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This field-based case describes the approach and decisions used by Harris Corporation's vice president of supply chain management and operations to establish a set of financial benchmarks. It requires students to use those benchmarks to decide what areas need focus to potentially raise the company's financial results and elevate its financial performance through specific actions within its supply-chain group.

In this case, lessons from the Chicago Benchmarking Collaborative illustrate key principles of collaborative action and the importance of using data to achieve SMART goals.

In 2015, the Chicago Benchmarking Collaborative (CBC) was a network of seven agencies in Chicago, Illinois, serving 12,000 low-income residents. Each of the agencies had early childhood, school-age children, and adult education programs. At the prompting of the Chicago Community Trust, they came together to (1) benchmark their education programs outputs and outcomes; (2) learn and share best practices through developing a common set of metrics and measurements and implementing these measurements into a case management software system; and (3) share the costs of the case management software system to be used for program evaluation and continuous quality improvement.

Three aspects of CBC are particularly noteworthy. First, there are no joint program activities or clients among these agencies. Their exchange is limited to sharing data and other information. This makes CBC distinct from collaborations formed to begin a program or to advocate for a policy. Second, the group requires each agency to enter data on a timely basis and to set SMART goals based on the data reports. The agencies are held mutually accountable for their work to achieve their own SMART goals during the year and report on progress. Third, CBC used monetary incentives to ensure that data entry and SMART goal action remained a priority for each agency.

Strategy.

The case can primarily be used for a Strategic Management course for teaching the revival strategies for financially weak plants. The case highlights the need to shift from a product manufacturing perspective to a market orientation perspective and, hence, may add value as an add-on case in a Strategic Marketing course. The case also covers the topic of benchmarking which may be of use in an Operations Management course.

DJSL Ltd. is the largest engineering and manufacturing enterprise in India in the energy-related/infrastructure space in the public sector. Its Lucknow unit, manufacturing porcelain insulators and wear resistant ceramic lining (CERA LINING), has started reporting losses. A change of management took place in October 2015, whereby Mr. S P Singh was appointed as the Head of the Lucknow Unit. Mr. Singh had rich functional experience of 30 years, mainly in the domains of strategy, project execution and commercial aspects. He was asked to come up with a revival plan for the Unit by the top management of DJSL. The case highlights the importance of operational issues in turnaround management.

Students may be encouraged to debate the benchmarking practices that are best suited for the Lucknow unit. They can also discuss the impact of benchmarking efforts upon turnaround strategy. Students are also encouraged to understand the constraints which may limit the success of initiatives impacting operational improvements. Students need to develop the understanding of marketing strategy to perform a SWOT analysis of each product of the Lucknow unit and to sense the business opportunities in and around the environment. Students need to discuss how productivity may be improved with the adoption of appropriate people development strategies. Students are encouraged to discuss the revival/turnaround strategies and to identify the influence of improvement in operational efficiency/productivity upon revival plan.

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: 11: Strategy.

A consulting team to an international food packaging company (SDYesBox) is attempting to decide which algorithm is the most useful for selecting two national markets in Central America and the Caribbean. SDYesBox wants to work closely with its immediate customers – manufacturers in the dairy and food industry and their customers (retailers) – to develop and market innovative products to low-income consumers in emerging markets; the “next big opportunity for the dairy industry” according to SDYesBox.

New product development and market selection in emerging markets in Latin America.

Five algorithms are “on the table” for assessing 14 countries by 12 performance indicators: weighted-benchmarking each country by the country leader's indicator scores; tallying by ignoring indicator weights and selecting the countries having the greatest number of positive standardized scores; applying a conjunctive and lexicographic combination algorithm; and using a “fluency metric” of how quickly consumers can say each country aloud. At least one member of the consulting team is championing one of these five algorithms. Which algorithm do you recommend? Why?

Learners gain skills, insights, and experience in alternative decision tools for evaluating and selecting choices among emerging markets to enter with new products for low-income (bottom of the pyramid) products ands services.

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 are as follows: to teach the concept of mutual fund as whole, how mutual fund works and who are the investors; discuss how any asset management company can work and what is their investment process; discuss how mutual funds are affected by changes in economic outlook/macro-economic variables; discuss the alternative risk-adjusted measures of performance evaluation, such as the Sharpe ratio, Treynor, Jensen’s alpha and measure of risk-adjusted performance; and discuss which index to use as a benchmark and how to improve funds’ performance.

In April 2019, Khaldoon Bin latif, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Faysal Asset Management, reflected on the changes that had occurred during his two and a half years at Faysal. He was quite pleased with the recent performance of Faysal Funds and the company’s relationship-oriented approach to money management for individuals with high net worth. Yet, he wanted to ensure that both the investment-process and performance-evaluation measures that he had implemented at Faysal would continue to provide superior returns. Latif also wanted Faysal to outperform the relevant indices, not only on an absolute basis, but also on a risk-adjusted basis. He pondered which indices and models Faysal should use in the future based on their performance.

Undergraduate/graduate

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 1: Accounting and Finance.

Jennifer McDougall is considering investing in mutual funds for the first time, and has narrowed her options down to three: one that is domiciled in Germany, and two that are domiciled in Luxembourg. As a cautious and risk-averse investor, Jennifer has done extensive research on the three funds, and has come across a curious fact: the beta of the German fund is surprisingly low. After speaking to her financial planner, she learns there is no legal requirement in Germany for mutual funds to compute net asset values at a particular time of the day. If the German fund is closing its books in the middle of the day and its net asset values reflect its midday holdings, rather than end-of-day holdings, this could explain the low beta. Thus, the German fund might appear less risky, without actually being so. Jennifer needed to get a clearer picture of what was going on before making her decision.

Using the data provided with the case, students will determine the closing time of the three funds and how that affects the beta of each. Then they must make a recommendation about which fund would be the best investment for Jennifer.

Fred Bocock was examining the performance of the Energy Hedge Fund and the Energy Portfolio, a hedge fund and a mutual fund respectively, which he manages. Bocock had become increasingly aware that absolute returns or relative returns (returns relative to a benchmark) may not adequately capture his performance and some measure of risk-adjusted performance was necessary. The Dynamis Energy Hedge Fund extends the discussion of performance evaluation into the hedge fund arena. (See “Zeus Asset Management,” UVA-F-1232, for an examination of performance evaluation techniques in the mutual funds arena.) More broadly, the case engages students in discussions on what hedge funds are, what investment strategies they use, and who their investors are. Since the portfolio manager of Dynamis manages both an oil sector equity mutual fund and an oil sector hedge fund, the case allows for a comparison between a hedge fund and a mutual fund. Students should consider the pros and cons of evaluating the performance of the oil stock mutual fund against a number of oil sector stock indices as well as against a number of generic indices, such as the S&P 500 Index. The use of futures, options, shorts, and leverage by hedge funds makes it a lot more difficult to measure their performance. The case comes with a spreadsheet that contains data on the energy mutual fund, the Dynamis hedge fund, and several relevant indices.

The owner of a small financial services firm is evaluating the performance of four funds to determine whether to offer them to his clients. The funds span a variety of objectives and include a recently initiated fund. The case explores issues related to the evaluation of mutual fund performance, including the selection of benchmarks and the effect of fees. The case provides a natural and compelling context in which to discuss market efficiency.

Business development, sustainable business practices, corporate social responsibility.

Executive education, postgraduate, undergraduate.

City Developments Limited (CDL) is one of Singapore's leading international property and hotel conglomerates, involved in real estate development and investment, hotel ownership and management, facilities management and the provision of hospitality solutions. The group has developed over 22,000 luxurious and quality homes in Singapore, catering to a wide range of market segments. CDL is widely recognised as a champion of sustainable practices in Singapore. It was the first company honoured with the President's Social Service Award and President's Award for the Environment in 2007. It was also the only developer to be accorded the Built Environment Leadership Platinum Award in 2009 and Green Mark Platinum Champion Award in 2011 by the Building and Construction Authority, the governing authority for Singapore's built environment. CDL was the first Singaporean company to be listed on all three of the world's top sustainability benchmarks – FTSE4Good Index Series since 2002, Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World since 2010 and the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes since 2011. This case discusses the many factors that have enabled CDL to successfully manage its journey in sustainable business development. It also creates an opportunity for students to discuss other steps or measures the company could take to further increase stakeholders' awareness and adoption of their sustainability vision.

This case discusses the concepts of sustainability and the reasons why companies believe in following sustainable practices. Through this case, students would get an opportunity to discuss the sustainable practices adopted by one of the well-known Singapore companies, CDL. They would understand the costs and benefits of being a champion of CSR, the benefits to the stakeholders of CDL, and the ways CSR provides a competitive advantage.

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

Business management, organization behaviour, organization values, organization culture, customer service.

The case study is suitable for undergraduate courses, particularly business management and related areas.

Ritz Carlton Hotel is one of the luxurious hotels which has expanded internationally in the last 30 years and recently opened its iconic hotel Abu Dhabi Grand Canal. Ritz Carlton offers unique experiences to its customers, which are driven by the embedded “Gold Standards” and values. It has enabled the Ritz Carlton to redefine the hospitability experience and create a competitive advantage. In this case study, the experience of opening this Abu Dhabi hotel is explored with reflections on their “Gold Standards” and the values which have resulted in the Ritz Carlton being benchmarked as a best service company. This made Ritz Carlton to change the way it redefines its business by not being just a hotel, but rather a company which creates memories and experiences for customers.

Discussing the essential factors that contribute to the success of companies in the service industry, with a focus on organization values and living these values in order to achieve competitive advantage.

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