the case include the following: to provide information and help the students to understand how a start-up business succeeds with the proper branding and marketing; to help understand different marketing theories related to segmentation, targeting, positioning, branding, distribution and marketing process and the frameworks of understanding start-up business marketing with a practical example; to improve analytical skills and help evaluate marketing strategies related to segmentation, targeting, positioning, branding, distribution and marketing in the Indian quick-service restaurant (QSR) business; and to encourage learners to think differently towards solution generation and strategy decisions.

The case portrays the dilemmas related to segmentation, targeting, brand positioning, distribution and start-up business marketing in the context of an Indian QSR. The present case strives to portray the journey of WoW! Momo is a QSR brand in India and highlights the company's branding and marketing challenges. Based on the challenges faced by the company and the decision dilemma pointed out in the case, the readers can get sufficient motivation to generate probable solutions. This was early 2007; Binod Kumar Homagai and Sagar Daryani, bosom friends, were on the verge of finishing their graduate studies in commerce from St. Xavier's College Kolkata. Pursuing Chartered Accountancy or MBA was the common trend as the career option among most commerce graduates then. Still, both Homagai and Daryani thought to be innovative and different in their career options. After a series of discussions, they determined to start with their favorite dish, momos, as an alternative brand proposition that would be opening off from the City of Joy, Kolkata. They managed to arrange a seed capital of INR 30,000 in 2008 and started their venture WoW! Momo. In the financial year 2018–2019, the company's revenue had already crossed INR 1170m, achieved its presence in 11 cities in India, and reached more than 243 outlets. This case has followed the qualitative research methods where in-depth interviews of the founders and stakeholders along with the observation method were used. The case unfolds a systematic solution of dilemmas related to segmentation, targeting, brand positioning, distribution and start-up business marketing in the context of Indian QSR business. This case can also be seen as one of the youth entrepreneurial success stories of Indians.

This case is primarily meant for second-year students in a postgraduate program in business management. The case could also be discussed in an executive development program on marketing/brand management/business strategy.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing.

At midnight on Thursday, 26 March 2020, the South African government ordered a three-week lockdown in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequently extended this lockdown for a further two weeks until the end of April 2020. Among other measures, businesses not classed as “essential” had to cease operation. This meant that Jonathan Robinson, founder of the Bean There Coffee Company had to close his trendy Cape Town and Milpark coffee shops, as well as the company’s hospitality and corporate business. At the same time, Bean There’s costs increased by 25%, as the rand: dollar exchange rate worsened substantially. A glimmer of hope was that the company was able to continue roasting coffee and supplying its retail clients. Unlike most captains of industry, Robinson was not driven by the bottom line and clamouring shareholders. His corporate strategy was driven by a single, simple purpose: to achieve ethical sustainability aspirations while still running a profitable business. The question for him now, however, was how to ensure that his company could survive in the short term, so that it could achieve these goals in the longer term, and whether he could take this opportunity to think about whether his business was best positioned to achieve these goals when things returned to normal.

The learning outcomes are as follows: conduct a thorough analysis of a specific company and its industry, including its markets, competitors, and other aspects of the internal and external business environment, using a range of tools, including a Business Model Canvas (BMC), SWOT analysis and PESTLE analysis; analyse and explain the market outlook of a company; identify and analyse a company’s competitors; discuss and explain a detailed implementation plan showing the way forward for a company, considering its current challenges, including integrating a range of conceptual and analytical fields of knowledge to assess a management dilemma, and arrive at a creative and innovative management solution; and be able to present information and defend substantial insights and solutions to a management dilemma in oral and written modes, appropriate in standard for both the academic and business communities to analyse and appreciate.

Postgraduate Diploma in Management, MBA, Masters in Management, Executive Education.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.

Over the last two decades, Under Armour (UA) has emerged from being the “underdog” in the sports apparel and footwear industry to being a leader in the industry, with a fierce attention to performance and great skill at picking up-and-coming athletes who emerge as superstars. This case underscores its administrative heritage, competitive strategy, and growth potential as a global player in a highly competitive industry. It addresses the tension between being a performance brand while launching lines for women vs technology applications and conflicts between its growth strategy and macro-economic forces. It highlights areas in which it has succeeded against macro-economic forces and where it has not.

The research relies primarily on secondary sources and countless studies of UA and its major competitors. Primary research is based on databases, videos of UA’s Chief Executive Officer, Kevin Plank, and articles from Bloomberg to The Baltimore Sun (UA’s headquarters) on the history, growth and future of UA. It also includes observations and site visits to one of its signature brand house stores as well as intensive research and directed studies with students in the USA and China.

The case can be applied to undergraduate, graduate or executive business classes in: business policy and strategy; general management; (sports) marketing; leadership or organisational behaviour classes.