Introduction To Case Management - Semantic Scholar
Introduction to case management What is case management? Case management is the powerful one-of-a-kind business simulation exercise case customization tool that is integrated to Cesim Instructor platform and available with all Cesim business simulation games. What is a case? Case in Cesim dictionary refers to a set of parameters that guide the development and fluctuations of the business and economic environment in our business simulation games. In addition to the parameters that change on roundly basis, case usually includes a separate case description or business case document giving a background story for the simulation exercise. How to use case management? Create new custom cases To create a new custom case, go to case management in Cesim Instructor and choose “Create new case” from the sidebar. Insert a name for the case in the respective field and choose the desired Cesim business simulation. Here we are creating a Global Challenge custom case. To create the custom case, click “Create”. The new custom case you just created can now be found under “Your cases”. 1
Your cases You will find all your custom cases listed in chronological order under “Your cases”. There are also four options to choose from next to each case: Setting, Edit parameters, Delete and Copy. Settings option opens up a settings panel that includes the following options: custom case name, case description, sharing option, available languages and custom description file upload. Edit parameters link launches the parameter editor, which is covered extensively in further chapters. Delete function allows you to delete the custom case. Copy function allows you to create an exact copy of a desired custom case if you want to use your old custom case as a template for further changes. Shared cases You can share the custom cases that you have created with all Cesim instructors that have registered into our platform, and you can take a copy for yourself from any of the custom cases that other instructors have shared with everyone. You can share a case by clicking “Settings” under “Your cases” in case management. This opens up a pop-up window that includes a checkbox for sharing your case. Select “Shared” and save your settings to share your new case with everyone. 2
All shared cases appear in a list under “Shared cases” The list includes the name of the case, short description, creator name and the copy control, which you can use to copy the shared case for yourself to be used as is or further refined by you. Changes to the original copy of the shared case do not have any effect on your account after you have copied the case to yourself. Cesim cases In addition to shared cases, there are also highlighted Cesim cases. Depending on the particular business simulation game, Cesim offers several pre-defined Cesim created and supported business cases to choose from. These are available for all instructors through the course creation or later through case management. They are clearly highlighted in the list of available cases for each course. 3
Assign custom cases to courses and universes Once you have created a custom case, you can assign it to your course or universe within a course by clicking “Assign” from the sidebar. This opens up the following view: The “Assign” page includes a familiar course list in the sidebar and course details appear on the top right. Below the course details, you will find details about the currently assigned case. All simulation courses have a case assigned to them; by default, it is the default Cesim case. The case information box includes details about the case name and description, simulation type, inclusion of a custom case description and available languages. If the case includes a case description file, you can download it from here. The assigned case can be changed by clicking “Change” at the bottom left corner of the information box. This opens up the following pop-up window: 4
The case change window includes the same case details as in the previous phase, and in addition to the details, a select box at the top left corner for changing the case. The select box includes a selection of available Cesim cases and your own custom cases, including the ones you may have copied from shared cases. It is also possible to assign different cases to separate universes. This option is available at the bottom of the “Assign” page. You can assign custom cases to universes by clicking the green button or return to using the custom case assigned to the course by clicking the red button. The case assigned to the universe is highlighted under “Case”. In case there is no custom case highlighted, the particular universe is using the custom case assigned to the entire course. 5
Editing a custom case If you wish to edit your custom case, click “Edit parameters” next to the set you want to modify under “Your cases”. This will in most cases take you to Outlooks page where you can pick any of the languages available in the simulation to modify market outlooks. Next to the Outlooks tab you will find several business function categorized tabs under which you’ll find relevant parameters that form the business case of your simulation exercise. When editing a custom case, note that most of the parameter inputs are validated against minimum and maximum limits. All of your changes are saved as you make them and there is no ability to go back to the previous value, so be careful when making changes. Some of the parameter changes are immediately reflected everywhere in the game, but this does not apply to all parameters, so if you wish to make changes to your case during the course, it is recommended to do so with at least one round advance. Remember also that you should reinitialize your course if you wish to affect the initial situation in any way. Be also aware of the fact that although some parameter changes are technically possible to make, it does not mean that they make up a good business case or are reflective of an actual real world market place. It is important to note that changes to parameters are currently not automatically reflected in market outlooks. Market outlooks are supposed to give a rough description of how the case evolves and as such should be in sync with the parameters. Please note that changes to custom names and currencies will be immediately reflected on all of the pages. For example, in Global Challenge, Finance and logistics page might show tariffs per unit in Australian dollars for all transports from Australia to Japan instead of showing the same in US dollars for all transports from US to Asia. Moreover, some parameter inputs might be grayed out based on what modules are currently activated. All parameter edit pages allow you to change the number of rounds that are displayed. This decision is common across all pages and affects both parameter input cell visibility and graphical presentation. The purpose of this is to lessen the amount of clutter on the page in case all the rounds are not relevant for your purpose. Although all of our simulations follow a similar structure when it comes to case management, there are notable differences. In the next chapter, we will introduce you to the process of creating a custom case specifically for the international business and strategy simulation Cesim Global Challenge. 6
Excel download / upload functionality This feature is currently not available to Cesim instructors directly. The Cesim Instructor platform allows for seamless downloading and uploading of all parameters and market outlook texts between Microsoft Excel workbooks and the Cesim Instructor platform case management tool. We have created purpose built Excel templates for all our business simulations for editing the entire custom case in Excel and uploading all the changes back onto our servers with the click of a button. The Excel template and the case management tool can be used as complementary ways of editing your custom case. You can create a case in case management, download it to Excel for heavy editing, upload back onto our servers and continue making final changes before assigning it for your course. We hope to bring this functionality to all Cesim instructors in the future. 7
Global Challenge custom case creation Best practices with Cesim Global Challenge A good case is transparent to participants. In other words, teams who engage themselves in analyzing the market outlooks and previous rounds’ results and make well justified decisions based on their analysis, also succeed in the game. A good case is built to support and target desired learning outcomes. On the other hand, you should not create a case where parameters incentivize contradictory decision-making; you should not for example decrease demand while increasing advertising elasticity in a given market. The case is supposed to force teams to carefully analyze the situation and give them some gratification upon recognizing leading trends. Custom case creation can be approached from a top-down or bottom-up perspective. In the former, you will start developing an overall storyline for the simulation exercise in broad strokes. You might write down the key changes you would like to see in each round, make changes to market outlooks and then seek to have these changes be reflected in all the relevant parameters. A rough sketch for a new storyline including 7 rounds and weak economic conditions might be something like this: Rounds 1&2: Normal economic conditions, moderate growth (2%-5%), upbeat outlooks Round 3: Growth halts, uncertain outlook Round 4: Sharp contraction in demand (-10% to -15%), negative outlook Round 5: Economic contraction slows down, but growth negative, negative outlook Round 6: Recession bottoms out, cautiously positive outlook Round 7: Recovery begins, slight growth and recovery, positive outlook When the basic storyline is described in the outlooks, you can start adding twists in between to highlight different areas of your choice. It is also possible to add surprising and remarkable events to the outlooks. With different events you can force teams to adjust their strategy in their decision-making. Finally, you can start to build accurate parameter changes for every round. Familiarize yourself with the parameters available in the case management tool and start working on numerical changes for every round. You might also take a more bottom-up approach to custom case creation. A good way to start experimenting with Cesim case management is to identify few key parameters that would alter the basic dynamic of the simulation exercise a bit after using the simulation for few times. This is of course not necessary, and we are happy to give advice on how to 8
immerse yourself into the practice of creating great custom cases that achieve your course learning targets. Some of the most common parameters, whose implications are straightforward include: Demand growth rates for each market area Price elasticity in each market Network coverage for each technology Corporate tax rates in each market area Foreign exchange rates for both currency pairs HR and inventory modules Custom currency and market names These parameters that are found under Demand and marketing, Finance and logistics and Modules are a good starting point alongside necessary adjustments to market outlooks. However, the next sections will introduce everything that is available in Global Challenge case management tool including adjustable parameters, default values and some guidance. 9
Outlooks Available languages: English Lithuanian French Spanish Brazilian Italian Chinese Romanian Russian Hungarian Portuguese Editing outlooks Global Challenge outlooks are edited by first choosing the desired language. Secondly, the instructor must select custom outlooks into use from the top right corner of the page. Once that is done, the market outlook texts that appear in the editable boxes will be the ones used by the simulation. The market outlook edit view includes Global Challenge outlooks divided into three sections: demand, costs and finance. The original market outlook text will always be available for reference on the page along with the editable text boxes at the bottom of the page. There are 12 market outlooks, one for each round and these are changed from the top left corner of the page from the round number selector. Remember that if you wish to use multiple languages all respective languages must be modified to use your desired custom market outlooks. By default, other languages will continue to use their respective default market outlooks. 10
Demand and marketing Demand and marketing page contains parameters affecting demand formation, competitive elements and marketing efforts. Basic demand For round 0 (the starting situation for your students), you can decide the amount of basic demand per team in thousands of units. From round 1 onwards, you can set the percentage growth ( ) or decline (-) of the basic demand on sequential or round-on-round basis. Basic demand per team is further influenced by pricing, advertising, number of features and several other factors before the team specific final demand is determined. Market area 1 (2000 K units, growth rates between -3% and 20%) Market area 2 (2006 K units, growth rates between -7% and 41%) Market area 3 (1739 K units, growth rates between -15% and 15%) Total demand in the market also varies depending on teams’ decisions. If teams have invested significantly into advertising and average prices have been heading lower, the total market size expands and vice versa. 11
A good case might include different starting levels and growth rates for each market with noticeable differences to force teams to team prioritize the market areas and possible adjust their strategies in the middle of the game. The graph in the case management tool shows the big picture for basic demand in each market. Network coverage Network coverage is an index telling you how widespread each technology is on a given round. If network coverage is set as zero, there are no sales for it. You might consider evolutionary trends for different network technologies or you might choose to set them to be more direct competitors. Note that the simulation does not structurally consider the different technologies to depend on each other, so you may freely change the coverage parameters. You can also change the names of the technologies under Custom texts. Please, also consider changes to development and licensing costs, available features, production costs and other parameters in case you consider significant changes. Students can observe these parameter values on the demand page in network coverage forecasts charts. Market area 1 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Market area 2 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Market area 3 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Price elasticity Elasticity is a measure of a relative impact of a factor to a relative outcome. It is measured as a percentage difference in the explainable variable (often “quantity demanded”) divided by the percentage difference in the explaining variable (such as price, advertising etc.). The higher the absolute value of elasticity is, the higher the effect of price difference on demand is. Note that the price elasticity has to be negative. The absolute value should be higher than 1 and smaller than 6. With values smaller than 1, teams would always benefit more from increasing price than what is the effect of price increase on demand. If the price elasticity is set at -3, 10 per cent difference in price will lead to a 30 per cent difference in demand provided that all other demand factors are excluded. The behavior of price elasticity can be misinterpreted if one does not take into account the general change in price level. If a team reduces pricing by 5 per cent but the overall prices decline by 10 per cent, the specific team will indeed lose demand. The price sensitivity is set separately for each market area. It is recommended that there is a difference in price sensitivity between the market areas. Market area 1 (-3.20) Market area 2 (-3.90) Market area 3 (-2.40) 12
Advertising elasticity Advertising elasticity should always be positive, because higher advertising always leads to higher demand no matter how small the effect might be. A higher promotion elasticity will increase the effect product promotion has on consumers, and differences in demand due to promotion will grow. Elasticity of 0.1 means a 10% difference in promotion effort would cause a 1% difference in the demand. Advertising elasticity is set separately for each market area and it should be in the range of 0.05 to 0.3. Market area 1 (0.13) Market area 2 (0.07) Market area 3 (0.10) Number of features elasticity These parameters determine how much customers appreciate additional features in products. If you set the elasticity to be higher, it’ll increase the effect of having more features than competitors. This figure needs to be positive, so that offering more features always increases demand. The number of features elasticity is set separately for each market area. Market area 1 (0.20) Market area 2 (0.20) Market area 3 (0.45) Technology attractiveness Technology attractiveness measures the relative appeal of products. What matters, is the relative rates of Tech 1, 2, 3 and 4 within a single market. For example, if Tech 2 attractiveness multiplier is two times higher than Tech 1 attractiveness multiplier in the US, then Tech 2 is two times more popular than Tech 1 in the US given otherwise similar properties. You can use the attractiveness parameter to create interesting twists in the game. Remember to write about changes in attractiveness to market outlooks. Attractiveness parameters are set separately for each technology in each market area. Market area 1 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Market area 2 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Market area 3 Tech 1 Tech 2 Tech 3 Tech 4 Cumulative part of advertising The share of advertising investment that remains effective on the next round. For example, a value of 50 per cent means that out of an investment of 1000 units of advertising expenditure on round 1, 500 units continue to affect the demand on the second round, and 13
only 500 additional units of expenditure are required to achieve the same effect as on round 1. The advertising residual parameter is set separately for total company advertising and technology specific advertising. Company advertising (50.0 %) Technology advertising (50.0 %) Last round’s market share elasticity Last round's market share elasticity dictates the extent to which differences in last round’s market share affect differences in team specific demand on the current round. Note, that this creates an effect where it is increasingly harder for weak teams to contest those who succeed at first. Last round’s market share elasticity parameters are set separately for each market area. A value close to 0.2 is appropriate. Market area 1 (0.20) Market area 2 (0.20) Market area 3 (0.20) Technology market share elasticity Technology market share elasticity dictates the extent to which differences in technology market share affects differences in team specific demand. These parameters are set separately for each market area. A value close to 0.1 is appropriate. Note also that since there are two different market share related demand factors there combined effect might become too high. Market area 1 (0.10) Market area 2 (0.10) Market area 3 (0.10) Cross elasticity multiplier Cross elasticity multiplier affects situations where a team is offering two different products in the same market. Lower figure creates larger impact. For example, a value of 1 means that cross elasticity has no impact. High cross elasticity leads to lower combined demand for teams that have products with significantly differing market demand before considering the cross elasticity impact. These parameters are set separately for each market area. Market area 1 (0.75) Market area 2 (0.75) Market area 3 (0.75) Technology advertising elasticity Tech advertising elasticity dictates the extent to which differences in total technology specific advertising (advertising for products of the same technology) affects differences in team specific demand. These parameters are set separately for each market area. 14
Market area 1 (0.17) Market area 2 (0.08) Market area 3 (0.12) Global multipliers These parameters affect the formation of total demand for each technology. For example, average pricing determines how strongly total demand is affected by deviations from customers' standard price perceptions. Attractiveness (1.00) Network coverage (1.00) Average pricing elasticity (-1.60) Average advertising (0.30) Last round’s market share (0.00) Number of teams (0.50) Total technology market price elasticity These parameters dictate the impact of average pricing on the total market demand for a certain technology among the technologies that are available in the marketplace. The price elasticity parameters should be negative, and they are set separately for each market area. Market area 1 (-0.40) Market area 2 (-0.45) Market area 3 (-0.35) 15
Production Production page covers parameters related to production, production cost determinants, inventories and supply. Basic in-house production unit cost Basic production unit cost acts as a base for the actual unit cost. It is then multiplied by economies of scale, planning penalty and learning curve multipliers when the actual production unit cost is calculated. These parameters should reflect other issues that might affect production unit costs in the real world. Note that the learning curve multiplier effect in the default case is quite large and can decrease the cost around 20% already in the beginning. Therefore, set the production basic cost higher than what you would like the actual production cost to be. Production unit costs are set separately for all technologies in the first two market areas (third market area does not have production). 16
Market area 1 Tech 1 (171.0 USD) Tech 2 (242.0 USD) Tech 3 (156.6 USD) Tech 4 (330.0 USD) Market area 2 Tech 1 (210.0 USD) Tech 2 (332.0 USD) Tech 3 (224.6 USD) Tech 4 (344.0 USD) Economies of scale You can set the economies of scale level to 1-10, where 1 indicates a low effect and 10 a high effect. Economies of scale parameter in Global Challenge is the effect that capacity utilization rate has on the production unit cost. It is the same multiplier for both market areas that have production. There is a graph in the case management tool that shows the multiplier with different capacity utilization ratios. For example, if the graph shows that the unit cost multiplier is 0.98 at 80% capacity utilization, then the unit cost is multiplied by 0.98. Economies of scale effect (1-10, 10 being the highest) Planning penalty Planning penalty refers to how much the allocated production decision differs from actual production. Planning error is interpreted so that every time the actual demand for a team has been smaller than their production decision, the team's production unit cost is multiplied by a multiplier that is higher than 1. Please note that production is never scaled upwards, and that planning penalty does not apply to courses that use finished goods inventories. There is a graph in the case management that shows the unit cost multiplier at different planning error levels. Planning penalty effect (1-10, 10 being the highest) Learning curve Producing a technology will decrease its production cost over time. Here you can decide the level of the learning curve effect between pre-determined levels 1 and 10. The graph in the case management tool shows the multiplier by which the unit cost is multiplied at different cumulative production amounts. Note that the learning curve effect is technology specific. High learning curve effect incentivizes low pricing strategies and can lead to fierce initial price competition. Learning curve effect (1-10, 10 being the highest) Scrap rate Scrap rate is the share of production that goes to waste and cannot be sold to customers. Teams pay the production costs for the scrapped products. Scrap rate is set separate for both market areas that can have production. Market area 1 (5.00) Market area 2 (10.00) 17
Maximum outsourcing limits These parameters dictate the maximum amount of contract manufacturing per team in thousand units. You can set both minimum and maximum limits for maximum outsourcing. The amount of products available for allocation to contract manufacturing depends on the cumulative allocated amount. Thus, the more teams decide to outsource in previous rounds, the more contract manufacturing capacity they have available later on. The parameters are set for both market areas that can have production. Maximum cannot be more than Market area 1 (2000 K units) Market area 2 (2000 K units) Maximum cannot be below Market area 1 (1000 K units) Market area 2 (1000 K units) Basic outsourcing costs This is the basic unit cost of contract manufacturing in base currency. A volume discount multiplier is used to arrive at the final unit cost of outsourcing. Outsourcing costs are set separately for each technology in both market areas that can have production. Note that outsourcing is available from the second market area even if it does not have production facilities. Market area 1 Tech 1 (118.5 USD) Tech 2 (137.2 USD) Tech 3 (102.5 USD) Tech 4 (187.1 USD) Market area 2 Tech 1 (145.5 USD) Tech 2 (188.2 USD) Tech 3 (138.6 USD) Tech 4 (195.0 USD) Volume discounts Volume discounts affect the extent to which effective outsourcing costs are affected by cumulative outsourcing orders. With outsourcing, the more you order, the lower prices you get. Volume discount (1-10, 10 being the highest) Initial number of own production facilities Here you can determine the amount of production facilities available in the beginning of the simulation. Please consider this together with production plant capacity parameters, outsourcing capacity and total demand growth. Also, remember that overcapacity cannot be divested in Global Challenge. Moreover, any changes should probably be reflected in balance sheet values that are available for adjustment under the Finance and logistics page. Market area 1 (10 plants) Market area 2 (0 plants) 18
Production plant capacity per round These parameters dictate the total production capacity of each production plant per round in thousands of units. Market area 1 (550 K units) Market area 2 (550 K units) Feature cost Feature costs are added directly to product unit costs based on the number of features that are offered. For example, if a product has 6 features and the feature cost is 10 US dollars, out of the total unit cost of the product 60 US dollars are directly dependent on feature costs. These parameters are set separately for each market area as features are added to the product in each market area separately and not in production. Market area 1 (6.0 USD) Market area 2 (6.0 USD) Market area 3 (6.0 USD) Inventory cost Inventory costs can be set to be dependent on both stored units and a fixed cost, and separately for both production areas. Remember that you must activate the inventory module under Modules page in order to have finished goods inventories included in your course. Variable costs are set as base currency per unit whereas as fixed costs are set as thousands of units of base currency for both market areas separately. Fixed costs are incurred on every round irrespective of whether a team has any units in inventory. Variable costs are based on average storage balances. Variable cost, USD per unit Market area 1 (10) Market area 2 (7) Fixed cost, K USD Market area 1 (0) Market area 2 (0) 19
Finance and logistics Finance page contains all the relevant parameters detailing finance, financial management, logistics costs and market valuation. Tariffs per unit Tariffs parameters are set in base currency per unit. Each product that is transported across market areas is subject to tariffs according to these parameters. Market area 1 - Market area 2 (7.0 USD) Market area 1 - Market area 3 (3.0 USD) Market area 2 - Market area 1 (7.0 USD) Market area 2 - Market area 3 (3.0 USD) 20
Transportation costs per unit Transportation cost parameters are set in base currency per unit. Each product that is transported across market areas is subject to transportation costs according to these parameters. Note that there are no transportation charges in sales within the production area. Market area 1 - Market area 2 (15.0 USD) Market area 1 - Market area 3 (9.0 USD) Market area 2 - Market area 1 (15.0 USD) Market area 2 - Market area 3 (5.0 USD) Investment cost of a plant This is the cost of building a plant in market area 1 or market area 2 in thousands units of base currency. The investment is paid one round after the investment decision. For example, if the cost for a plant in round 3 is 200 M USD, the decision to build a plant was already made in round 2. The construction delay can be set as 1 or 2 rounds on Modules page. However, the construction delay does not alter the cash flow schedule. Market area 1 (140 000 K USD) Market area 2 (160 000 K USD) Foreign exchange rates (method 2) Initial round parameter is used to set the absolute level of each currency in relation to the base currency. All subsequent parameters are annual percentage changes in the exchange rates for both currency pairs. This method enables you to preserve the exchange rate dynamics of the game if there is a need to adju
To create a new custom case, go to case management in Cesim Instructor and choose "Create new case" from the sidebar. Insert a name for the case in the respective field and choose the desired Cesim business simulation. Here we are creating a Global Challenge custom case. To create the custom case, click "Create".
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