International Management Exam Guide

Discussion Questions

Q1: How does technology result in greater integration and dependencies among economies, political systems, and financial markets? CH 1 specific ways in which technology will affect international management in the next decade include:

• Rapid advances in biotechnology that are built on the precise manipulation of organisms, which will revolutionize the fields of agriculture, medicine, and industry.
• The emergence of nanotechnology, in which nanomachines will possess the ability to remake the whole physical universe.
• Satellites that will play a role in learning. For example, communication firms will place tiny satellites into low orbit, making it possible for millions of people, even in remote or sparsely populated regions such as Siberia, the Chinese desert, and the African interior, to send and receive voice, data, and digitized images through handheld telephones.
• Automatic translation telephones, which will allow people to communicate naturally in their own language with anyone in the world who has access to a telephone.
• Chapter 2 The Political, Legal, and Technological Environment 51
• Artificial intelligence and embedded learning technology, which will allow thinking that formerly was felt to be only the domain of humans to occur in machines.
• Silicon chips containing up to 100 million transistors, allowing computing power that now rests only in the hands of supercomputer users to be avail- able on every desktop.
• Supercomputers that are capable of 1 trillion calculations per second, which will allow advances such as simulations of the human body for testing new drugs and computers that respond easily to spoken commands.

Q3: Describe the concept of cultural values, and relate some of the international differences, similarities, and changes occurring in terms of both work and managerial values CH 4

values
• Basic convictions that people have regarding what is right and wrong, good and bad, important and unimportant.

Values in transition
• 1. Lifetime employment is widely accepted in Japanese culture, but the state- side Japanese managers did not believe that unconditional tenure in one organization was of major importance. They did believe, however, that job security was important.
• 2. Formal authority, obedience, and conformance to hierarchic position are very important in Japan, but the stateside managers did not perceive obedience and conformity to be very important and rejected the idea that one should not question a superior. However, they did support the concept of formal authority.
• 3. Group orientation, cooperation, conformity, and compromise are important organizational values in Japan. The stateside managers supported these values but also believed it was important to be an individual, thus maintaining a balance between a group and a personal orientation.
• 4. In Japan, organizational personnel often are rewarded based on seniority, not merit. Support for this value was directly influenced by the length of time the Japanese managers had been in the United States. The longer they had been there, the lower their support for this value.
• 5. Paternalism, often measured by a manager’s involvement in both personal and off-the-job problems of subordinates, is very important in Japan. State- side Japanese managers disagreed, and this resistance was positively associated with the number of years they had been in the United States.

Q5: Most MNCs need not enter foreign markets to face the challenge of dealing with multiculturalism CH 6

Managing multiculturalism and diversity
• international and domestic workforces of variety of cultures
• diverse population – women, men , old, young, black, white, Arab, Asian

Phases of multinational development
• phase 1: domestic corporations
• phase 2: international
• phase 3: multinational
• phase 4: global

Types of multiculturalism
• domestic multiculturalism: today’s organisation everywhere have people with diverse background
• older generations stress hierarchy, ethics, dynamic – young focus on individual performance, new horizons and responsibility
• group multiculturalism
• homogeneous members have similar backgrounds and generally perceive, interpret, evaluate events in similar ways
• token groups: all members but one have same background
• bicultural groups: 2 or more members represent each of two distinct cultures have formed a team to investigate the possibility of investing in a venture
• multicultural group: there are individuals from three or more different ethnic backgrounds who look into an operation in different country

Problems with diversity
• when culturally diverse groups come together they bring preconceived stereotypes with them
• cross cultural communication barrier eg don’t speak the language or differences in culture dealings can lead to misinterpretations and mistrust
• inaccurate biases
• perceptual problems
• inaccurate communication
• attitudinal problems

Advantages with diversity
• enhance creativity – variety of cultures → unique solutions
• prevent group think
• facilitate highly effective teams under right conditions

Multicultural team effectiveness
• teams most effective when they face tasks requiring innovativeness
• in early stages build team trust & cohesion
• Guidelines
• select teams for task ability
• recognise and deal with differences
• team leader help define overall goal
• members have equal power
• mutual respect
• give positive feedback to team on output