After returning from the wonderful journey taken in Costa Rica, there is so much that I’ve learned and have taken back with me. From the various business visits, the adventures, and diving into the local culture, I am much more well rounded than when I left. The 2 main learning experiences that stuck out to me the most pertained to the ICU Medical Visit and the daily interaction with the local culture.

What was one of the most beneficial information I obtained was hearing ICU’s business model pertaining to ensuring high quality and the extremes that they go through obtain it. They are extremely focused on employee satisfaction and consider this their key to success. Their ability to motivate 2400+ employees to output the highest quality in a culture that is extremely laid back and unaware of time is quite the obstacle, and through their policies and environment they are able to achieve their goals.

Secondly, I learned how to adapt to a culture that didn’t primarily speak English. I had never left the country or was ever placed in a position where others didn’t understand me and I didn’t understand them. Being forced to learn basic Spanish in order to conduct routine activities was a great learning experience. I feel much more comfortable visiting another Latin American country now but would definitely want to learn more Spanish before doing so.

3 business examples:

1. Gator cove Cajun seafood restaurant

• Contribution to economy: tax revenue from restaurant sales, serves great tasting food to tourist to help encourage return visits

2. Cajun Swamp Tours

• Contribution to economy: tax revenue from swamp tours, exposure to fun activities offered in the state to encourage tourists to return.

3. Cocodrie Fishing Tours

• Contribution to economy: tax revenue from chartered fishing trips, provides a great fishing experience to tourists and teaches proper fishing techniques and water preservation practices to preserve LA fishing

If I was in charge of preserving our culture I would institute programs to invest in coastal and waterway cleanup as well as tax incentives for local restaurants to help them reinvest in their businesses and advertise to promote visits from tourists and local residents.

I believe the future for organic products in agriculture, industry, and home use is extremely bright. Within the past 5 years, especially in the United States, the use of organic products and consumption of organic goods has accelerated greatly beyond the large cities and into the suburbs. With the increased awareness of side effects of toxic chemical use in foods and products, the demand for organic products is constantly increasing.

Pros:

• Natural food production
• Pure soil that doesn’t have chemical runoff into rivers and streams
• Biodegradable products such as paper towels

Cons:

• Higher initial investment costs compared to non-organic chemicals
• Uphill battle of convincing farmers and producers to switch to or use more of organic fertilizers, insecticides, etc.

For most industries in Costa Rica, especially agriculture, there are multiple competitors to consider when determining a business plan. To obtain a competitive advantage, it’s critical for businesses to provide a value added benefit to its consumers.

For example, there are many pineapple farms in Costa Rica. The pineapple farm that we visited today provided a value added benefit of being able to provide pineapples year round to its distributors by manipulating the ripening time of the pineapples so they are able to have crops ready for picking at multiple times in the year. Another example of providing a value added benefit was how the software programming company can provide a custom solution for a company with a need to improve their processes and aren’t quite sure what they need. The ability to not only provide a custom solution, but be able to work with a customer who is unsure of what they need and be able to provide a solution that works for them is a value added benefit.

Business Model

-providing the most superior quality products in their industry

-provide product solutions that make an impact on its end users (nurses, patients)

-Constant innovation

-Seek every opportunity to stand separate itself from its competition

Corporate Culture

-Designed to provide an atmosphere that employees want to be apart of and contribute to producing high quality products

-highly value suggestions from employees and implement suggestions as often as possible

-Reward system for attendance

-long breaks

-Promotes fun, laid back atmosphere (i.e. foosball tables & video games)

-5 minute early clock out for pregnant women and those with disabilities

Cohesiveness between Business Model and Corporate Culture

-The key to providing a quality product is happy employees who share ICU Medical’s interest in building superior products.

-By providing a culture that encourages fun, happiness, and makes the employees feel like their company cares about them is a recipe for happy, quality oriented employees that will be encouraged to seek innovation and efficiency to propel ICU Medical far beyond its competition.

A country’s assets are critical to the likelihood of foreign investment. Whether providing land resources, skilled labor, or tax incentives, there are many factors that can encourage foreign investors. The major assets that Costa Rica has to offer is skilled, hard working laborers, tax incentives via Free Trade Zones, as well as close proximity to, and the same time zone as the United States, which is the main factor tech companies from the U.S. use Costa Rica for their support centers.

One of the main assets that Louisiana has to offer are fossil fuels in the form of oil and natural gas in the Gulf of Mexico. The largest expense in developing a new oil well is drilling the well and constructing the production platform. To reduce the financial impact on oil producers for drilling new oil wells and getting them to the point of producing would be to encourage foreign investors to invest capital into the drilling of the new well and construction of the production platform with a return on investment of their original investment plus interest and additional royalties based on oil production for an agreed upon duration. The state of Louisiana could provide tax incentives to the direct investors as well. The owner company and the state of Louisiana would both benefit from the increased number of oil & gas producing wells.

I can’t wait to arrive in Costa Rica. I have been looking forward to this trip since I started in the MBA program and learned that we had the opportunity to study abroad in Costa Rica. I haven’t left the country before and am most excited to see how different the culture is compared to Louisiana. It’s been almost 10 years since I’ve taken longer than a week off from work and I am excited to have a break from the hustle and bustle of the oilfield and partake in this class in such a beautiful place. I am looking forward to experiencing the natives, the food and fruit, and especially the coffee. I am most excited about the outdoor activities we will get to partake in such as zip lining, snorkeling, and surfing. Lets go!

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton