MKTG/INTL 5233 Global Competitive Environment

MKTG/INTL 5233 Global Competitive Environment

SPRING 2019

January 14th through May 10th TR 10:30 - 11:45pm GU 103

Professor: Kevin Voss, Ph.D. Business 307 Phone: 744-5106 Office Hours: W 10:00 - 11:30 am

W 1:30 - 2:30 pm or by appointment Texts: International Business: Competing in the Global Marketplace

11th Edition Charles W. Hill , 2016 (Irwin McGraw-Hill) The course syllabus is in three parts:

The main syllabus (this document), the course calendar, and the syllabus attachment. All three are available on the content page on Brightspace (online.okstate.edu) The syllabus attachment can also be found at: https://academicaffairs.okstate.edu/sites/default/files/Spring%202019%20Syllabus%20Attachme

nt.pdf

Suggested Readings: Harvard Business Review (HBR), Sloan Management Review (SMR), California Management Review (CMR), The Economist, Wall Street Journal, etc.

Course Objective This course is designed to provide a thorough overview of the external environment of international business. A primary learning objective is for you to understand actual and potential effects of worldwide integration resulting from globalization. A second primary objective is for you to apply your understanding of the external international business environment to the development of global business strategy. Students will practice critical thinking by keeping current with global events and learning more about themselves and others in a globalizing world. By the end of the course students should understand what globalization is, how globalization is affecting the global international business environment, and how global business is affecting globalization.

Course Objective Program Learning Goal

Students will examine the behavior of global firms to

assess the effects of these behaviors on identified

stakeholder groups.

Ethical Decision Making

Students will participate in discussions as both discussion

leaders and discussants. This provides practice on

enthusiastic and cooperative relationship building.

Additionally students will practice dividing and sharing of

team workloads.

Teamwork & Leadership

Students will build an advanced knowledge of business

vocabulary, processes, environment, and practices

appropriate to MBA students;

Decision Analyses

Students will be exposed to integrative and synthesized

knowledge of the business disciplines. Students will

analyze complex scenarios and critique the strategic

appropriateness of decisions and behavior.

Decision Analyses

Students will read a variety of articles addressing the

global competitive environment requiring analytical

reasoning to break problems into their component parts;

identify important patterns and details; and identify

assumptions, reasons, and claims

Critical Thinking

Students will critically review papers to evaluate data and

claims, draw appropriate conclusions, recognize flawed

analyses, and identify misinformation.

Critical Thinking

Students are expected to support stated positions with

logic, evidence, and persuasive arguments

Critical Thinking

Students will have the opportunity to apply rigorous logic

in scenarios that require application of deductive

reasoning.

Critical Thinking

Students will learn to assess probable truths and falsehoods

in contexts of uncertainty

Critical Thinking

Students will practice professional and tactful arguments in

written article reviews.

Written Communication

Students will learn to take complex matters and present

them in a manner easily understandable to peers, superiors,

and novices

Written Communication

Students will express views concisely so that others will

read what they have to say

Written Communication

Students will have the opportunity to practice presenting a

message that is well-organized, concise, and quickly

understandable;

Oral Communication

Students will practice connecting with their audience

through professional use of body language, eye contact,

and tone.

Oral Communication

Students will practice discussing contentious issues with

those who disagree in a confident and professional

demeanor

Oral Communication

Assigned Course Work 2 major exams: Exams are scheduled on the attached calendar. Missed exams will be given a grade of zero. Exams will consist of a combination of objective, short-answer, and/or essay questions. There will be a mix of questions that are covered in the text, lecture, or both. Class Participation: Students are expected to participate in class discussions. Contributions to the discussions will be tracked. Attendance and Participation: Students are expected to attend every class session. Attendance will be taken. Students are expected to contribute to every in-class discussion. Participation will be tracked. Article Summaries: A major part of the course is reading the assigned material.

Reading consists of two parts. First, chapters from the text are assigned. These are to familiarize the student with the material prior to the lecture. Second, a list of assigned journal articles is attached. These serve as the basis for our group discussions. Students are expected to do their OWN WORK. Every student is expected to read every article on the list. During the semester

students will be expected to prepare one-page summaries of ALL 30 articles.

At five UNANNOUNCED times during the semester the Professor will collect a summary for an article (20 points each, 100 points total). These are not automatic points, the summaries will be graded.

At the end of the semester, the student will turn in all 30 summaries (100 points). These are not automatic points, the summaries will be graded.

Writing Article Summaries: Summaries should be typed on one side of a single page with one inch margins in Times Roman 12pt font. Single space paragraphs, with one blank line between sections. Summaries are expected to be well-written and thoroughly proof-read to eliminate grammar, spelling, word choice, typographical errors, etc. The article review has five important sections. Section one is the citation for the article including the authors; names, the article title, the publication’s name (or acronym), etc. Section two should be an abstract (short description) of the article. Section three should describe the strengths of articles (in the student’s eyes) while section four describes the weaknesses (student’s criticisms) of the article. In section five, the student should state what she/he concluded (or learned) from the article. An example summary is attached.

Grading

2 Exams (100 points each) 200 points Summaries 200 points Attendance and Participation 150 points Total 550 points The final grade in the class will be based on the final scores. Please note that grades are based on points only, there will be no rounding. Normally, exams will not be reviewed during lecture time. Any student who would like to review the grading on any exam question or assignment should contact the professor outside normal lecture times. Office hours are listed above and I will be available to make appointments if necessary.

Academic Standards

Students enrolled in classes at Oklahoma State University are honest, forthright, and trustworthy. Refer to the syllabus attachment. Students should be familiar with the University’s academic integrity policy at:

http://academicintegrity.okstate.edu/

Articles

Articles are available on-line in full-text or acrobat (.pdf) format. Obtain the articles through the

OSU Library’s full-text periodical index. Go to http://www.library.okstate.edu and select the

option for Full-text Periodical Titles. Then type the name of the journal in the search window.

For Sloan Management Review, make sure to search for MIT Sloan Management Review.

Academy of Management Executive changed its name to Academy of Management Perspectives.

Cultural Imperialism (January 29)

Szeman, Imre (2000), "The Rhetoric of Culture: Some Notes on Magazines, Canadian

Culture and Globalization," Journal of Canadian Studies, 35, 212.

Neeley, Tsedal (2012), “Global Business Speaks English: Why You Need a Language

Strategy Now,” Harvard Business Review, May, 116-124.

Foreign Exchange (February 5)

Kester, W. Carl and Timothy A Luehrman (1989), “Are We Feeling More Competitive

Yet? The Exchange Rate Gambit,” Sloan Management Review, 30 (Winter), 19-28.

George, Abraham M. and C. William Schroth (1991), “Managing Foreign Exchange for

Competitive Advantage,” Sloan Management Review; 32 (Winter), 105-116.

Blaine, Michael (1996), "Trade, FDI, and the Dollar: Explaining the U.S. Trade Deficit,"

Sloan Management Review, 38 (Fall), 81-101.

Regional Integration (February 12)

Kaelberer, M. (2007), "Markets, States and Societies in the Governance of Money,"

Journal of Political and Military Sociology, 35 (2), 323-337.

Berentsen, Aleksander and Fabian Schar (2018), “A Short Introduction to the World of

Cryptocurrencies,” Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Review, 100 (1st Quarter), 1-16.

Shelton, Judy (2018), “The Case for a New International Monetary System,” Cato

Journal, 38 (2), 379-389.

Cost of Capital (February 19)

Morone, Joseph and Albert Paulson (1991), “Cost of Capital: The Managerial

Perspective,” California Management Review, 33 (Summer), 9- 32.

Poterba, James M. and Lawrence H; Summers (1995), “A CEO survey of U.S.

companies' time horizons and hurdle rates,” Sloan Management Review, 37 (Fall), 43-54.

Outsourcing and Offshoring (March 5)

Taylor, Timothy (2005), "In Defense of Outsourcing," CATO Journal, 25 (Spring), 367-

377.

Harrison, Ann E. and Margaret S. McMillan (2006), "Dispelling Some Myths about

Offshoring," Academy of Management Perspectives, 20 (November), 6-22.

Blockchain (March 5)

Taspscott, Don and Alex Tapscott (2017), “How Blockchain Will Change

Organizations,” MIT Sloan Management Review, 58 (2), 10-13.

Felin, Teppo and Karim Lakhani (2018), “What Problems will You Solve with

Blockchain?” MIT Sloan Management Review, Vol. 60, Iss. 1, 32-38.

Dutra, Andre; Tumasjan, Andranik; Welpe, Isabell M (2018), “Blockchain is Changing

How Media and Entertainment Companies Compete,” MIT Sloan Management Review,

Vol. 60, Iss. 1, 39-45.

Free Trade (March 14)

Culbertson, John M. (1986), "The Folly of Free Trade," Harvard Business Review, 64,

122-128.

Roberts, Russell (2000), "Speaking about trade to the open-minded skeptic," Cato

Journal, 19 (Winter), 439.

Larue, Bruno (2018), “Economic Integration Reconsidered,” Canadian Journal of

Agricultural Economics,” 66, 5-25.

Rowe, Christopher (2018), “William Huskisson and the Rhetoric of Free Trade,”

Economic Affairs, 38 (no. 2), 207-223.

Fair Trade (March 28)

Henderson, David R. (2008), “Fair Trade is Counterproductive – and Unfair,” IEA

Economic Affairs, 28 (3), 62-64.

Fridell, Gavin (2010), “Fair Trade, Free Trade and the State,” New Political

Economy, 15:3, 457-470.

Globalization (April 9)

Zhu, Xiaodong (2012), “Understanding China's Growth: Past, Present, and Future,” The

Journal of Economic Perspectives, 26 (Fall), 103-124.

Bartlett, Christopher A. and Sumantra Ghoshal (2000), “Going Global Lessons from Late

Movers,” Harvard Business Review, 78 (March/April), 132-41.

Foreign Market Entry (April 16)

Letelier, Maria Flores, Fernando Flores, and Charles Spinosa (2003), “Developing

Productive Customers in Emerging Markets,” California Management Review, 45

(Summer), 77-103.

McKague, Kevin, and Christine Oliver (2012), “Enhanced Market Practices: Poverty

Alleviation for Poor Producers in Developing Countries,” California Management

Review, 55 (Fall), 98-129.

Chliova, Myrto, and Dimo Ringov (2017), “Scaling Impact: Template Development and

Replication at the Base of the Pyramid,” Academy of Management Perspectives 31 (no.1)

44-62.

Global Strategy (April 23)

Porter, Michael E. (1998), "Clusters and the New Economics of Competition," Harvard

Business Review, 76, 77-90.

Adams, Stephen B. (2005), "Stanford and Silicon Valley: Lessons on Becoming a High-

Tech Region," California Management Review, 48 (Fall), 29-51.

Huggins, Robert (2008), “The Evolution of Knowledge Clusters: Progress and Policy,”

Economic Development Quarterly, 22 (4), 277-289.

Mindset (April 25)

Gupta, Anil K. and Vijay Govindarajan (2002), “Cultivating a Global Mindset,”

Academy of Management Executive, 16 (Feb), 116-126. {EBSCO HOST}

Begley, Thomas M. and David P. Boyd (2003), “The Need for a Corporate Global Mind-

Set,” Sloan Management Review, 45 (Winter), 25-32.

Unruh, Gregory C., and Angel Cabrera (2013), "Join the global elite," Harvard Business

Review 91 (no. 5), 135-139.

Example Summary

Gupta and Govindarajan (2002), “Cultivating a Global Mindset,” AME, 16(Feb), 116-26.

Abstract: Firms must continually scan the global competitive environment. The ability of

management to “perceive and interpret” {p. 116} the opportunities and challenges of the global

competitive environment determines the strategies that the firm chooses to pursue and the

success-rate of these strategies. The authors contend that this process depends on the manager’s

global mindset, which they define as “an openness to and awareness of diversity across cultures

and markets with a propensity and ability to synthesize across this diversity.” {p. 177}. A global

mindset allows the firm to compose fast and accurate responses to events in the environment.

The authors argue that developing a global mindset can be achieved through a set of HR policies

and practices including employee recruiting and hiring, training and continual education,

exposure to diverse locations, cultures, and people, and reward systems that encourage

integrative thinking.

Strengths: The authors provide a good discussion of knowledge structure. The distinction

between differentiation and integration is useful even if simplistic. Especially valuable is the

notion that global mindset is developed as part of an iterative process. The authors provide a

fairly comprehensive to-do list for managers. They also stress that this approach is a continual

process that requires constant work and periodic assessment.

Weaknesses: Their definition of global mindset is too complex. Thus, it will be difficult to

measure the degree of global mindset, something that would be necessary for periodic

assessments. As an example, one could use a standard questionnaire to assess both an

employee’s openness to diverse cultures and their awareness of diverse markets. Employee A,

say, could score in the middle of both scales. Employee B could score high on the openness

scale but low on the awareness scale. Employee C could score low on the openness scale and

high on the awareness scale. When the scales are summed to arrive at a mindset score,

employees A, B, and C would all score equivalently. But they clearly are not equivalent. More

specificity should be given to the definition so that accurate measurement might ensue.

Conclusions: I believe an important point for the modern business manager is attaining and

maintaining a global mindset. This paper addresses the problem from the viewpoint of HR

policy and practice. I think that this is a useful starting point, but only a starting point. It is

equally important to understand how routine business operations influence the manager’s

mindset. Also, I believe that mindset must be embedded within the corporate culture. Thus, an

understanding of how to change corporate culture to accommodate a more open mindset would

seem important. Thus, while I agree that global mindset is important to today’s business

manager, and that this article is an important starting point, a deeper understanding of building

and maintaining a global mindset is needed.

January 2019 MKTG/INTL 5233

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10:30 AM Course Introduction 10:30 AM Balance of Payments

10:31 AM Balance of Payments Chapter 6 Appendix

10:31 AM International Economic Chapter 6 Appendix

Organizations

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10:30 AM Culture

10:30 AM Culture 10:31 AM Chapter 4

MLK DAY 10:32 AM International Monetary 10:31 AM Chapter 4

System

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10:32 AM International Monetary 1 2 Group Discussion - Cultural

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Imperialism 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

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Group Discussion - Foreign 10:30 AM Regional Economic

Exchange Integration

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Lincoln's Birthday Valentine's Day

Group Discussion - Regional 10:30 AM Global Capital Markets

Integration 10:31 AM Chapter 12

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President's Day Group Discussion - Cost of Capital Exam Review Washington's Birthday

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10:30 AM Political & Legal

Environment Midterm Exam

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