Volkswagen Do Brasil Harvard Business Case
Final Exam - Executing Strategy
Volkswagen do Brasil: Drving Strategy with the Balanced Scorecard
Name: Roy Stoop
Student number: 5877431
MSc Business Studies/Business Administration – Marketing Track
University of Amsterdam (UvA)
Date of submission: 23-10-2014
Case questions
1. What challenges does Thomas Schmall face upon becoming CEO of Volkswagen do Brasil (VWB)?
2. Describe VWB's new strategy and comment on it in terms of quality of strategic thinking.
3. Does the strategy map (Exhibit 4) and the Balanced Scorecard (Exhibit 5) help Schmall and Senn implement the new strategy? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the scorecard and its implementation?
4. What are behavioral aspects of the implementation of this strategy, how are these addressed, or not, by the proposed implementation plan?
5. How can Schmall and his team use the scorecard to deal with the challenges faced by the company in January 2009?
6. Any other observations you think are pertinent to this case in terms of strategy execution?
1. What challenges does Thomas Schmall face upon becoming CEO of Volkswagen do Brasil (VWB)?
Thomas Schmall was appointed as CEO by VWAG in 2007, but he already knew the business, because he had subsequently held different managerial positions in the company in different countries (South Africa, China and Mexico). He did not want to continue VWB’s strategy of cost reduction, capacity downsizing and employee layoffs. With the model of the German technology in mind to produce small, reliable vehicles, he had the vision to format a high performance team and let VWB become the automotive industry leader in sales, profitability, quality and innovation in a sustainable way. From 1999 until 2007, VWB faced a declining market share and financial losses, so Schmall and his new VWB management team started to introduce the balance scorecard. One of the main challenges of this introduction was to create a high performance spirit and to introduce the different
Volkswagen do Brasil: Drving Strategy with the Balanced Scorecard
Name: Roy Stoop
Student number: 5877431
MSc Business Studies/Business Administration – Marketing Track
University of Amsterdam (UvA)
Date of submission: 23-10-2014
Case questions
1. What challenges does Thomas Schmall face upon becoming CEO of Volkswagen do Brasil (VWB)?
2. Describe VWB's new strategy and comment on it in terms of quality of strategic thinking.
3. Does the strategy map (Exhibit 4) and the Balanced Scorecard (Exhibit 5) help Schmall and Senn implement the new strategy? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the scorecard and its implementation?
4. What are behavioral aspects of the implementation of this strategy, how are these addressed, or not, by the proposed implementation plan?
5. How can Schmall and his team use the scorecard to deal with the challenges faced by the company in January 2009?
6. Any other observations you think are pertinent to this case in terms of strategy execution?
1. What challenges does Thomas Schmall face upon becoming CEO of Volkswagen do Brasil (VWB)?
Thomas Schmall was appointed as CEO by VWAG in 2007, but he already knew the business, because he had subsequently held different managerial positions in the company in different countries (South Africa, China and Mexico). He did not want to continue VWB’s strategy of cost reduction, capacity downsizing and employee layoffs. With the model of the German technology in mind to produce small, reliable vehicles, he had the vision to format a high performance team and let VWB become the automotive industry leader in sales, profitability, quality and innovation in a sustainable way. From 1999 until 2007, VWB faced a declining market share and financial losses, so Schmall and his new VWB management team started to introduce the balance scorecard. One of the main challenges of this introduction was to create a high performance spirit and to introduce the different