Pandemic Fights in a Network! COVID-19 Challenges in Northeast Brazil

ABSTRACT

With the occurrence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, it became imperative to adopt emergency measures to prevent a crisis in the health system in northeastern Brazil. In this context, Miguel Bastos, manager of Sistema Indústria, a class entity in the northeastern industrial sector, dedicated all his efforts to coordinate an emerging network of institutions involved in research, development, innovation, manufacturing, and maintenance of products demanded by a health system. Thus, this teaching case aims to allow students to understand the context of a cooperation network created to meet the needs of the health sector in combating the pandemic of COVID-19. Given the difficulties inherent in a leadership process involving seven different institutions, how should the protagonist organize this network to meet the expected demands? The case has as target audience undergraduate Business Administration students, as well as lato sensu graduate courses, in subjects such as Business Strategy, Cooperation Networks, Public-Private Partnerships, among others that address the themes proposed in the present case. It is noteworthy that authors collected data from participant observation, secondary data, and interviews. The characters are real, but the names are fictitious.

Keywords:
network innovation; collaborative governance; crisis and emergency management; COVID-19 pandemic