Global Business Environment

The course will cover the following ten topics:

1. The commercial significance of opportunity and transaction costs
2. Firm performance in competitive markets
3. Winning in strategic situations
4. Exploiting market power and optimal price setting
5. Disruptive technology and new business models
6. Creating incentives when at an informational disadvantage
7. How differences in incentive systems account for perceived differences in the world’s most successful business environments
8. How business environments change over time, differ in emerging markets, and the implications for corporate strategy
9. Long- and short-run macroeconomic trends and the business implications
10. The future of work in light of AI and machine learning as well as an economic outlook at times of rising global debt

Ultimately, this course will demonstrate how looking at key managerial decisions, in terms of the incentives involved, raises considerations which are other-wise overlooked, and results in better decision-making.

Simon J. Evenett is Professor of International Trade and Economic Development, and for the past 7.5 years has also been Academic Director of the MBA, at the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland. He is also the coordinator of the independent
trade policy watchdog Global Trade Alert. Professor Evenett's interests include protectionism, trade disputes, WTO and regional trade negotiations, emerging markets, and the manner in which firms actually compete internationally. He was educated at Cambridge and Yale universities, taking economics degrees at both. Previously Professor Evenett has taught at Oxford and Rutgers universities, has been a Visiting Professor of Corporate Strategy at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, was a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Brookings Institution in Washington DC, and a World Bank official, twice. Professor Evenett comments frequently on leading international economic developments to the media and to corporate audiences. He has over 200 publications.

Dr. Stefan Legge is a Postdoctoral Researcher and Lecturer in economics at the University of St.Gallen. He also serves as a Fellow for the World Economic Forum, working on projects concerning the future of consumption. This adds to his core fields of research which are international trade, macroeconomics, and political economics. In St.Gallen, he has taught students in economics at undergraduate, graduate and MBA level. Stefan holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Mannheim as well as a master’s and doctoral degree in economics from the University of St.Gallen. During his graduate studies, he visited the University of California at San Diego, the University of California at Berkeley, as well as Princeton University. Stefan previously worked as an intern for BMW in Munich and as a research assistant at the SEW-HSG Institute in St.Gallen. His research papers have been published in leading economics journals and he received several national and international awards.

Note: All information is accurate for the 2019-2021 academic year and is subject to change for future classes