International Management #1: Introduction

[samvara]

Thursday nights - neatly coinciding with Social Dance classes much as last Trimester classes were canceled and rescheduled to coincide with meditation class. *sigh* Thankfully the antibiotics have kicked in and rather than feeling like a poorly warmed corpse with inner ear problems I felt pretty decent.

Introductions were made and some jokes, it may interest you to know the three biggest international 'businesses' are

1. Arms
2. Drugs
3. Oil

We talked briefly about the difference between business and management - this unit looks at how to manage the business. There was a brief-sh discussion introducing everyone and getting us to fess up about where we work and what our experience is.

Safety announcement!

Lecturer is a dry, funny guy who is about to retire - this is his last class.

Massive discussion about assessment and expectations - took us through to the break in which I formed a team with the people sitting near me and we did the exchanging emails and numbers thing.

Review of theory:

• We all have theories which have been developed through informal observation and experience although we call them ideas, beliefs, opinions.
• Academics develop theories, concepts, principles through formal research.
• The movement from theory to practice to theory to practice - is called praxis

Review: Organisations are characterised by:

• Division of labour - to form a task structure (hierarchy)
• Presences of one or more power centres - official and unofficial
• Substitutability of people
• Communication

Review: Organisation and management theories

• Classical / structural / scientific management (Fayol, Taylor - early 1900's)
• Neo-classical / motivational
• Mathematical / decision making
• System
• Now - learning organisation, empowerment, competency, benchmarking etc.

Review:

• Models of organisations include the variables of: objectives, strategy, task and management structure, systems / methods, people, environment
• The 75 Mackinsey model;

Strategy, Structure, Systems, Staff, Skills, Style, Shared values

Review: views on the manager's job

1. Balancing organisational goals versus individual goals, autonomy versus control change versus traditional operation, division of labour versus coordination.
2. Fayol - POSDIC
3. Mintzberg roles - interpersonal, informational, decisional
4. Drucker - objectives (results, efficiency, quality etc.)
5. A personal view - managers deal with processes and people and make decisions to reach objectives. Processes are the Fayol activities and the people part is communication, motivation, conflict resolution etc. (the people activities can be grouped as Leadership)

I deeply dislike the derogatory use of 'motherhood statement'

The International Manager

Required skills / knowledge - for effective management those just listed in the review plus (1 is usually a given, 2 & 3 are the people management)

• Business / technical - conceptual and practical
• Cross cultural communication - conceptual and practical
• Situational - country business rules, the STEP analysis

Some questions to think about

• What are the pluses and minuses of a flat structure versus a tall structure?
• What is the best balance between control and freedom?
• Should decision making be centralised or decentralised?
• How much of a manager's job requires intuition, judgement and feelings as opposed to technique and objectivity?
• How do we select managers who will perform as we would wish?
• How do we get people to accept change?
• What is the value of planning when the future cannot really be predicted?
• How is a vision communicated to all staff?
• Should we judge an international manager's performance in the same way as a home manager?
• Plus all the other questions managers are always grappling with - BUT, there are no universal answers

Handout: The Principles of Problem Solving - and subsequent discussion

Case Study: Australian and Malaysian negotiation

A Malaysian Adventure.

An Australian team was negotiating in KL, trying to set up a deal with a Chinese family business in Malaysia. The company was informally structured, and the organisational chart they were shown was obviously inaccurate. For instance, the second son was titled Finance manager, but spent most of his time in marketing. Finance was the responsibility of a sister-in-law, whose name did not appear on the chart. Never-the-less, the president of the Malaysian company, first son of the late founder, impressed his visitors with his obvious sincerity and determination to reach a settlement. After three days, an informal agreement was reached and the young man announced that after sorting out a few last details, he would sign the deal, probably in the next 24 hours.

The Australians congratulated themselves on concluding so rapidly. They looked forward to the opportunity to discuss further collaboration. But for the next two days they heard nothing from the young president and telephone calls failed to reach him. Then the younger brother appeared. He greatly regretted that no deal could be made. Their widowed mother had refused her eldest son permission to sign. The Australians had neither seen nor heard of the lady before. They discovered that she held no office in the company. However, her family authority translated into absolute right of veto over the company's business.

Questions:

1. Obviously the Australians were disappointed? What relationship had they expected to create with the Malaysians? Why did they have these expectations? Lack of understanding of power / decision making hierarchy, expectation that president had decision making power
2. Why did the younger brother deliver the message and not the older brother? To maintain control of the negotiation, younger brother has no negotiating power and can't make explanations or renegotiate. Also face issues? *g* Two Malaysian guys in the class who were willing to give their opinion - one said that's exactly what his father does with him.
3. How should you respond to the younger brother's announcement - assuming you still want to collaborate? Could keep negotiations open and negotiate with mother (probably via sons). Malay dude in class emphasised it was important to pick which one you're going to negotiate with and 'take a side' so to speak.
4. How could the Australians have protected themselves against their disappointment? More research, better understanding of local environment / culture, talk to official resources etc.
5. What implications does this case have for international management?

Then we ran away.

Comments

[transcendancing]

Where does the motherhood statement apply? I couldn't quite tell from your notes and am curious if you've brain to explain?

[samvara]

It comes up when they're talking about policy/process recommendations - they'll say it can't just be some 'motherhood' statement.

Meaning, I presume, lacking in substance.