More from these Authors

• Case | HBS Case Collection | November 2019

  Celebrity Fashions Limited (A)

  V.G. Narayanan, Tanvi Deshpande and Shreya Ramachandran

  In May 2017 in Chennai, India, the chairman of Celebrity Fashions doubted whether the company could last until the end of the year. Venkatesh Rajagopal had found that the company, a readymade garment manufacturing and exporter he founded in 1989, was hitting hard times financially. It had been dealing with declining revenues for the past five years, and its losses had tripled between 2014-16. A slowdown in factory plant processes in 2006 and the value of the rupee against the dollar, as well as wage arrears, contributed to the financial problem. Rajagopal’s son, Vidyuth, had recently joined the company after moving roles both within Celebrity and its sister company, Indian Terrain, and at organizations elsewhere. In 2017, as joint managing director, he was convinced he would be able to turn the company around. Vidyuth, along with the independent director Venky appointed, identified the problems. There were communication gaps on the factory floor, and this caused lags in the shipments of garments and pushed up costs of production. The financial problems had confused some employees, and others were not aware of it at all. The leadership team was not communicating effectively. Would Celebrity be able to cut operational costs, and would Vidyuth be able to get the buy-in from his team to transform the company, and protect his family business?

  Keywords: turnarounds; Operations; Management; Financial Condition; Problems and Challenges; Communication; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Transformation; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Manufacturing Industry;

  Citation:

  Narayanan, V.G., Tanvi Deshpande, and Shreya Ramachandran. "Celebrity Fashions Limited (A)." Harvard Business School Case 120-053, November 2019.  View Details

  CiteView DetailsEducators

  Related

• Supplement | HBS Case Collection | November 2019

  Celebrity Fashions: Moving Ahead (B)

  V.G. Narayanan, Tanvi Deshpande and Shreya Ramachandran

  In May 2017 in Chennai, India, the chairman of Celebrity Fashions doubted whether the company could last until the end of the year. Venkatesh Rajagopal had found that the company, a readymade garment manufacturing and exporter he founded in 1989, was hitting hard times financially. It had been dealing with declining revenues for the past five years, and its losses had tripled between 2014-16. A slowdown in factory plant processes in 2006 and the value of the rupee against the dollar, as well as wage arrears, contributed to the financial problem. Rajagopal’s son, Vidyuth, had recently joined the company after moving roles both within Celebrity and its sister company, Indian Terrain, and at organizations elsewhere. In 2017, as joint managing director, he was convinced he would be able to turn the company around. Vidyuth, along with the independent director Venky appointed, identified the problems. There were communication gaps on the factory floor, and this caused lags in the shipments of garments and pushed up costs of production. The financial problems had confused some employees, and others were not aware of it at all. The leadership team was not communicating effectively. Would Celebrity be able to cut operational costs, and would Vidyuth be able to get the buy-in from his team to transform the company, and protect his family business?

  Keywords: turnarounds; Operations; Management; Financial Condition; Problems and Challenges; Communication; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Transformation; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Manufacturing Industry;

  Citation:

  Narayanan, V.G., Tanvi Deshpande, and Shreya Ramachandran. "Celebrity Fashions: Moving Ahead (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 120-054, November 2019.  View Details

  CiteView Details

  Related

• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2019

  Intelligent Design of Inclusive Growth Strategies

  Robert S. Kaplan, George Serafeim and Eduardo Tugendhat

  Improving corporate engagement with society, as advocated in the Business Roundtable’s 2019 statement, should not be viewed as a zero-sum proposition where attention to new stakeholders detracts from delivering shareholder value. Corporate programs for sustainable and ethical sourcing practices, however, have fallen far short of solving the underlying causes of extreme poverty, extensive use of child labor, and threats to the environment and human health. We identify several causes to explain this disappointing shortfall in societal performance, including traditional company policies and incentives that inhibit the implementation of innovative, inclusive growth strategies. We propose the role for a new actor, a catalyst, to help companies forge new relationships with external funders, local intermediary companies, NGOs, and community leaders. The catalyst aligns the multiple stakeholders from multiple sectors into enduring, mutually beneficial relationships that produce more value than that currently produced when stakeholders connect only by transactional relationships. The catalyst attracts funding from public and private sources to invest in the new ecosystem, which can generate attractive financial returns while alleviating poverty and environmental degradation. Finally, the catalyst engages the multiple participants to collectively co-create explicit strategies and scorecards of metrics, which serve to motivate, create accountability, and enable an enduring governance model for a multi-stakeholder ecosystem.

  Keywords: inclusion; sustainability; performance measures; Environmental Sustainability; Social Issues; Strategy; Governance; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Stakeholder Relations;

  Citation:

  Kaplan, Robert S., George Serafeim, and Eduardo Tugendhat. "Intelligent Design of Inclusive Growth Strategies." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-050, October 2019.  View Details

  CiteView DetailsSSRN Read Now

  Related