Smeal MBA Program
FG teaches several second-year elective courses at the Smeal College of Business. His current courses focus on Global Finance and Global Strategy and Organization.
Global Finance – New Horizons
FIN 855
The course deals with the analysis of problems in international business finance and the impact of evolving international payment systems on business. The focus will be on how decisions about financial management are and should be made in the modern multinational enterprise. The impact that these decisions have on the worldwide allocation of economic resources and distribution of wealth will be assessed. Other topics of discussion include: what are the financial risks inherent in these decisions? What role can new financial instruments play in the management of these risks?
Global Strategy and Organization
MGMT 861
This course focuses on the “strategic” challenges facing the multinational firm. The types of questions that we address are: Why do firms go abroad? What differentiates a “global” from a “multi-domestic” industry? What are the sources of competitive advantage in a global context? Why and when do/should companies engage in cross-border strategic alliances? What are the associated risks and how to guard against them? What potential roles can foreign subsidiaries play in an MNC’s global strategy? How do companies choose an optimal global structure? How do companies ensure coordination between the center and the subsidiaries and among subsidiaries? How do companies manage strategic change from one type of global strategy to another?
Executive Education
FG is one of many Smeal faculty members who has offered research, expertise, and experience to business managers through Penn State Executive Education Programs. Smeal offers an intense, sustained approach to working with managers — enabling managers to make more effective and strategic contributions in their business environments.
Penn State Executive Programs has been partnering with organizations from public and private sectors in custom development solutions more than 25 years. We have been recognized by such influential publications as Business Week as standing among the top ten providers of customized programs worldwide. Our expert reputation in this area is a direct result of what we consistently provide our clients in experience, value, and impact:
- Research processes to truly understand an organization’s strategic direction and development needs
- Unique solutions through the design of competencies matrices and road maps that define desired outcomes
- Sound expertise in orchestrating educational processes that combine classroom sessions, personal feedback, experiential exercises, simulation, and action learning
- Reliable relationship management and ongoing faculty involvement
The Pennsylvania State University Executive Education Programs has worked with the majority of the Fortune 100 companies, including many major chemical companies.
Past Clients Include:
- Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business
- Carnegie-Mellon’s Tepper School of Business
- Duke University
- Harvard Business School
- George Washington University
- University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School
- EXec EXcel Group LLC
Presentation Samples
Global Business Strategy and Implementation
Global Megatrands
Enterprise Strategy: A Platform for Value Creation
Course Materials
Many of the cases authored and coauthored by FG are included in the New Financial Instruments: Horizons for Risk Management book.
These cases include:
- Korean Won (A&B)
- Penn Lubricant
- Mexican Pharmaceutical Subsidiary
- CANAM Construction and Engineering Co.
- Dow Asiana
- Hong Kong – Economic Outlook and Country Risk Assessment
All cases are copyrighted by the Smeal School of Business at Penn State.
Session Overview
Worldwide, CEOs and senior managers need to prepare their industries for Global Tectonics–the process by which developing trends in technology, nature, and society slowly revolutionize the business environment of the future. Much like the earth’s tectonic plates, global trends shift unnoticed as they transform our industrial and societal topography. Business executives easily and often overlook such gradual developments — that is until a major quake shakes their corporate foundations.
We have identified twelve global trends that will present the most formidable challenges to world business leaders in the next thirty years. Developments in areas such as demography, infectious disease, resource degradation, economic integration, nano and information technologies, international conflict, and governance will determine corporate strategy. Whether these tectonic shifts put industries through minor tremors or major earthquakes will depend on how businesses have prepared for imminent change. Corporations have both the ability and the responsibility to foresee, to understand, and to adjust to these Every business, regardless of its size or industry, must view day-to-day operations in light of these global developments. Our report and presentations facilitate this type of analysis by clearly outlining global trends and their potential impact on international business. The evolution of global tectonics will be pivotal in CEOs’ decision-making processes, now and decades into the future.