Intercultural Communication in Business Assessment 1 Presentation

This presentation discusses the importance of intercultural communication in global business, challenges and opportunities faced by global managers, cultural theories and models, and essential skills required when communicating across cultures.

Intercultural Communication in
Business

Table of Contents
 Introduction
 Intercultural communication in global business
 Challenges and opportunities faced by global managers
 Cultural theories and models
 Essential skills which are required when communicating across cultures
 Conclusion
 References

Introduction
Intercultural communication refers to that where
communication is taking place across different cultural
boundaries. This happens when two people from different
culture are communicating with each other then in this stage
it will be called as intercultural communication. The
intercultural communication in business takes place when
the business wants to make the expansion in another country
or the business is having its existence also in another
country.

Intercultural communication in Global Business
 Intercultural communication refers to that
communication which is taking place between
people from different backgrounds and are of
different countries.
 But it is not just this as it also involves the specific
behaviours and activities which takes place when
people from two cultures communicate.

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 But most importantly intercultural communication is
required when the business is working in different
countries where the intercultural communication has to
taken place because their will be people who will be
from different background.

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 This communication used to take place when the company will
be making the hiring of right and talented staff members also
this will be required for developing good relationship between
the employees and employees; employee and employer.
 When the communication will be effective in the workplace
then in this condition the chances of conflicts within the
organisation will be less.

Challenges and Opportunities faced by managers
To work with people who are from different cultures and speak in different languages creates a problem to the
company and specially to the managers because they have to make the proper management of everything
which is taking place within the organisation. This exist because when company makes the establishment of
their business in another country then they have to employ people who are from different cultures and
backgrounds. There are some challenges which are faced by global managers are those challenges are
discussed below-
 Ethnocentrism- This is the behaviour where people make their own assumptions about the cultures of other
people. They are the one who wants to do the work according to what they believe but only in their own
way.

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 Language barriers- The language barriers is
also the another issue which is faced by the
managers because any company who wishes to
start their business in another country then in
this case, firstly the managers whom they
appoint have to conduct the research about the
culture which prevails in that country and they
have to make the changes in their language
speaking.

Opportunities
 Productivity and proficiency- The intercultural
communication is helpful when employees from
different backgrounds communicate in a productive
way. This is also helpful to the management of
company like Unilever to frame their working
policies according to the diversity in people which
are existing their so that every employee can be
productive and effective in whichever work they are
given to do.

Hofstede's Cultural dimensions theory
This model was developed to make the understanding of differences which exist in culture across
different countries. It also provides the ways that how the business can find out the ways by which
business has to be done across different cultures. The categories of the Hofstede model has been
discussed below-
 Power distance index- The high power distance in this model explains that the organisation works
with great inequity and with power differences because of which they have to face the issue of high
level of employee turnover. The low power distance index means that the organisation is not
supporting the culture and have the culture of providing equal power distribution with not
inequality.

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 Masculinity v/s femininity- The masculinity in the society is considered to be people for the achievement,
assertiveness, heroism and those which are also getting the rewards. While the feminity indicates being
modest, empathetic and competitive.
 Long term orientation v/s short term orientation- Long term orientation means that the organisation is
working on their long term goals which Unilever does and are ignoring their focus on the short term goals.
While the short term goals are those which the organisation is focused on and deliver the short term
success. The only difference which exist in short term and long term orientation is that the long term
objectives are achieved lately while the results of short term are very quick.

Handy's model of organisation culture
 Power- Power in this model is related with the authority which people within the organisation are
having. It is because in organisation people who are at higher post have the higher authority or power
compared to the people who comes below them. They are considered to be the most famous personality
within the organisation because of the power they are having. Other then this, the subordinates within
the organisation have to work according to the rules that are framed by the top management. Unilever
does not support such kind inequality which happens in the organisation because this hinders the growth
of people.

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 Person culture- The person culture is based on the scenario in
which the employees consider their goals to be most important
rather then considering the objectives of a organisation.
Employees in the organisation are concerned more about
themselves because of which the organisation has to suffer. This
situation does not happen and because of this the management of
Unilever frames the policy of providing effective training to
employees so that they do not prioritize their goals to be more
important and starts considering the organisation goals
achievement.

Skills required to communicate across culture
To work in different culture and with different background of people an individual must be having some skills
which will be helpful to them in communicating and this will also help the individual in developing good
relations with people. Their are some of the skills which is required for making the communication cross
cultures-
 Strong communication skills- The first which is most important for the person to develop their intercultural
communication is that they must be having good communication skill. It is because with that only they would
be able to communicate with people from different backgrounds. If the communication skill in a person will not
be good then they will be hesitated to communicate with individuals and that too with people who are from
different background

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 Clarity- The person who will be making communication
with the other person of different background must
involve clarity in the words and sentences which they are
going to speak to another person. It is very important to
the person that they are clear in their views. The
intercultural communication with people of different
background will require the development of such type of
skill so that no barrier can be faced by both the parties.

Conclusion
From the above report it can be concluded that the business has to face certain challenges when they have to
do their business in another country because of the different cultures and language. The intercultural
communication plays an important role and this is because that each of the employee are from different
background, experience which influences their performance in work. When their will be no existence of
work culture then in this case people from different background will not be able to foster their
communication. In intercultural communication there are some of the skills which is required to be
developed by an individual because with the development of skills the intercultural communication could
take place effectively.

References
 Ai, B., Cui, C. and Wang, L., 2019. Language, Identity, and Transnational Communication:
Chinese Business Expatriates in Africa. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, 62(2),
pp.178-191.
 Guo, Q., 2019. Competency in globalization and intercultural communication. The Wiley Handbook
of Global Workplace Learning, pp.277-299.
 Mayer, C.H., Louw, L. and Boness, C.M. eds., 2019. Managing Chinese-African business
interactions: Growing intercultural competence in organizations. Springer Nature.
 Shrikant, N., 2018. “There’s no such thing as Asian”: A membership categorization analysis of
cross-cultural adaptation in an Asian American business community. Journal of International and
Intercultural Communication, 11(4), pp.286-303.
 Simpson, A. and Dervin, F., 2019. Global and intercultural competences for whom? By whom? For
what purpose?: An example from the Asia Society and the OECD. Compare: A Journal of
Comparative and International Education.

Thank -You