Business Strategy: Cultural Inclusion Challenges for Disney in Bangkok

This report examines the cultural challenges Disney faces when operating in Bangkok, Thailand. It highlights the importance of understanding cultural differences, including communication styles, cognitive aspects, material aspects, and behavioral aspects. The report analyzes how Hofstede's cultural dimensions impact Disney's management and employee interactions, particularly the differences between individualistic and collectivist societies. It discusses the influence of Thai culture on workplace communication, remote working policies, and the adoption of technology. The report also addresses potential barriers Disney may encounter, such as legacy systems, costs, and security concerns. Furthermore, it emphasizes the need for Disney to invest in employee wellness, team development, and talent management to succeed in the Bangkok market. The analysis provides recommendations for adapting to the local culture and ensuring successful business operations.

Running head: CULTURAL INCLUSION
Cultural Inclusion
[Business, Disney and Culture]
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

1CULTURAL INCLUSION
Cultural differences can be observed in the world regions and countries. Any business
operating globally or intend to enter a new marketplace must understand the cultural differences
in the home country. This activity is required to be able to avoid the negative consequences of
working with diverse culture (Gurung and Prater 2017).
Any culture has four main elements. These are Communication aspects, Cognitive
aspects, Material aspects and Behavioural Aspects. The sharing of information in the
organisations as discussed above for various reasons falls under Communication aspects
(Crowley and Heyer 2015). Cognitive is the most important of all the elements of culture. It is
influenced by the ideas, beliefs and knowledge of the people. It determines the level of
acceptance in people for a business coming from a different culture (Berry and Dasen 2019).
Material aspects include religious faiths, traditions and customs (Berger 2016). Behavioural
aspects describe how people will react to thing. For example, the reactions of people can vary
from one to another culture (Vuong et al. 2018). The management team in Disney can face
cultural challenges for many cultural differences between the United States and Bangkok. As
obtained from the Hofstede’s cultural dimension, an individualistic society is more dominant in
the United States. This means an individual is himself or herself responsible for things that
matter to them. In the workplace, the interaction between the management and employees is very
informal. On the contrary, as per the findings of the Hofstede’s cultural dimension of Bangkok,
Bangkok is a highly collectivist country. Interaction between management personnel and
employees in the workplace is more formal (Hofstede-insights.com 2019). All this will impact
the management’s behaviour when they will be in operations in Bangkok. They will be needed to
take care of such minute things like maintaining formal etiquettes in the workplace. This will be
required to operate at the similar platform and to deliver productive results.

2CULTURAL INCLUSION
Communication in the workplace in Bangkok largely happens in the Thai language
whereas some companies also encourage communicating in English. Traditional workplace rules
are followed mostly in the workplace. This includes booking the meeting dates in advance,
dressing conservative business suits, respecting elderly and senior employees, after the
presentation giving the business card, etc. (Crowley and Heyer 2015). The culture has an
influence on the western world. However, it still carries its tradition and Buddhist values. This
culture can be observed on streets and in the types of foods being served in restaurants or street
food centers. New Year celebration is an essential part of this city. There is full freedom to other
communities to celebrate their festivals as well (Buildabroad.org 2019). Due to increasing dust
pollution in the city, most employers prefer adhering to “Remote Working Policy”. The pollution
could encourage Disney for the adoption of technology to provide its employees work from
home. The list of technologies includes but not limited to like mobility, cloud and artificial
intelligence (AI) (Keeble and Wilkinson 2017). This remote working culture is more attractive to
millennial workers.
Switching to trending workplace culture in Bangkok could be one of the critical success
factors (CSFs) for Disney. The workplace, working culture and workforce is becoming more
automated. The productivity of the workplace is, therefore, becoming more enhanced and
efficient as well in many ways. However, Disney should never misunderstand the fact that
technology is just an enabler. Technology requires proper strategy in place to become productive
for organisations.
Disney may face barriers while implementing these technologies into practice. Some of
the potential barriers are legacy systems and processes, the high cost of the range of
technologies, and security and privacy concerns. Security and privacy concerns is potentially a

3CULTURAL INCLUSION
challenge for those who are exceedingly dependent on information sharing over remotely
distributed network of technologies (Bhanot, Rao and Deshmukh 2015). Moreover, Disney will
have to work towards ensuring that no potential threats affect their network of interconnected
devices. It is important for Disney that it shows and demonstrate their commitment to employees.
This can be done through investing in employee wellness and team development process.
Personal skills development should also be given importance. Disney must have the eagerness to
redesign its human resource departments to meet the trending practices (Noe et al. 2017). This is
required to introduce a number of new roles derived from employees' experience of the work.
Disney would need to provide more friendly and millennial-centric technology and workplace
culture to its employees in Bangkok (Hall 2016). An incrementing use of technologies as
highlighted in this section of the study and the workplace culture should not be a huge task for
Disney. The Company has adequate cash flow and investments pouring from its investors in
Bangkok; however, reaching to skilled talents can be a challenge for the company (Elegbe 2016).
Even with lucrative salary range and work flexibilities, this can be a time-consuming process
(Elegbe 2016).

4CULTURAL INCLUSION
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5CULTURAL INCLUSION
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