Domain Digital Communication

Name of the Case: Embracing digital in communication

Introduction
Communication plays a crucial role in brand building. In today’s context, communication has assumed newer
dimensions, thanks to availability of digital led technologies. Proliferation of smart, intelligent and intuitive digital
platforms, novel content formats, and ever-changing consumer preferences are all making the space interesting
and challenging at the same time.
Background

With an intent to embrace and leverage Industry 4.0, Tata Steel has initiated a digital
transformation programme across all aspects of its business including communication.

In context of communication with the internal audience, we have deployed an enterprise social networking
service to enable conversations within the organisation. Our presence on social media (Facebook, Twitter,
LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube) in addition to corporate website helps the brand communicate with the external
stakeholders. We have adopted a framework of Online Reputation Management which includes real-time
monitoring of online conversations, reporting and analysis, and response management. We have also deployed
few chatbots as an interface to handle some specific conversation (incl. query handling) with external audience.
Problem Statement/Challenges Faced

Tata Steel has a rich legacy and a proud heritage. The organisation, over the years, has grown multi-fold, and
is changing rapidly across its business spectrum. As a result, the stakeholder ecosystem is continuously
expanded and evolving.

In context of communication, we believe there are a lot of interesting brand stories to be told, conversations to
be struck, and newer realms (platforms, technologies and content formats) to be explored.

With a stakeholder ecosystem as large and diverse as ours, it is a challenge to adequately cater to their dynamic
communication needs and preferences with agility. While digital led technologies will surely be an enabler in
this journey, the question is how?

Critical Case Questions

1. Understanding of communication needs and preferences of stakeholders (keeping the new media’s
current and future context in perspective):
a. Internal: Employees, Women employees, employees (spent < 5 years in the organisation),
Senior Leadership
b. External: Community, Investors, Customers, Vendors, Prospective Employees (Young talent),
Media, Govt./ Bureaucrats, NGOs, and General Public
2. Mapping of the stakeholder communication requirements with the new media of today:
a. Analysis of current set-up (only secondary research based data).
b. What step-up change can be brought in the current communication eco-system (platform and
content)?
3. How can we embrace the future of new media in communication? (context of Self-learning, self-
controlling and self-communicating standalone intelligent systems)? Illustrate and provide specific
recommendations.
4. Provide specific recommendations and ways to leverage Artificial Intelligence in communication and its
intended impact.
 Domain Corporate Strategy
Name of the Case: TSL Co. in search of new materials

Introduction
It’s a sunny Saturday morning. Suraj is sitting in his home sipping his coffee. Last few months had been very hectic for him. Being
the Chief Strategy Officer of TSL Co. – a large steel company in India, he had been deeply engaged with the recent acquisition of an
asset. This Saturday he decides that he is going to relax. He logs into Netflix and starts watching the next season of ‘Shark Tank’.
Suraj loves Kevin O’Leary’s devil’s advocate attitude and the way he assesses a new business before putting his money in it.
Suddenly his phone rings. It was Naresh – the CEO of TSL Co. Naresh tells him that from a recent study conducted by a leading
consulting firm, TSL Co. has been recommended to explore Composites (Fiber Reinforced Polymer and Carbon Fiber Reinforced
Polymer) as new materials to diversify the company’s business.
Background
TSL Co. is a 100-year-old steel manufacturing company in India. In the last 100 years, TSL Co. has perfected its systems and
processes to ensure a seamless value chain right from mining to steel-making to engineering. Similarly, all the support functions like
Finance, HR, IT and procurement have evolved in line with the strict guidelines. These standard operating procedures, though time
intensive, minimize risk arising due to any manual error.
From the people perspective, TSL Co. is around 40000 people strong company with almost four-fifth of the people constituting shop
floor workers, miners, logistics support and office support staff. The rest one-fifth are the officers of the company who hold
managerial positions in various functions. Being used to working in a strong process-driven culture, even most of the officers have
attuned to sticking to the well-trodden path.
Direction from the TSL Co. Board
The Board of Directors want TSL Co. to assess the potential of stepping in the new area of Composites. However, they believe that
with the established ways of working and the cultural aspects, the business might not pick up the right momentum with the current
systems.
Every year, the board approves an annual operating plan and budget for the steel business and the plan is reviewed on a quarterly
basis. For the new material business, the board has given Naresh an opportunity to move away from the norm. The board wants TSL
Co. to come up with a business plan with time bound milestones and let Naresh and Kaushal (Chief Financial Officer) decide the
capital to be invested in the business. In this way, TSL Co. would also take a step towards creating its own Corporate VC.
Problem Statement/Challenges Faced

Steel business is cyclical in nature. Downturn periods are long and put immense pressure on company’s budget and revenue. There
is also a risk of steel being replaced by other materials as manufacturing technology progresses. The Board of Directors want TSL
Co. to assess the potential of stepping in the new area of Composites. However, they believe that with the established ways of
working and the cultural aspects, the business might not pick up the right momentum with the current systems.
Critical Case Questions

Naresh communicates the board’s guideline to Suraj and asks him to haul his team of analysts to work on the new business
proposition. The aspiration is simple- earning $2bn revenue in five years from the composites business.
Naresh and Kaushal want the following –
1. A milestone based business pitch including the market potential, size of prize, GTM strategy, technical capabilities required,
HR requirements –should people be hired from the existing company or outside, M&A (if required and potential candidates
anywhere in the world) – along with funding required for each milestone.
2. A lean organisational structure to support this new business.
3. The governance mechanism for this new business with learnings from how startups are monitored by VCs, including nature
 of questions depending on milestones.
The next Board meeting is in 90 days. So Suraj and his team need to start today. Suraj puts his phone down. He takes another look
at Kevin O’Leary’s face paused on his TV screen, smiles, and picks up his laptop to share the case in hand with his team.
Domain Digital Communication
Name of the Case: Influencer Communication and Relationship Building

Introduction
The public relations and communications industry has undergone major changes in the last decade which to
a considerable extent, can be attributed to the dominance of social media. An important facet of this story has
been Influencers. They have been a part of the marketing and branding game for some time now. In the past,
the powerful influencers assumed celebrity status in some form such as sports icons, actors or models.
However, the demography and status of influencers have changed now.
Background

Tata Steel has a rich legacy and a proud heritage. The organisation, over the years, has grown multi-fold, and
is changing rapidly across its business spectrum. As a result, the stakeholder ecosystem is continuously
expanded and evolving.

In context of communication, we believe there are a lot of interesting brand stories to be told and conversations
to be struck with our stakeholders.

Currently, we are leveraging a mix of traditional media, digital media, on-ground events and exhibitions to tell
our brand stories to the external stakeholders.

Problem Statement/Challenges Faced

We wish to embark on an influencer programme for the corporate brand. For a brand, as large and diverse as
ours, we have various themes of importance like community, environment, regulatory affairs, innovation &
technology, sustainability, products & solutions, raw material & mining, supply chain etc. where we intend to
tell our stories and take the conversation forward.

The challenge is to identify influencers who understand the brand and its perspective on such subjects,
onboard them and sustain the relationship. This is particularly difficult due to the nature of our operations, and
geographies where we operate in, which makes the involved nuances complex and sensitive.

Critical Case Questions

1. Understanding of complex nuances of themes detailed above.

2. How to identify influencers, onboard them and sustain the relationship? What is the proposed
framework?
3. How do we organically achieve and sustain the relationship with influencers?
4. Mapping of themes with influencers - Give specifics.
5. Explain the nature of engagement with influencers when a story/narrative need be told to the defined
audience?
6. Give a sense of the opportunities and challenges involved and propose the way forward for the brand
in this journey?
 Domain Corporate Strategy
Name of the Case: Royalty on iron ore

Introduction
Alexa joined the Raw Materials strategy team as a Head six months back. She has more than ten years of experience in
Mining team and Improvement Group, Noamundi of Tata Steel RM Division. She won many hearts when it came to handle
critical situations the company went through in the past. Finally, she joined the department of her interest area.
But there is an issue that recently became the major concern for entire RM team and that is the increasing cost of iron ore
and that too for regulatory reasons which is almost beyond anybody’s control at the moment. Being a part of RM Strategy
team she and her colleague Alina are trying to delve into the root causes and find the ways & means to deal with the same
from a long term perspective.
Background
Tata Steel India operations has an edge over other competitors mainly because of operating efficiency and its captive iron ore mines
that feed Tata Steel’s blast furnaces, as It is cheaper to have captive mines rather than purchasing the ores externally. Captive mines of
Tata Steel are located in Noamundi, Khonbond, Katamati and Joda.
Recently Tata steel hired women managers directing mining operations that has made Tata Steel standout in the industry. This follows
the government scrapping section 40 of the Mines Act 1952, which imposed restrictions on women’s employment in mines. Tata steel
has a competitive advantage because of its captive iron ore mines, but the benefit of having captive mines is getting eroded due to
regulatory costs. Royalty on iron ore has gone to a very high level as compared to FY06.

Indexed Iron Ore cost and Royalty

600
500
400 319 328
300 152 239 189
215 159 154
200 170
102
10 10 5 37 227 227 227
100 9 152 175 178 217 209 213
91 106 119 128 125 137
0
FY06 FY07 FY08 FY09 FY10 FY11 FY12 FY13 FY14 FY15 FY16 FY17 FY18 FY19 FY20
(E)

Indexed Iron ore cost(Excl levies) Indexed Royalty and other govt levies

*Considering base year as FY06

Methods for calculation of royalty and related challenges
(a) Royalty on Royalty- Ad-Valorem price declared by IBM already includes royalty. So, there is a cascading effect when royalty is levied
@15% of market price. This has a major impact in the increasing cost of iron ore. There is a need to sanitize DMF & NMET levies
from all-inclusive sale value reflected in the invoices.

Cost of iron ore = Own production cost

+ Royalty @15%+DMF @30% Royalty & NMET Levies@2% on total of Own production cost and Royalty. = (19.8%)

(b) Royalty on iron ore at higher grade in Khondbond- Currently in Khondbond the royalty is paid on higher grade (Fe>65%) instead
of actual grade (62%-65%). In order to pay the royalty at actual grade there is a need of separate stacking and sampling of each
grade of iron ore to enable the chemical analysis by government officials. This is quite elaborate process and there is a long cycle time
 taken in order to get it validated from the government officials. So, to have an uninterrupted supply of iron ore the royalty is paid on
higher grade. (Annexure I)
(c) Payment of Royalty on fines at the rate of lumps in Katamati and Khondbond- Captive mines of Tata Steel supply the lump ore.
The lump ore is crushed and converted into fines and used in manufacturing process. As per the government, whatever may be the
quantity of lumps and fines, the royalty is to be paid on the price of lump iron ore. No matter in what form the ore is used. Lump ore is
costlier as compared to fine ore. So, iron ore prices paid for fines at the rate of lumps and that too on highest grade have led to
increase in cost.
(Annexure II)
Problem Statement/Challenges Faced

Mining is a significant sector of Indian economy. Fiscal policies-royalty and taxes are the major determinant when it comes to the
competitiveness of the mining- based businesses. Recently there has been a continual increase in royalty and other regulatory rates
imposed by the DMF (District Mineral Foundation) and NMET (National Mineral Exploration Trust). This has led to increasing iron ore
cost for captive steel players, reducing the competitive advantage of owning captive mines.
Critical Case Questions

Alexa and her partner have to think on:

Considering the current regulatory practices, will it be a better option to depend on purchasing iron ore rather than captive iron ore mines
in future?
What alternative strategies can be adopted in order to safeguard the company’s profitability from the rising cost of iron ore in such a
situation?