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The Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS), a South African based business school and one of the top ranked business schools in Africa, was yet again facing a crisis during the COVID-19 pandemic. Having emerged out of an extraordinary year of strict lockdown regulations and having managed a rapid shift to emergency remote teaching. GIBS had managed to maintain its academic programmes, ensuring the completion of the curriculum within the academic year whilst maintaining the exceptionally high standards and quality learning experience it was known for. As 2020 drew to a close, the academic programmes team and the students looked forward to starting the new year in a more “normal” mode of operation. GIBS closed for Christmas holiday with the intent on returning, in early 2021, in some form of face-to-face teaching. However, on the 27th of December 2020, the President of South Africa announced a return to level-3 lockdown as the second wave of infections swept through the country. Strict measures were once again enforced, significantly impacting GIBS’ possible return to campus in January 2021. Reflecting on the lessons learnt over the past year, the Executive Director: Academic Programmes, Professor Louise Whittaker, yet again faced the challenge of deciding how best to proceed given the circumstances. The case illustrates the need for effective change management through the application of Kotter’s 8 steps to transformation, whilst demonstrating the complexity of change management during a crisis. A particular focus on the importance of communication during a change management process in a crisis is illustrated through this case.

The learning outcomes are as follows: students need to understand that in a crisis, change management will be emergent and requires flexibility and adaptability; students will determine what concrete actions may be required during a change management process in a crisis; students will need to discern that theoretical models do not necessarily fit real world contexts, particularly in a crisis situation; and students will identify aspects that might be missing or inadequately formulated in standard models of change management.

The case is positioned at a post-graduate level and would be ideal as a teaching case for business school students on a Master of Business Administration programme, a specialised business masters programme or selected executive education programmes for general managers or senior executives. The case can be taught in a course in the following fields, namely, change management, leadership or strategy.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.

The case describes the internal growth workshop initiative at Vedanta Group. Anil Agarwal in 1976 founded Vedanta as a scrap-metal dealership in Mumbai (then Bombay). Over the years, Anil pursued a very aggressive growth journey with a vision to create a leading global natural resource company. The principal objective of discussing this case is to understand how Vedanta introduced this initiative and how it fits within the strategic human resource management at the group.

Human resources management, international human resources management.

The case is suitable for undergraduate or graduate/training programmes specialised in international dimensions of HRM.

The study aims to evaluate the experiences of hotel employees at the Mandarin Oriental Bangkok's new employee centre. This centre, called the “O-Zone”, is an example of the hotel's commitment to the well-being of its staff. On a larger scale, it is an illustration of a method to maintain employee motivation and commitment in the luxury hotel industry. The case is particularly useful to investigate as the hotel has created a unique approach to employee well-being in a large urban setting where employees experience a stressful living environment, including long commutes. This is supported by studies in the literature which reveal that burnout and stress are important factors to consider for hotel employees.

The case study allows students to discover the following key learning points: an example of a well-being initiative for employees of a luxury hotel in the Thai context; an investigation of the need for employers in luxury hotels in Thailand to attract and retain talent; and an understanding of the use of incentives at work for employee motivation in the Thai luxury hotel industry.

Teaching notes are available; please consult your librarian for access.

This case focusses on social innovation and social entrepreneurship in Africa, specifically looking at behavioural characteristics of social entrepreneurs, their motivations to create social value and the application of personal initiative theory. The case discusses the self-starting proactiveness and innovation traits of the social entrepreneur. The social business model canvas will be used to analyse the social enterprise’s business model.

Students of social entrepreneurship, development studies, sustainable livelihoods and asset-based development. It is useful for customised or short programmes on social entrepreneurship or for students with a background in business wanting to understand social enterprise as a vehicle for social and economic change. As such, this case is written for Business Management and Entrepreneurship undergraduates or students of elective courses in social entrepreneurship (“understanding” and “remembering” learning activities under Bloom’s taxonomy). When personal initiative theory is used, the case provides an initial understanding of social entrepreneurship in a less developed context for post-graduate students and may be used for higher-order learning activities (“analysing” and “applying”).

The case tells the story of Dr Engr Moses Musaazi, who is a Social Entrepreneur and Managing Director of Technology for Tomorrow (T4T). Troubled with the persistent social problems in his country. Musaazi, through T4T, strived for social innovations to reduce school dropouts of Ugandan girls. While exploring Moses’ journey for solving persistent social problems through social innovations, students will be able to understand, remember, analyse and apply Dees’ (2001) social entrepreneurial behaviours and Santos’ (2012) theory of social entrepreneurship. The case discusses what motivates African social entrepreneurs to start a social venture (Ghalwash, Tolba, & Ismail, 2017). Students will apply personal initiative theory to identify the social entrepreneurial behaviours displayed in the creation of social ventures. To exemplify and analyse the different components of social ventures’ business model, the social business model canvas by Sparviero (2019) will be introduced.

The teaching objectives are Objective 1. Students are able to remember, understand, identify and apply the social entrepreneurial behaviours as defined by Dees (2001) and the elements of Santos’ (2012) theory of social entrepreneurship to Dr Moses Musaazi’s case as a social entrepreneur. Objective 2. Students remember, understand and identify what motivates social entrepreneurs in less developed economies to create social value (Ghalwash et al., 2017). Objective 3. Early-stage postgraduate students are able to apply and analyse (also evaluate and create for higher-level post-graduates) personal initiative theory to explain the emergence of social entrepreneurial behaviour and especially how innovation, self-starting and proactiveness may lead to social entrepreneurial venture start-up (Frese, Kring, Soose, & Zempel, 1996). Objective 4. Students use the social business model canvas (Sparviero, 2019) as a tool to understand, analyse and improve a social-enterprise business model.

Supplementary learning materials are provided in the Teaching Note (Table 1). Table1, which includes videos and their description. Also, a link to Uganda’s sustainable development index is provided (the focus is sustainable development goals [SDGs] 3: Good health and well-being, SDG 4: Quality Education, SDG 5: Gender equality, SDG 10: Reduced inequalities).

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

This case was developed with information gathered from publicly available secondary sources, including news articles, company annual reports, various organizational websites and social media posts. The authors pilot-tested the case in two undergraduate courses: Leadership and Labor-Management Relations.

In 2019, Abigail Disney, granddaughter of Roy Disney (co-founder of the entertainment giant The Walt Disney Company), gained considerable media attention when she publicly criticized the high compensation paid to the current Disney CEO, Robert Iger. In fact, Iger had one of the largest ratios of CEO-to-average worker pay in corporate America. Abigail Disney called for the company to reduce Iger’s compensation and to increase pay for the average Disney worker to address the perceived pay inequity.

This case is primarily written for the undergraduate level. The topics would be appropriate for Human Resource Management, Labor Relations, Business Ethics, Leadership, and an upper level Compensation course. It is possible that the case could also be used in a Business Strategy or Economics course if supporting documents are provided.

Information for this case was gained first-hand as the case authors are also the protagonists. Care was taken to ensure case material was presented in an unbiased and accurate manner.

Sherry Finney, co-manager and partner at Escape Outdoors (EO), North Sydney, Nova Scotia, has just about completed a social media campaign collaboration with Cape Breton outdoor influencers, Davey and Sky. This was the company’s first collaboration with social influencers, and EO had done it to increase their follower base, particularly on Instagram. Defining measures of success was the task now facing Finney and her Sales and Marketing Assistant, Megan Penney. The campaign costs were in the range of $500, and if EO were to do this campaign again, they needed to understand the pros and cons and if it was a success. The campaign would end in a few days, and before it was finalized, Finney and Penney had to decide what final metrics would be required for evaluation and, specifically, how the campaign would be evaluated.

This case is intended for courses in social media marketing, marketing management, marketing analytics, digital marketing or entrepreneurship. The typical user of this case will be an undergraduate or graduate business student who has completed an introductory marketing concepts course.

Later in the discussion, the options for long run strategy in dealing with a possible takeover offer and other strategic options can be discussed by the class. Lack of familiarity by students with the role of the outside potential acquirer of the camp (in this case, a hotel chain) and the lack of familiarity with the role of an investor who is a family investor, who may wish to sell stock and use the proceeds for another purpose, or a small investor who invests because he or she uses the camp and takes advantage of the stockholder’s discount will probably preclude role playing, except in executive MBA classes where students have sufficient experience in possible takeover situations or in investment management, Emphasis should probably be placed on discussing the major issues, such as social and cultural issues and on marketing and public relations issues and on financial issues, including the options available in the event of a possible takeover effort. All of these issues are impacted fully by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Instructors will need to play an active role in teaching this case. It is recommended that the instructor give a short lecture or discussion at the beginning as to how a camp such as Camp Teddy functions. The authors recommend that the instructor then begin the case discussion by asking students questions about such issues as social and cultural issues and marketing and public relations issues.

Camp Teddy is a seasonal camp for families in rural Connecticut adjacent to New York City and suburbs in New York and Connecticut. It is technically a for-profit organization but operates more like a nonprofit organization because many of the campers own shares and have used the camp sometimes for several generations. The camp has traditions that are liked by many of the shareholders and campers. Although net income has increased in the past year, there does not seem to be enough funds to support necessary capital expenditures to improve facilities for the future. The largest stockholder has recently died. His immediate heirs’ control 300 of the 1,000 shares and other family members control 400 shares with the remaining 300 shares in the hands of small shareholders, many of whom use the camp each summer. A large hotel chain is interested in possibly acquiring the camp through a buyout or perhaps a hostile takeover, with a potential large gain to shareholders. The board of directors must consider a number of issues to insure good occupancy of the camp in the future and must decide what to do about a potential takeover attempt.

This case can be used in several courses, including investment management, hospitality management, corporate finance and business strategy. There are ethical and societal issues in the case, so that the case might also be used in courses looking at business, environment or business ethics. The case is best used at the graduate level, but it might be suitable for some advanced undergraduate courses.

This two-part case illustrates the use of economic order quantity to manage conflicting performance measures across different siloed functions in an organization. Part A requires students to assess the costs of various order quantities and quantify the concept of “robustness.“ Part B emphasizes managing the variables of annual demand, ordering cost, inventory carrying cost, and unit price to achieve strategic goals. The student must determine how to lower ordering costs to compensate for increases in the other variables as well as to help guide Just-In-Time implementation efforts.

The case study analyses competition in the automobile industry in Zimbabwe, a developing economy. From that perspective, it discusses Puzey and Payne’s business operations; a company with a long-standing history in the country’s automobile industry. Since its establishment during the Colonial era, the company endured a prolonged period of rapid car and spare parts sales decline in 2012. Following a management buyout deal in 2013, the decline in sales proved to be its real dilemma and it required strategic decisions to diffuse the impact of the “grey markets”. Government policies added to the company’s problems.

The case study follows a qualitative research approach. Information about Puzey and Payne’s business operations was gathered from archived materials, through qualitative conversations as well as company artefacts. Published materials in newspapers and magazines were used to provide background information.

The case study is appropriate for both undergraduate and postgraduate students studying International Business Management.

This case is used in Darden’s “Digital Marketing” course elective. It explores the experience of a niche search firm whose founder attributed her ability to open her recruiting firm to LinkedIn and the new model of recruiting it created. LinkedIn Corporation had been one of the most successful companies in the digital media space, with more than 4,000 employees and a market capitalization of over $25.5 billion in August 2013. But few people knew how LinkedIn had grown and how it had become profitable. LinkedIn had multiple unique aspects to explore: its focus on professional--not simply personal--social interaction, the company’s B2B components, and also its marketing positioning from user experience to targeting and growth strategy.