Working Knowledge
Business Research for Business Leaders
Cold Call
A podcast featuring faculty discussing cases they've written and the lessons they impart.
Subscribe on iTunes

Should Global Beer Company Molson Coors Dive into the Cannabis Beverages Business?

In March 2019, Molson Coors CEO Mark Hunter considered a request to pull forward $65 million to build a facility in Canada to produce cannabis beverages. This request was not part of the original plan to test the waters with a few products in a small geography to see if there was a viable market opportunity, given that there was no legal market yet. It's this change in direction that gives Hunter pause. Should he approve the request, or push the team back to the original, more conservative plan? Senior Lecturer Derek van Bever and Steve Kaufman discuss balancing exploitation versus exploration inside this global brewing company in the case, "Beyond Beer: Brewing Innovation at Molson Coors."  Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Read the Transcript

Filter Results: (159) Arrow Down

Cold Call PodcastRemove Cold Call Podcast →

← Page 7 of 159 Results →

Can Wynton Marsalis and Lincoln Center Save Jazz Music?

With its listenership in steep decline, jazz legend Wynton Marsalis is looking to rebrand the genre and engineer its comeback. Rohit Deshpande discusses his recent case study on the effort. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

The American Food Paradox: Growing Obese and Going Hungry

One third of the United States population is obese, even as 50 million Americans struggle to find enough to eat. And all that in a country where 40 percent of the food made each year is thrown away. Jose Alvarez discusses how the former president of Trader Joe’s is experimenting with a potentially elegant, sustainable solution in a pilot store in Massachusetts. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Target's Expensive Cybersecurity Mistake

Professor Suraj Srinivasan explores one of the largest cyber breaches in history, analyzing why failures happen, who should be held accountable, and how preventing them is both a technical problem and a matter of organizational design. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How Wayfair Built a Furniture Brand from Scratch

What was once a collection of 240 home furnishing sites is now a single, successful brand, Wayfair.com. How that brand developed over time and the challenges and opportunities presented by search engine marketing are discussed by Thales Teixeira. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Digital Change: Lessons from the Newspaper Industry

In a podcast, Professor Bharat Anand discusses Norwegian media giant Schibsted’s resounding success in the newspaper business through modernization of classified ads, bringing users together, and adopting a digital-first approach. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Building Affordable Health Care in Paradise

By some accounts, only about 5 percent of people worldwide receive cardiac treatment they need to survive. Professor Tarun Khanna highlights the need for affordable health care at scale, and a possible model based on factory-like repetition and learning in the Cayman Islands. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

You're Fired: Managing Gray-Area Decisions

Joseph Badaracco discusses how managers can sort through difficult gray-area decisions, such as firing an employee. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

The Spectacular Fall and Fix of HealthCare.gov

Professor Len Schlesinger describes his case study around the enormous challenges involved with building, launching, and ultimately fixing HealthCare.gov—one of the largest IT fiascos ever. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

The Munich Oktoberfest: From Local Tradition to Global Capitalism

Professor Juan Alcacer discusses how the Oktoberfest brand has been transplanted around the globe, whether copycat festivals help or hurt its reputation, and to what extent its original hosts could or should be profit-motivated. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Innovation Under Constraint: Constructing a Turnaround at Lego

In this podcast, Jan Rivkin takes us behind Lego's iconic building "bricks" and into the minds of its leaders as they tackle digital disruption, staying true to the brand, and engineering an impressive turnaround. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How Netflix Built its House of Cards (and Changed TV Forever)

The TV drama "House of Cards" not only made Netflix a major entertainment player, but it changed the viewing habits of millions of watchers. In this Cold Call Podcast, Anita Elberse discusses her case study on the impact of this pioneering series and the small production company behind it. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Behind Apple's Tax Situation, an Unprecedented Financial Policy

The European Union recently hit Apple with a $14.5 billion tax bill, but that’s hardly the first or worst financial challenge the technology giant has faced. Mihir Desai explains the financial wiring behind the inventors of the iPhone. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Behind IBM's High-Risk Decision to Put Watson on 'Jeopardy'

The gamble looked like an epic fail when supercomputer Watson fumbled the first question. But failure didn't last long. Willy Shih describes IBM's marketing of Watson in a recent case study.

Why College Rankings Keep Deans Awake at Night

Can parents and prospective students trust college rankings? Bill Kirby unpacks this complex system, including what “world-class” actually means, what rankings don’t take into account, and how schools are learning to game an imperfect system. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How Small Investors Can Bet Big on Brands They Love

LOYAL3 allows consumers to make small stock purchases of companies they love. In this Cold Call podcast, Luis M. Viceira discusses LOYAL3's move into IPOs and the idea that shareholders make better customers. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How to Fix a Broken Global Team

On a Cold Call podcast, professor Tsedal Neeley discusses her recent case study about a manager charged with corralling a hugely diverse, underperforming group and leading it back to success on a global scale. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Who Makes the Eyes for Driverless Cars?

Professor David Yoffie discusses why a company many have never heard of, Mobileye, will be a linchpin in the future of self-driving automobiles. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Hold on to Your Complexity: Bringing Multiple Identities to Work

Striking a careful balance between professional image and personal passion is difficult, as a case study on high-profile banker and gospel singer Carla Ann Harris underscores. Professor Lakshmi Ramarajan discusses the case in this Cold Call podcast. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

A Better World Through Brewing

Since brewing is a marketing-driven business, finding ways to differentiate a beverage from its competition is crucial. Heineken’s chief marketing officer took a novel approach: take the complicated processes of production and distribution and make them interesting and important to the consumer. Professor Forest Reinhardt explains how a big, sophisticated company used small details, from trucking routes to the color of refrigerators, to put its commitment to the environment to work on its behalf. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Who Owns Space?

Entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are tapping into their vast personal wealth to make commercial space travel a reality. In the process, they're revitalizing a listless national space program. Professor Matthew Weinzierl discusses his new case on New Space, and how public-private partnerships are becoming the building blocks for the hottest new startup sector. Open for comment; 0 Comments.