This case examines the life, career and leadership style of John Meredith, the group managing director of Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH). Meredith established the company in 1972 based on his vision for more efficient global trade. Under his leadership, the company grew to become the world's largest container port operator. The company grew from owning and managing a single container port to owning and managing 45 container ports by May 2007. .....more

Ward Carter, general manager-operations of Wilson Fuels, St. Catharines, a division of the Toronto-based Mather Corporation, had just returned to his office after investigating the spillage of 400,000 gallons of liquid fertilizer on Friday, February 17, 1984 at the Port Dalhousie storage terminal located 18 miles from St. Catharines. Ward knew there would be an investigation of the incident and he was now ready to write to Gerald Hudson, president .....more

The general manager of a division of an international cosmetic company must decide hoe to deal with a lack of response to a memo. The general manager wrote to the vice-president of operations to elicit some response from Operations that would lead to better communication between marketing and operations. It is now only three days until the next meeting between operations and marketing and the vice-president has made no response to the general manager's .....more

A small team of Canadian managers from a large financial institution is faced with the challenges of managing a recently acquired Mexican operation. Managers must cope with a language barrier and cultural differences as they try to restructure the over-staffed Mexican financial institution. A second teaching note (5A97L01) discusses how to use this case from a cross-cultural orientation perspective.

The vice-president of finance & administration and the manager of finance are reviewing the expenses of a proposed joint venture. The process had been time consuming and expensive; they began to doubt whether the joint venture was even possible. What could they do to increase the probability of success? Should they be considering an additional partner or even a merger with other competitors?

The vice-president, government and corporate affairs, must prepare an action plan outlining how the company will communicate the phase-out of its entire manufacturing operation. The phase-out would directly affect the jobs of 217 unionized employees. He knows that because the market would now be supplied primarily from plants in the United States, the union, politicians, and the press would impute the phase-out to the Free Trade Agreement. Such accusations .....more

The newly appointed division head must examine organizational or communication problems within a division of a billion dollar semiconductor manufacturer. The manager made a decision, which an employee emotionally responded to, creating the potential for conflict within the department. Cross-cultural issues come into play given that the manager, although originally from China, was educated and gathered extensive experience in the West and was thus .....more

Alpha Gearing Systems Shanghai Co., Ltd. (Alpha Shanghai), a joint-venture between Alpha Gearing Systems of Illinois, USA (a large producer of gearing products), and Kai Li Machine Systems (one of China's largest manufacturers of gearing systems for mopeds and motorcycles), had invested several millions of dollars in tooling in the hope of winning a major contract. The general manager of Alpha Shanghai had made the decision that the next round .....more

It had been almost a decade since the first article surfaced in the media alleging that factories sub-contracted by Nike in China and Indonesia were forcing workers to work long hours for low pay, and for physically and verbally abusive managers. The article was the seed of a media campaign that created a public relations nightmare for the company. A financial crisis in Asia and intense competition in the domestic market contributed to a decline in .....more

The Pizza Public Company Limited is a division of the Minor Group of Companies and focuses on the management and operation of food-service outlets. This case series takes place between November 1999 and February 2000 and covers the negotiation process between Pizza Public Company Limited and Tricon Restaurants USA regarding the renewal of the company's franchise agreement for Pizza Hut in Thailand. After 20 years of managing the brand, an agreement .....more