IB CUEGIS Essay Guide (Updated 2023)

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IB CUEGIS essay is a conceptual extended response question. It is addressed by students in section C of their Business Management Paper 2. This essay accounts for 10% of your score, and if you know how to do it right, you have an easy scoring opportunity that will take you a step closer to achieving that perfect IBDP score you have been preparing for.

 

A student has to answer the given question using two of the six concepts, They are:

 

1. Change
2. Culture
3. Ethics
4. Globalization
5. Strategy
6. Innovation

 

These concepts are used as a foundation to address real-life organizations' situations and issues. A student needs to use business management tools, techniques, and theories to analyze the business activities they have chosen. This helps them showcase their application of acquired knowledge.

 

For better preparedness, you must identify specific real-life business organizations to which you can apply these CUEGIS concepts. Choose an organization going through a significant period of structural or cultural transformation, ethical dilemmas, challenges related to globalization, strategic decisions, or innovation opportunities. Doing so gives you a lot of material to discuss and elaborate on in your essay. One of the main aspects is to show the examiner that you know your organization inside out. This, in turn, helps you display your understanding of CUEGIS concepts in your IB Business Management paper. Even though the examination questions often prompt a student to discuss only two concepts in the context of their chosen organizations, it is suggested that you select organizations to which more than two concepts apply. This will allow you to gain flexibility in using your knowledge in a way required by your chosen examination question.

 

Once you have selected an organization of your choice, you study the concepts of change, culture, ethics, globalization, strategy, and innovation (CUEGIS). In a nutshell, you need to highlight activities by the organization that reflect the concepts above (or the lack thereof). It is suggested that your answers are backed by concrete examples.

 

Using business management tools while elaborating on any of the CUEGIS aspects in your chosen organization is the ideal way to support your analysis. An example of doing so can be using the Fishbone Diagram for a problem in a company that can be initiated due to the lack of ethical protocols. Lastly, you must identify possibilities of other perspectives on any of the CUEGIS concepts in the company from the viewpoint of different stakeholders of the organization.

 

In short, the essence of CUEGIS essay are:

1. CUEGIS concepts
2. Real-life examples of organizations
3. Business tools, insights, and theories from your course

 

The CUEGIS essay is more accessible to wrap your head around than your TOK essay and TOK presentation. If you have gone through and understood our TOK Essay Guide and TOK Presentation Guide, then acing your CUEGIS essay will be a breeze. CUEGIS, akin to TOK, focuses on your acquired knowledge, application of the learned concepts, and your ability to relate it to the real world.

 

Before we dive into how to write your CUEGIS essay’s answer, let’s understand the pillars around which your answer might be built.

Change refers to adapting business objectives, strategies, and operations to accommodate changes. These changes can occur due to exogenous factors or because of endogenous ones. As a wise man once said, 'Change is the only constant in the dynamic business environment.' Your job is to understand how effective your organization is in accommodating unprecedented and inevitable changes. This includes the decisions which need to be made to keep up with the changes in the operating environment. Every change brings with it a favorable and opposing force. The relative strength of these forces concludes whether the change should take place. Due to the conflicting parties, change must be managed within organizations if they are to move forward and remain competitive. Force-field analysis is a management tool to understand the gravitas of the change and its impact on the organization.

 

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The tool serves as a framework for helping managers to understand the pressures for and against any change. By identifying these forces, managers can assess the points' effects. This analysis lets managers know if the upcoming change is good for the company. If so, they can investigate how to implement the difference in the best way possible. 

 

Example: 

For generations, Kodak was synonymous with photography. Founded in 1889, the company was one of the best-known brands of the twentieth century. However, with the rise of digital cameras, the market for camera films (dominated by Kodak) dissolved quickly. Instead of embracing the wave of change, Kodak ignored the difference and proceeded to expand its global workforce and increase its production of the old technology. By 2006 it was selling an obsolete product, and in 2013 the company filed for bankruptcy protection. Had they better analyzed the change's forces and deemed it inevitable, they may have invested more in their Research and Development Department to adopt the new trend. You, too, should be able to present such claims with evidence. Here evidence would be other companies who foresaw a similar change and, as a result, acted in favor of it. Of course, your answer must be well-structured and more formal in nature.

To understand a company, one needs to dig deep into its culture. Culture is heavily influenced by the country in which the company operates. Culture mainly comprises the values, beliefs, and norms of an organization. It shapes the customs of people and how things get done. To say that culture makes a company's soul is not an exaggeration. It also helps a company have an individual identity. For instance, JP Morgan's culture will differ from that of the Timberland Company. Your job is to understand the impact of the company's culture on its operation.

 

Example: Consider studying Ben and Jerry's and how their culture of helping local vendors has resulted in an exponential increase in sales!

Ethics are the socially accepted moral principles that guide decision-making based on the collective belief of right and wrong. The somewhat subjective nature of ethics means it is sometimes unclear what is ‘right’ or ‘wrong,’ especially when looking at an issue from the perspective of various cultures. Every organization has its own beliefs and has based its ethics on them.

 

Example: The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Companies (OPEC) has a unique set of ethics that justifies its actions. The actions might be ethically wrong for a company working in sustainable and green energy simply because they focus on eliminating the need for Petroleum as a fuel.

Globalization is the coming together of various countries and organizations to create many opportunities unknown to humanity a century from now. It has helped integrate social and economic factors. Moreover, it has helped various multinationals capitalize on markets across the globe. This has also enabled a better allocation of global resources.

 

You will need to study how your organization benefits through globalization. Not only that, but you should also be aware of the challenges this global phenomenon has caused (like the spread of coronavirus in the year 2020).

 

Example: Globalisation considerably increases the level of competition. The expansion of multinational corporations was an unprecedented challenge for local vendors. Even small and medium-sized companies needed to change their selling strategies to overcome this challenge.

Innovation in the CUEGIS concept refers to changing or creating more effective processes, products, and ideas that may increase a business's likelihood of succeeding. Creation emphasizes companies' need to renew themselves in the competitive and technologically advanced marketplace with increasingly sophisticated customers. Innovation in the corporate world often empowers a business to attain a competitive advantage. It is observed that the most economically successful companies and countries are the ones that have an innovative corporate culture. Creative entrepreneurs thrive on commercializing new ideas or reinventing existing ones. Innovation often leads to new industries, like smartphones and tablet computers. In today's highly unpredictable business world, innovation has become an integral strategy, leading many multinational companies to financially commit to innovation.

 

Innovation can apply to all aspects of business activities, not just products. For example, innovation is integral to Kaizen. Management guru Michael Porter (yes, he was the one behind porter's five forces model and many more) said that innovation is essential for the prospects of a business and for the economic prosperity of a country. Creative and holistic thinking towards their entire business operations drives innovation amongst managers. To analyze how innovative your chosen organization is, you can track its continuous improvement and the innovations introduced in its production processes and/or products.

 

Example: Look no further than Toyota when talking about innovation. Known for its process improvement concepts, Kaizen has revolutionized the industry's functions. It would help if you considered looking into new and upcoming innovations such as industry 4.0. Consider analyzing the way your chosen enterprise is integrating the upcoming innovations!

The strategy is about devising plans to achieve an organization's long-term goals. Most organizations strive to anticipate their stakeholders' future needs to succeed. Strategic analysis requires a thorough review of an organization's current situation, including examining an organization's existing vision, mission, aims, and objectives. It facilitates a clear framework to aid decision-making and help allocate resources more effectively. The company's long-term goals play a crucial role in determining the strategy. Furthermore, assessing associated financial costs and benefits and considering qualitative factors before selecting the most appropriate strategy is imperative. One of the main tools that companies use for creating a proper plan is to benchmark organizations that are already there where your organization wishes to be.

 

Example: To further understand the importance of strategy, consider studying how Instagram overtook Snapchat even though Snapchat was the pioneer in introducing 'snapping' photos for conversations. Another topic of interest would be Tic-Tok and its exponential growth. Try and study their marketing 'strategies.'

What your examiners are looking for?

 

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A student must begin by reading and developing a clear understanding of what has been asked and then decide their approach towards answering it. Give the reader an outlook into both sides of a business, i.e., how the concepts have been helpful and unhelpful to the industry, how a company has been proactive and reactive in its approach to an idea, and how it has benefited and suffered as a result of these concepts. This will help you in portraying the business in a much-balanced way.

• Introduce your company’s name and background, including the type of business, scale, industry served, etc. 
• Define the key terms you intend to use, including the concepts you will apply.
• Define your hypothesis so it becomes a single-sentence answer to your question.

• Explain the concepts that you have addressed in the first paragraph more elaborately.
• Link the concept with an example of a company.
• In this section, you elaborate on the company’s significant experiences with respect to the first concept.
• Use at least three-course keywords in your answer and explain at least one effect on a stakeholder.
• Your approach must contain a fact about your chosen company and the first concept;
• Use the keywords from your course, which can be used to develop your insight into the organizational activities which talk about the CUEGIS concept at hand.

 

For example, explain how the company has embraced the concept (i.e., globalization). Mention the benefits of them, using some actual facts about the company. And then show how they could have gone further (i.e., trying to outsource production overseas even more).

 

Quick Note: Use the keywords from your course from a meaningful perspective. For example, don’t just say that the company has used “job production.” Instead, use: “They use job production because it allows them to provide a higher quality product, from the customer’s perspective. Customers get exactly what they want, and this increases customer loyalty.” 

• Address your stakeholders in your conclusion.
• Take a few minutes to explain some conflicts and agreements between stakeholder interests.
• Try to make stakeholders' interests as straightforward as possible. 
• Make the whole essay cohesive in terms of the concept(s) (if there was more than one) 
• State the end result of the company.
• Evaluate their success or failure related to the idea?

• Definition of the CUEGIS Concept
• Definition of the strategy
• Background of the business organization.

• #1 Point that supports your CUEGIS Concept
• Advantages (around 2)
• Disadvantages (around 2)
• #2 Point that supports your CUEGIS Concept
• Advantages (around 2)
• Disadvantages (around 2)
• #3 Point that supports your CUEGIS Concept
• Advantages (around 2)
• Disadvantages (around 2)

• Short Term Implications
• Long Term Implications
• Stakeholder Conflict
• Stakeholder Impact
• The Cost Implications

 

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