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Grupo Inca, a conglomerate that owned Peru’s leading textile business with a long history of working with alpaca fleece, was at a crossroads regarding the conservation and commercialization of black alpaca fiber. Historically, black alpacas were as common as their lighter-colored counterparts, but market preferences drove them to near extinction…

AMAG is Switzerland’s premier automotive retail and service company, holding exclusive rights to import Volkswagen Group car brands such as Audi, Volkswagen, Skoda, Cupra and Seat. In 2022 AMAG had 7,300 employees and a revenue of CHF 4.4 billion. The electrification of the automotive industry and the introduction of the agency model by the Volk…

Nespresso, the global leading brand in portioned coffee, is facing an existential threat. The company’s current market base, which consists primarily of aging consumers, is likely to decline in the medium to long term. To compensate for the certain shortfall, the company needs to attract young coffee drinkers among Millennials and Generation Z, …

Dolf van den Brink, CEO of HEINEKEN, left the company’s global headquarters in Amsterdam for a company retreat. Over the next three days, the entire executive team would gather to discuss the company’s future. The preliminary results for 2022, presented during the recent two-day Capital Markets Event, were positive, and the company’s progress on…

In many informal economies, entrepreneurs face a visibility paradox: increasing visibility to resource-granting stakeholders simultaneously increases exposure to resource-extracting stakeholders. To investigate this phenomenon, we leverage a unique, hand-collected, small-area census dataset of firms in the township of Delft in Cape Town, South A…

You think you have a winning strategy. But do you? Executives are bombarded with bestselling ideas and best practices for achieving competitive advantage, but many of these ideas and practices contradict each other. Should you aim to be big or fast? Should you create a blue ocean, be adaptive, play to win–or forget about a sustainable competiti…

The case explores the principles and challenges of operational excellence through the experience of Magdi Batato, former EVP of Operations at Nestlé. It examines how he implemented Mission-Directed Work Teams (MDWTs) to empower front-line workers, align goals and drive accountability within a collaborative culture. MDWTs, introduced in South Afr…

The board of Nestlé S.A. announced that Anna Mohl would become the CEO of Nestlé Health Science (NHSc) — a global leader in nutritional science — on 1 January 2024. She was delighted to hear about her new position but knew there was little time to celebrate. The pressure was on her to make timely strategic decisions to navigate some operating ch…

The B case picks up at the end of Case A. It’s now autumn 2022. Klaas Ariaans and Eric Jones, leaders within ABN AMRO’s Personal and Business Banking Division had been reflecting on the success of self-organization in their divisions. This new working method gave branches and banking teams more autonomy over how, when and where they worked, as w…

This technical note introduces the Negotiation Staircase Framework, a comprehensive approach to understanding and managing complex negotiations. The framework presents six distinct levels of negotiation: Set-up, Process Definition, Guiding Principles, Shared Fact-bases, Deal Architecture and Detailed Bargaining. The note explains how skilled ne…

Founded by Lim Hock Chee in 1985, Sheng Siong has evolved from a humble grocery store into a leading supermarket chain in Singapore, renowned for its cost-effective pricing and commitment to customer satisfaction. Mr Lim’s unique philosophy, which emphasizes self-cultivation, perseverance and positivity, has been instrumental in shaping Sheng Si…

This technical note introduces two powerful frameworks for navigating complex, rapidly changing business environments: TSUNAMI and SURF. The TSUNAMI framework provides a comprehensive tool for assessing external challenges across seven dimensions: technological disruption, socio-economic shifts, upheaval potential, network vulnerability, acceler…

This episode takes you behind the scenes of a recent gathering led by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development together with IMD, where David Bach sat down with two sustainability leaders.

All organizations should have a plan to secure trust during, after (and even before) a crisis hits. Here are a host of examples, good and bad, to learn from.

A recent survey by IMD, Microsoft, and Ringier reveals that just 35% of organizations have strategies to address diversity bias in GenAI. Alexander Fleischmann identifies the risks and suggests ways to mitigate bias in the machine. A recent survey by IMD, Microsoft, and Ringier reveals that just 35% of organizations have strategies to address di…

Surviving Global Tariffs means Medtech and Luxury brands must revisit 1990s strategies to adapt to the US’s steepest trade barriers in decades.

How a private equity-backed corporate carve-out created a successful, sustainable consulting powerhouse by Benoit Leleux

Understanding differences between demographic cohorts is crucial to being an effective leader. But do you know what they are? Take this short quiz to test your knowledge, and read on for tips on maximizing inter-generational learnings. Understanding differences between demographic cohorts is crucial to being an effective leader. But do you know …