Q&A Hero

Q: The relationships among ecological, social, and economic systems in sustainable environments need to be: A. discreet. B. renewable. C. positive. D. interdependent.

Q: Sustainable business practices have three characteristics: limits, interdependence, and equity.

Q: Environmentally sustainable businesses need to consider the economic and ecological systems in which they function, but not the social.

Q: Environmental sustainability is about maintaining the environment, and it is both local and global.

Q: Interface, the manufacturer of Flor, is an example of a petroleum-based business that has developed a sustainable model.

Q: Triple-bottom-line accounting is an example of sustainability with economic, social, and environmental accountability.

Q: Stakeholder theory suggests that balancing competing tensions in a business is impossible and that recognizing this early in the process is helpful.

Q: Coal and nuclear power are both in decline as energy sources.

Q: Compassion has nothing to do with sustainable business. Business is business.

Q: The stakeholder model for environmentally sustainable business has failed because we don't have an accounting system to measure the present costs of environmental irresponsibility.

Q: Limits, interdependence, and equity are characteristics of sustainable business practices.

Q: Sustainable approaches in business usually involve trade-offs such as lower profits compensated by reduced marketing costs and improved image/reputation.

Q: Biomass is a category of renewable energy fuels based on their heavy weight.

Q: Because it is a high polluter, coal is on the decline as an energy source.

Q: Nuclear power is a leading contributor to the French energy grid.

Q: The largest portion of proven oil reserves can be categorized as being at the highest level of investment risk.

Q: Saudi Arabia and Canada have the largest proven oil reserves.

Q: Heavy oil is oil weighted down with an extra carbon molecule, and it can be gasified using the Fischer-Tropsch process.

Q: China and India combined are using more marketed energy than is the United States, and this trend is projected to increase.

Q: Through 2035, fossil fuels are expected to remain the world's dominant energy source.

Q: Nonrenewable energy sources include coal, fossil fuels, and ocean thermal energy conversion.

Q: Climate differences explain differences in human and economic development because the less temperate climates limit mental powers.

Q: Bodies of water, much like deserts and mountains, also serve as barriers to trade.

Q: Every coast between 20 and 30 degrees of the equator (north or south) is dry.

Q: Switzerland, China, and Colombia are nations that present topographic challenges to marketers because their markets are divided by mountain ranges.

Q: Mountain barriers found in the area of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border impede travel and separate populations.

Q: Mountains tend to impede trade, whereas flat areas tend to facilitate trade relationships.

Q: Geographical proximity is rarely a major reason for trade.

Q: Because Austria sided with the West in the Cold War, it became a favored location for offices of international firms servicing eastern European operations.

Q: With globally networked transportation, location does not matter as a basic factor condition.

Q: Porter suggests that adverse conditions can motivate innovation, which may lead to the development of a competitive advantage.

Q: Porter's diamond model suggests that Switzerland should not be competitively successful.

Q: Porter's diamond can be used to explain the importance of the environment and natural resources.

Q: Switzerland exports cheese and chocolate because one of its factor endowments is lots of rich agricultural land.

Q: What two aspects of the culture frameworks would you share with a colleague leaving on her first foreign assignment, and why?

Q: Why should international managers study the religion of the country they are planning to work in even if they are not especially interested in the general area of religion?

Q: Explain Trompenaars' achievement-ascription dimension, and comment on its usefulness in an international business setting.

Q: Discuss Hall's high- and low-context framework, and suggest how it might be useful in an international business situation.

Q: The specific-diffuse dimension looks at: A. work behaviors. B. organizational loyalty. C. attitudes toward public and private life. D. attitudes toward paternalism.

Q: If people consider the context and relationships when they make decisions about the application of rules, they are likely to be: A. universalist. B. particularist. C. achievement-oriented. D. individualist.

Q: The Trompenaars dimension that describes a society whose rules regulate behaviors for all members and are applied evenly is: A. particularist. B. universalist. C. feminist. D. specific.

Q: Latin and Asian countries' scores on Hofstede's power distance dimension are relatively large and relatively low on: A. the individualism dimension. B. transparency. C. masculinity. D. femininity.

Q: The characteristics of Hofstede's long-term orientation include: A. social order and hierarchical relationships. B. perseverance, pragmatism, and hierarchy. C. the centrality of spending. D. planning in the medium-short term.

Q: A term Hofstede uses to describe long-term orientation is: A. Herculian commitment. B. Confucian dynamism. C. big-picture focus. D. strategic commitment.

Q: The masculine-feminine dimension is about: A. task vs. relationship. B. the gap between men's and women's roles in the culture. C. doing vs. being. D. quality of work vs. quality of life.

Q: Hofstede's measure of the amount of effort a society puts into ordering the environment and avoiding ambiguity is termed: A. Truth. B. flexibility. C. ambiguity. D. uncertainty avoidance.

Q: The extent to which members of a society expect and accept that power is to be distributed unequally is termed by Hofstede as: A. uncertainty avoidance. B. feminist. C. power distance. D. nondemocratic.

Q: In some countries people are relatively loosely connected and tend to focus on themselves and their immediate family. Hofstede would describe these countries as: A. myopic. B. xenophobic. C. self-referential. D. individualistic.

Q: If people belong to strong, cohesive in-groups that look after them in exchange for loyalty, the culture is likely to be: A. low context. B. collectivist. C. economically underdeveloped. D. democratic.

Q: Whereas Trompenaars was trained as an economist, Hofstede and Hall were trained as: A. anthropologists. B. business scholars. C. accountants. D. strategic planners.

Q: In HC cultures, time tends to be: A. loosely conceived. B. tightly planned. C. monochronic. D. polychronic.

Q: Hall's high and low context is based upon communication styles and specifically on the role of: A. the speakers. B. nonverbal behavior. C. the medium. D. context.

Q: In high-context cultures, relationships tend to be: A. short term. B. medium term, except for family. C. long term. D. pragmatic.

Q: Monochronic cultures tend to be: A. high context (HC). B. low context (LC). C. ethnocentric. D. hierarchical.

Q: Hall suggests that communication tends to be implicit and indirect in: A. the United States. B. high context (HC). C. low context (LC). D. Australia.

Q: The only cultural framework described in the text that is based on communication styles is: A. Trompenaars' dimensions. B. the Globe study. C. Hall's high and low context. D. Hofstede's dimensions.

Q: Leadership may be influenced by sociocultural forces, and its model might be: A. either anachronistic or contemporary. B. reasoned, emotional, strategic, or planned. C. exogenous or endogenous. D. paternalistic, heroic, integrative, or directive.

Q: Two basic ways to understand the role of leadership are as providing direction for a collection of individuals and as: A. limiting the freedom of individual group members. B. integrating a group. C. linking top management with workers. D. organizing workers for production.

Q: Accounting controls directly relate to a culture's assumptions about: A. the basic nature of people. B. inventory policy. C. efficiency. D. leadership.

Q: Production managers have discovered that their introduction of new production methods across cultures is affected by varying attitudes toward: A. their personalities. B. developed economies. C. change. D. technology.

Q: E. T. Hall suggests that to learn another culture, you have to undergo extensive training or spend: A. a lifetime in the other culture. B. considerable time with people of the other culture, but perhaps outside that culture. C. time studying the language of the other culture. D. considerable amounts of time and money taking guided tours in the other culture.

Q: When you assert that a certain aspect of your own culture is superior, you are probably exhibiting: A. objective observation. B. ethnocentric behavior. C. your understanding of truth. D. your hunches.

Q: Because of their close linkage, sociologists often combine the terms: A. social and cultural. B. social and kinship. C. kinship and monogamy. D. culture and monogamy.

Q: The presence of tattoos suggests social outcasts universally, based on: A. their use in Japan by the Yakuza. B. a primitive human desire to change and thus control the body. C. a universal aesthetic. D. nothing, because this statement is not accurate.

Q: A. we'll be able to understand too much detail of a culture, and this will slow down decision making. B. we'll limit rather than enrich our perceptions. C. our perceptions will become stereotypes, however sophisticated. D. B and C. We have to remember that these frameworks need to be applied to enrich our understandings of another culture rather than limit them. They are possible descriptors, what we might look for or be perceiving, and not prescriptions.

Q: Facebook is: A. an organization based on kinship. B. an organization based on free association. C. a tool that international marketers best avoid, given the complexities of culture. D. a passing fad that will absorb many marketing budgets but won't produce much in the way of results.

Q: Kinship and free association are: A. structures for political action. B. social structures used to develop marketing programs. C. social institutions found in all societies and categorized by the conditions of their formation. D. levels of the Masons found in Europe but not the United States.

Q: Gift-giving in many cultures is marked by: A. specific etiquette and meaning that may be markedly different from what the international manager knows in the home culture. B. graft and corruption; for example, a way to launder money. C. humility not fitting an international manager. D. drinking and late parties.

Q: In order to really understand another culture: A. living in it is important, but you don't need to know the spoken language. B. both the spoken and unspoken languages are important to understand. C. the unspoken language is enough because it allows you access to the culture. D. A and C.

Q: Material culture includes: A. what people in the culture make, such as tools, art, and everything material. B. tapestries but not their frames and the wool or other fabric before it is woven. C. only manufactures of which the culture is proud. D. only pottery, glassware and eating utensils.

Q: Understanding the religious beliefs of foreign markets is: A. not really necessary because religion is one and the Truth is universal. B. useful, because religions affect attitudes and beliefs across cultures. C. not necessary because religion is not a part of culture; it is beyond culture. D. useful because there is always the possibility of conversion.

Q: Lack of folklore knowledge is illustrated by: A. Smirnoff's use of a Che Guevara image in Cuba, because Che is a national hero there. B. Apple's use of an image of the Dalai Lama, because it offended China, where the government sees the Dalai Lama as a political dissident. C. the U.S. NFL playing U.S. football in the UK. D. A and B

Q: Musical tastes vary across cultures: A. and are built on the solid foundation of the octave. B. which is why they need to be understood by marketers who use music in commercials. C. and come together in the Silk Road. D. A and D.

Q: A culture's sense of beauty and taste is: A. universal, as described in Homer's The Odyssey. B. an aesthetic concern of no interest to the international manager. C. an aesthetic concern that may interest the trailing spouse and is good to know a little about. D. expressed in the culture's art and music and important for international managers to know about.

Q: According to Trompenaars, a culture's attitude toward the environment can range from: A. peaceful to warlike. B. overwhelmed by aesthetics to dominating the environment. C. control over the environment to harmony with it. D. submission to atheism.

Q: An achievement culture is one in which members are: A. rewarded with social status for who they are in a spiritual sense. B. rewarded for what they do, what they have accomplished, and so what they are. C. not rewarded at all because achievement is a doing mentality. D. rewarded for their lineage.

Q: In an affective culture (Trompenaars), emotions are seen as: A. responses to be freely displayed. B. private and, therefore, not displayed. C. a weakness and, therefore, hidden. D. appropriate to share with family members only.

Q: Trompenaars' particularist dimension describes a culture in which: A. people apply the rules equally to everyone. B. context is considered when rules are applied. C. relationships rather than rules regulate behaviors. D. B and C.

Q: Most developed nations have: A. small power distance. B. high individualism. C. strong uncertainty avoidance. D. all of the above.

Q: Hofstede's masculinity-femininity dimension suggests that, as an international manager, you might well: A. avoid feminine cultures because their production levels will lag. B. avoid very masculine cultures because they violate EEOC standards. C. find men and women equally ready to assume leadership roles in a feminine culture. D. find women too competitive in a feminine culture.