Kobe, Japan Briefing Document / Cross-Cultural Training Program Homework Help

Topic: Kobe, Japan Briefing Document / Cross-Cultural Training Program

Order Description

Business School Assignment Brief
2013-2014
International Management

Assignment 1 & 2 This assignment is worth 100% of the overall unit mark

THE BRIEF

This is an individual written work

Assessment is via two equally-weighted, integrated assignments. The two marks will be aggregated (combined) to produce a single unit mark. In order to pass the unit, you must achieve an overall average of 40%.

The scenario below will lead to you producing two separate, though related, deliverables:

1. A Briefing Report on living and working in Kobe / Japan.
2. A training programme for the manager assigned to the project

Each deliverable is a separate Assignment and should be submitted separately.

Scenario

You work for an international consulting company (invent a name), which provides bespoke training to a range of companies involved in international business. Your company specialises in cross-cultural training and has gained a reputation amongst peers and clients for developing and delivering high-quality training programmes.

Your company recently won a contract to prepare a manager from a new client company for an overseas assignment. You won the contract thanks to a particularly impressive presentation that you gave to the client, as well as to a free ?refresher? workshop you ran for the client, entitled ?The Impact of Culture on Business and Management?.

The new client is called ?Seagate Marine Construction? (referred to hereafter as ?SMC?). Employing 120 people, and working, where relevant, with local hires, SMC design and build underwater gates and locks for marinas and harbours. They are also involved in the design and construction of hydro-electric schemes.

Recently, SMC won a prestigious overseas design and construction contract with the port of Kobe, in Japan. The assignment to manage this project will begin on April 2nd 2015, and SMC have identified a manager, whom they wish to appoint to the role of Project Manager. The project is scheduled to last for two years.

The manager in question put herself forward for the role, is female and in her mid-forties. She joined the company six years ago and has performed exceptionally well, earning two promotions in that period. She is married, to John, and has two children, Isobel (16) and Henry (10). Since having children, she has worked only in the UK, but has made several short trips overseas on job-related matters. However, in her first graduate job, she worked in Singapore for three years.

ASSIGNMENT 1

Prepare a ?Briefing Document? to be given to the manager as a guide to living and working in Kobe / Japan. It is up to you to decide on the precise contents, formatting and presentation of this document yourself, asking yourself what information would be useful to someone in her position. The guide should be ?bespoke?, though it is also likely to include lots of generic information, which would be of value to anyone posted to Kobe / Japan. You are encouraged to be creative in the formatting and presentation. Your end product may not necessarily look like a traditional assignment?

Parameters:

1. You should not include in this document any information about the actual project, other than, if you wish, the location (e.g. no reference to maritime engineering required).
2. The document should be no longer than 10 sides of A4 (or equivalent), excluding the cover page, contents page (if any) and Bibliography.
3. You are free to incorporate, as appropriate, graphics, images, artwork, etc.
4. The text of the document does not need to be Harvard Referenced. However, you may, if you wish, incorporate footnotes.
5. Whilst you are not required to Harvard Reference your document, you are NOT permitted to simply copy and paste large chunks of information from other sources. You should seek to summarise, paraphrase and re-word the material you exploit.
6. You must include a Bibliography, i.e. a list of all resources used to compile the document, presented in the Harvard style.

ASSIGNMENT 2

Provide an overview of the cross-cultural training programme your company would deliver for the international assignee described above. You are expected to demonstrate how you design effective cross-cultural training with necessary analyses. While you are free to apply any model of designing a cross-cultural training programme and follow the necessary analyses suggested in the model, if you are not sure what model to apply, you can use the model introduced in the session 6 of the unit.

Parameters:

1. The overview should be presented in a report format.
2. The word limit is 2,500 excluding direct quotations and bibliography.
3. Please follow the Harvard Referencing System.

The generic assessment criteria for level H will be used for making these assignments.

These assignments test the following ILOs:
1 A critical appreciation of the nature and complexity of international organisations and management issues;
2 An ability to critically evaluate international management policy, practices and processes;
3 An ability to contribute effectively to the formulation, communication and implementation of management policy and practice in both national and international contexts;
4 An understanding of national, institutional and cultural differences and the associated management and behavioural issues which require sensitivity.

SUBMISSION DETAILS

ASSIGNMENT 1
1. The document should be no longer than 10 sides of A4 (or equivalent), excluding the cover page, contents page (if any) and Bibliography.
2. You are free to incorporate, as appropriate, graphics, images, artwork, etc.
3. The text of the document does not need to be Harvard Referenced. However, you may, if you wish, incorporate footnotes.
4. Whilst you are not required to Harvard Reference your document, you are NOT permitted to simply copy and paste large chunks of information from other sources. You should seek to summarise, paraphrase and re-word the material you exploit.
5. You must include a Bibliography, i.e. a list of all resources used to compile the document, presented in the Harvard style.
ASSIGNMENT 2

1. The overview should be presented in a report format.
2. The word limit is 2,500 excluding direct quotations and bibliography.
3. If necessary, you may exceed the word limit by 10%. Exceeding the word limit beyond this without prior permission may result in the penalisation of the mark by up to 10%.
4. Please follow the Harvard Referencing System.