Looking Ahead: Main challenges

I foresee five main challenges: the growing competition from other nations (and not only in technology), being dependent on foreign manufacturing and resources, energy issues, credit and finance issues, and the lack of globally oriented talent.

United States companies have to integrate a global strategy into their yearly planning for three major reasons: to increase sales, generate economies of scale to manage risk, and raise profitability. The global aspect cannot be ignored any more, since the competition in technology, manufacturing, and talent will grow the gap between the United States and other countries’ ability to compete. Other countries are on our doorstep, with some we are competing neck to neck, so it is not up to us to make the decision whether to compete globally or not. It is happening, and therefore, U.S. companies need to leverage competition and design and implement cost-effective strategies to enter the international marketplace.

Other countries have been increasing their global trade for years now; they get their education in the best universities in the United States, and basically they duplicate and adapt our methods to their country’s needs in a very clever and sophisticated way.

In many ways the United States is still the leader; however, we don’t do enough long-term planning and don’t know enough about what the other countries do in similar industries. With the emergence and continuous growth of countries like Brazil, China, India, The Philippines, Thailand and so many others, it is becoming a necessity to do business globally, and it would be very costly to not make the right