Practical Skills in International Business: Training Needs for Workforce Competence by Minnesota Companies

Abstract

Companies doing business internationally face the competitive challenges of a constantly changing operational environment. Employees need to update their international knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) frequently by attending training programs. A survey of Minnesota firms indicate that almost all companies are willing to cover the time and cost of employees attending such programs, apparently believing that workforce development benefits both day-to-day operations and improves employee morale. The current specialization in educational (K) and training (SA) programs by academic and nonacademic providers largely meets the needs of students and of corporate workforce development, but company competitiveness overseas could be enhanced if international K and SA providers cooperated more closely in complementary programming.

Meeting the Needs of Global Companies Through Improved International Business Curriculum

“…Less evident is any significant body of research into the needs of leading companies as the global environment continues to change at an accelerating pace. Data from studies on specific schools and markets provide support for this growing need for research (Cox et al, 1995;Delaunay & Blodgett, 2005;Prestwich & Ho-Kim, 2009;Sulaiman & Mohezar, 2008). In some cases, these studies have further illustrated the gap between student perceptions of the skills they need to be successful and company and industry assessment of the skills needed in the immediate future (Angeline, 2001).…”

A two-stage fuzzy multi-criteria approach for proactive maintenance strategy selection for manufacturing systems

“…In aluminium rolling mills, the failures of equipment [47][48][49] (criterion FR 122 ), for instance, aluminium circle blanking equipment, are a foremost hindrance to the rolling mill operations. When a breakdown occurs [50] (criteria DR 131 , DR 121 , DR 122 , DR 123 , DR 124 , and DR 124 ), reinstating the equipment depends on the competence of the workforce [51,52] (criterion FR 143 ) and the maintenance resources [53,54] (criteria DR 111 , DR 112 , DR 113 , DR 114 , and FR 123 ) available to the maintenance team. Encouraging a philosophy of reliability (criterion FR 134 ) among team members assists to establish the measures [55,56], for instance, mean time to restore (criterion FR 121 ), mean time between maintenance (criterion FR 124 ), mean time between failures (criterion FR 122 ), the number of defective products (criterion DR 132 ), maintenance workforce cost (criterion FR 111 ), spare parts cost [53,54] (criterion FR 112 ), overhead cost (criterion FR 113 ), and consultancy cost (criterion FR 114 ) are constantly tracked and enhanced while adopting the most appropriate maintenance strategy for the rolling mill plant [53,54].…”

Curriculum Internationalization Focusing on India: Pre- and Post-Assessment of Student Learning

“…Nonetheless, ample evidence suggests a lack of international preparedness among U.S. college graduates (e.g., Aggarwal, 2011;Milhauser & Rahschulte, 2010;Prestwich & Ho-Kim, 2009) and serious gaps between the global industry demand for skills and higher education's capability to supply that demand Yu, Guan, Yang, & Chiao, 2005). In particular, "American students are often ill prepared for the realities of the global economy and to take up global assignments.…”