Teaching international business development using current business metrics

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to set forth a less-costly, more flexible approach to teaching the analysis of international business development opportunities. Design/methodology/approach: The approach capitalizes upon the high-quality business condition metrics, which are necessary to inform the development decision, that have recently become freely-available through a set of institutions that gather and distribute these metrics. Findings: Critical thinking skills in this area are developed here not just by understanding the tools of analysis but also by having participated in a series of active classroom activities focused upon private investment decisions in a set of disparate countries. Practical implications: This approach develops rising business professionals with refined critical thinking skills who will be able to immediately contribute to international business development decision-making. Social implications: Opportunities for students to learn these critical thinking skills can be far more available because the traditional method by which these skills have been taught has been by finding a partner business with the resources to pay for such data. In exchange for allowing students to use the data experientially the partner firm benefits from the work product of the students who study the international business development project at the firm’s offices. Originality/value: The approach set forth provides an accessible alternate for those on-campus students and distance-learning students who do not need to have the flexibility to travel to the site of a business partner – where most of this learning has heretofore been arranged.