International Leadership and Entrepreneurship

International Leadership and Entrepreneurship 

Today, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play a significant role in most economies, especially in developing countries. The majority of businesses worldwide are as a result of SMEs, and they play a vital role in the creation of employment and global economic development. Currently, approximately 90% of businesses and more than 50% of employment worldwide is as a result of SMEs, and they contribute to up to 40% of national income (GDP) in developing economies (Keskġn, 2010). Therefore, as SMEs grow in size, there a need for the entrepreneur to evolve and adapt to the changes as fast as possible. It usually takes a special kind of individual to make an entrepreneur and formulate an idea, and put the same idea in action. To be an entrepreneur, you have to be ready to take risks and see the reward, not the risk's negative side. 

As a business grows in size, its organizational structure and culture will unavoidably shift and become more structured and formal.  Such changes will need to be managed effectively if the business has to grow successfully with no bureaucracy layers. Therefore, SMEs require flexible, fast, and focused leaders, including dynamic culture, to help them thrive in this post-COVID-19 hardship and become successful. 

In order to make great leaders, entrepreneurs should embrace strategy and culture to maintain organizational viability and effectiveness. Normally strategy provides a formal logic for the company's goals and orient individuals around them. At the same time, culture presents goals through values and beliefs and guides activity via shared postulations and group norms. Thus, it is the culture that upholds the name of an organization which means; a bad culture will lead an organization to an imminent failure; however, a good culture will make the business thrive and succeed just like as stated by Peter Drucker, "Culture eats strategy for breakfast" (Drucker, 2016).         

Task One 

Question 1: 

 With the current situation of post-COVID-19, tomorrow is not promised as nobody knows what tomorrow will look like. As a result of this pandemic situation, uncertainty exists in the world. However, life must continue, and thus, enterprises should strive to adapt to the current situation of post-COVID-19. Currently, a lot of organizations across the globe have realized how much their business models relied on a smooth-sailing environment with no setbacks. All businesses across the world are now closed, consumers have been forced to change their buying patterns making businesses go digital or adapt to the current culture of customers. Consequently, businesses need to adapt to a new era of the digital world where most organizations, firms, SMEs, and institutions have invested in Technology, Artificial Intelligence, and Social Media (Renz & Hilbig, 2020). 

Firstly, for businesses to thrive in this post-COVID-19 situation at the international level, entrepreneurs should be creative and innovative. Although machines and digital technologies have been seen taking human roles in analytics and business operations, they cannot think nor feel and thus they are not as perfect as human beings. Innovative and creative entrepreneurs will always have an upper hand over others. Due to post COVID-19 consequences on business across the world, there is a need for businesses at the international level to evolve and adapt rapidly due to changes in people's lifestyle, social distancing, and isolation, making business turn digital (Gregurec, Tomičić Furjan, & Tomičić-Pupek, 2021). For instance, any entrepreneur willing to venture into entrepreneurship will need to consult their creative mindset and be innovative to steer the business through the challenges and opportunities his/her faces. 

Additionally, there is a need for entrepreneurs to be 'tech-savvy.' Although the use digital skills gap has been in operation even before COVID-19 across the globe, the pandemic has increased the desperate need for specialist skillsets to help the business become more aligned with the current's myriad technologies and platforms. The fourth Industrial Revolution on the horizon has raised a need to invest in technologies and individuals who understand that technology is essential. Although some might find it challenging to understand every system or platform, one should show a solid working knowledge of data literacy, computer programming, big data, the cloud, artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, and more, which will help you succeed in your business (Moşteanu, 2020).                                                     

Question 2 

With the increasing size of SMEs, an entrepreneur needs to keep up with the change such as information technology. Entrepreneurs must evolve their skills in technology, critical thinking, computer programming, coding, artificial intelligence, and the ability to handle extensive business operations as the enterprise's size has grown. Important traits such as adaptability should be practiced and perfected by the entrepreneur as the enterprise develops in size. Being adaptable will help the entrepreneur keep up with his/her business's pace despite the challenges passed through. Also, as your enterprise develops, you would encounter big challenges. Some might be your competitors; there will be changes in government policies and regulations, making them complex; however, the more persistent an entrepreneur is, the more the business flourishes. Succeeding without persistence is very hard, and nothing can take the place of persistence. 

Today, an entrepreneur is seen as a hero for the Free enterprise market. The current and future entrepreneurs are expected to be innovative and creative and should be willing to take risks in their SMEs. As such, as SMEs grow in size, more operations will emerge, especially growth in technology as most business will venture into AI where modern technologies and the internet have improved the ways of conducting business, giving the entrepreneurs of the 21st century the opportunity of putting their business idea into action through the click of a button. Therefore, with the rapid changes being experienced by entrepreneurs as the enterprises develops in size, persistence is the virtue all entrepreneurs should grow, train, and master in order to survive the hard time expected (Burns, 2016). 

Task two Question 1 

As businesses across the world face crisis amidst the global COVID-19 pandemic, the airline industry faces the same fate with a confirmed significant decline in passenger number (Maneenop & Kotcharin, 2020). This is as a result of imposed government lockdowns, social distancing, and general disruptions in the social for life in order to contain the novel coronavirus. Therefore, there is a need for airline industry players to be agile and holistic at-risk management, including accounting risk, in parallel with direct economic risks. As such, this industry needs soft leadership management skills that will propel most airline companies to the forefront as companies compete favorably in a world that has gone digital due to post-COVID-19 (Lee & Park, 2020). Thus, airline industries leaders should develop leadership skills that should be targeted at specific high-leverage skills to provide the management with the best possible chances for success of airlines in this post-Covid-19 era. Such leadership skills include communication skills, empathy, hybrid team leadership, and technology smarts. 

Communication skills are among the skills that most managers in the airline industry should practice in this precondition for business and the spectrum of realistic business outcomes are subject to rapid change. A management team with good communication skills will help foster communications in airline companies to the forefront of operational activities with the aim of keeping all stakeholders up to date. As a result, leaders in the airline industry are called upon to communicate effectively with candor and different aims and always target audiences in mind. Communicating with candor means a leader has the quality of being open and honest. The only way leaders can manage the overwhelming whirlwind of information and shifting circumstances is through making sure the information delivered is clear, candid, consistent, reliable, and fact-based information (Avery, 2005). This essential because there will be no room for misleading half-truths or irresponsible optimism due to anxiety and cynicism looming large. As such, certain humility, self-awareness, openness to feedback, and a steady flow of communication both on and offline are called upon to make the airline industries strive to succeed in this turbulent time.  

Currently, technology platforms such as Zoom and Microsoft Teams are currently largely used by major companies. Such rapid changes need the leaders of airline industries to sharpen their skills in leveraging technology. Such kind of solutions in technology, together with the workflow management team, project-based collaboration, and communication, has currently turned significant in this turbulent time of the COVID-19 pandemic since they will ensure airline companies withstand future waves and other potential epidemics (Hepburn, 2020). Additional sources for airline corporate success will include robotics, augmented reality, big data, artificial intelligence, and the internet. Thus, airline corporate firms will need an executive leader who has proper leveraging technological skills, build a strong digital presence, those leaders who have the capability to draw upon competencies in the areas of cloud computing, digital marketing, web development, modeling, and coding to help stand head and shoulders above the rest of other airline companies. At the moment, the rapidly heightened significance of data in decision-making will require the leadership management team to learn new strengths in data and media literacy, problem-solving and critical thinking. 

Question 2 

The arts and culture sector across the world has also been largely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, with museums, cultural institutions, World Heritage Sites, and other historic monuments closed, making communities deprived of their culture and, most significantly, revenue (Guest, 2021). Although some countries are lifting off their lockdown measures, most countries are still closed. Due to the cancellation of national and local cultural and religious events, aviation industries have been majorly affected, and this has just shown the importance is culture to this industry that is on the edge of failure. Also, the culture of the airline company is of significance to the passenger since it will either attract them or frighten them since everybody is afraid of contracting the virus. This shows that airline firms should create values and norms that will not only prevent the spread of COVID-19 but also make passengers comfortable and secure (Amankwah-Amoah, 2020). Additionally, as a result of government-imposed measures to help prevent the spread of COVID-19, some measures discourage people from traveling to such oversee countries; this will affect largely impact the airlines of such countries. 

Resumption of air travel will now depend on the measures that a specific airline company will uphold and their restrictive measures, social distancing, self-isolation, and most importantly, social perception (Song & Choi, 2020, pg. 9). As such, there is a need for the airline corporate management team to integrate cultural considerations more visibly and explicitly while making decisions. By paying attention to the culture that favors both the organization and the passengers, the airline company will cruise successfully through this hard time. As every country is trying its best to contain the virus, measures such as self-isolation and social distancing are mandatory. For instance, airlines in the U.K are having a difficult time after the British Government made it mandatory that arriving passengers from a number of countries will be required to spend in a quarantined hotel at their own expense. This has given a great blow to U.K airlines as they have been left floundering trying to adapt to timetables and respond to customers (Mulvihill & Beaumont, 2021). As such, the airlines have been compelled to start recommending pre-flight COVID-19 testing in order to reduce the need for quarantines and post-flight testing in order to allow people free of the virus to cut short any required quarantine measures. This has raised the need for airline companies to learn to adapt to culture when the need arises swiftly. 

Conclusively, airlines will depend on culture in all aspects, and thus there is a need for these corporate firms to improve on their leadership and management skills that will make sure they thrive despite the post-COVID-19 situation. Currently, life has changed, people socialize differently, everything has turned digital, countries have changed their norms and values, and thus, the airliners have to adapt in order to keep up with this rapid change. Therefore, the future of airline growth depends on how the management team will be able to adapt to this demanding and changing culture. 

Reference List 

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Song, K.H. and Choi, S., 2020. A Study on the Behavioral Change of Passengers on Sustainable Air Transport After COVID-19. Sustainability, 12(21), p.9207. 

Renz, A. and Hilbig, R., 2020. Prerequisites for artificial intelligence in further education: identification of drivers, barriers, and business models of educational technology companies. International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education, 17, pp.1-21. 

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Moşteanu, N.R., 2020. Challenges for Organizational Structure and design as a result of digitalization and cybersecurity. The Business & Management Review, 11(1), pp.278-286. 

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Avery, G., 2005. Leadership for sustainable futures: Achieving success in a competitive world. Edward Elgar Publishing. 

Hepburn, N.J., 2020. A Case Study: Exploring the Perceptions of Generation Z about the Value of Their Digital Knowledge and Skills in a Selected Health Services Organization (Doctoral dissertation, Drexel University). 

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Amankwah-Amoah, J., 2020. Stepping up and stepping out of COVID-19: New challenges for environmental sustainability policies in the global airline industry. Journal of Cleaner Production, 271, p.123000. 

Drucker, P., 2016. Culture eats strategy for breakfast. Doesn’t it. 

Keskġn, H., Ġentürk, C., Sungur, O. and Kġrġġ, H.M., 2010, June. The importance of SMEs in developing economies. In 2nd International Symposium on Sustainable Development (pp. 183-192).