International Law and Transactions - 30 points
Question 1: 10 points
Jackson owns a business in a foreign country that is considered "friendly" with the U.S. but which has significant political unrest. Jackson is uneasy about the situation in the country. He is concerned that his business could be the subject of expropriation or losses due to civil unrest. What advice would you give him? (50 words or fewer)
Question 2: 10 points
Connie owns a retail establishment that sells electronics. She does a lot of business with Company ABC in Japan. Connie does not want to learn Japanese law or travel to Japan in the event of a dispute with the company. She seeks advice regarding how she can protect herself from risks in the event of a dispute. How would you advise her? (50 words or fewer)
Question 3: 10 points
Allison, a dress designer, believes that she has a great deal with a company in Ireland, called Fashion, which has agreed to purchase a number of her dresses. The manager of Fashion, however, insists on delivery of the dresses before payment will be provided. What would you advise her to do to protect her interests? (50 words or fewer)
Ethical Leadership Review: 20 points
MegaFun Games Company
As it approaches its 100th anniversary, MegaFun Games, once the undisputed leader in the family games/entertainment industry and a beloved brand among consumers, finds itself in dire straits. The collapse of the economy, the emergence of strong niche competitors in nearly every one of its product lines, and a recent string of less-than-successful new-product introductions has produced such dramatic revenue losses and accompanying decreases in profitability that the very existence of the company is thought to be at serious risk. In fact, the situation has become so desperate that MegaFun-which has always thought of itself as more like a family than a business and which had avoided laying off employees even during the Great Depression-now feels it has no choice but to cut costs by cutting employees.
Each department manager has been asked to cut one employee. In the small, but highly compensated, Games Design Department, there are 4 people under consideration:
The first, Leo, is a highly educated and experienced former marketing executive in his early 60s. About 4 years ago, though he had no formal game-design experience, he submitted an application portfolio to MegaFun. The portfolio so impressed MegaFun's reviewers that the company flew him in for interviews and hired him on the spot. MegaFun paid a small fortune to move Leo and his wife to Merryville, the medium-sized Midwestern city where MegaFun was headquartered. Leo also was hired at a higher pay grade than MegaFun typically offered to new employees. Since joining MegaFun, Leo has been a model employee. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the most conceptual thinkers in the company, and his broad experience in other industries and his flexible and innovative thinking have allowed him to contribute productively to every phase of the MegaFun product line, from board games to interactive Internet offerings. He is widely liked by co-workers, is a sought-after collaborator, and has contributed significantly to many important projects. Leo and his wife have no children. His wife has a successful career as a highly compensated political consultant. They have a showplace home and seem to be well fixed for money.
Miranda is a 40-ish single mother of three teenagers. She had moved to Merryville because its atmosphere was more conducive to bringing up her kids than city life on the west coast, where she had worked in the entertainment industry in a wide variety of positions, ranging from animal wrangler to stunt person to script doctor. Miranda is very savvy about the likes and dislikes of tweens, teens, and young adults-the prime audiences for MegaFun's products. She is an extremely hard worker and is always willing to take on multiple projects simultaneously and to do grunt work that others find boring. Her performance evaluations have always been excellent. Miranda's financial situation is iffy: she was hired at the base level for a game designer so, with kids to care for, she has to work numerous moonlighting jobs in order to make ends meet. These jobs leave her in a constant state of sleep deprivation, which in turn leads to more frequent than usual bouts of illness and missed work days. Despite this, Miranda has rarely missed a deadline and is thorough and professional in her work. However, her unpredictable absences can be frustrating to her project teammates and sometimes result in having to reschedule important meetings multiple times. Miranda's been with MegaFun for about 6 years but has not yet been promoted and is known to be disappointed about that situation.
Antwan is a hotshot designer in his early 20s. He was recruited to MegaFun after a summer there as an intern, where he had shown great promise. Although he's been at the company for less than two years, he's already been promoted from Designer I to Designer II. He has formal training in computer graphics and animation, has attended film school, and is a brilliant scriptwriter. He has a wicked sense of humor and, although generally well liked, his occasionally immature and barbed remarks about others' work sometimes gets him into trouble. He can also at times be something of a prima donna concerning what projects he is or is not willing to work on or people he is or is not willing to work with. He is a little cavalier when it comes to observing work hours and deadlines; and his supervisor has spoken to him about this on a couple of occasions-but nothing has ever appeared on his formal reviews. Antwan is quite ambitious-while MegaFun feels lucky to have landed him, there are also recent rumors that he is floating his resume out to competitors. But whenever this subject comes up, for example in casual lunchtime conversation, Antwan never confirms the rumors and always asserts his satisfaction with his current situation.
Marybeth is a long-time employee of MegaFun: she joined the company as a young woman right out of high school many years ago, and it is the only place she's ever worked. She began her career as an administrative assistant in the finance department, but worked hard to learn all aspects of the company's operations and managed, through her innate talent and long hours, to make the rare switch from the business side to the creative side of the company. Her rise at MegaFun coincided with the company's go-go years, when it could do no wrong and made huge profits each year, and the retirement package she has amassed will be substantial. That retirement package will become 100% vested in six months. During her years in Game Design, Marybeth has created many lucrative products for MegaFun, particularly in the board and card games areas, which seem to be a particular strength of hers. But in recent years, with the emphasis shifting to interactive video games and other digital formats, Marybeth has struggled to contribute-it's been awhile since one of her ideas has been accepted for development. However, the other designers love working with her and say she is really good at offering suggestions that improve their ideas.
Using Professor Badaracco's framework, if you had to make this decision, what would you do? Consider all steps of the process, including the three tests. Incorporate any relevant information from preceding weeks of the course in your discussion. Your discussion should not exceed 900 words (approximately 3.5 pages, double spaced).