Developing Strategies for International Business. The WRAP Process

Developing Strategies for International Business. The WRAP Process

A round-up of some of the best book reviews recently published by Emerald.Developing Strategies for International Business. The WRAP Process

J.A. Gillon, L. PearsonPalgrave Macmillan, London, 2004

The scale of professional business literature has two extremes: one (guarded by highly educated academics) represents the most sophisticated models, analyses, and mathematical relations – and is not always digestible for simple businessmen. At the other extreme is a textbook for future managers who want to start their own business and are now learning the basic rules of the game (e.g. in an “incubator park”).

Gillon and Pearson’s book is closer to this second extreme, but this does not diminish the assets of the book: I can hardly believe that spoiled academics or fêted CEOs of giant multinational corporations will put the book under their pillow at night, but it is a clever and practical guidebook mostly for managers of SMEs (and also for disloyal academics, starting their own enterprise!) when they are planning their first steps on the international scene.

The acronym “WRAP” stands for “world rational analytical prioritization” – and the WRAP process guides the reader upwards on the WRAP Stairway, representing the eight steps of a successful international strategy planning and implementation. The chapters of the book – corresponding more or less to these steps – include short theoretical introductions, much more detailed technical advice for managers approaching the international scene for the first time (or having already had some disappointing experiences there) and also some fascinating examples based on the authors’ experiences with American, British, German, etc. companies. It is worth enumerating the titles of the chapters:

• •

  “1. International business rationale”;

• •

  “2. Overview of the WRAP process”;

• •

  “3. International business cultures” (my first remark: this could be more detailed!);

• •

  “4. Understanding international customers” (my second remark: what about the two directional switches of “international” and “local” customers?);

• •

  “5. Building a foundation” (representing the first two steps, i.e. internal assessment and external information);

• •

  “7. Analysis and strategic prioritization” (the name of the step is the same);

• •

  “8. Routes to market”;

• •

  “9. Building a strategy” (the equivalent steps are strategic options, evaluation and reassessment as well as strategy development)”; and

• •

  “10. Strategy implementation and management” (this also covers the meaning of the last two steps).

This structure of the book sets in frame not only general suggestions for a prudent international business strategy, but also for some original ideas which are interesting for a more experienced reader too. As examples I can name here the role of “corporate anthropologists” (on p. 50); the difference of “parameters and criteria” when establishing the search for external information (on p. 71); “ranking contextual factors across territories” (on p. 94); the example of divergence in strengths and weaknesses on the international scene (on p. 147); and the basic requirement that in modern business all “not principal partners” – banks, accountants, lawyers, advertising agencies, service suppliers and others – must be continuously kept informed about the business achievement and problems of the firm (p. 173).

Finally, let me also make a third critical remark: it is a pity that this clever, modest and practical book does not discuss in a more detailed way the general tendencies of the international (in our days global) scene of business. Namely, it is essential even for managers of SMEs – especially when they plan their first steps on this scene! – to know some “rules of the Big Game”, e.g. the role of MNCs, the effects of the technical, economic, political power centres, etc. – not to mention the real threats of the Big Game, such as the sometimes vital influence of huge foreign direct investments on the existence of SMEs, or the pitfalls of the international financial markets turning in reverse the expected and well-founded success of an SME’s international strategy. (And this is the reason why university students working towards grades in international business strategy have to also put into their bags – in addition to the present remarkable book – some extra volumes on the characteristics of today’s global market, of today’s global economic trends, and also the main effects of global technical, political and social tendencies of our small but ever more interdependent world …).

A version of this review was originally published in the European Journal of Marketing, Volume 40 Numbers 5-6, 2006.