The Corporación de Desarrollo Social del Sector Rural (Codesser)

This case takes a look at Corporación de Desarrollo Social del Sector Rural (Codesser), a nonprofit organization created in the 1970s to manage technical farming schools in Chile’s rural areas. Later, Codesser broadened its scope, building alliances with other nonprofits to manage other technical higher schools with industrial and food-service orientations. In 2003, Codesser’s board members were considering an offer that would take the organization to a new business niche: this time, Codesser would acquire a school (instead of just managing it) to provide elementary and scientific-humanistic higher school education (instead of just offering technical higher school education). Case discussion zeroes in on this decision, which involves assessing its consistency with the organization’s mission and competencies, as well as the project’s financial feasibility and growth opportunities.

This case is appropriate for management courses focusing on nonprofits’ strategic decision making. It may be used to introduce topics associated with decision-making environments, core competency analysis, key success factors, growth strategies, and the criteria involved in strategy evaluation. The issues that surface in case discussion may also prove relevant for educational management courses.