Essay Sample on Culture and Communication

Introduction

The people all around the globe, who are being connected with the help of modern telecom technology and are independent politically, socially, and economically. However, communication plays a vital role in assessing business while operating in different culturally devised markets. Thus, the present essay portrays different forms of challenges that are being faced in a global community. Furthermore, the essay also depicts intercultural interaction which is certainly necessary in terms of international business operation. Other than this, the essay also highlights the traditional approach that is used for communicating across different cultures all around the globe for the development of international business. Alongside. The new approaches related to intercultural communication are also being addressed in this essay.

1. Challenges of living in a global community

In this era of globalisation, every organisation around the world irrespective of its business nature is trying hard to increase its presence in the international market. While operating in the international market or living in a global community, there are several challenges that businesses often come across that create an imbalance in the strategic positioning or business structure. These challenges are further being discussed briefly.

Language barrier- While living in a global community it is quite important to be connected and create a link where everyone would be able to understand and respond to the others (de Lemos et al. 2022). Hence, in this case, language plays a substantial role in assessing an individual’s thought process, decision-making process, and inclination. Thus, living in a multicultural community language can be a barrier, which may have a negative influence. In accordance with the study of Varma et al. (2021), language barrier takes place when two individuals representing different cultures and different languages speak to each other that prohibits them from understanding each other’s thoughts and values. Similar consequences are often faced by global business as well which tries to collaborate with a different culture having a huge language barrier that further leads to misunderstanding or misinterpretation (Ramlan et al. 2018). At times due to language barriers, organisational representatives face serious ethical consequences that further impacts the overall business procedure.

Complexity in multiculturalism- Apart from language barriers, there are also challenges like complexity in multiculturalism that can often create issues among individuals or organisations operating in a global community. Multiculturalism certainly creates misunderstanding and creates difficulties in meeting the values of a particular culture (Pauliene et al. 2019). For instance, western culture like that of America, Canada or the UK is far different than that of the Asian cultures, mainly countries like Japan and China who are still into following their traditions over anything else. Thus, due to cultural barriers, organisations often face failure in increasing their business operations in other culture-oriented markets. Tesco’s failure in countries like America and China can be considered as an example of cultural issues where the company failed to provide service and offer products that would match the cultural values of American and Chinese people (Tamunomiebi and John-Eke, 2020). Hence, complexity in multiculturalism is another issue in a global community that hinders the overall progress of a company in the international market.

Cultural shock- Culture shock can be often seen within organisations that transfers managers or expatriates to a different cultural country or place. In this regard, Wilczewski (2019) has confirmed that culture shock deals with several phases in which re-entry shock and re-adjustment phases are commonly noticed within an organisation. For instance, if an expatriate travels to another culture-oriented country that suffers from the individual’s own culture he or she certainly comes across culture shock while entering the new market and tries to adjust over time (Pauliene et al. 2019). Then after a period when the expatriate visits back to its origin then he or she might suffer from re-entry shock and faces difficulties to again adjust according to its own culture. This phase is regarded as the re-adjustment phase. Thus, due to such culture shock, it has been often noticed that one culture can certainly be suppressed by the other culture in order to merge accordingly.

Intercultural interaction for global business

The term culture stands for a particular group of people in a society with different beliefs and behaviours. As per the modern days, international business is a major part of the global economy and human relations (Søderberg, 2017). Latest communication technologies and a better form of transportation have made it possible for international business management for intercultural communication, which is also known as global communication. Intercultural communication is a major aspect of global business (Søderberg, 2017). Thus, it has three different importance to the global market of business which is necessary.

It is mainly necessary for international business management to interact with their customers without any language barriers and communication obstacles. Hence, giving necessary importance to other cultures and learning their languages while implementing two strategies that are open-minded and reflective listening can make communication both helpful and profitable (Usunier, 2018). There is always a need for proper intercultural communication for the benefit of global marketing, which helps for internal communication with the customer and advertising their products as per the category in the marketplace. Employees from several nations may collaborate effectively when they use a successful global communication strategy (Usunier, 2018). Whereas, improper marketing and advertising communication can be a huge loss for the company’s finance as well as affecting their brand name in the market. When there is a lack of intercultural communication skills in a management team it can result in accidentally offending another individual from the client’s perspective.

2. Traditional approaches to communication across cultures

Interpersonal Information Exchange

Culture is a vast concept, which needs to be analysed for different aspects of business and others. Culture of different areas are said to be different in different ways; therefore, exchange of interpersonal information can increase the chances of getting the knowledge of the culture of the people and can help in cultural communication (Lin and Chang, 2018). People who want to get knowledge about a person from a different culture need to communicate in a different manner in order to get an in-depth knowledge of the other person’s culture. Culture helps to know the mindset of the people and along with that helps to set certain goals for the organisations in order to drive the interest of the people from other cultures into buying such products. The products can be made according to the choices and preferences of the people. With differences in culture, the opinions and preferences of people also change (Davison et al. 2018). Therefore, interpersonal information exchange can be used extensively in order to gain information of different cultures and can facilitate cross-cultural communication for several aspects such as business growth and others.

Powwow dance

The communication advancement in the present situation has enhanced phenomenally than that of the traditional ways. In the present situation, translators can be used through the applications in phones in order to understand the language of a different portion of the world unknown to the people of the host country. However, in traditional forms of cross-cultural communication, people used to prefer communicating through different styles of dancing, such as Powwow dance (Aicinena and Ziyanak, 2021). The language in today’s world is considered as a significant barrier to communication. However, there are ways through which that can be mitigated without any hassle. On the contrary to the present scenario, people with traditional ways of communication used to dance and communicate their opinion or statement through the medium of dance along with that used to exchange cultural information. Through such a medium of dance, intercultural communication used to be facilitated in the traditional way (Hester, 2018).

Cultural exchange through Movies and Books

Intercultural communication is the key to growth of people and others which can be facilitated through utilisation of books and movies. People from different locations belonging to a different culture can read books of different countries with different cultures to get knowledge about the people of other cultures (Stokes and Maltby, 2019). In several cases, it has also been observed that movies along with books play a crucial role in communicating culture to people. Movies provide a visual presentation of the culture from which the movie has been created. Both the contributions of movies and books are immense for achieving intercultural communication. Curiosity can be a key point, which escalates the point of triggering people to aspire for knowledge about different cultures of the country. On the other hand, the culture of a country facilitates knowledge about the people residing in that location along with knowing their mindsets in regards to several perspectives of the world and in regards to business (Oakley et al. 2018).

Cultural theories and their validity in present global business management

Theories help in understanding the differences between two cultures based on which communication can be developed. In this regard, the validity of cultural theories is quite diversely present in the current generation in terms of global business and management. The above-defined traditional approaches of communication across different cultures are not quite relevant in the present global business and management (PÎRLOG, 2021). These traditional approaches are more inclined towards achieving cultural communication in a more traditional manner where the existence of global business may or may not be present. The approaches of traditional communications that have been discussed above have several limitations and issues due to which they have become irrelevant in the present generation especially in the context of global business and management. In this regard, cultural theories such as Hofstede’s cultural model and Trompenaars cultural dimensions can be taken into consideration that helps in understanding various aspects based on which cultural differences can be identified (Minkov and Kaasa, 2020).

These theories are relevant in the present generation since it helps in understanding the difference between the two cultures. Organisations can identify these differences present between these cultures based on which specific strategies can be adopted to mitigate the risk of cultural gaps and issues arising due to cultural problems. In this regard, organisations can adopt various strategies that can help them to train their employees. Training of employees is not only based on the adoption of different cultures and operating in a single organisation where a diverse workforce operates but also helps the organisation to mitigate any kind of intercultural conflicts that might arise (Ugrin et al. 2018).

In context to cultural theories like Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, various aspects linked with culture can be identified such as power distance, which is a measure of bureaucracy present in a particular culture. Based on such cultural identifications, organisations can adopt strategies that can help in minimising the impact of higher or lower bureaucracy in their global organisational management. Similarly, there are other dimensions such as indulgence, long-term short-term orientation and others that help an organisation to understand the way individuals prefer to work (Minkov, 2018). In terms of indulgence, organisations can identify if individuals are more comfortable in working individually or in a team based on which human resource management can be effectively done. Similarly, organisations can also identify if a particular culture is more focused on achieving long term goals or short-term goals. This helps in understanding the strategy companies need to adapt in a multicultural context. This turns out to be quite effective in managing a business in a different global context.

3. New approaches to intercultural communication

Meetings

As mentioned by Kharouf et al. (2020), in an organisation, meetings are the most common elements, which are done in order to communicate with the whole team members along with building unity. In an organisation, there are several different types of individuals who are from different cultures and religions. Staying in the same room and approaching the same agenda is one of the advantages of conducting meetings in a company. In this relation, meetings help the individual to be flexible, observation as well as creative (Tworzydło et al. 2021). Through the meetings, everyone understands each protocol, which needs to be followed along with establishing norms as well which helps to understand the meeting’s objectives. Learning each other’s culture started from the very first meeting as it clears out the expectation and improves communication.

Linguistic training

A technique to further manage cultural diversity in an enterprise is through linguistic training. It has long been the most common strategy for encouraging good cross-cultural communication and collaboration. As suggested by Lestari et al.(2020), linguistic training is a technique or practice that improves an individual’s resilience to respond to intercultural situations and function well in a different cultural setting. Linguistic training promotes the shift from a home-based local leadership style to a more culturally appropriate approach. As reflected by Beviá (2020), employees’ capacity to grasp the language of others, as well as their principles and attitude, improves as a result of linguistic training. It captivates employees’ curiosity in learning more about their own different backgrounds and traditions. It is important that one should be proud of their own heritage, so they should appreciate and embrace the cultures of other colleagues in the same manner.

Social media

Social media plays an important online device that allows individuals to interact, communicate, network, connect, share feelings and concepts, and perform a variety of other functions. As demonstrated by Hao et al. (2018), social media improves individuals’ presentation skills, allowing them to communicate effectively with friends around the world they adapt faster as social networking helps them get on well with a close connection. Adding to this, digital networks improve individual language reading comprehension ability as well. Social networking improves users’ skills in communication, allowing them to communicate effectively with worldwide relationships. In this context, Appendix 1 reflects the percentage of people using different social media sites.

Furthermore, with its heavy influence, new networking improves intercultural trust and interaction (Nisar et al. 2019). For many individuals around the globe, social networking is playing an increasingly significant role in interfaith communication and awareness. As a response, social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn can be used for a wide range of purposes by individuals who want to experience new areas digitally.

Use of social media in global business and management

The new approaches that have been identified and discussed above are applied in several contacts in present global business management. Meetings are a necessary part of an organisation and this allows the leaders and the management of the organisation to communicate with the rest of the workforce which plays a particular role in identifying the issues that are present as well as to identify if the workforce is facing any problems to carry out in their organisational duties (Amin and Rajadurai, 2018). Meetings that organisations conduct on a regular basis plays a major role in sharing information and facilitate communication within the workforce which is necessary. Furthermore, in an organisational meeting, formal conduct is mandatory which discourages any kind of cultural conflicts that might arise in traditional conversation or communication. Organisational meetings for both formal and informal employees working in the company get the chance to freely express themselves which facilitates communication in a much more effective manner (Abu Bakar et al. 2019).

Linguistic training or training individuals working in an organisation to speak in different languages is essential for organisations that are working on their global expansion. Language training allows an organisation to prepare expatriates who can move to a foreign country and manage the business operations as a senior executive. Training is not only essential in the global context but also allows organisations to remove any kind of cultural barrier in the domestic markets. Linguistic running within an organisation can be identified to be an upskilling program that companies often undertake when they have a highly diverse culture. In this regard, the language that is most widely spoken in the company is adopted as the organisation’s primary language. This plays a major role in increasing the overall performance of the workforce as this reduces the chances of communication gaps (Bauman, 2020).

With the inclusion of Industry 4.0 businesses, irrespective of their nature, are more inclined towards digital advancements that have certainly delivered promising results for long-term growth and development. In this case, social media nowadays plays a significant role in assessing business growth capabilities by offering mass communication strategies. According to the study of Hao et al. (2018), social media is such a platform that allows organisations to develop meaningful relationships and get to know customers’ requirements better.

According to the graph in Appendix 2, users of social media on different platforms are increasing day by day and it is estimated that by 2025 there will be more than 4.41 billion users of social media (Statista, 2021). Hence, this proves that virtual communication and interactions are more preferable to consumers as they are able to gain real-time data. This, in turn, helps organisations to sustain their business by targeting a large number of consumers and limiting their operating costs. Hence, it can be stated that new approaches are more likely to be applied in today’s global business and management.

Conclusion

From the discussion made above it has been found that communication into business growth and expansion have an extensive role. Moreover, as discussed above, there are several challenges that an individual or organisation may face while living or operating in a global community. These challenges are related to language barrier, multiculturalism and culture shock. Due to these issues, expatriates or organisations often face obligations while planning or progressing with their expanding strategy. Other than this, the discussion also reflected that intercultural communication is an important part of every business operation. Through this, organisations are able to merge with different cultures and plan their service in accordance to consumer needs that will value their culture. Even, traditional communication approaches have been identified in this essay that is supported with theories of Hofstede’s cultural model and Trompenaars cultural dimensions. Other than this, new approaches have been identified that are related with the inclusion of Industry 4.0. Thus, it can be concluded that with proper knowledge regarding culture and the use of effective communication tools it is now more convenient to express thoughts and degrade misunderstandings.

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