Corporations

Company Site visits
Businesses within close proximity to Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania are encouraged to consider hosting a small group of interns for a site visit. Site visits usually include a tour of the facility with an overview of the business operations and an interactive discussion with the company’s management team. Typical site visits are two hours in length.

The Global Village also travels to New York City, Washington DC and Baltimore, Maryland. During these trips, we take both large and small groups of interns to area businesses for site visits as described above. These site visits tend to be shorter in length and usually last a maximum of 90 minutes.

Companies interested in participating on our site visit program are encouraged to contact Sherry Buss, Curriculum Director at slb9@lehigh.edu or 610-758-6509.

Executive Visitor Program
During the Global Village, we provide interns the opportunity to interact with more than 60 executives who represent large and small corporations, family-owned businesses, start-up companies, and sole proprietorships. These interactions are a key feature of the program.

Each week in the Global Village, top-level senior executives visit the program to spend time interacting with interns. During these visits, they meet with small groups of interns for informal discussions about business trends, corporate ventures, career paths, successes and failures, and the future.

More importantly, it is the interns themselves who direct the conversation by asking questions, by raising objections, and by offering alternative points-of-view and the best practices of their respective nations. Again and again, visiting executives tell us what a rare joy it is to have the opportunity to learn from others as well as to teach from their own experiences.

The time commitment for executive visitors is a half-day. Executives arrive on campus at 8 AM where they will be greeted by their intern hosts. The interns will spend the next 30 minutes with the executive meeting with the executive in person and finalizing the morning introduction. At 8:30 AM, executives accompanied by their intern hosts will proceed to the morning meeting. Each of the five executives that are with the Village that day will have 15 minutes to present their session topic. For example, you will have 15 minutes to share your story with the entire group of 100 interns and staff. After each executive has their "15 minutes", then we will proceed to the breakout sessions. Interns will decide which executive's roundtable they want to sit in based on the executives' presentations.

Following the morning presentations, each executive will hold two consecutive roundtable discussions with different groups of interns. These sessions will be moderated by one of our management staff. This first session will run from 10 AM to 11:15 AM and the second session will be held from 11:30 AM to 12:45 PM.

A summary of the executive day is as follows…

8:00 AM Arrival at Lehigh University
8:30 AM Introductions and Executive Presentations
10 AM Roundtable Discussion #1
11:30 AM Roundtable Discussion #2
1:00 PM Executive Day concludes

The afternoons of our executive days are dedicated to group sessions such as country panel presentations and leadership roundtables. As always, our executives are both welcomed and encouraged to stay with us and partake in the rest of the day’s activities.
For more information on the Global Village Executive Visitor Program, please contact Sherry Buss, Curriculum Director at slb9@lehigh.edu or 610-758-6509.

Global Village Business Consulting Projects
A key component of the Global Village curriculum is the Business Consulting Project. These projects are mutually beneficial for the participants of the program and the companies the projects serve.
From the perspective of the person within the organization that hosts a project, these projects are a valuable means for a fresh and objective view, and often a unique approach, to a real business issue. At NO COST to the company, approximately 350-400 of person hours are dedicated to researching, analyzing, and providing recommendations on the given issue. The multi-cultural teams are comprised of six or seven highly-talented individuals, with skills sets relevant to the type of project identified. A formal presentation and final report are provided to the client at project closure. The primary commitment on the part of the representative(s) of the organization is to be available for an in-person or teleconference meeting at the start and conclusion of the project. These two meetings should not exceed six hours total, but should also be supplemented with periodic telephone calls and/or email correspondence with the project team throughout the duration of the project.
Typical projects are those which:

Focus on a real business issue that may be addressed in approximately 250 to 300 man-hours over a six-week, summer schedule
See a deliverable that is important to the company as a basis for decision making and/or implementation (example: new market entry)
Face a real issue, which requires a “fresh” look from various cultural perspectives
Are from companies which have, or desire to have, an international presence
May be financial, marketing and/or economic in nature for either products or services
May be research and analysis intensive, but also have a creative component

Does not require a great deal of technical “spin up” on the company’s product or service
Scoped to fit the six-week, summer schedule of the GV

Each year, approximately 14 projects are selected for the Global Village. If you are interested in hosting a project from your organization, please contact Carol Ham at (610) 735-3467 or csh205@lehigh.edu.