Social Etiquette in Business: The Art of Gift-Giving

This report discusses the importance of social etiquette in business, specifically the art of gift-giving. It covers the significance of personalized gifts, planning budgets, considering religious beliefs, and more. The strengths and weaknesses of present social etiquette displayed by colleagues in the organization are also discussed. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of being familiar with the social etiquette of gift-giving of the clients’ nation before offering any gift.

Running head: DESIGN AND CREATE ORGANIZATIONAL DOCUMENT
DESIGN AND CREATE ORGANIZATIONAL DOCUMENT
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Discussion about social etiquette...............................................................................................2
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
References................................................................................................................................10
Appendix..................................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
The present report provides an overview on the discussion on social etiquette in the
business enterprise. The topic that has been selected for this study is the Etiquette of gift –
offering in business. Etiquette refers to the code of an individual behaviour which delineates
anticipation for social behaviour based on the conventional contemporary norms within a
specific society, group and social class. It mainly relates to the rules which govern good
behaviour and attitude of individuals as well as business and social interactions. It highlights
on the cultural norms, rules of different groups and few accepted ethical codes. Etiquette
facilitates the individuals in showing consideration as well as respect to other people and
build good relationship between them (Trends, Avoid & Pilon, 2018). In fact, it relates to the
standards which govern socially acceptable behaviour in a particular situation. Social
etiquette in a business organization relates to the standard which govern any kind of social
interaction relating to business that has been held away from the work. Business social
etiquette has been considered as one of the key to business success. It plays a huge role in the
business operations especially while interacting with international clients and other
colleagues at any social events, (Jennings & Biss, 2016). Effective social etiquette in business
helps to make winning impression among the clients, other stakeholders and colleagues
working in the same company. There are few business organizations in the present century
that needs more formality in the workplace and in other social events of the organization. The
strength and weakness of present social etiquette displayed by the colleagues of my
organization is also discussed in this study.
Discussion about social etiquette
Significance of social etiquette in business

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It has been opined by Valíková (2014) that, one of the basis of social etiquette in
business is to build strong relationship with the colleagues by nurturing better
communication. Social etiquette in business might vary between the nations and few
principles can rest on time as well as geography. In today’s business world, social etiquette
serves some vital functions that includes-
 Etiquette helps to provide personal security- By knowing proper way to behave in a
particular condition makes an individual highly comfortable.
 Protect the emotions of other individual- Proper social etiquette in business helps to
make other individual comfortable as well as protect their emotions.
 Improves the communication process- Social Etiquette increases communication by
eliminating barriers during any interaction procedure (The Importance of Business
Etiquette. 2018).
 It also improves the work status – Proper social etiquette improves the status of work
in any of the difficult working situation.
 It creates good impression – Appropriate etiquette during client interactions helps an
individual to create good impression to the client.
 It creates confidence in social situations and business- Proper social etiquette as well
as social skills helps the workers in the business to ease uncertainty as well as replace
it with proper decisiveness and direction.
 It increases employability, career success and productivity- Social etiquette in the
business organizations increases employability and productivity and brings about
success in the employees career. The reason behind this is that social skills and
etiquette facilitates in leading people, solve- work related issues and approach
complex circumstances in business.

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Good social etiquette that is displayed by the employees in the organization allows the
business to put best foot forward and also protect them as well as business owners from any
kind of external as well as internal conflicts. As business social etiquette extends beyond
workplace, it is vital for the individuals to adhere certain etiquette standards in the business
related events. It has been pointed out by Jennings & Biss, (2016) that, the individuals with
good dinning manners help to win over their counterparts as well as colleagues while the
individual with bad conduct might miss out deal in business. Moreover, the etiquette of
condolence letter, art of offering gifts in business also helps to improve business relations. In
addition to this, there are few circumstances in which an individual do not realize their
improper behaviour while interacting with other persons. However, social etiquette facilitates
in correcting mannerisms, behaviour and communication during professional socializing. For
the multinational business enterprise, social etiquette might create difficulty within the
business enterprises as the mannerisms that are considered as polite in one nation’ s culture
might not be considered as polite in another nation. It has been stated by Valíková (2014)
that, an employee while conversing with the group of clients or managers might need to be
humble, polite and sophisticated. Moreover, proper use of language is also necessary while
interacting with the clients and colleagues. Social etiquette in business also requires that the
body language of the individual must be polite and respectful while making any interactions
during business socialization.
The Etiquette of Gift- giving in the business
Pipyrou (2014) opines that the art of offering gifts to the business partners or clients
might be rather stressful as well as complicated if etiquette behind this is not known. If an
expensive gift is purchased but is not aligned to interest of recipients then the individual’s
good intentions might be overshadowed by gaffe. It has been found out every business
culture across the globe has the customs of gift giving. Thoughtful gifts often becomes easy

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way of improving morale as well as keep the clients happy and satisfied. Furthermore, it
involves some crucial rules of offering gifts in different nations owing to difference in
culture.
While giving gifts to the clients and managers of in the organization, my colleagues
makes sure it is offered at appropriate time and within reasonable range in price. The business
etiquette that my colleagues consider before offering gifts to clients, staffs, managers and
other stakeholders of the enterprise are discussed below-
Personalizing gifts
Gifts are sometimes personalized to every recipients during making any business
operations in my workplace. The main reason behind such thought is that the clients or
business partners are eager to know that they are being appreciated. It has been stated by ()
that, giving a gift which is mainly aligned with the people’s interest might mean more than
promotional item from the organization (Kube, Maréchal, & Puppe, 2012). For instance,
there occur some exceptions where some staffs of my organization prefer cash bonuses rather
than physical gift. In this case, my colleagues generally keeps in mind preference of the
individual before offering the gift.
Planning budget for the gifts
Proper budget is planned for gift- giving occasions by the colleagues throughout the
year as it mainly involves with the finances of the company. There are times when small
amount of money is spent on the gifts if there is less amount of budget. In this situation, a gift
card is provided to these staffs by my colleagues in order to show that are equally important
to this business enterprise. In certain cases, as some individuals do not accept the gifts, the
employees of the organization gathers information about this issue for avoiding an unpleasant
circumstances.

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Considering religious beliefs
It has found out by Anderson (2013) that , offering gift to one individual in business
who cannot accept it owing to their religious beliefs might make gift recipient as well as gift
giver uncomfortable. In that situation, my colleagues of this organization appreciates it by
showing in other way, which involves sending small gift to other employees after completion
of the project or providing it as bonus at the end of the financial year.
Regifting with caution
Regifting refers to the practice of offering gifts which are previously obtained from
other individuals. It has been evident from few facts that this practice is not acceptable in
every business culture but is becoming increasingly common in the present century (Schrift,
2014). Regifting must be practiced in proper way owing to the fact that the gift recipient
might have the ability to tell that the item is regifted one. My colleagues also adopt these
practices in effective way in order to build good relationship with other staffs and collaborate
with each other for achieving the target of the business.
Considers every individual as important
The gifts should be provided to every individual of the organization and not only to
particular team members in the business. While offering gifts, the employees of my
organization makes sure that no individual are forgotten. Even if the budget is low, the
management of the company makes sure that every employees receive the gifts or cards.
It has been seen from recent studies that in some nations such as Australia, gift-
offering is not a major part of social etiquette in business. However, if a business partner
coming from foreign countries is invited for dinner, then it is the social etiquette of foreign
business partner to offer gifts to the Australian business partner. It has been suggested by

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Wurmser (2013) that, while offering gifts to Australian business partner, one should bear a
thoughtful choice in mind rather than considering real cost of the gifts.
Even though gift offering in business is considered as one of the vital business social
etiquette, it must not be considered as mandatory (Katzenbach & Smith, 2015). This is
because selecting gifts from the colleagues as well as clients might be one of the challenging
task in the business operations. However, it becomes difficult for the employees of the
enterprise to come up with perfect gift by following gift protocol in business. There are
several companies that still have strict policies or rules about the types of gifts to be given to
the colleagues of the enterprise. However, my organization also has some of principles
regarding the art of providing gift to clients, colleagues, and other staffs. In case any issues
relating to gift offering occurs in the enterprise, my colleagues either ask their clients or
check with their HR (Human Resource Department). In addition to this, all employees of this
organization consider the interest of clients such as pastimes, hobbies and so on before
offering the gifts to them. The groups of the company also makes sure that the item to be
gifted meets a particular quality standard and thereby the logo of the company is printed on it
in order to promote the business. Martin & Chaney, (2012) suggest that, the objective of gift-
offering must be kept in mind that is to show gratitude and build good relationship with the
clients. However, my colleagues of the organization also focuses on the objective of gift-
giving and offers it in the appropriate time. This in turn helps to do business with the clients
at appropriate time.
Strength of the present social etiquette displayed by colleagues in the organization
The strengths of gift- giving in business are given below-
 Offering gifts to the employees or clients in business boosts their morale and keeps
them happy

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 It helps to develop the business to business relationship
 It improves the company’s image to the clients
 It makes every individual working in the company feel equal
 It clears misunderstanding that might cause while doing business with the clients
 Etiquette of gift giving to the colleagues helps to build good relationship and improve
the work culture.
 It helps to increase productivity and improve performance of the business
 It also aids to expand the business in the global market
Weakness of the social etiquette displayed by colleagues in the entity
It has been cited by Schmiederer & Holdermann (2014) that, there are few weakness of
etiquette of gift- giving to the clients or employees as displayed by colleagues in the entity.
These weaknesses includes-
 Giving gifts to the employees or clients as a means of social etiquette sometimes
increases cost of the business organization
 There are times when it creates motivational issues among the employees and clients
as the gifts are provided in few times a year
 Sometimes when the gifts given to the clients are not the same, it damages their
morale as they feel that there is an existence of personal biasness’s
 It often creates expectations among the employees and clients that similar gifts will be
offered in future.
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be concluded that social etiquette facilitates to
create good work culture and enhance growth in business. A gift- giving etiquette is one of
the intricate issues as it takes into account difference in nation’s culture. The fact that the

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business partners or clients comes from different parts of globe, employees of the
organization is required to have proper knowledge about etiquette of gift- offering. Moreover,
good intentions of the individual might be overshadowed at times if the gifts purchased do
not correspond to the interest of recipients. However, before offering any gift to the clients or
other colleagues, one must be familiar with the social etiquette of gift- giving of the clients’
nation. Some of the vital points that must be considered in business social – etiquette are-
proper types of gifts, occasion when it will be presented, value of gift and the way in which it
will be presented. Furthermore, before sending or offering gift to the clients of the business,
one must also keep in mind client’s religion so that it does not hurt their emotions.

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References
Robicquet, A., Sadeghian, A., Alahi, A., & Savarese, S. (2016, October). Learning social
etiquette: Human trajectory understanding in crowded scenes. In European conference on
computer vision (pp. 549-565). Springer, Cham.
Martin, J. S., & Chaney, L. H. (2012). Global Business Etiquette: A Guide to International
Communication and Customs: A Guide to International Communication and Customs. ABC-
CLIO.
Baskin, E., Wakslak, C. J., Trope, Y., & Novemsky, N. (2014). Why feasibility matters more
to gift receivers than to givers: A construal-level approach to gift giving. Journal of
Consumer Research, 41(1), 169-182.
Chua, R. Y. (2012). Building effective business relationships in China. MIT Sloan
Management Review, 53(4), 1.
Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (2015). The wisdom of teams: Creating the high-
performance organization. Harvard Business Review Press.
Schmiederer, M., & Holdermann, R. (2014). Business and Social Etiquette Guidelines to
business and social etiquette. Going Abroad 2014: How to understand foreign markets and
do business around the globe, 135.
Anderson, C. (2013). Free: How today's smartest businesses profit by giving something for
nothing. Random House.

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Schrift, A. D. (2014). The logic of the gift: Toward an ethic of generosity. Routledge.
Kube, S., Maréchal, M. A., & Puppe, C. (2012). The currency of reciprocity: Gift exchange
in the workplace. American Economic Review, 102(4), 1644-62.
Wurmser, T. A. (2013). Obtaining financial support through grants and gifts. NICHE
Planning and Implementation Guide. New York: NYU, 3.
Pipyrou, S. (2014, October). Altruism and sacrifice: mafia free gift giving in south Italy.
In Anthropological Forum (Vol. 24, No. 4, pp. 412-426). Routledge.
Trends, S., Avoid, B., & Pilon, A. (2018). Business Gift Giving Etiquette and Mistakes to
Avoid - Small Business Trends. Retrieved from https://smallbiztrends.com/2014/10/business-
gift-giving-etiquette.html
Jennings, S. E., & Biss, J. (2016). Perfecting the Professional Image: Preparing students for
business dining. M-PBEA Journal, 7(1), 7-11.
Valíková, D. (2014). Social Etiquette Across Cultures: Teaching English for Building
Relationships and Rapport. LINGUISTICS, CULTURE AND IDENTITY IN FOREIGN
LANGUAGE EDUCATION, 409.
The Importance of Business Etiquette. (2018). Retrieved from
https://yourbusiness.azcentral.com/importance-business-etiquette-1222.html

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Appendix
Mind Map
Report on group processes

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FORMING STORMING
PERFORMING NORMING
ADJOURNING
Individual Commentaries and Reviews
Commentary 1 (client)- One secret to start up success is the art of giving gift in business
Reviews 1 (employees)-It gave a personal touch and hoping to make more business deals
Commentary 2 (client)- The organization has proper etiquette of giving gifts and I am
satisfied by making business deals with it
Reviews2 (employees)-My colleagues has some biasnessness in giving gifts in business
Marketing Phamplet

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Giving gifts or
business cards
Stand and give it
to clients
Give the card
with both hands
Shake hands after
giving cards
Print company’s
Logo on gift cards