The 2013 International Business Club Summit- a student’s experience

Post by Vi Nguyen, CISB student

Thank you to the Global Business Center for giving me for the opportunity to attend the third annual International Business Club (IBC) Summit 2013 at the Fisher College of Business, The Ohio State University. The IBC had prepared an intense two-day summit for the purpose of gathering international business clubs from across the U.S. to share their best practices and develop deeper global awareness. This experience was very inspirational in many ways.

Prior to the event, each student had to fill out an IES (Intercultural Effectiveness Scale) survey. The idea focused on the likelihood of your working effectively with people whose cultural backgrounds differs from yours. This survey related to one of the sessions that were hosted on the first day, which was an assessment debriefing by Dr. Larry Inks, Department of Management and Human Resources, Fisher College of Business, The OSU. Dr. Larry Inks explained the purpose of the IES and emphasized that this assessment allows for an individual to seek out growth opportunities, to grow and develop based on our results. The IES provided us with the information on areas where there is room for improvements and to consider. He further mentioned that our position as college students is the richest environment for global reach.

The next event was the best practices presentation where each club had to give a 10-minute presentation on their club’s best practices and why they think their club is doing a good job for its members. It was then followed by an international trivia/jeopardy quiz where the questions were based from the issues of The Economist magazine. Additional questions were from general awareness and knowledge on global issues, geography, politics, cultures, etc. To end the first night of the summit, we had dinner and the chance for students to network with each other. We also had the honor to have Kent Larsson, currently a retail marketing consultant for The Gordman Group. Mr. Larsson shared his senior positions in marketing, merchandising, and strategic planning during his 30 years in specialty and general merchandise retailing companies such as Big Lots. He also spoke about the challenges of working overseas and of course the rewards of it.

The second day was an intense simulation on making great global decision based on the topic “China in Africa: Savior or self-interest”. This simulation was created by the Foreign Policy Association that requires robust discussion and consensus building on international topic and was facilitated by Shannon McAfee, Columbus council on World Affairs (who is also from Washington). After reviewing the topic, each team was to debate their positions on elements of this topic and present their points of view to all the participants. To end the summit, we had a keynote speaker: Mr. Patrick Terrien, President and CEO, Columbus Council of World Affairs. We had the opportunity to hear Mr. Terriens biography and how he was exposed to globalization. He then led an informal discussion on the topic of The Business of Global Awareness.

Through this experience, I had the opportunity to learn compelling best practices from other clubs across the U.S., build global competitiveness through survey feedback, test my knowledge with Economist quiz, network with peers also interested in global careers, participate in Foreign Policy Association global simulation and gain a competitive edge by expanding global awareness.