Why do so many global strategies fail - despite companies' powerful brands and other border-crossing advantages? Seduced by market size, the illusion of a borderless, "flat" world, and the allure of similarities, firms launch one-size-fits-all strategies. But cross-border differences are larger than we often assume, explains Pankaj Ghemawat in "Redefining Global Strategy". Most economic activity - including direct investment, tourism, and communication - happens locally, not internationally. In this "semiglobalized" world, one-size-fits-all strategies don't stand a chance. Companies must instead reckon with cross-border differences.Ghemawat shows you how - by providing tools for: assessing the cultural, administrative, geographic, and economic differences between countries at the industry level and deciding which ones merit attention. Tracking the implications of particular border-crossing moves for your company's ability to create value. Creating superior performance with strategies optimized for adaptation (adjusting to differences), aggregation (overcoming differences), and arbitrage (exploiting differences), and for compound objectives. In-depth examples reveal how companies such as Cemex, Toyota, Procter & Gamble, Tata Consultancy Services, IBM, and GE Healthcare have adroitly managed cross-border differences - as well as how other well-known companies have failed at this challenge. Crucial for any business competing across borders, this book will transform the way you approach global strategy.

Globalize and Materialize No Matter What!
In Redefining Global Strategy, Harvard professor Pankaj Ghemawat outlines and engages in a thorough analysis of what he calls "semiglobalsim." He argues that distance--whether cultural, geographical, ideological, administrative, economic, linguistic, or colonial, among other criteria--still matters, in spite of the revolution in communication technology. Ghemawat suggests that differences (and barriers at borders) across countries are still larger than what both defenders and dissenter of globalization acknowledge. In fact, he doesn't oppose so-called globalization; rather, he emphasizes that it has not reached its peak, claiming that the real state of the world is "semiglobalized," not globalized. Thus, economically speaking, companies need to overcome the abovementioned barriers in order for their products and markets to become global. Ghemawat acknowledges the gap between the theory and experience of globalization, and he provides the readers with an array of strategies, policies, and approaches to solving/bridging this divide and achieving fairer globalization in the future. To this end, he elaborates on a few examples of products (Coke, McDonald's, and others) that have managed to cross borders as a result of advocating a flexible business reality in making business decisions. This reality doesn't strictly espouse either a country-by-country basis or a one-size-fits-all-countries basis. Instead, "What must be grasped is a business reality that lies in between one country and one world" (32). Unlike David Harvey--geography's most influential analyst of contemporary urban life--who believes that the recent technological advancements have tremendously transformed the world into a small village in which "all that is solid melts into air," Ghemawat thinks that geographic distance or proximity, among other aspects, still plays a central role in our postmodern, if not post-humanist, society. For Ghemawat, the greater the distance between any pair of countries, the less they trade and visa versa. Still, he is aware of other political, cultural, and ideological differences that can impede bilateral trading relationships between bordering countries. Consider, here, India and Pakistan (albeit sharing a colonial past, a land border, and linguistic ties), Israel and Syria, and Turkey and Armenia as examples of belligerent nations. Indeed, the long-standing mutual hostility between Israel and Syria, which stems from Israel's occupation of the Syrian Golan Heights, means that official trade between them is less than one-hundredth of what gravity models would predict it to be. Perhaps the most original component of this book is how it addresses a question much in the air these days: "Why globalize?" The author makes it clear that tackling this question requires serious and multifaceted analysis. However, I think "to expand selling and marketing in order to profit more" would be the simplest answer for this question. Likewise, the book expounds on strategies for creating globally accepted value via adaptation, aggregation, and arbitrage. These strategies guarantee or ensure adjusting to differences across countries, overcoming some differences among countries by putting them in groups according to their similarities, and exploiting differences rather than perceiving them as constraints or hindrances. In short, a company must take both similarities and differences among countries in account in order to achieve a global reputation. Ultimately, I tremendously enjoyed reading this interdisciplinary book. However, from a non-economics/non-business perspective, I want to see more on the responsibility of (post)colonialism or imperialism, in its cover and overt forms, for creating uneven, disruptive similarities among otherwise enormously dissimilar countries. Consider the role of the English language, let alone Christianity, in hegemonizing large parts of the world. In reality, these similarities intensify the gap between the privileged colonizers/imperialists and the disadvantaged colonized who (were) are coerced to consume the same colonial products and change their way of life as a result. Analogously, Ghemawat neglects or avoids addressing the dire effects of globalization on the weaker part of the equation. To put it mildly, the book's major concern is globalizing, profiting, and marketing, but the exploitation of people and nature in order to achieve this goal are not mentioned at all. These shortcomings aside, the book is still a handy, eclectic source not only for business majors, but also for those in other fields.