Maersk Line and the Future of Container Shipping

Synopsis: For class today, you should have read the case study Maersk Line and the Future of Container Shipping. For purposes of this group exercise, suppose that the following paragraphs have been appended to the end of the case study :

January 5th was a sunny Friday morning in Copenhagen; a welcome reprieve for residents who were muddling through the dark northern winter. Soren Skou walked out of his office, turned left, and headed down a long hallway past a row of empty offices. Copenhagen’s shipyard, with Maersk containers stacked in neat rows, was visible through the office windows as Skou strolled briskly past. The offices belonged to senior members of Maersk Line’s Business Strategy Group, and they were empty because Skou was two minutes late to the kickoff meeting of Maersk’s annual strategic review process.

The agenda for the meeting – set by Skou himself – contained but a single item. The team was to begin a three-month review of the firm’s differentiation strategy, with the goal of revisiting the broad strategy stated on page 1 of the case: “In 2010 the company decided to focus on three differentiators to help it maintain its position as the global leader: reliability, ease-of-doing business, and environmental performance.”

The goal of today’s meeting wasn't to answer the question, but instead to develop marching orders for the Business Strategy Group’s staff of business analysts. These analysts, smart-but-inexperienced business graduates of prestigious northern European universities, would then be turned loose for weeks of study before marking final reports to senior management. Skou expected to partition the firm’s staff of analysts into four five-person teams.

For purposes of today’s Group Case Exercise, you are to suppose that you are the senior members of Maersk Line’s Business Strategy Group. Your job today isn’t to devise strategy, but instead to give the marching orders