International Management – Managing Across Borders and Cultures

Citation

Manus, A. (2006), "International Management – Managing Across Borders and Cultures", International Journal of Emerging Markets, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 96-97. https://doi.org/10.1108/17468800610645031

“International Management – Managing Across Borders and Cultures” is a great management book that includes globally oriented ideas, theories, examples and cases. The author, Helen Deresky, tried very successful to make this management book an easy‐reading textbook. But in doing this, she did not create book that can be used only in management classes, but also in marketing, strategy, organizational behavior, emerging markets courses and so on.

This book was not designed especially for being used in an emerging markets/countries class, but because of the nature of the information provided inside, this book should be used by any professor who teaches a international business management/strategy subject, including emerging markets/countries. It is a globally oriented book, and it uses all the recent developments and cases in the international business world. The easiness of the read makes this book enjoyable for the student, and the presence of so many examples and cases make the book really important for any international business student, future manager.

Reading this book makes you feel like you are going through a four‐course meal in a classy restaurant. You have the starter, which is the first part of the book, “The Global Manager's Environment,” includes two great chapters that introduce you to the global business world. The first course, made out of three great chapters focused on culture, makes up for the second part of the book, “The Cultural Context of Global Management.” The main course looks at “Formulating and Implementing Strategy for International and Global Operations.” The last three chapters are equivalent to a great dessert, “Global Human Resource Management.” And the icing on the cake is the “Integrative Section” which wraps up everything in a term project.

Fine, you say, other books do the same thing. And nobody can deny that. But what other books do not do is give you enough seasoning to make the meal amazing. The salt and pepper of this book are its cases and examples. Starting with small examples about how people in Latin America are polychromic people, to medium size cases like McDonald's adventure in Russia, to big comprehensive end of parts cases like Footwear International in Indonesia or Management of Human Assets at Infosys in India, this book does not offer only theories and ideas, but also it offers education by example.

A particular chapter stands very high in my opinion. Chapter 5, “Cross‐cultural Negotiation and Decision Making” belongs to part two of the book, “Cultural Context of Global Management”. Not only does the author goes as deep as detailing how different culture look at negotiation procedures, but she also gives information on how to approach such negotiations. This chapter should be give as mandatory reading for international managers in any company, small or big. This chapter is also used by the author to link very well the two halves of the book. If until now the book has been providing information on the SLEPT factors that affect a international manager, from now on the book is focusing on the decision making process, the use of all previous information in creating strategies, adapting strategies and making the company work in a global environment.

Part three of the book, “Formulating and Implementing Strategies for International and Global Operations” takes a more theoretical approach. The author starts by describing a simple SWOT analysis that the company has to do, goes on to talk about cross‐border strategic alliances, and finishes with structure, control and coordination processes that any company should use in dealing globally. But even if there is more theory explained in this part, the “salt and pepper” is not missing: we find cases, examples and stories of companies working around the world, especially in emerging markets.

The last part of the book, is trying to deal with the eternal problem that companies have when starting business outside the home country: who do they hire? Should they hire a local person or bring in someone from the home country? The author does not give a direct answer to this, but using theory and examples, illustrates all the approaches which the companies might use in hiring people for their international branch.

As mentioned earlier, one of the top features of this book is the “Integrative Section”. One of the two areas covered in this section deals with the case of Wal‐Mart in Germany, which is a very good way to bring this book to a close, asking the students include in their work everything that they learned from the book. The other part of this section is my favorite part of the book. It is a group project that makes students work on each single aspect of taking a business from a home country and expanding it globally.

The theory in this book is also very good – all the necessary terms are explained very well. But in order for the students to understand, a small real world example is given to them. Almost all of these examples come from emerging markets or less developed countries (LDC). Sometimes the information provided by the author makes the readers feel like there is a bubble‐like protection around them. The emerging markets are sometimes regarded as a sick child and the author is trying to vaccinate the reader with all the information necessary in order to avoid failure in setting up businesses and working in emerging markets or in LDC.

A 50‐year old quote is the best way to look at what this book can do not only for a student, but also for an international manager.

Once upon a time there was a great flood, and involved in this flood were two creatures, a monkey and a fish. The monkey, being agile and experienced was lucky enough to scramble up a tree and escape the raging waters. As he looked down from his safe perch, he saw the poor fish struggling against the swift current. With the very best of intentions, he reached down and lifted the fish from the water. The result was inevitable. – E.T. Hall, The Silent Language in Overseas Business – Harvard Business Review (May‐June 1960) (also quoted in Chapter 3, p. 87)