Art of creative leadership: Diaghelev and the Ballets Russes, early 1900s

In April 2021, Sava oban, the newly appointed EVP of Intertech, faces a perfect storm of Turkey's economic crisis and the global scramble for tech talent. This forces him to confront an operational meltdown at Intertech, the IT subsidiary of DenizBank. The massive talent exodus results in a 60 turnover rate, which threatens to derail critical projects as Intertech is now competing with both local firms and global giants hiring remotely during the Covid-19 pandemic. With traditional solutions proving insufficient, Sava proposes a radical strategy: pivoting from being a direct IT provider to an orchestrator of a platform ecosystem. The case challenges participants to map the practical steps necessary to build the ecosystem from the ground up by learning how to create trust with skeptical clients, internal teams and wary partners in the high-stakes fintech sector.

Avoid a scattershot AI strategy. Learn how to unlock GenAI’s full potential with a focused four-step “deep and narrow” approach for lasting competitive advantage.

In late 2023, when the management team at the consumer packaged goods company Reckitt considered adopting gen AI, potential use cases spanned the business—from drafting presentations to delivering customer support to optimizing procurement contrac...

Energy efficiency is the fastest and cheapest way to cut emissions. Business leaders must do more to translate words into action.

With US tariffs on Swiss goods at 39%, Carlos Cordon outlines eight strategic ways to reduce costs and turn protectionism into advantage.

In October 2023, New York City released its AI action plan, publicly committing to the responsible and transparent use of artificial intelligence. The plan included guiding principles — accountability, fairness, transparency — and the creation of ...

IMD Professor Omar Toulan speaks with Dan Luo at OWP Singapore about driving growth, profitability, and leadership across global brands like Heinz and Lego.

European innovation can be a force for resilience, transformation and global leadership. And yet it is often overlooked due to the geographical bloc’s fragmented markets, risk-averse culture, regulatory complexity and limited access to growth capi...

The case examines how DNB Bank, Norway's largest financial services company, reshaped its growth strategy by focusing on startups and SMEs, a segment traditionally considered unprofitable. In 2013, DNB launched a bold SME strategy, deliberately choosing a gross approach to win new startups early in their life cycle rather than a net approach focused on the profitability of existing accounts. This strategy, enabled by a significant investment in digitalization and a cultural shift toward customer lifecycle engagement, generated exceptional results and by 2025, the SME segment delivered the highest return on allocated capital. The journey, however, was not linear. A European regulatory crackdown in 2019, following the Danske Bank money laundering scandal, forced DNB to shift its focus from growth to compliance. The bank reallocated 1,000 employees to KYC units, dismantling its startup-friendly onboarding process and causing customer acquisition to stall. As competitors advanced, DNB had to orchestrate a strategic Restart effort to rebuild its SME leadership. This involved launching superior digital tools, providing automated lending decisions within a minute, and renewing its customer-centric focus. By 2025, the recovery was well underway, with one in three Norwegian SMEs banking with DNB. The case challenges students to evaluate DNB's past choices, the critical balance between growth and compliance, and the future of SME banking as AI and digital agents transform customer interactions.

The case looks at the fundamental challenges, tensions and opportunities associated with an internally run venture as opposed to an externally funded startup or spin-off company. It discusses the genesis and context of Kontor, an internal venture ...