Irina Golovanova

This paper is rather urgent because the task of increasing the efficiency of Russian higher education has acquired particular significance over the past few years due to globalization and various processes occurring in our economy. Today, Russia faces the challenges of creating competitive advantages both in world markets and in the global market for educational services in particular. The purpose of this study is to analyze the scientific literature on the research problem and to highlight the main trends observed today in higher education. The results of this research contribute to the further solution of a whole range of problems in the field of improving the efficiency of higher education. The methodological basis of the study is the analysis of the literature on the problem of the development and application of modern learning technologies in higher educational institutions.

The importance of cross-cultural competences for future economists in the current world, unprecedentedly globalized both culturally and economically, is hard to underestimate. There is no doubt that a modern highly qualified specialist in the sphere of economy has to possess a significant degree of cross-cultural awareness in order to make business contacts more efficient and to avoid the potential faux pas resulting from poor understanding of the cultural aspects of international business relationships. Gamification of the learning process in the form of business role-playing games is one of the most effective ways of forming professional competences, including cross-cultural ones, widely known and used throughout educational institutions worldwide. The aim of the research is to develop and implement a series of cross-cultural business games for future economists. The article provides a detailed description of one of the developed and implemented games at SSEU, the results of competence measurement before and after the game and the general outline of the series of games intended for the purpose of forming the necessary cross-cultural competences for specialists in Economics. The methodology of the research includes: publication analysis, testing (input / output questionnaire), teaching observation, experiment and comparative analysis of collected data.