International perspectives on the profile of highly talented international business professionals

There is a global demand for talented managers and leaders. To meet this demand, higher education institutions are developing talent programs. However, international perception of talent is diffuse. In this study, our profile of highly talented international business professionals was internationally validated by 172 participants, representing East Asia and Western Europe. Results indicate consensus on three domains: communicating, achieving results, and seeing patterns and interrelationships in a global context. Strikingly, diverse country-specific interpretations of the accompanying behaviors were observed. The findings contribute to the talent literature and offer insights for educational practitioners when developing competence frameworks for talent or professionalization programs.     

Entrepreneurship and international business

Henry Wai‐chung Yeung. 2002. Entrepreneurship and the Internationalisation of Asian Firms: An Institutional Perspective. Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited. 311 pages. ISBN 1‐84064‐734‐5. Victoria E. Bonnell & Thomas B. Gold (Eds.). 2002. The New Entrepreneurs of Europe and Asia: Patterns of Business Development in Russia, Eastern Europe and China. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe. 357 pages. ISBN 0‐7656‐0775‐1.     

Corruption in international business

I analyze corruption in international business, presenting a critical assessment of the topic and providing suggestions for future research. I argue that corruption creates a laboratory for expanding international business studies because its illegal nature, the differences in perception about illegality, and the variation in the enforcement of laws against bribery across countries challenge some of the assumptions upon which arguments have been built, i.e., that managers can choose appropriate actions without major legal implications. Hence, I first provide suggestion for how to analyze the topic of corruption in future studies by analyzing the types, measures, causes, consequences, and controls of corruption. I then provide suggestions for how to extend leading theories of the firm by using corruption as a laboratory that challenges some of the assumptions of these theories: extending agency theory by analyzing the existence of unethical agency relationships; extending transaction cost economics by analyzing illegal transaction costs minimization; extending the resource-based view by studying corporate social irresponsibility capability; extending resource dependency by analyzing the ethical power escape; and extending neo-institutional theory by studying illegal legitimacy.     

The domain of international business: Futures and future relevance of international business

Using data generated by a global Delphi study involving international business (IB) scholars and practitioners, this article reflects on the core and domain of a discipline that, on one side, has to deal with increasing competition from related disciplines, which internationalize their research focus, and, on the other side, is trying to develop conceptual knowledge to explain ever more complex international phenomena. Generating a multilevel framework of important issues for IB leads to propositions, which may widen the focus of the discipline to go beyond the firm, which, comparing IB to related disciplines, can provide pathways that maintain IB highly relevant for most diverse communities affected by international business. ©2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Mapping international business and international business policy research: Intellectual structure and research trends

This paper analyzes the core international business (IB) areas covered by ten IB-focused journals to date using 13,937 documents reflecting more than 300 years of combined publication history. Using bibliometric and citation analysis, it provides a systematic understanding of the current IB landscape, explicates the relevance of the future of IB research and depicts trends in this research field with emerging prevalent themes identified. The strongest themes across IB journals are performance, perspective and emerging economies/MNEs, shared strongly across UK/Europe, US and Asia-based journals. Our findings report on the prevalent research field, economy and geography, the latter analyzing the impact of author numbers and distribution, and thus, scale effects. Within this context, sole authorships are largely replaced by co-authorships, yet often on national level. We further limited the study to IB policy and found the focus centers on key themes of foreign business attraction, transnational governance and IB promotion.     

Russia's true business performance: Inviting to international business?

Russia may be twice as inviting to international businesses as has been previously thought, because its gross domestic product (GDP) and its consumer demand may be twice as large as has been reported in the official Russian statistics of Goskomstat. This is because as much as 90 percent of the business activity of Russian companies, especially small private-sector companies, is never reported to Goskomstat and therefore never included in Russia 's data about GDP and per capita income (PCI). This vibrant and growing economy, unearthed in this study by carefully structured qualitative research tools, implies solid, but dangerous and compromising, opportunities for international business.     

Determinants of bribery in international business

Levels of perceived bribe taking in 54 countries in two time periods were analyzed with respect to two independent variables—their level of human development measuring education, wealth, and health (Human Development Index) and the level of economic freedom measuring the extent to which a nation's economy is open to market forces. The results indicate that lower levels of bribe taking are associated with high human development and greater economic freedom. Developed countries that have shown improvements on the two variables over a five‐year period also show a reduction in their perceived levels of bribe taking. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

What are international business centers?

To improve the international competitiveness of U.S. firms, the 1988 Trade Act (PL 100–418) authorized the Department of Education to create Centers for International Business Education. This article provides an overview of the background and the program activities of these International Business Centers. Several issues (such as the appropriate model for the Center, Center administrative structure, funding level, and external accountability) are also raised for discussion to further enhance the effectiveness of this program.     

Engaging values in international business practice

Managerial decisions and behaviors in the international business arena have ethical implications across cultures and countries. The need for ethics and core values in business practice has been heightened by continued business scandals and ethical managerial lapses that have violated public trust. Global businesses can offer practical guidance and set ethical examples for others to follow by establishing corporate values beyond written business codes. Four key work values (Honesty, Fairness, Concern of Others, and Achievement) known to be present in businesses across cultures, are put forth as a baseline start for multinational corporation leaders. Offered is a process for making the core values unique to an organization, and for adopting and training managers in the use of core values. Presented is evidence of managerial implementation of the core work values, and managers’ alignment of work values with organizational strategies. By addressing the values and principles of their workplaces, international businesses can achieve cross-cultural ethical practices, managerial alignment, and global social responsibility.