THE NEW YORK INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT
SPRING, 2007
MGMT 301
COURSE OUTLINE
INTRODUCTION TO INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
DR. STEPHEN W. HARTMAN
PREREQUISITE: ECON 101, MGMT 201 AND MRKT 101
3 CREDITS
OFFICE HOURS:
MONDAYS AND WEDNESDAYS 3:30-4:30 PM
AND BY APPOINTMENT
WISSER LIBRARY, 3RD FLOOR, ROOM 312
OLD WESTBURY
OFFICE TEL.: (516) 686-7554 O.W.
Reference Web Site
Course Web Site
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MGMT 301
INTRODUCTION TO INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course involves techniques for analyzing and understanding the world of
international business. Students will examine the challenges posed by the multinational
firm and the dynamic nature of international business.
UPON SUCCESSFUL COMPLETION OF THIS COURSE, STUDENTS
WILL BE ABLE TO:
1. Recognize the concept of the three environments and their forces.
2. Consider information presented to assist in comprehending the dynamic growth and
the magnitude of both international trade and foreign investment.
3. Consider an overview of the theories of international trade and economic
development for basic understanding and insight.
4.
Discuss the reasons why international organizations are an extremely important
subject with which business executives and students should be familiar.
5. Review the developing and constantly changing international monetary system.
6. Discuss the uncontrollable financial forces with which MNE's must contend.
7. See how the physical forces of location, topography, and climate influence both the
controllable and uncontrollable forces.
8. See how the wide variety of attitudes and values among cultures affect managers of
all business functions.
9.
Investigate the political forces of nationalism, terrorism, unstable governments,
international organizations, government owned businesses, various ideological
forces, and how they affect the success or failure of a foreign venture.
10. Discuss laws concerning taxation, antitrust, imports, price and wage controls, labor,
currency, and industrial property.
11. Discuss the composition, skills, attitudes, and union activities of an area's labor pool
in terms of how they may affect productivity and profitability.
12. Understand how a firm's ability to compete frequently depends on its ability to obtain
adequate channels of distribution.
13. Assess and analyze markets and market factors, indicators and screening.
14. Assess and analyze international marketing as it differs from domestic marketing.
15. Review export practices and procedure in international markets and marketing
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GRADING PROCEDURES:
MIDTERM AND FINAL EXAMINATINONS - 50%
PROJECTS - 40%
CLASS PARTICIPATION (ARTICLES) – 10%
Complete On Time Project Assignments (within one Week of their due
date) with correct grammar, spelling, footnotes and bibliography = Full
Credit
Complete Late Project Assignments (up to one Week after their due date)
with correct grammar, spelling, footnotes and bibliography = One Letter
Grade Penalty
Complete Project Assignments more than 3 weeks late regardless of
grammar, spelling, footnotes and bibliography = Two Letter Grade Penalty
Missing or Incomplete Project (questions not completely answered and/or
no footnotes or bibliography) Project Assignments = 0 Points
Grades are assigned using the school's 13 point grading system for
undergraduate course work.
GRADES
95+ = A+
92-94 = A
89-91 = A85-88 = B+
82-84 = B
79-81 = B75-78 = C+
72-74 = C
69-71 = C65-68 = D
0-64 = F
REQUIRED TEXTBOOK
Text: Ball, Donald A., and Wendell H. McCulloch, Jr. et. al. International Business,
The Challenge of Global Competition, Irwin Publications, 10th Edition, 2005. ISBN 007-295802-2 Component of Pkg. ISBN 0-07-310576-7.
Reference book: Dictionary of International Business Terms,
York: Barrons Educational Series, Inc., 2004).
3rd
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edition (New
COURSE PROCEDURE
This seminar will be an interactive process providing exposure to lectures, case studies,
discussions, and research. The students are expected to have done all of the readings
and course related work prior to the actual class session. Failure to do the readings
and related work prevents the student from adequately participating in the classroom
discussions and thus detracts from the overall quality of the seminar. Please do your
part!
STUDENT SUBSCRIPTIONS
It is expected in this course that each student will at least read the Wall Street Journal.
The instructor will make available a special student discount subscription form for those
not having access to the paper.
In recent years there has been a flood of business journalism as the environment of
business assumes center stage importance in current day events. Students are
therefore asked to consult other publications such as the New York Times Business
Section, Forbes magazine, Money magazine, and the ETV program Wall Street Week,
as well as TV business wrap-up programming.
While it is impossible to keep up with everything, students should at least be aware of
the major developments of the day. Consistent with this philosophy students are asked
to cut out and bring to class one business article from the business press each class
session. Additionally students should prepare at least a one half page summary of the
article. It can be in handwriting. These articles will be collected at the BEGINNING OF
THE CLASS. THEY ARE NOT ACCEPTED AT THE END OF THE CLASS! Prepare to
be called on to discuss the contents of the article with the class. READ YOUR
BUSINESS PUBLICATIONS!
ASSIGNMENTS
Please read the following chapters in your textbook follow the schedule for submission
of all projects.
Week 1: Chapter 1 The Rapid Change of Global Business. Read the chapter lecture,
review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter
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quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 2: Chapter 2. International Trade and Foreign Direct Investment. Read the
chapter lecture, review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and
complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 3: Chapter 3, Theories of International Trade and Investment, and Chapter 4, The
Dynamics of International Organizations. Read the chapter lecture, review the power
power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quizzes in
the Syllabus area.
Project 1
Review tables 2-2 and 2-3, World Trade in Merchandise Exports and Services in your
textbook. Pay particular attention to the percentage share of worldwide exports in 1992
and 2002 for the following regions and selected countries:
North America
United States
Latin America
Africa
Middle East
Asia
China
India
European Union
France
Italy
Answer the following questions:
1. Are their any noticeable trends?
2. What are the implications of these trends?
3. In your opinion, why the growth in Asia as compared to the decrease for the
European Union?
4. Africa and the Middle East’s percentage shares have decreased or remained
stagnant, why do you believe this is the case?
5. Should you, as a future business leader, be concerned about these trends?
Due February 12, 2007.
Week 4: Chapter 5, Understanding the International Monetary System, and Chapter 6,
sociocultural Forces: Influencing International Business. Read the chapter lecture,
review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter
quizzes in the Syllabus area.
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Week 5: Chapter 7. Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability. Read the
chapter lecture, review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and
complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 6: Chapter 8. Economic and Socioeconomic Forces. Read the chapter lecture,
review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter
quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 7 Chapter 9, Political Forces. Read the chapter lecture, review the power point
slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus
area.
Week 8: Fifty question multiple choice questions covering chapters 1-9. Chapter 10,
Legal Forces. Read the chapter lecture, review the power point slides in the Course
Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus area. Mid Term
Examination. Fifty question multiple choice questions covering chapters 1-9.
Week 9: Chapter 11, Financial Forces. Read the chapter lecture, review the power
point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz in the
Syllabus area.
Project 2: Use the globalEDGE site to complete the following exercises.
Part One
You are assigned the duty of ensuring the availability of 100,000 yen for a payment that
is scheduled for next month. Considering that your company possesses only US
dollars, identify the spot rate and forward exchange rates. What are the issues of
utilizing spot versus forward exchange rates? Which one would you choose? How
many dollars do you have to spend to acquire the amount of yen required?
The currency exchange rates can be accessed via a variety of sources. A list of these
sources is available http://globaledge.msu.edu/ibrd/ibrd.asp and can be accessed by
searching the term “exchange rates.” The first resource listed under this search is the
FX Street, located under the globalEDGE category “Money: Finance”. This site offers
daily updated information about foreign exchange markets as forex news, market
reports, forecasts, and real-time exchange rates and charts. A currency converter and
historical tables are also available
Search Phrase: “Exchange Rates”
Resource Name: FX Street
Website: http://www.fxstreet.com
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globalEDGE™ Category: “Money: Finance”
Part Two
As an entrepreneur, you are interested in expanding your business to either Poland or
Portugal. As part of your initial analysis, you would like to know how much investment
is needed to go to these markets. In order to get a rough number, you hire a consulting
firm to do initial investment analysis. The consulting firm provides you a short report
about how much money is needed fro both countries. The numbers provided are: one
million zloty (Poland’s currency) and 45 million escudo (Portugal’s currency). To make
a clear comparison, you need to convert these currencies to US dollars. Do the
conversion and suggest where to invest.
The data source can be accessed by searching the term “Conversion” at
http://globaledge.msu.edu/ibrd/ibrd.asp. The Conversion & Calculation Center is the
first conversion resource in this search. This resource is found under the globalEDGE
category “Reference: Standards and Conversions”.
Search Phrase: “Conversion”
Resource Name: Conversion & Calculation Center
Website: Convert It
globalEDGE ™ Category: “Reference: Standards and Conversions”
Due March 12, 2007.
Week 10: Chapter 12, Labor Forces, and Chapter 13, International Competitive Forces.
Read the chapter lecture, review the power power point slides in the Course Documents
area, and complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 11: Chapter 14 Assessing and Analyzing Markets. Read the chapter lecture,
review the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter
quiz in the Syllabus area.
Week 12: Chapter 15, Entry Modes. Read the chapter lecture, review the power point
slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz in the Syllabus
area.
Project 3: Interview an individual involved in exporting such as a member of a
bank's international department or a local multinational's export department, a
foreign freight forwarder, or a foreign trade specialist in the U.S. Department of
Commerce or state government's department of commerce. Describe what they do
and what their current experiences are. Due April 9, 2007.
Week 13: Chapter 16, Export, and Import Practices. Read the chapter lecture, review
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the power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz
in the Syllabus area.
Week 14: Chapter 17, Marketing Internationally. Read the chapter lecture, review the
power point slides in the Course Documents area, and complete the chapter quiz in the
Syllabus area.
Week 15: Final Examination. The final exam is a 50 question multiple choice exam
covering chapters 1-17.
MGMT 301 PROJECT GUIDE
1. All Projects shall be typed double-spaced. The general length of the Project should
be a maximum of five pages.
2. The questions being answered within each Project are to be clearly stated followed
by the student's response.
3. Footnotes and bibliography:
a) I strongly suggest using Kate L. Turabian, A Manual for Writers of Term
Papers, Theses and Dissertations (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
latest edition) as this still is the standard guide for writing term papers in the country.
b) Footnotes may either be at the bottom of the page or on a separate piece of
paper at the end of the text. However, footnotes inserted in the text are not
acceptable simply because there is very little standard of agreement on their
formatting and students invariably become confused with them.
4. Since so many of our students are using word processing to prepare their research
papers, I strongly recommend students use the spelling checker option to reduce
the number of spelling and typographical errors. In addition, I strongly recommend
students use a grammar checker to check the grammar of all written work.
5. Acceptable research materials are authored articles in scholarly academic journals
(see bibliography at end), government hearings, and other documents, internal
research from an organization whether published or not, published books using
original research rather than reviews of previously available research, and
interviews. These are termed primary source materials. Newspaper and
magazine articles are acceptable secondary source materials only if they are (1)
authored and (2) used to supplement primary sources mentioned above.
TEXTBOOKS ARE NOT ACCEPTABLE RESEARCH SOURCES OR
DOCUMENTS. Go to the original sources.
8. All Projects are carefully read and criticized. The best way to get full credit for the
Project is to do quality work and follow this guide. Plagiarism is a major No No!
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Any student found to have plagiarized his or her research would fail the Project
and the COURSE! GIGO!
Bibliography
International Strategic Management and Government Policy / edited by Peter Buckley.
New York: St. Martin's Press, 1998.
Meyer, William H. Human Rights, and International Political Economy in Third World
Nations: Multinational Corporations, Foreign Aid, and Repression. Westport, CT:
Praeger, 1998.
International Business Strategies: Economic Development Issues / editors: Abbass F.
Alkhafaji, Zakaria El Sadek. Slippery Rock, PA: International Academy of Business
Disciplines, c1997.
Phelps, N. A. (Nicholas A.) Multinationals and European Integration: Trade, Investment,
and Regional Development. London; Bristol, Pa.: J. Kingsley Publishers; London:
Regional Studies Association, c1997.
James W. McKee Forum on International Management (1st: 1994: New York, N.Y.)
Making International Strategic Alliances Work / edited by Margaret Hart and
Stephen J. Garone. New York, NY: Conference Board, c1994.