NAME: - PIYUSH VARMA

ROLL NO: - GM22NS006

o Question 1 : Give two things which you really did not know before the Business &
Global Economics class and/or surprised you, and/or which were of your highest
interest and/or your most impactful take away. Describe both and for each explain in
detail the reason(s). How does it change now your view on global
business/environment.

Business and Global Economics is something which keeps you updated with overall scenario
throughout the world and makes you know the ongoing events in relation with trade, national issues
and other financial and non-financial activities. Before the start of the course, I was aware of the
Business and Global Economy core elective in Term-1. Economies was studied by me which
highlighted more about micro and macro economies in regards with population or the demand,
supply, consumption, manufactures and so on. In middle of this course my idea of visualising the
global economy and business has totally changed. As there were many events occurred and
discussed in class, the two main event/topic which had surprised me or which I was unaware about
were The National Differences and Impact on Business and the second was The Establishment of
European Union and Greek Debt Crisis.

1. The National Differences and Impact on Business: - It was quite a new thing for me to gain
knowledge, as I was very much aware about the business that were operated in foreign
countries and the consequences. There is always an impact on economy due to various
factory that were either due to the natural disaster or either due to any black swan activity
or wildcards. But after this topic was covered in our class, I came to know that it’s not just
the natural disaster or black swan activity which could impact the business but there are
various other things that could create a huge impact on business activities like the cultural
difference, localisation (adapting the local ideas and point of view as per what they think),
communication, hierarchy and so on. I had a clear picture for the same when were given the
example of Failure of Walmart in Germany, Walmart was the biggest successful retailer
which had its expansion globally. In 1997 Walmart has entered the Germany with its first
store by buying the German retail chain Wertfauk.
 Walmart failed to adapt the local ideas and failed to understand the local people and
their purchasing power, the price in Walmart was more than what they used to pay at
the local store.
 Walmart failed to examine the German market as there were other large local retailers
like Kaufand and Lidl who used to offer low price with wide range of products.
 Walmart even wasn’t able to adapt the culture of German which was even one of the
reasons for the failure. Walmart used to give plastic as their shopping bags which were
not reusable, on the other hand German used to reuse their bags for daily consumable
items for certain period of time before throwing them away.
 Germans never entertain low price over quality of goods and services, they are willing to
pay more if they found that product is good and of good quality.
 Germans have the policy of the Union at their workplace and on the other hand
Walmart does not entertain unions at their workplace which led to protest by German
employees.
NAME: - PIYUSH VARMA
ROLL NO: - GM22NS006

Walmart was widely spread in Germany and due to lack of culture and customer adaptation
by 2006 Walmart failed and was forced to withdraw from the country. This example of
overnight shutdown can make us aware of how the business needs to be run in other
country in to consideration various local factors and to not have a fast expansion.

2. China and Non-Market Economy Status: - WTO (World Trade Organisation) which was
formed in 15th Dec 1993 with its 125 members there were several countries which were
under single trade rule, wherein its main function was the smooth flow of trade and needed
to be as freely as possible with its member countries. WTO main factor was to lower the
trade barriers in between the nation and its people and to have a market economy status.
 WTO accepted China after 15years and entering into the organisation in 2001, this
entry was made by accepting the agreement with WTO.
 China soon started to violate the agreement by its Anti-Dumping techniques. This is
something which I was unaware about till date. Anti-Dumping is the process/refers
to the exports of goods below their normal price in their home countries resulting in
to gain the market share of overall trade world-wide, which is totally prohibited by
the WTO in their agreement. After this step taken by China and this lead its economy
and % of share of world export increased from 4.3% in 2001 before entering the
WTO to 11.2% by 2012. This effect of China has lower the trade of US 11.9% to 8.6%
in that spam of time.
 China even started to provide illegal state subsidies, this step was taken as China
wanted to be the biggest exporting country. They started this activity by providing
cheap bank loans, providing discounts and tax breakup which were totally illegal
under trade rule.
 Discriminating against foreign goods and supplies, it has been noticed that there
was a discrimination of trade for other manufactures in their country, e.g. the
foreign automakers they were operating in China they had to buy some of the
component in certain amount from China itself else the manufactures had to pay
double the tax for import of parts from other countries which has been not
acceptable by the WTO and was under the Non-Market Economy Status.

These certain events have come under during consideration during our Business and Global
Economics academic, and which I was not at all aware about the same and it had given me true idea
so to how the market works in respect of trade in foreign countries and to either run the business in
foreign land.
NAME: - PIYUSH VARMA
ROLL NO: - GM22NS006

o Question 2 : Looking back at your professional experience(s), is there something you

would now do differently compared to last time if you took this class earlier. You can
share up to two situations.

“Ambiguity is not, today, a lack of data, but a deluge of data.”

By Paul Gibbons Ref.1

Before getting into the GMBA I was working in a private bank ie NBFC Bank (Non-Banking Financial
Company) there I was into Internal Audit department where is used to travel in to different location
of branches and used to do audit related to business occurred in that same month and look into the
observations and to full fill the same as per the SOP created by Business team. We were in to lending
SME and HL as the primary factor and apart from that our main focus was on the construction
finance as my company used to fund the on-going construction projects and other such kind of
funding were taking place in my organisation. Everything was going in a smooth and easy way till the
time when COVID-19 came in to existence. In 2019 when there were rise in the cases of COVID-19
there was a slow downfall of business in all sector and that to in all part of the world.

This pandemic situation was too sudden for all of us as this was something which all of us were
facing for the first time in the history. We had no clue how we shall deal with the same in regards
with company point of view. The low interest rate as well the Pandemic scenario has reduced the
banking core profitability in markets, there were very less amount of business that could occur at
that period of time. This pandemic was taken under the Black Swan or Wild Card Event which means
that high impact events that were occurred and have impacted the human condition severely. The
high volatility in stock markets had affected the financial sector by the valuation of the company
dropping in all around the world, this even affected the bank credit growth which kept declining for
certain period of time till the time there were no way-out for the same.

If I could have taken this economic class earlier pre pandemic situation then there would have been
some chances of getting back into the business or else could have not faced such a major loss which
would had been occurred during pandemic. The topic of VUCA which was covered I was totally
unaware for the same. VUCA which states Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity which
gives the image to how we could mitigate this quality and improve our strategy depending on leader
to leader to drive the better outcome. VUCA can be applied to the see how I can predict the result of
my actions and better I could understand the situation.

Taking into consideration of the any other black swan activity or other such relatable event I would
consider business to be more been diversified into different sector be it either the E-Commerce or to
get more in to digitalisation and technology taking VUCA in to consideration. Adapting technology
like fintech can be very beneficial for the banking industry as Blockchain, cloud-computing, Big Data
are regarded as the biggest support for FinTech.

Taking VUCA into consideration and the factor that is been shared by Mr Donald Rumsfeld that there
are KNOWNS KNOWNS (Things that we are aware of and understands), KNOWNS UNKNOWNS
(Things we are aware but don’t understand), UNKNOWNS KNOWNS (Things we understand but are
unaware of), UNKNOWNS UNKNOWNS (Things we neither aware nor understand).

Ref1 : - Quote by Paul Gibbons