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Ukraine’s Superhumans Center: When Trauma Drives Purpose, Leadership, and Culture

Amy Kenworthy, George Hrivnak, Chelsea Gill, Olga Rudneva, Yaryna Boychuk

Product #:W46519
Supplier:Ivey/UCU
Discipline:General Management, Organizational Behaviour/Leadership
Setting:Ukraine, 2025
Details:Case (PDF) • 11 pages • 2026-07-17

Subjects:

Business managementLeadership and managing peopleLeadershipOrganizational culture

Industries:

Healthcare sector

Geography:

Ukraine
Your Price:$10.54

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In April 2025, Olga Rudneva, chief executive officer and co-founder of the Superhumans Center in Lviv, Ukraine, faced the challenge of scaling an organization built in the middle of an active war. Since opening its first clinic in April 2023, Superhumans had grown rapidly to provide advanced prosthetics, reconstructive surgery, psychological support, rehabilitation, and social reintegration for Ukrainian amputees and other war-wounded civilians and military personnel. With new centres opening in Dnipro and Odesa, a team expanding beyond 400 staff, an estimated 80,000 Ukrainians in need of prosthetics, and demand rising far faster than capacity, Rudneva needed to determine how to lead, motivate, and grow the organization while preserving its distinctive culture, deepening clinical and operational expertise, and securing long-term financial sustainability beyond donor funding—ensuring Ukraine's wounded could ultimately live the superhero life they deserved.

Learning Objectives

This case is intended for use in organizational behaviour, leadership, organizational culture, entrepreneurship (especially regarding social ventures and/or scaling), and general management courses. It is appropriate for undergraduate, MBA, or executive education students and can be used at any point during the semester as a stand-alone case. The case provides a rich context for students to explore the power of inspirational leadership to attract, retain, and motivate employee engagement and performance. Set in the context of an entrepreneurial nonprofit organization operating in a country fighting an active war, the case also provides an opportunity to explore the influence of leadership in a crisis. More specifically, students will learn to do the following:

  • Explore the dynamic role of founders of a new venture and the importance of adapting and evolving one’s leadership approach over time.
  • Explain the three key roles that, if enacted successfully, set inspirational leaders apart.
  • Examine the mechanisms by which inspirational leaders motivate those around them by satisfying fundamental human needs.
  • Closely examine an organization’s culture to evaluate whether the mechanisms and manifestations of culture align with the organization’s espoused values and beliefs.
  • Consider the changes needed to support rapid organizational growth while maintaining a consistent focus on the vision and preserving the key elements that make the organization unique.
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Case Study: Ukraine’s Superhumans Center: When Trauma Drives Purpose, Leadership, and Culture (English version) | Ivey Publishing