Characteristics of a Global Business Leader

My first hand encounter with Globalization that came from a project to standardize KPAs (Key Performance Area) for different roles within the HR function intended to bring uniformity in the appraisal process at offices spread across India, China, South Africa, and Philippines. My experiences made me ponder the complexities in bringing orderliness and uniformity in organizations spread over multiple locations. As we talk of ‘one world or none’, it is certain that any organization wanting to compete in the global market place will have no option but to globalize thereby creating a need for global leaders who can operate beyond the conventional norms of management, adapt to the changing international requirements seamlessly. And I look forward to be one of those global leaders within the organization who would be able to plan and direct the organization transformation into a global entity

The global markets become increasingly interconnected and economic dynamics change, companies offering supply chain and logistics services are finding themselves facing multiple challenges and opportunities. Through the increasing integration of global labor markets, companies now have access to massive amounts of talent streams that were once not possible to obtain. However tapping into these talent streams is only possible through a global leadership strategy where the organization has global leaders with a high IQ and global management (Gardner, 2007).

These groups rely on technology to communicate with one another and to accomplish the tasks allocated by the organization. One benefit of a virtual team is that they use technology and this can help increase efficiency and productivity of the members. The virtual teams also assist in the development of intellectual capital. The composition of the virtual groups helps improve quality as well as the outcome. The other benefit is the efficiency of communication. Some of the challenges include the distance between the members. The significant distance may dilute leadership, weaken human relations as well as amplify dysfunction. Virtual teams are hard to manage especially when it comes to goal setting, task distribution, coordination and member motivation. Virtual organizations rely on trust that the other members will fulfill their roles since it is not possible to monitor them closely (Hoppe, 2011). The virtual teams may face some internet challenges such as slow internet or disconnection. This problem can be handled through the use of alternative methods of communication such as mobile phones. While making a virtual team, the team members should address all challenges which may hinder communication by coming up with all possible substitutes of means of communication. These organizations rely heavily on the internet for video conferencing and sending emails. However, when the internet fails, they

The essence of this article is noting the fact that virtual teams are only going to be effective when technology is involved. When virtual teams first started, there wasn’t much effective meeting technology available, but now there

The world is a growing and changing place, and in business we have seen many changes occur. Most of these changes are of a result of globalization and multiculturalism Diverse and virtual teams have developed in response. The work force has become more diverse and spread out, and it has forced managers to adjust and change their management styles to adapt to the new work force needs. This paper will address the risks, the benefits, and the ways managers plan to manage the new diverse and mobile teams.

In the article” Making it Overseas” by Mansour Javidan, Mary Teagarden, and David Bowen, states that for developing skills of global leadership, working all in various countries is one of the strategies which people can gain capabilities for cross-cultural issues. However, by gaining working experience overseas is not the only determinant to decide leaders’ success. In order to succeed overseas, leaders need a global mind-set, which includes Intellectual Capital, Psychological Capital, and Social Capital, and each of them are defined by three specific characteristics.

As per the 14th Annual Global CEO Survey by Price Waterhouse Cooper for the year 2011, the need had been identified to bridge the gap of global skills as one of the biggest concerns, specifically for companies considering attraction, recruitment, development and retention of talents across the globe (Moran, 2014). Costly mistakes, frustration, and confusion are the main consequences of absence of global skills mainly because of ignorance regarding the effect of culture across the work place. This is because ignorance of culture differences result in unproductivity across the organization (Latimer, 2012).

First, it is very challenging to build trust within virtual teams. It is very hard for you to trust people who you do not know well or those whom you have not observed working over time. Secondly, in virtual teams, it is difficult to obtain group-process gains (positive synergy) that many times accompany face-to-face communication. Process losses (negative synergy) are more likely. It is difficult to create team synergy and to overcome the absence of informal, interactive learning. Thirdly, there is a feeling of isolation and detachment associated with the virtual teamwork. There is no physical interaction which is associated with verbal and non-verbal ques and thus, there is absence of social interaction with supervisors and coworkers. Virtual team members may be less productive and satisfied than their counterparts working face-to-face due to feeling of isolation and detachment. Fourthly, it is tricky to balance technical and interpersonal skills among the virtual members. There is a challenge for a virtual teal leader to recruit, select and retain team members who have a good balance of technical and

As a 69-year-old company, Lowe’s has a well-established organizational culture that long pre-dates the concept of virtual teams. As such, the company still has embedded in its culture certain concepts that impede its ability to be truly effective in the virtual team collaboration space. One such concept is the idea that decisions are made in meetings and not by individuals or through ad-hoc consensus. This notion generates obstacles to fast and effective decision-making, since it requires the coming together of global workers in a single meeting. That by itself creates logistical challenges due to time differences. Lowe’s can benefit from encouraging and supporting decision-making practices that utilize the knowledge and experience of

Hertel, Guido, Susanne Geister, and Udo Konradt. 2005. “Managing virtual teams: A review of current empirical research.” Human Resource Management Review 15 (1): 69-95. doi: 10.1016/j.hrmr.2005.01.002.

They’ve been feeling disconnected as well as feeling discomfort by team members as their two managers, Nazr and Ashok, don’t get along. There’s an underlying and perceived racism going on between the two teams as well. They were not able to focus on the problem at hand and understand one another since the trust and respect were not established among members. Another dysfunction this team is facing is lack of leadership. It is no doubt that Greg is well established and valuable employee of Sun Microsystems, Inc. with many notable accomplishments. However, he overlooked specific challenges of leading a virtual global team and the importance of his role as a leader. As Hill stresses, “it is essential to understand the role of leadership within teams to ensure team success and to avoid team failure” (Hill, 2010, p.242). Effective leadership is even more crucial with virtual teams and demands “50% more investment” (Dyer, Dyer, & Dyer, 2007, as cited in Hill, 2010, p.248). Greg failed to read all the “personal and contextual nuances” and potential conflicts among his team members (Hill, 2010, p.248). He failed to understand potential meaning of silence, misunderstandings, team process, and overlooked signs that have eventually led to discontentment and misunderstandings of his team members. Greg formed his team rather quickly, composed of seven members from France, Inida, UAE, and US. James hired them based on their credentials and impressive resumes, but he didn’t

Organization wants to achieve the objectives of sustained growth and increased profitability, organization must constant innovation its product or service, also need to carry out some plans to expand its business to enable an organization to have a better development. Organization expands its business cannot be confined to the domestic market must also move abroad, which effectively allows an organization closer to the global market and broadening the scope of business and profitability. However, business expansion is not as easy in this global environment, globalization has not only changed the enterprise competitive landscape also influence the way leaders conduct business (Caligiuri, 2006). Furthermore, with globalization, global leadership in terms of cultural knowledge needed to become more acute and require more advanced level of cognitive ability on the complexity of managing the demand of multiple cultures while completing managerial tasks (Caligiuri, 2006, Grosse, 2011). Therefore, the development of global management skills is very important for the global organizations and managers. Only effective in developing global management skills can help the organization reduce the risk of international business

The evolution of globalization and the advancement of communication technology have increased the amount of cross cultural, virtual teams in existence in today’s business world. Cross cultural, virtual teams can leverage on the diverse experiences of its members to achieve good results even without the members meeting face to face.

In times of rapid globalisation and economic development growth, the environment of business has become more and more complicated as a huge number of firms want to globally expand their businesses. Subsequently, the managerial implications of cross-cultural management is the challenge of this development. As Abbe (2007) states, cross-cultural leadership has developed as a way to understand leaders who work in the global markets. Culture is the “software of mind” that can influence people’s patterns of thinking and behaving.

the skill sets and aptitudes to manage in global organizations. These skills include the culture, the