The Routledge Companion to International Management Education

6EMERGING COMPLEXITY IN INTERNATIONAL MANAGEMENT

Joo-Seng Tan

 

 

Introduction

In the twenty-first century, there have been seismic shifts from stability to instability, and from predictability to non-predictability, in every area of life. Extraordinary political, economic, social, and technological transformations and disruptions have unleashed “tsunamis” of chaos, volatility, and complexity in all aspects of life. Recent studies by IBM (2010) and KPMG (2011) spotlight the importance of managing complexity in the global marketplace. Key findings reveal that businesses face increasing complexity that presents both management challenges and opportunities. In fact, in the IBM study, one key finding was the significant gap between the need for complexity ...