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This compact case study was developed from secondary sources readily available in the public domain. These secondary sources included websites, videos and articles.

Throughout 2023, social media companies faced a wide range of criticism on several fronts. Critics claimed that the companies were not doing enough to manage content and the algorithms were influencing American public opinion in the Israel-–Hamas war. Others argued that social media was negatively impacting the mental health of American youth. In response, the platforms reiterated their neutrality and emphasized the features, functions and policies that were designed to address the issues and encourage a positive user experience. As generative artificial intelligence (AI) grew in popularity, the impact on social media was inevitable. Was the convergence of social media and AI inspiring progress or exacerbating problems? How would society balance the opposing forces in a rapidly evolving environment?

This case should be used in marketing and management classes at the undergraduate level. Applicable concepts include AI, social media, content and information.

Marketing, Sports marketing and Social media marketing.

Graduate level.

This case, based on field research and multiple secondary sources, documents the 12-month period since early 2014 during which Cricket South Africa (CSA) developed the Protea Fire brand for their national men’s cricket team, known as the Proteas. In mid-2014, Marc Jury, the Commercial and Marketing manager of CSA set up a project team to take the previously in-house Protea Fire brand public. With the 2015 Cricket World Cup in Australia and New Zealand less than a year away, Jury worked with a diverse project team of Proteas players, cricket brand managers and external consultants to build a public brand identity for the national team, to nurture greater fan affinity and to mobilize South Africans behind their team for the World Cup. The project team developed a range of Protea Fire multimedia content as the core of the campaign. These included video diaries, scripts which were written by the Proteas players themselves, player profile videos, motivational team-talk videos and good luck video messages featuring ordinary and famous South Africans. Having invested in creating this content, the project team faced the difficult task of allocating a limited media budget to broadcast and amplify the content. Another significant challenge was to ensure that the Proteas team values were authentically communicated across all content, including via the social media strategy using Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. As the World Cup tournament kicked off on February 14th 2015, South Africa was well placed to overcome their previous inability to reach a final, although Jury wondered whether another exit in the knockout round would weaken the strong and positive emotions the Protea Fire campaign had ignited. With the last two balls remaining in South Africa’s semi-final game against New Zealand on March 24th 2015, and the home team requiring just five runs to win, Jury joined 60 million South Africans hoping that Protea Fire was strong enough. The case concludes with South Africa losing the semi-final game and Jury turning his attention to how the #ProteaFire campaign should respond.

This study aimed to analyse the development of a sport team brand and a megaevent campaign; to assess the efficiency and effectiveness of a marketing campaign; and to consider appropriate brand responses to the team’s failure to deliver on expectations.

CSS 8: Marketing.

The learning objectives of this case study are based on Bloom’s taxonomy. Upon completion of the case study discussion and exercises, successful students will be able to design a leadership transition and succession plan for non-profit organisations; identify and evaluate critical skills and competencies required in leadership positions; and frame expectations and responsibilities for new and departing executives.

Apar Gupta co-founded Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), a digital rights organisation born out of SaveTheInternet – Net Neutrality movement of 2015, credited for urging the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to uphold net neutrality in India. And ban zero-cost internet services that promoted data discrimination in the country. After working on and winning the net neutrality movement, Gupta identified many areas in technology where democratic rights had not been identified or were yet to be clearly defined (like in the case of net neutrality). There was also a service gap between the existing internet volunteer groups and digital rights organisations, which could IFF fill. This was to provide objective clarity, stakeholder identification, handle policy discussions and, most importantly, arrange resources to support movements over the long term. This prompted him to co-found IFF in 2017, which he later joined as a full-time executive director in 2018. IFF worked at the intersection of technology, democratic rights and government policies and was comparable to some global organisations, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation in the USA and the Open Rights Group in the UK. Still, none existed in India at the time. After four years as a full-time executive director in 2022, he was convinced that it was finally time for him to act on the pre-defined strategic departure plan and work towards succession for the executive director position. While there were visible gaps in the system, Gupta’s leadership design and plans had helped IFF overcome existential challenges in the past. Also, while digital rights were still at a nascent stage in emerging economies, under Gupta’s leadership, IFF had delivered unmatched value to its beneficiaries in the world’s biggest digital consumer market. However, constant changes in regulations and continuing financial constraints made him nervous about the outcomes of the succession and the overall sustainability of IFF. Gupta wanted to ensure that this phased transition from executive director after two years and then trustee manager after the next four years are carefully communicated to reduce the likelihood of attrition and loss of trust.

Being the co-founder and the first and only executive director IFF had seen, the organisation would also require significant skill and competency mapping to identify the new executive leadership. But with no clear internal successor in sight, the non-profit trust would also need a successor who not only was competent but also would share a passion for the type of work done by IFF, its unique delivery mode, and also would openly inherit its position in society. The other alternative strategic routes present were to look for dual leadership or interim leadership, but then there could be concerns about Gupta’s influence overshadowing any such alternative.

In the case scenario, IFF is planning for succession while navigating the organisation through financial constraints and constant regulatory changes to ensure long- and short-term sustainability.

The case study has been written to gain insights into departure-defined successive planning in non-profit organisations. The case study can also be used to gain insights into innovative start-ups and innovative non-profit start-ups, as digital rights are still at nascent stages in emerging markets. The case study will be valuable for courses such as human resource management, strategic human resource management, social entrepreneurial leadership, leadership development, start-up environment, innovation and entrepreneurship, public policy, development studies, cyber security and information technology. The case study also allows students and young professionals to take the perspective of an innovative start-up founder and design a departure-defined succession plan. The case study can also be useful for senior students wanting to undertake an entrepreneurial career by starting or joining a non-profit organisation. While the case study is suitable for postgraduate- and executive-level courses, it can also be used for conducting entrepreneurial workshops and skill training.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

Corporate diversification, product portfolio analysis, industry structure, international business expansion, beverage industry.

The case is suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate MBA strategic management, international business strategy, and marketing strategy courses.

Thai Beverage Public Company Limited (ThaiBev) was Thailand's largest beverage company and was among Asia's major alcoholic beverage companies. The case situation takes place during the latter part of August 2010, two years after the public announcement of ThaiBev's ambitious intentions to become a comprehensive and integrated beverage company and after having recently re-launched its acquired Wrangyer energy brand, a move signaling ThaiBev's strong commitment to its non-alcoholic beverages. The case describes the beverage industries at the global, regional, and country level and discusses ThaiBev's range of businesses. Marut Buranasetkul, Senior Vice President of Corporate Service and Deputy Managing Director of Thai Beverage Marketing, the sales and marketing arm of ThaiBev, must decide on the direction for ThaiBev to pursue to bring ThaiBev's non-alcoholic beverages to account for at least 10 percent of the company's total revenue. This case presents a number of important strategic topics, particularly in discussing industry structure and competition, as well as diversification issues encountered by a firm that was attempting to create a greater balance between the revenue contributions from its market leading dominant businesses and that of its younger and newer business lines.

Students will: understand the challenges faced by large conglomerates wanting to change their market position; learn to apply different frameworks such as Porter's Five Force Model, portfolio analysis, SWOT and to assess the competitive environment; learn to evaluate a company's current product portfolio and to recommend strategies to improve its allocation of resources; and learn to identify key success factors necessary to compete in a highly competitive industry.

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

SONY Online Entertainment (SOE) was planning to release a new version, EverQuest II®, of its popular online game, EverQuest®. The first EverQuest® game was very successful financially, generating approximately $5 million/month in 2002 for SOE. However, some issues surrounding addictions and corporate responsibility were interfering with the new product launch. These problems revolved around several deaths in which the EverQuest® game had been implicated. The case focuses on the dilemma faced by the Vice President of Marketing prior to the new product release: How far must a company go to protect possible misuse of a product by consumers?

The learning outcomes are as follows: first, identify the characteristics of born-global SMEs, and how these characteristics facilitate their global expansion shortly after the company’s inception. Second, demonstrate that companies work with limited resources, typically and notably newly established companies, and that these resources should be allocated according to a carefully determined strategy. The resources focussed on in this case pertain to marketing. Third, examine entrepreneurial marketing and its various manifestations. An understanding of how this type of marketing is used by companies for international expansion is expected. Fourth, assess the role of digital marketing and how social media forms an important part of digital marketing. Particular attention is paid to the use of digital marketing, notably social media, in international expansion. Fifth, develop critical thinking skills with respect to strategic business decisions, such as whether to expand a business into foreign markets or to consolidate locally; and how best to penetrate foreign markets, given the nuances and complexities specific to these markets.

This teaching case is about The Duchess, a recently developed and launched virgin alcohol-free and sugar-free gin and tonic beverage. The adult soft drink was originally launched in South Africa, and just 18 months later became available in international markets (the UK and Belgium). The founders and protagonists of the case, Johannes le Roux and Inus Smuts, face the dilemmas of creating a competitive local brand while also looking to access new markets and internationalise as a born-global firm.

The target audience for this case comprises students enrolled in tertiary business education programmes who have already had some sort of work experience and hands-on exposure to real-world business. MBA and EMBA students, as well as those enrolled in post-graduate studies specific to marketing, international commerce and entrepreneurship, would be suitable candidates.

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 8: Marketing

The learning outcomes are as follows: to identify stakeholder groups in an inter-country training intervention and apply contextual intelligence to a leadership role and to apply the theory of constraints in developing solutions to research constraint environments.

On 10 September 2018, the Director-General (DG) of South African National Department of Health (NDOH) Ms Precious Matsoso pondered over the scheduled meeting that afternoon with the South African Committee of Medical Deans in Pretoria. She was leading the initiative of the integration of the South African Cuban-trained medical students into the local medical schools for the final phase of their studies. She needed to streamline the assimilation process. The case highlights the dilemma to identify actions to improve the level of integration of these students.

MBA M Phil in Healthcare Management

Teaching notes are available upon request for educators only. These teaching notes should be shared solely with the instructor and students should not have access to. Please contact your library to gain login or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 10: Public Sector Management

When do you throw it all away? The first senior female in a male-dominated business school decides it all comes down to a question of principle – and maybe a few others. What is the best balance between her responsibilities to students, family, and the next generation of female leaders? Can she both be true to herself and compromise? What factors should influence this decision? This case brings together questions about power and influence, rational decision-making, leadership, and the intra and inter-personal responsibilities of organizational “firsts.” Further, issues related to a university's effort to better compete within the global higher education marketplace, provide a valuable opportunity to explore institutional approaches to promoting diversity, inclusion, and cultural competency.

This case, which was developed from primary sources, highlights the array of competing objectives and personal and political tensions involved in university administration.

This case was designed for graduate students in Masters of Public Administration, Masters of Business Administration, Masters of Education in Organizational Leadership, or similar graduate degrees that include significant management and leadership content. Students working with this case should have already completed foundational courses in topics such as organizational management, public policy, leadership, strategic human resources management, or their equivalents within their respective programs of study. Virtually all of the issues raised by this case address core themes, concepts, theses, and theories associated with an accredited graduate program in educational management, business or public administration.

The Beringer Wine Estates Company has been expanding its market share in the premium segment of the wine industry in the 1990's. After operating as a wholly owned subsidiary of the giant Nestlé food company for almost a quarter of a century, the firm was sold in 1996 to new owners, in a leveraged buyout. For the next year and a half, management and the new owners restructured the firm and expanded through internal growth and strategic acquisitions. With a heavy debt load from the LBO, it seemed prudent for management to consider a significant rebalancing of its capital structure. By paying off a portion of its debt and enhancing the equity account, the firm would achieve greater financial flexibility which could enhance its growth rate and business options. Finally, a publicly held common stock would provide management with another “currency” to be used for enhancing its growth rate and overall corporate valuation. With the equity markets in turmoil, significant strategic decisions had to be made quickly. Should the IPO be completed, with the district possibility of a less than successful after market price performance and these implications for pursuing external growth initiatives? A variety of alternative courses of action and their implications for the financial health of the Beringer Company and the financial wealth of Beringer stockholders are integral components of this case.

This case focuses on the steps taken by the Director of the Jaipuria Institute of Management, Jaipur, to arrive at a working definition of the problem of lack of student engagement and to initiate corrective measures. A key assumption made by the Director was that if students were engaged outside of the curriculum, they would be more engaged with the curriculum. This is consistent with research findings (see for example Kuh, Kinzie, Buckley, Bridges and Hayek, 2006) which show that students who are more engaged within the curriculum are more engaged with their institution's governance and student activities. It must be pointed out, however, that each institute, given its own context, should examine whether this assumption holds—activities outside the curriculum should not end up simply competing for valuable students' time.