Focusing on Global Thinking

1849 Words4 Pages

Due to the recent economic crisis, it is time to rethink corporate strategy, especially as it applies to the global environment. In 2009, the value of international trade was expected to decline by as much as 9%. Foreign Direct investment fell 15% in 2008 and another 40% in 2009. This article is predicting a rough decade to come with weak global growth, pressures from overcapacity, persistently high unemployment, volatility in the financial markets, costlier capital, a greatly expanded role from governments, a much larger burden of regulation and taxation for all, and maybe even increased protectionism. (Ghemawat 56) These are exactly the types of things the business world must begin to play closer attention to. This may even mean a greater focus on home markets than in recent years. Losing focus on the global economy is almost guaranteed to hurt in the long run, especially as emerging markets continue to solidify their positions as global economic powers. In 2009, it was predicted that China would account for 66% of global growth in GDP, India for 11%, and Indonesia for 4%. (56) This trend is not looking like it will subside any time soon. Chinese and Indian per capita incomes are expected to continue to be between one-half and one-third that of more advanced economies even up until 2050. This will provide huge growth potential in these sorts of developing countries for many decades to come. (56) This article focuses on five strategic changes including strategy and competition, markets and products, operations and innovations, organization and people, and identity and reputation.

Current global strategies are focused on integration and on treating the world as a singular unit. This, however, needs to change to reflect national ...

... middle of paper ...

... and managing cultural differences will allow companies to continue to be greater than the sum of their parts. It is also important to note that the reputation of businesses in general is lower because of the recent economic crisis. Moving forward it will be important to shift public opinion into a more positive mindset.

I do believe that this article focuses too much on protectionism. If governments begin to take protectionist stances, they will do nothing more than hinder the growth of their respective nations and globalization becomes the key to all long-term, large-scale growth. Overall this was a very interesting article. Globalization will continue, and thinking globally is quickly becoming an absolute must. This of course explains the new focus of the school of business on global thinking and the fact that the title of our senior seminar is global strategy.

Open Document