International Management Reflection

“Although they are not directly related to internationalization, decision making and controlling are two management functions that play critical roles in international operations.” (Luthans & DOh, 2012, p. 360). While reading this chapter and the overall course chapters there is a lot to international management that I never thought of. It takes time, patience, and a lot of research before a company decides to merge into another country. This chapter of international management focused on the management decisions and control, it focused on the management decision process, factors affecting these processes, culture differences, total quality management decisions, control linkages including internal, external, direct, and indirect control methods, along with financial, quality, and personal performance. My first thoughts while reading this chapter was on the decision making, and controlling. Decision making is the procedure of selecting a course of action between other options. Controlling is the procedure of weighing results in connection to plans or objectives and determining what action, if any, to make. Management decision and control is the best course of action between the options and the calculation of results of those selections in connection with the plans and/or objectives. It was interesting to find out all the factors affecting decision making, and quite fascinating to find all the differences among these countries. Some countries incline to use centralized decision making than others. French managers tend to lack confidence in their middle managers so decision making tends to be centralized. German MNCs tend to be impartially centralized, oppressive, and hierarchical managers focus more on productivity and quality of goods and services than on managing subordinates.. As for decentralizations most British organizations are highly decentralized. Decision making in Sweden is decentralized and participative Focus more on quality of work life

References: Luthans, F., & Doh, J. P. (2012). International management: Culture, strategy, and behavior (8th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin