Canada: A Suitable Destination for an MBA Student

Students taking a Masters of Business Administration (MBA) have similar goals; to become global business managers and leaders, to become their own bosses or to get higher salaries. While undertaking the MBA program, it is essential for students to learn through experiences by visiting countries that make significant contributions to the global economy. One such state is Canada. The country’s alignment to global business in the past few years has propelled it towards becoming the new global leader. This paper discusses some of the reasons that make Canada a suitable country for an MBA student to visit.

Canada is open to trade and has the potential of becoming a free trade hub in the near future. It is crucial for an MBA student to understand the current trends in world trade. For example such as when other countries like the U.S are becoming protective regarding trade, Canada is taking the opposite direction. That position makes it easy for Canada to diversify trading measures into various markets (Kelley, 2017). What’s relevant here is to learn what the Canadian government and other stakeholders are doing to maximize on this opportunity. Furthermore the opportunities opens the trade space for both small and large businesses, it would therefore be useful to assess how the small and big companies are utilizing the space.

Secondly, Canada is building many new companies that require top talent to grow. However, the country does not have the needed expertise to help the companies scale. Therefore, managers are aggressively seeking the best talent from all over the world (Rufollo, 2017). This aspect is significant for an MBA student because he or she can learn how the Canadian companies are building talent pipelines.

Canada has remained calm despite the ongoing political turmoil around the globe. While the U.S is dealing with the coming in of Trump administration and its controversial policies on immigration and the U.K is busy working on leaving the European Union, Canada remains one of the countries whose current status, and contribution to the global economy can be used to project the future of world economy better. What is essential for an MBA student is to study the strategies that the country is employing to seize the opportunities.

Although Canada is ranked the ninth largest economy in the world, it still needs to enhance innovation and productivity (“Canada’s Role and Influence Internationally”, 2017). The country therefore, needs to have movements and organizations that support innovation and help improve productivity by encouraging people to work (Traill, 2017). As an MBA student, it would be useful to learn how the Canadian organizations are fostering innovation and enhancing employee motivation to improve work efficacy. It will also be helpful to identify the areas of innovation and if they align to the current global trends.

Even with the promises of growing trade and economy, Canadian multinational companies have had stagnated growth for the past two decades. Apart from that, the country’s leading trade partner has been the United States only. Therefore, Canadian multinational companies still face the challenge of competing against industrial giants of emerging economies (Simpson and Ramaswamy, 2017). The growth process of Canadian industries into the world market is worth studying mainly on the strategies being employed to keep up with the global pace of development. Simpson and Ramaswamy, (2017) suggest that Canada should transform the way it conducts business, get leaner and more productive locally while pursuing growth opportunities in other parts of the world. It would be useful for an MBA student to find out how business leaders are incorporating such recommendations in the management of their companies.

References

Canada’s Role and Influence Internationally. (2017). Bdp.parl.ca. Retrieved 11 February 2018, from https://bdp.parl.ca/content/lop/researchpublications/cei-15-e.htm

Kelly, D. (2017). Why 2017 might be the year Canada leads the new global economy. Canadian Business - Your Source for Business News. Retrieved 11 February 2018, from http://www.canadianbusiness.com/innovation/why-2017-might-be-the-year-canada-leads-the- new-global-economy/

Rufollo, J. (2017). Why 2017 might be the year Canada leads the new global economy. Canadian Business - Your Source for Business News. Retrieved 11 February 2018, from http://www.canadianbusiness.com/innovation/why-2017-might-be-the-year-canada-leads-the- new-global-economy/

Simpson, B., & Ramaswamy, S. (2017). Canada’s winning combination for the new global economy. The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 11 February 2018, from https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-commentary/canadas-winning- combination-for-the-new-global-economy/article29394854/

Traill, R. (2017). Why 2017 might be the year Canada leads the new global economy. Canadian Business - Your Source for Business News. Retrieved 11 February 2018, from http://www.canadianbusiness.com/innovation/why-2017-might-be-the-year-canada-leads-the- new-global-economy/