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The writing of this case study was triggered by the numerous media reports in 2020 that talked about the EU nations losing its solidarity. EU being a very appropriate example of economic, monetary and customs union while teaching theories of economic integration and international relations, the post-pandemic approach of EU leadership to rebuild the crisis-ridden member nations seemed an excellent material for developing a teaching case study.

The case study was written based on secondary data and published information available. Enough desk research was undertaken to build the characterisation of the protagonists and due diligence done to chronologically report all facts of the case as the story developed. It was decided to build the epilogue into the case study so that the case analysis had enough depth.

The case is set in 2020 when the global economy was reeling under the massive impact of a lockdown and the aftermath. The case study examines the model of economic union in international business and the various challenges that governance of an association of nations such as the 27 member EU can throw up. It examines the conflict of interest that can arise among member nations during critical circumstances such as the pandemic and its massive tolls.

EU had established itself as a critical international trade player and had already proven their might as a united entity to the world trade partners, given the fact that they were not only a customs union but also a monetary union. In this scenario when the pandemic threw them into the whirlwind of lockdown-induced crisis, the united front of the mighty EU all but crumbled. As the worst-hit economies of Italy and Spain struggled to pull themselves back to normalcy, EU experienced one of its worst solidarity crises.

EU’s president Angela Merkel and ally French President Emmanuel Macron with support from the EU Council’s President Charles Michel stepped forward to resurrect the badly hit economies. They viewed this as the best opportunity to bring about a united front by coming together at Brussels for a summit when lockdown eased up in July 2020. It was to be a show of unity to jointly bail out the severely affected member nations by grants rather than loans. The summit, however, snowballed into bitter arguments and open bickering between the wealthy and not-so-wealthy members, and they could not agree upon the issue of debt vs aid. The fact that the EU was an agglomeration of 27 nations, which were far from homogenous in socioeconomic status, not to speak of divided political ideologies, only added dimensions to the dispute. Negotiations repeatedly hit roadblocks. Can the EU leaders lead their bitterly divided house to a consensus?

The case is suitable for graduate and post-graduate levels. Management courses where international business studies, international trade blocs and global leadership are part of curriculum can use the case to teach concepts of “Regional economic integration”, “Economic and Political union” and theories of “International relations” and “Negotiation”. It can also be ideally used in an executive management programme on “Global Leadership” to highlight the complexities of “governance of international associations” and “consensus building amidst diversity”.

Employee well-being in a casino work environment is crucial for the quality of work-life and employees' performance. This study examines the dimensions of well-being at a casino in Malaysia to gain deeper insights into employee challenges and motivational factors to arrive at practical mitigation efforts.

The study adopted a qualitative approach involving 14 semi-structured interviews with casino employees in Malaysia. Interviews lasted 30 min to 2 h at a time when Covid-19 was raging in 2021. Responses were analysed via a data-driven approach and coded using NVivo software to delineate the contents into analytical categories of well-being dimensions.

The findings suggest that employees at the casino face challenges in achieving work-life balance. Employee's well-being suffers from insufficient break time, irregular working hours affecting family time, managing customer temper tantrums and lack of emotional support systems and remunerations altered by the pandemic. Women employees were particularly vulnerable.

The findings suggest a need to create better working conditions and address well-being with counselling support for stress management, a balanced approach by employers to the “customer is always right” mantra, creating promising career pathways and supervisors to have better oversight of workaholics. The research focused only on one casino and there was limited access to management departments for an organizational perspective.

This study adds to the body of knowledge on employee well-being in the context of a casino. It suggests hospitality and tourism organizations review their human resource practices that would ease the stresses at the workplace and create support systems to promote employee well-being. Crucially, in a pandemic crisis, well-being dimensions must be accommodating and integrative to employee sentiments, sensitivity and self-actualization.