Thomas Friedman Position Paper

Thomas Friedman Position Paper

Jose Nader Calero

Bus D301

April 18 2016

        Listening to Thomas Friedman speak about how the world is flat back in 2005, one can realize this man was way ahead of his time. Friedman was able to predict a movement that today in 2016 has become a substantial and fundamental force in communicating and doing business.

        Thomas Friedman starts talking about how this book was a complete accident of an eye opening theory that as he says, was occurring while he was sleeping. Everything started while he was planning the next show for Discovery Channel. Due to some declarations of John Carry, who said outsourcing was a horrible thing for America. Friedman decided to go to Bangalore to document the other side of outsourcing. As interviews went through, Friedman realized that “while he was sleeping” he had missed something really big in the world of outsourcing, which had made the world flat.

        Mesmerized by his discovery but still ignorant on the topic, Friedman decided to take three months off his job at the New York Times, to write a book and understand the phenomenon that was occurring in the world.

        In the video Friedman describes his book based on the first three chapters. The first one being called while you where sleeping. Talking about the three great parts of globalization history has experience. The first part was between 1492 and the early 1800’s starting when Columbus discovered America. Friedman expresses that this era was about countries globalizing, for example Span going to the new world and England colonizing India. This era made the world go from a large to medium size. The second era was from the 1800’s to the early 2000. This era was characterized for company’s going global, looking for markets with potential and cheaper labor. This era made the world go from a medium to a small size.  Finally, Friedman expresses that the third era happened while everyone was asleep. Individuals and small groups globalizing characterize this era, and unlike the past two era’s forces like China India and other third world countries will come into play. Making the world from small to tiny.