Case studies

Crisis management, reputation and brand management, corporate communication, logistics, organization strategy.

Post-graduate and executive education.

The Eyjafjallajökull Iceland Volcano erupted on April 14, 2010, causing an estimated loss of US$1.7 billion for the aviation industry. At one stage in this weeklong event, 1.2 million passengers were affected with 100,000 flights being grounded across Europe. This case documents the way Etihad, a leading global airline company managed the crisis and continues to learn for future scenarios.

Adaptation strategies, reputation management, brand management, crisis planning and implementation, communication and stakeholder management, scenario analysis.

Teaching notes.

Brand strategy, marketing strategy, service marketing, hospitality management and international marketing strategy.

Post-graduate-level students; practitioners from the hospitality sector, brand management, corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the arts and culture field may also benefit from the case.

Jumeirah Group is a luxury hospitality company that is implementing a global brand strategy after developing a strong-regional reputation. Jumeirah's strong cultural alignment to its Dubai heritage in the form of its hallmarks and communication tag line “Stay Different” is being translated into events, activities, sponsorship and more importantly in terms of service to create a symbolic and experiential brand strategy. For Alice Royton, the Director of Branding for Jumeirah Group, the dilemma was how to maintain the thrust forwards as a top luxury brand and keep brand synergy especially as Jumeirah was increasing its portfolio and the competitive arena heats up in the international market place.

Creation of stakeholder value, brand strategy looking at various brand levels, using arts and culture as part of CSR initiative; communication strategy, emotional touch points and moment of truth as part of interactive service strategy; CRM and loyalty.

Teaching notes.

Marketing strategy; services marketing; tourism.

Upper year undergraduate business/management, MBA, marketing/international business.

Memento Park is a large open air museum on the outskirts of Budapest, that houses statues, and related ephemera related to the communist period in Hungary. The park opened in 1993, four years after Hungary had shaken off its yolk of communism as part of the Iron Curtain, in 1989. This case presents a classic example of a business enterprise that sprang from a concept and access to inexpensive materials directly resulting form a changing external environment. The case presents the issues involved in making Memento Park a sustainable part of the Budapest tourist experience.

This case challenges students to decide how best to determine a sustainable advantage. Arguably the value proposition that is being offered by Memento Park has a number of identifiable benefits to the target consumer. It is not replicable (at least in Hungary), has a truly unique content, and does not have large fixed or variable costs in terms of operations. The question is how to best develop a plan of attack for such a firm?

Teaching notes.

Human resource management.

The case might be used in teaching International Management or Russian society at a Master's level, including MBA.

Quotas for the employment of disabled people exist in many countries, including Russia. Many companies in Russia, however, are “forced” to find “creative solutions” to avoid this quota. This attitude is caused not by the unwillingness of companies to support disabled people, but rather by their moral and technical unreadiness to do so. Using one example of a company providing freight services, the case illustrates this. The company is faced with additional challenges: it is a 100 percent subsidiary, dependant on its parent company in many respects – especially in financial matters.

Students: learn some informal practices (legislative norms and networks) in the Russian business context;, discuss how organizations are faced with informal practices and establish problem solving techniques; and receive some additional information on the business environment in Russia.

Teaching notes.

This case describes the journey of Karson as he transitions from female to male. Throughout his life, Karson experiences a great deal of anxiety trying to reconcile his identity with the expectations of society. The anxiety inherent in this situation is described in order to get the reader to more fully empathize with the issues faced by transgender individuals. The case then focuses on issues specific to the workplace as Karson begins his career with a counseling agency and experiences several instances of discriminatory behavior.