Global relations

Lyndsey Erickson traveled to China as part of a program that makes international consulting services available to the business community

This morning I called an online company to check on the status of several custom-designed t-shirts I had ordered.  I learned that my order had shipped out of Hong Kong on Tuesday, had arrived in Indianapolis today, Thursday, and would be in my hands by late tomorrow morning.  Globalization never ceases to amaze me. 

Likely the most ubiquitous buzzword in my business school classrooms, right up there with 'ethics' and 'sustainability', is 'globalization'.  I guess I have always had a sense of the importance of globalization and of what it means.  To me it means that on Sunday I can order t-shirts to be made in China and on Friday my friends and I can have those t-shirts to wear out on the town.  I appreciate that to corporations globalization means the opportunity to gain cost advantages and develop partnerships with world class companies.  I've gained an even better sense of how and why globalization works through my course work at business school.

But to truly understand how and why globalization works, and how it develops and evolves for a specific corporation, I had to see it first hand.  To that end, last August I traveled to China with seven of my classmates and one faculty adviser to participate in an international consulting project.  We worked for a major US-based multinational corporation. 

The opportunity to participate in this program was an opportunity I could not pass up.  For several reasons, gaining an understanding of global business via a first hand experience was an important business school goal of mine.  First, although this summer I will be joining a consulting firm based in Boston, it would be naïve to think that I will have a purely domestic career.   Not only is the consulting firm I will be working for multi-national, with offices around the globe, but it also staffs a large number of its consultants on cases related to globalization issues.   Second, I have always wanted to see another country in a capacity that does not just involve sunning on a beach or chatting with locals in a coffee shop.  The chance to engage in business in another country was very attractive.  Finally, the prospect of going to China sealed the deal.  It goes without saying that China is on the forefront of minds of all contemporary business people.  There doesn't seem to be a week that passes when China is not on the cover of a major business publication. 

My team's task in China was to evaluate the size and characteristics of a construction machinery business opportunity.  During our three weeks of in-country work, we spent time in Tianjin, Beijing, and Shanghai.  After obtaining some initial leads from the Chinese offices of the US-based company that hired us, we identified important industry players throughout the supply chain, from component manufacturers to end users.  We then spent our time gathering as much information as we could.  Conducting interviews with component and equipment manufacturers comprised the bulk of our work, but we also toured factories, visited construction sites, and talked to mechanics at road-side repair shops.  Many interviews were conducted in person, and almost all required that a translator be present.  Fortunately, we also found some free time to explore China a bit too; we hiked the Great Wall, toured the Forbidden City in Beijing, and dined on the Bund in Shanghai. And incidentally, if ever in Shanghai, I highly recommend seeing the acrobatics show ERA: An Intersection in Time.

In September, just days before our classes began, we returned to the United States, at which time we began the final phase of our project, which included an in-depth analysis of research and a final presentation to the client.  Working closely together and using many of the skills gained via our first-year business school curriculum, we amalgamated findings, deduced common themes, and formulated a recommendation for the client.  Finally, we traveled to the company's headquarters to present our findings to members of senior management. 

A Chinese classmate told me the other day of an old Chinese proverb that says, "You can learn more in one trip around the world than you can by reading 10,000 books."  Traveling to and working in China not only helped me avoid having to read 10,000 books, it also helped me develop my own opinions of critical success factors for global corporations.  My greatest takeaways are quite simple.  First, in order to improve chances for success, constant and clear communication with clients and with corporate headquarters is crucial. Second, in order to gain a better understanding of end customer needs and to gain customer trust, there is no substitute for old fashioned face-to-face time: getting to know the managers, becoming familiar with their places of business, asking probing questions, and building trusting relationships.

Lyndsey Erickson is a second-year student at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth in Hanover, NH, USA. This summer she participated in the Tuck Global Consultancy, a program offered by the school which makes international consulting services available to the business community. The projects, which are real consulting engagements with multinational corporations, are short-term and highly focused, offering immediate solutions to specific challenges.  Second year students have the option of participating in the program in August or December