Case studies

Applicable to both undergraduate and graduate courses in managing technology or sustainability.

Technology strategy.

Business Model evaluation.

Sustainable technologies.

In this case study, gas and electric utility holding company Southern Company has embarked on an ambitious experiment to learn more about energy usage at a household level, as well as community scale microgrids. Every minute, 62 homes in Reynolds Landing upload appliance and electrical outlet level data to Southern Company. How can Southern Company use this vast amount of data to promote energy efficiency? Are microgrids a key to creating a more sustainable and resilient energy future? At a higher level, how can microgrids impact or change traditional power generation business models like those used by Southern Company?

1. To explore why companies develop technologies that are counter to current business models.

2. To understand how new technology can lead to new business models for existing businesses.

3. To understand the drivers of company led R&D.

4. To discuss “technology push” applications. Where technology is developed and then a market or markets are sought.

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

Two parts here. The first is looking at sustainable energy solutions such as solar farms and micro-grids. The second is this case challenges students to ask how this research helps the 45% of consumers making less than $40,000/yr.

CSS 11: Strategy.

The case is suitable for both undergraduate and graduate business students. The suggestions in the teaching note would suit classes of varying sizes and can be organized by teams or for individual work.

The case is suitable for classes discussing a range of topics including business ethics, values-based leadership and entrepreneurship. The case is told from the perspective of a Hispanic, first-generation female CEO in tech – a male-dominated field. As some of its decision points include discussions with other female entrepreneurs in similar positions, this case is also suitable for discussions on gender and minority leader representation.

This case tells the story of a female tech entrepreneur in Baltimore, how her personal values influenced the values of her company and how she successfully applied those values even in the early stages of her venture. It includes a discussion of her former career in the military and her experiences as a first-generation American.

The case offers several decision points where students are invited to anticipate and discuss the protagonists’ values and their application of them in her work. It likewise invites students to reflect on their own values and how they influence their business decisions. As the case is based on true events and uses real names, students may also perform research on the real business and its context to extend this case even further.

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

Women are chronically underrepresented in leadership positions and some choose to become entrepreneurs because it offers a surer path to CEO roles. Additionally, this case offers some perspective on the different leadership styles of women, such as this protagonist’s choice to allow her personal and corporate values to drive important early decisions for her business. The instructor and students also may wish to focus on aspects of the case related to the protagonist’s ethnicity and her family’s status as recent immigrants to the USA. Ideally, class discussions will consider the protagonist holistically, and her identities as intersectional.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

Graduate or Undergraduate Entrepreneurship Majors

Entrepreneurship/Venture Capital (VC) Investing

The case highlights a women-founded venture capital firm that values investments in diverse entrepreneurs and an innovative retail business started by two minority entrepreneurs. Students will be asked whether the firm should invest in the venture and will also be asked to discuss models that may help transform the retail business into a VC-backed scalable technology business.

By the end of the discussion, students will be able to evaluate the feasibility and scalability of a new business venture; and evaluate the alignment between a venture capital company and a new venture.

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

This case highlights the lack of resources for women and minority entrepreneurs as well as the underrepresentation of minority women in the VC industry.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship

The case could be effectively used in courses on entrepreneurship, strategy and brand management in MBA programs and executive-level training programs.

Entrepreneurship, strategy, marketing, women leadership and women in business.

This case deals with the business decision-making situation of Ms Jyotsna Ramachandran, a first-generation woman entrepreneur from Southern India, who has created a Global collaborative business network in self-publishing of books from India. After gaining industry experience for five years in some of the leading retail brands of India, she decided to take a plunge in entrepreneurship. She tried several businesses ranging from retail staffing to custom-made chocolates. Though it was profitable, the volumes and margins were smaller, and Jyotsna aspired big. As, at that time she was on her family way, she decided to identify a profitable business with better value creation and premium for the consumers and at the same time free from minute-by-minute concentration to take care of her child. In other words, a less-hassle home-based business with better revenue streams and margins. The case gives a thorough background of her rise in the industry and talks about some of her new ideas and plans.

Students will be in a position to: 1. Understand gender issues and bias affecting women in work. 2. Illustrate the initial phases of entrepreneurship. 3. Understand and apply the evaluation tools like PESTLE, SWOT and then business model canvas. 4. Understand the value chain and the intensive and integrative growth strategies. 5. Illustrate blue oceans in an industry setup – irrespective of the industry growth rate. 6. Apply perspectives on brand management.

Detailed teaching notes attached. Teaching notes are available for educators only.

The case addresses the important gender issues affecting women’s work–life balance. It will also inspire many women through the success of the woman protagonist and her project head well documented in this case study.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship

This compact case study uses the marketing mix (product, price, place and promotion) and customer segmentation/targeting as theoretical platforms for the Amazon Go business concept. It reinforces the idea that these are important aspects in developing a successful marketing strategy especially when they are aligned with the core competencies of a firm. Additional concepts include localization strategy, loyalty and Maslow’s hierarchy. Localization focuses on merchandising and local partnerships. Customer loyalty is discussed in the context of loyalty programs and consumer trust. Maslow’s hierarchy is used as a way to connect the pandemic and safety concerns to the offline retail experience.

This case was developed from secondary sources readily available in the public domain including websites, news articles and social media sites. This case has been taught in undergraduate marketing management courses.

In 2018, Amazon opened high tech convenience stores across a number of metropolitan cities in the USA offering a checkout-free experience for customers. This case evaluates the marketing aspects of the move including industry structure, store format and customer loyalty. The underlying question is how will Amazon, the company that pioneered online shopping, perform in an offline retail marketplace that is highly competitive? Will Amazon be able to leverage its massive technology power and shake up offline retail? Will changing market forces caused by the pandemic reshape retail as we know it?

This case should be used in a marketing management course or a retailing course for undergraduate students. Applicable concepts include competitive advantage, marketing mix, customer loyalty and retailing in a digital world. This case could also be used to discuss or compare the differences between online and offline brand leadership.

The term emotional intelligence was coined by the researchers Peter Salavoy and John Mayer. The concept was popularized by Daniel Goleman through his book Emotional Intelligence published in 1996. According to Salavoy and Mayer (1990), emotional intelligence consists of a set of skills hypothesized to contribute to the accurate appraisal and expression of emotion in oneself and in others, the effective regulation of emotion in self and others and the use of feelings to motivate, plan and achieve in one’s life.

The case study uses two sources of information, namely, primary and secondary. Dr Dev, a senior training and development manager with a multinational company constituted the primary source. The secondary source consisted of information publicly available on various websites. The case has been disguised for various reasons.

Lady mosquito at NPS Mumbai is a case study on emotional intelligence, a much sought-after concept in management education, but not many case studies have been written on the topic. This case involves an interaction that took place between a facilitator and a learner, and it highlights the importance of emotional intelligence in day-to-day communication. The use of emotional intelligence will manifold improve the ability of the facilitator to understand the learners’ behavior in the classroom. This will further enhance the effectiveness of learning, as the motivated facilitator/trainer will be more committed to engaging the learners in their educational activities.

This case has been developed to be used in postgraduate and undergraduate management programs. This case can also be used in management development programs for executives. As the case provides a basic understanding of human behavior and thereby teaches to manage others just by managing oneself. As the case revolves around a facilitator and the learner, it can also be used in the trainer program for facilitators who desire to conduct training programs or want to take teaching as a full-time career.

This study paper aims to analyse a real life case based on Human Resource Management, specifically the concepts of the recruitment process and the grapevine.

The main topic is HRM related. Concepts introduced include recruitment process and grapevine.

The information for the case was attained from one-on-one interviews with the main case protagonist, Sabrina (name of all characters in the case and organisations have been changed as per request of the interviewee. However, all the happenings in the case are real).

This case deals with the tricky situation faced by Sabrina, an certain employee of an international development organisation, (an institution focussing on aiding development in economically underdeveloped countries), who finds herself in when she inadvertently comes across some negative information about a job candidate currently in the middle of the recruitment process, who, if successful, will become her colleague and work closely with her in future. It has taken months to find this candidate, and if hired should lighten Sabrina’s workload tremendously. The preliminary decision maker in the case is Sabrina, but the ultimate management decision will have to be made by her boss John Nash.

The case can be used at undergraduate and graduate level. The main topic is Human Resource Management (HRM) related. It is of preliminary level of difficulty. There are no specific prerequisites. Concepts introduced include recruitment process and grapevine.

The case describes the origins of money, touching on the gold standard, the Fed’s 1942 purchase of US debt to fund the “war effort”, Bretton Woods (1944), Nixon’s 1971 pulling the currency peg and descent of money from gold to fiat. It also touches on theories of inflation and deflation, quantitative easing (QE) post the 2008 crisis and the “swamp” of (unorthodox) modern monetary theory (MMT). Aside from providing a brief history of monetary policy and economics, the case study seeks to widen students’ understanding of key economic issues including: fiat money, QE, government funding mechanisms, taxation, economic stimulation, inflation/deflation – and of course, the need for an ombudsman to limit excess.

In May 2020, South Africa’s deputy finance minister David Masondo announced that he would support the South African Reserve Bank’s lending to the government. This statement followed President Ramaposa’s earlier announcement of a R500bn COVID-19 stimulus package. The case explores the economic history of money, from barter to gold to cryptos. The case examines the origins of central banks’ printing of money, initially to support the Second World War effort and more recently the 2008 global financial crisis and now the COVID-19 crisis. In particular, the case raises the question of central bank independence – “democratically elected governments always need money, is it appropriate for central banks provide it? And are there limits?”

MBA and Executive Education

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS: 1 Accounting and Finance.

This case study provides students with the challenge of advising a small restaurant reeling under the impact of the Covid-19 crisis in South Africa. In the process, they must use their analytical skills combined with tools derived from value-based management theory to develop a revised business strategy for the owner.

Agility in any business in modern times is essential to survival – and this is particularly so for small, entrepreneurial enterprises that lack the history and resources to survive dramatic changes in the operating environment. A small restaurant in the coastal holiday village of Port Alfred, South Africa is managing to deliver a reasonable return for its owner, a former corporate financier from Johannesburg. The Covid-19 crisis requires a fundamental rethink of business strategy to ensure a future for the business.

This case study is ideal for a module in entrepreneurship for delegates in a diploma, undergraduate or postgraduate degree.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS: 3 Entrepreneurship.