Management of Culture Shock in Business

Running head: MANAGEMENT OF CULTURE SHOCK IN BUSINESS
Management of culture shock in business
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1MANAGEMENT OF CULTURE SHOCK IN BUSINESS
Introduction
The term ‘culture shock’ generally refers to the discomfort that an individual feel
when they visit a completely different as well as unfamiliar environment in terms of culture
(Gunn, 2017). The term has also been adopted in the business sector to identify the issues like
feeling of not knowing the ways to adjust with the new environment, feeling of anxiety and
other emotional distresses that a business individual feel due to several reasons (Shi & Wang,
2013). The reasons might be related to language, lack of cooperation from colleagues or some
other factors. In order to discuss the culture shock in business the essay gives an overview of
the term. The easy then discusses the human resource policies and other strategies which can
help in addressing the issues of cultural shock. It also mentions that the strategies and policies
help organizations in overcoming cultural shock along with suitable example of organization
that has managed culture shock in their business.
Discussion
The term ‘Culture Shock’ defines a feeling of anxiety, uncertainty or confusion that
business individuals experience when they change their workplace and encounter an entire
different environment (Van & van, 2013). Culture shock can occur due to different reasons
such as the unfamiliarity of the person with culture, language, business etiquettes and
behavior and so on. The generally when a person shifts to a new country, he or she find
difficult to adjust with the local customs, language and behavior. Work culture of the
organization plays a crucial role in this regard. Work culture may vary in different countries.
For example, the work culture of the person’s previous organization might be different from
that of the organization in which the person is presently working. Therefore, culture shock
has an impact on the performance of the person. It creates difficulties for the person in

2MANAGEMENT OF CULTURE SHOCK IN BUSINESS
building relationship with the organization. In order to address the issue, nowadays both
international as well as national organizations provide training to the business professional so
that they can overcome the culture shock. There are some stages of cultural shock along with
different approaches. Different researches have revealed several symptoms of cultural culture
shock ranging from homesickness, feeling of frustration, suffering from isolation, lack of will
to work and so on. Culture shock not only negatively impacts on the business individual’s
efficiency but on the other hand it also affects the growth of the organization. According to
Lombard, (2014), it has been noticed that most qualified and efficient employees leave their
jobs as they fail to deal with culture shock in the work place. As per the records and survey,
the rate of sick calls is higher among the employees who move to a foreign country than the
employees who work in their native country. Conclusion can be drawn from this that
international organization should give more attention to the training program to overcome
culture shock (Roces & Roses, 2013).
In order to discuss how to overcome culture shock in business, an example of an
Australian company, Woodside is given. The company had cultural issues and it had
successfully managed it. The following are the strategies and measures that the company had
taken to identify the issues of culture shock (Jack, 2014) and therefore, in order to help the
employees to deal with cultural shock and overcome it, the company had adopted several
training program. Along with that, some human resource policies were also taken. Some of
the strategies had been mentioned below that the company adopted in order to manage culture
shock.
While identifying the issue related the related to ‘culture shock’ the company
identified cultural differences as the main factor for which business professionals were
experiencing culture shock, which is the differences between the culture of his/her native
place and culture of foreign country (Rajasekar & Renand, 2013). Initially, those who moved