Customer Reviews

exito comercial: Prácticas administrativas y contextos culturales (with Audio CD)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm currently taking Business Spanish at UGA (SPAN 4150 for anyone else who needs this class) and am using this book, and just let me cut to the chase by saying that it's not worth the money. The problem is that the book does not go into great detail at all about any of the subjects (be it accounting, banking, management, finance, etc). Rather, it gives a basic, common sense overview of the subjects in each chapter that I find to be a bit insulting to my intelligence and procedes to briefly mention how they pertain to Latin America. Instead of elaborating on this, the authors thought it would be ingenious to stuff the book full of activities to be used in class (which by the way have NOT been utilized thusfar in my class).

As far as the actual tie-ins with Latin America are concerned.. there are very little. While this book does present overviews of most all of Latin America and Spain, don't let that fool you. In nearly every chapter the cultural norms, business hours, acts of courtesy, and geography are presented but the problem is that the similarities are presented more so than the differences, which makes it almost impossible to tell the difference between... say doing business in Mexico compared to doing business in Argentina.

Now for the vocabulary. From what I've noticed there are some useful vocab. terms which is why I gave this book 2 stars instead of 1. However, in every chapter some words are presented that have absolutely NOTHING to do with the subject. For example in chapter 7 which discusses human rights and work relations.. the author felt it necessary that I learn another way to say: side, vegetable, sabotage, temple (of your head), egg yolk, wink, and wine bottle. (pg. 210 - 211) Also, most chapters have well between 50 - 100 words to learn and while that might be good for reference's sake, it makes it incredibly hard to learn and retain any of these words from a student's point of view. On top of that, if you pay close attention you'll notice that alot of vocab. words repeat themselves throughout the chapters and that oftentimes the only thing you're really learning are just new ways to say the same thing. In short, the vocab. was good but because of its redundancy and oftentimes irrelevance to the subject at hand, it became very irritating.

All in all, about the only thing I would recommend this book for is its vocab. and nothing else.. and I'm saying that very hesitantly. If you want to learn how people in Latin America and Spain actually do business you'll need to look elsewhere because about the only damn thing you'll learn here is how to grip someone's hand when you shake it in Latin America and a bit about their economic woes. There were way too many pointless activities in the book and too little lecture notes that needed to be mentioned. Buy this book ONLY for the vocab. but be forewarned.. make sure you know what you're looking for because if not you will most certainly drown in its sea of uselessness.

P.S. The accompanying CD is meant only for class use and is not really meant for individual use as it just presents situational dialouge pertaining to the activities in the book.

This book arrived from the Lexington distribution center, in plastic wrap with a piece of cardboard behind it. It was supposedly new, so the corner of the front cover must have torn either in the distribution center or in transit. I would have tried to exchange the item, but I needed it right away for my class. Anyway, maybe it's not such a good idea to buy paperback books online.

-This book provides a very good background in business Spanish, especially for a business student because you can learn the basic terminology in all the fields of business. Probably best to be used in conjunction with an accounting, management, or marketing class.

-This book is for vocabulary but is not very practical so you can't really say you know anything specific about business in Latin America, you just know the words. This is also brought down by the fact that it's extremely outdated (it's an embarrassment that actually universities still use this book).

-RACISM and PREJUDICE- yes,

this book is filled with it. It seems like every chance the author gets to throw socialism, anti-capitalism, or anti-Americanism in your face he does it. He doesn't stop there, he also spends lots of time criticizing the Catholic Church with his preaching of what he thinks is his unanimous Latin American point of view. When he preaches about socialism though, he sounds really bad because that's the mentality that's hurting "el exito comercial" in Latin America.

I was really pleased with the quality of the book and that it still had the CD attached.