Part A
1) The first key learning point that I found to be particularly interesting and valuable was “How to start a business”. I found this point to be very interesting for starting a business has and continues to be a dream of mine. Within this category were sub- categories such as: business startup strategy, the right business for you, knowing your industry before you start your business, and estimating realistic startup cost. Although all very intriguing, I found the category on business startup strategies to be the most important for it gave the basics on how to start up a business, something that I didn’t know before The second key learning point that I found to be very interesting was where to start and what to do when “Buying a business”. I found this to be very interesting because if I can’t start a business, buying one would be the next best thing. Categories within this learning point included planning for purchasing a business, questions to ask when buying a business, knowing what you’re getting, and how to figure out what a business is worth. The last key learning point that I found to be very interesting while browsing the website was possibly more important than the first two learning points, “How to write a business plan”. Through the links in this category including: a standard business plan outline, different types of plans for businesses, what a business plan is, what makes a good plan, mistakes that can be made, a simpler plan for starting up a business and how long a business plan should be. I learned that a business plan is any plan that works for a business to look ahead, allocate resources, focus on key points, and prepare for problems and opportunities. I found this to be very useful and interesting because it can be used in other things other than just the business field.

2) After looking deeply into both the Barnes & Noble website and the Amazon website I have concluded that I, personally, would prefer Barnes& Noble opposed to Amazon. There are many reasons for this, the first one being that I am not a huge fan of the amount of products that Amazon carries on one website, it results in a mass amount of clutter whereas the Barnes and Noble website is very organized and contains a few types of products. Also, I’m not a fan at all of how many different distributors Amazon has for their products (listed at the bottom), the Barnes and Noble website goes as far as to provide a link for tracking your border, whereas with the Amazon website you have to track your order through different places. It is also nice that with Barnes & Noble you are able to go into a local store if needed, while Amazon is strictly web based. Barnes & Noble also has a more appealing home page for their website, the colors are bright and welcoming, even with a holiday theme for the season, while Amazon’s is quite dull and lacking in color (mostly white). I feel like overall Barnes & Noble is just a more efficient, reliable company, or it seems this way based on their website.

Part B
1) The Global Competitive Report is a yearly report published based on the Global Competitiveness Index of countries. The first key learning point number that really caught my attention and impressed me about the competitiveness of a country was that the Global Competiveness Index is composed of over 110 variables. They are organized into 12 pillars each considered important in determining competiveness. I found this to be very interesting for it showed me that the level of competiveness a countries economy has is much deeper than what I thought it was, a lot goes in to determining this. The second key learning point that really impressed me was that the United States is actually ranked seventh on the list in 2012-2013 due to the financial crisis of 2007-2010, and its macroeconomic instability. I was impressed by this because of the huge impact those two factors had on the ability of the United States to have a competitive economy knocking them down six whole places from number one in the years prior. The list fluctuates so much that the US has managed to work their way back up to a number five position in just in year. A third key point that I found to be very interesting and impressive goes hand in hand with my second key point. As wages rise with advancing development, countries move into the efficiency-driven stage of development, when they must begin to develop more efficient production processes and increase product quality. Apparently, at this point, competitiveness becomes increasingly driven by higher education and training, efficient goods markets, efficient labor markets, developed financial markets, the ability to harness the benefits of existing technologies, and its market size. These are all a part of the twelve pillars mentioned earlier, I found this to be impressive because it shows how well rounded a country must be in ordered to be considered competitive. If lacking in one of these areas a country very well could fall to their competition. There are many levels to being a competitive force, countries must start from the bottom until all aspects are strong. Something that was demonstrated in the Global Business Project.

Part C
1) The Global Team Business project has greatly improved my way of adapting to different learning techniques. The team project has enhanced my learning experience greatly and has taught me how to apply all of our ideas and opinions into one collaboration. Three key learning points that I took from this project included how to view business matters from an international perspective, how to work together with other team members to achieve a common goal, and how to efficiently conduct business research on a company and relay that information effectively into a complete, satisfactory project . I learned how to view business matter from an international standpoint by looking in to how our company, Nike, performed worldwide and how they did so. Through our research I was able to see how Nike adapted to the needs of customers in different areas of the world and how they performed in turn. In order for our project to be successful we all had to learn to compromise and respect other one another’s views, schedules, time, and also how balance out the work evenly so no one person was doing a majority of the project. So, that is exactly what I learned, personally, how to do all of those things and come out with a satisfactory project to turn in. This is very important for while working your way up no matter if it is in business or medicine, knowing how to work effectively with other people is imperative for success. The third key learning point that I took from this project is how to conduct business research efficiently and relay that information into a complete, satisfactory project. By “business research” I mean the researching of the components of a given company, in this case, Nike. I learned how to search webpages and articles for information on the company and analyze components of that company based on what I had read. Analyzing, thinking outside of the box, and problem solving all came into play here. This is very important once again not only in the business field, nut in all other fields as well. The project as a whole was mainly done collectively, with all group members contributing evenly to all parts. However, personally I conducted research on what countries Nike is currently doing business in and how they alter their company to suit the needs of these countries. I also created a list of potential problems the company may face and how they could go about solving said problems. Lastly, I collected all pieces of the project and put them together in an organized manner, along with designing the cover page and turning it in as a whole. A few things that were nearly impossible to do but would have improved our teamwork for the Global Project included, being able to actually visit a Nike factory as a group and see everything in action from an inside perspective. Also, it would have been nice if our group could have actually spoken with a representative from Nike that is from a different country and could provide us with solid insight on problems faced worldwide. Lastly, I feel like it really would’ve improved our teamwork if we could have presented out project in the form of a presentation to the class so we could include visual aids such as videos and pictures to better illustrate what we had come up with.