The results of the international business simulation Global Management Game-2009 have been summed up. based on them Ukrainians were named the best managers in the world
 |
|
MIM Vice President Yuriy Martynyuk (second on the left) congratulates members of the Watcher team that came first |
Steelmakers’ legacy
Today there are many business games in the world that have already become a mandatory part of a business education along with traditional lectures and seminars. Nevertheless, this particular game definitely stands out.
Êîììåíòàðèé
The server of the game is located at the Center for Interactive Simulations at the Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This city is known as the cradle of the U.S. steel industry. On the brink of the 19th and 20th centuries, half of the output of American steel was smelted here. Since the oil business was then only in its nascent stage, the largest fortunes were made in Pittsburgh. Today, the easily forgotten names of the steelmakers and financiers Andrew Carnegie, J. P. Morgan and Andrew Mellon were in those times symbols of success in life. The memory of these gentlemen is immortalized in the names of present-day museums, hospitals and universities. The Carnegie Mellon University is one such higher learning institution.
Incubator of Nobel Prize winners
A business school was founded at the university in 1949 by Andrew Mellon Jr. In the 1970s, student David Tepper studied business at this school. After graduating he applied his knowledge in practice to create a hedge fund with a turnover of US $3 bn and earn a place on the highly acclaimed Forbes list.
In order to become completely successful in life, Tepper, following the American credo, was also obliged to become a major philanthropist. In 2004, he made a US $55 mn donation to his business school. In line with that very same American tradition, the school was immediately named after Tepper.
Was that to tickle his ego? To an extent, it was. At the same time, this was a well thought out investment by Tepper into the image of his business.
The Nobel Prize in Economics has been awarded only since 1969, which is why accordingly only 64 people have received it so far. Seven of them graduated from Mellon… sorry, the Dave Tepper School of Business at the Carnegie-Mellon University.
There is no other incubator of Nobel Prize winners in the world as successful as this school and there likely will not be any time soon. By the way, the last Nobel laureate – a graduate of the Tepper School of Business of 1963 Oliver Williamson – was this year awarded the Nobel Prize “for his analysis of economic governance, especially the boundaries of the firm”
 |
|
Volodymyr Pavlov, |
The path to triumph
The Global Management Game has been played at the Pittsburgh business school since the 1960s and has long been considered an unofficial world championship in business management. It is actually not the game itself – it is not better or worse than many other business simulations – it is about who plays it. It is like in football: the rules are the same for local teams and at the world championships, where the national teams of Brazil, England, Germany, Italy and others play.
The aforementioned Nobel Prize winners and half the entrepreneurs on the Forbes list have participated in the Global Management Game at one time or another. New players try to prove each year that they are capable of running a business better than their competitors and remotely dispute that they are more skilled than Nobel winners and the most successful businessmen on the planet. Ukraine tried its hand in this game back in 2000. As veterans of MIM’s first team that participated in the Global Management Game – 2000 admitted that they were nervous, but had a strong will to win and they eventually did. The team’s success continued: each year the MIM-Kyiv teams were among the winners, while in individual standings MIM players were even leaders. So, the team’s success this year did not come as a surprise.
MIM-Kyiv came out as an undisputed champion. Four of the institute’s teams took first place in their “worlds” (i.e. artificially designed economies). Three of those teams took first place and second and fourth places in overall standings. In individual standings students of MIM-Kyiv took the first twelve places.
All the world’s a game
Each of the winners of the Global Management Game – 2009 said they had gained new and important experience from participating in it.
For example, the Kaipos team set the absolute record on earnings, though it took second place in the overall standings. The team’s president (and captain) Oleksiy Filonenko says it was the further development plan that pulled them down. To be more precise, it was not its plan rather its presentation to the board of directors.
“The presentation of a business hinges much upon one’s acting skills. So, the lesson I learned is that a manager should be a master,” says Filonenko.
Maksym Dubosarskiy of the Watcher team, which won the competition, was amazed by the way the Japanese and Chinese conduct business: “They act like kamikazes, both in life and in business!”
President of the Watcher team Andriy Hubinskiy says he knew a lot earlier, but admitted that the game helped him systematize such knowledge and provided a visual model of how business is conducted around the globe and how capital markets function.
Science and life
The undisputed champion of the Global Management Game – 2009 in trading in own securities Yuriy Derevyanenko of MIM-Kyiv over three conditional years won U.S $600,000 of a start-up budget of U.S $1 mn, which constitutes 20% in annual earnings. This is precisely that scientifically grounded maximum of increasing the well-being of a manager when he or she is entrusted to manage a business and does not confuse what belongs to them and what does not.
However, when a manager with zero capital buys a Landcruiser in a month and a cozy seaside home abroad in a year, this is not about science, rather about life. This is about our lives.
None of the young MIM students dared to forecast when Ukrainian business will begin operating according to the rules generally accepted around the world. But all of them are highly confident that they will live in these times and will manage a Ukrainian business according to the rules they have been taught at MIM-Kyiv. Otherwise, these experienced and successful managers, who know the realities of Ukrainian business, would not waste their precious time on the Global Management Game. And this is likely the most important result of this game.
What is the Global Management Game 2009?
Players
50 teams with 6 members each. In total, there are 300 students of business schools from the U.S., Japan, China, Chile and Ukraine. 10 teams represented Ukraine, all of them representing MIM-Kyiv.
Rules of the game
A virtual playing field consisted of 10 parallel “worlds” – i.e. consumer goods markets. The product in all worlds was the same – a watch. But the markets for this product were different in each world and did not cross each other’s paths. The initial conditions were the same for all teams: they owned two factories in the U.S. and in China. Market shares, profitability of the enterprises and some other initial factors slightly differed.
The task of each team was to conquer its rivals in their own “world”. Moreover, each of the 300 players was a virtual millionaire, their money was invested in shares and they could play on stock markets in other “worlds” (this was prohibited in players’ own “worlds” by the rules of the game) in order to increase their personal well-being. This was called securities trading.
Playing time
Each team had to run its business for a conventional 3 years. The timetable was tight: 1 calendar week equaled 1 conventional quarter. At the beginning of every week, teams received Microsoft Excel files, including production and financial results of the previous “quarter” and the current financial and economic situation in the “world” and made new decisions. After every conventional year came to an end, the teams reported to the boards of directors and were given new tasks for the next years from the companies’ owners.
How was the winner
determined?
Maximum profits and shares of the markets in certain “worlds” guaranteed only 40% of the victory. The future prospects of companies were also an important factor. 10% of the final results depended on the personal evaluations of every team member (their ability to manage a personal securities portfolio, bonuses from the board of directors, etc.). Finally, 10% of the victory depended on the opinions of rival teams.
Printable version
