Norms and Nations case
The Norms and Nations case (attached). This case involves an internal dispute among three of NBD’s executive board members—the VP of
manufacturing, the VP of marketing, and the VP of product design—arising from a series of mistakes made when distributing a
product. The CEO has asked you to write a report with its findings and recommendations for how NBD should handle this situation.
Specifically, the report needs to answer the following questions:
1. Was the Chinese supplier ethical in shipping more than 300,000 cases made of real leather instead of the requested faux leather material, even though the supplier was not charging NBD anything extra for the higher cost of real leather? Explain why or why not using ethical theory and principles.
2. When the manufacturing VP contacted the Chinese supplier to complain, the supplier could not understand why NBD was not pleased about receiving a real leather case, given that NBD was still paying for the less expensive faux leather one. Is there a cultural difference between customer expectations and business transactions in the West and in Asia? Explain.
5. As an organization, what strategic errors did the task force observe in the decision making by various individuals in this situation? By the design VP? By the manufacturing VP? By the marketing VP?
6. What is the appropriate strategy going forward? Conduct a SWOT analysis and PESTEL analysis (attached) to decipher what NBD should do in light of these strategic errors. Support your conclusion with references to cultural norms, strategy, and the principles of SWOT and PESTEL
7. Include a specific recommendation on what action, if any, the CEO should take based on your analysis and conclusions.
To answer these questions, you realize that you will need to gather information about the cultural factors that are in play in this situation, by reading about managing in a global environment, country cultural differences, and cross-cultural ethical business decision making.
Although these are a great introduction, you realize that you may need to do some additional research on the internet and in the library to fully answer the CEO’s questions. The task force wants to back up its responses with information about relevant differences in cultural expectations in China, South Africa, and the United States and will conduct further research on cultural differences and their impact on global business transactions.
Answer preview for Norms and Nations case
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