Cross-Cultural Competence in Real Estate Studies - The Benefits of International Student Competitions for Success in Management, Leadership, and Decision Making

The increasing internationalization of the real estate investment markets demands increasing sensitivity and openness of the executives. Interdisciplinary thinking and acting in an international environment becomes a critical success factor. For this reason, international communication and management competences must be integrated in real estate studies.The objective is to provide students as future leaders with intercultural knowledge and skills. This will enable them to make informed decisions and economic analyzes from an international perspective with regard to the execution of a project development, the investment in existing properties, refurbishment concepts or divestment strategies.This paper deals with the question of how international student competitions can help in this context. At such events, students from several universities from different cultures and countries work together in multicultural teams to find solutions for a customer-oriented task.The first part of the paper presents and evaluates various models and concepts of student competitions. In the second part, a non-compulsory module is shown as an example for a successful implementation in the real-estate study programs of the Nürtingen-Geislingen University. The third part provides an outlook on how these models can be further developed.