Analyzing Communication Issues in a Multinational Corporation Report

This report delves into the communication challenges faced by a multinational corporation operating in Australia, India, Vietnam, Nigeria, and Oman. The primary issues identified include the ineffective use of social media for knowledge sharing and task management, the lack of quality client feedback, and misunderstandings stemming from intercultural differences. The report analyzes these problems and proposes strategic solutions, such as leveraging social media for idea sharing, building a robust knowledge base, and improving task management. It also suggests methods for gathering client feedback and fostering trust among employees from diverse cultural backgrounds. The report concludes with actionable recommendations aimed at enhancing communication at all levels of the organization, ultimately improving the firm's operational efficiency, product quality, and profitability.

Running Head: COMMUNICATION 1
Business Communication Skills
Name
Institution

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Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
Analysis.......................................................................................................................................................4
Ineffective Use of Social Media Issue.....................................................................................................4
Client Feedback.......................................................................................................................................4
Misunderstanding and lack of trust based on intercultural differences....................................................5
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................7
Recommendations.......................................................................................................................................8
Resolving social media issues..................................................................................................................8
Resolving client feedback issues...........................................................................................................11
Resolving trust issues caused by intercultural differences.....................................................................13
References.................................................................................................................................................17

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Business Communication Skills
Introduction
This paper provides an overview and discussion about a Multinational corporation that
operates in various countries among them Australia, India, Vietnam, Nigeria and Oman. Notably,
its head office is based in Australia. The firm specializes in manufacturing and distributing
agricultural equipment to both the local and international market. Currently, the company has
employed approximately 8,000 workers in the five countries that it operates in. Additionally, it
has a client base of over a million customers from all over the globe. Over the recent years, the
organization has been experiencing multiple communication challenges. Mainly, these
challenges arise from the ineffective use of social media, social networks and blogs to support
teams in building knowledge, task management and sharing ideas. Another major problem is the
lack of quality feedback from the firm’s clients on ways to improve and enhance the quality of
its products as well as its service delivery. In addition, the company has been facing a series of
misunderstandings and lack of trust among its personnel due to intercultural communication
issues in different contexts. For this reason, the purpose of this report is to identify and discuss
various strategies and plans that may help the multinational corporation to improve on all the
three communication challenges at all levels of the organization. The paper covers an overview
of the social media challenges facing the company and ways in which it may solve these
problems. Additionally, it offers a detailed solution as to how the company may obtain feedback
from its clients on how to improve the quality of its goods and services. Lastly, it offers a
solution to the intercultural misunderstanding between the staff members due to cultural diversity
of the various countries that the organization operates. Lastly, the paper will offer various

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recommendations that that the firm may implement to improve the level of communication
among its subsidiaries. Primarily, the report is structured into various sections comprising of
overview and analysis on the issues section, conclusion and recommendations.
Analysis
Ineffective Use of Social Media Issue
Social media has become an important aspect in today’s society. It has gained rapid
prominence within a few years of its existence. Today, the most common social media include
blogs, wikis and social networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. It is generally the medium
to socialize and many are awed by the transformation of communication processes made possible
by the social media platforms (Robin, 2016). In the business world, the medium has penetrated
through boardroom of business organizations and has transformed the process of communication
and sharing knowledge (Singh, 2017). Although it is a recent concept, social media has proven to
be an effective method of communication and sharing knowledge within a business, especially
multinational corporations. It has also proven itself as a platform for institutions to exchange
contents and creations, thereby increasing the interaction among members of the organization
(Ferris, n.d.). Therefore, the MNC may utilize the resources made available by various social
media platforms to build its knowledge base, task management and share ideas within the
organization.
Client Feedback
As noted earlier, the multinational company is facing communication challenges that
arise from the lack of quality feedback from clients on ways to improve their product quality and

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service delivery (Zadjo, 2017). Also studies indicate that customers usually do not bother to
share their feedback with the service provider about an experience that did not meet their
expectations. Instead, they decide to never do business with the company again (Ciotti, 2016). As
a result, the company pays a significantly huge price for the lack of feedback from its customers.
Therefore, it is very important for the company to solve this problem. In order to solve this
problem, the company must devise a sound plan and strategy that would allow it to communicate
effectively with its clients and obtain useful feedback from them.
Misunderstanding and lack of trust based on intercultural differences
Apart from lack of feedback and ineffective use of social media, the company also faces
communication barriers and challenges arising from intercultural differences and lack of trust
between the organization’s subsidiaries. It is, therefore, important for the organization’s
managers to understand how to communicate effectively with other managers and company
personnel working in Australia, India, Vietnam, Nigeria and Oman in order to achieve the firm’s
common goals. Trust is a fundamental component in any organization (The Real Reason, 2015).
For this reason, building trust is a critical step in the creation of intercultural teams. Cultural
differences can create significant misunderstandings between teams from different countries with
different cultural backgrounds. As such, cultural disparities among employees and management
can create misunderstandings between them even before they have had a chance to establish trust
and credibility with each other (Murphy, n.d.). At the moment, the level of trust is the company
is low, thereby inhibiting the level and quality of communication in the organization.
Noteworthy, the level of trust between strangers varies from one country to another. While in

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some people normally assume that the other person can be trusted, others prefer to know the
other party before trusting them.
All in all, trust is fundamental and the company should focus on fostering the level of
trust among its employees. This can be achieved through emotional bonding and conceptual
understanding (Molinsky & Gundling, 2016). Emotional bonding can be created between
members of global teams through face to face meetings in convivial settings. On the other hand,
conceptual understanding can be fostered by providing employees with an intellectual
understanding of how cultural similarities and differences influences business conduct (Toegel
and Barsoux, 2016). On other occasions, the company may foster trust by measuring the level of
trust among its personnel. When monitored and reported back to the team and team leader,
challenges can be identified and overcome before they endanger team effectiveness.

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Conclusion
All factors taken into consideration, communication is an important element in every
organization. This report focuses on a multinational-corporation that deals in the manufacturing
and distribution of agricultural equipments to the local and international companies. At the
moment the organization operates in Australia, India, Vietnam, Oman and Nigeria. Over the
recent past the MNC has been experiencing fundamental communication challenges brought
about by the ineffective use of social media such as wikis, blogs and social networks to support
teams in sharing ideas, task management and building knowledge bases. In addition, the lack of
quality feedback from the organization’s clients on methods to improve its agricultural
equipment and enhance its service delivery has also contributed to the firm’s communication
challenges. What is more, the misunderstandings and lack of trust arising from intercultural
issues has contributed to the challenges facing the firm. Therefore, in order for the firm to
effectively solve these issues, it must develop strategies and plans that aim at enhancing
communication at all levels of the organization in the five countries. These strategies will go a
long way in improving the level of communication in the firm as well as lead to an improvement
in the quality of the firm’s agricultural equipment and overall service delivery to its clients.
Aside from that, the company would be able to effectively utilize social media platforms for
sharing ideas, knowledge bases and task managements. Most importantly, the firm would
manage to foster a culture of trust between the management team and its employees in all the
five countries. In the long term, a successful implementation of these strategies would improve
not only the organization’s communication levels but also its profitability.

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Recommendations
After a critical analysis of the case study, this report makes various recommendations that
the multinational corporation may implement to improve its communication issues arising from
the lack of quality feedback from clients, ineffective use of social media and misunderstanding
and lack of trust based upon intercultural communication issues in different contexts. These
recommendations include;
Resolving social media issues
As noted earlier, the company has been experiencing various communication challenges over the
recent past due to its ineffective use of social media platforms such as blogs, wiki, and social
networks. Thus, to resolve this challenge, the firm may implement the following
recommendations.
Using social media to share ideas .The multinational organization can use social media
as a tool to share information between the management and its employees. The firm may use the
‘Open Text’ software for this function. Noteworthy, this interactive media can be used for
interaction between the employees, customers as well as other organizations (Obbard, 2015).
Primarily, social apps can be used to create a socially charged work atmosphere that fosters
innovation and collaboration between employees (Beck, 2017)Mainly, this is because social apps
provide employees with a platform for them to engage with each other, discuss and share ideas,
and express themselves more often (Managing, 2016). Thus, employees can share information
through videos, post blogs, and resources or even participate in discussion forums in these
platforms.

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Using social media to build a knowledge base. It is noteworthy that knowledge is what
gives a company its primary competitive advantage, unique experience and insight. Additionally,
an effective knowledge base helps the firm to identify and address specific market gaps and
questions from its employees. It also provides an effective way for the company to store
important information regarding its services, products and workers. What is more, it helps
employees’ access critical information to address customer needs, resolve issues and gain insight
for collaboration with other experts in their field of work. What is more, an online knowledge
base helps an organization to enhance its productivity and efficiency since employees can easily
obtain information from one location. For this reason, it is important for the organization to
utilize the social media and social networks to develop a strong knowledge base.
Therefore, the multinational corporation can build its knowledge base using social
intranet software as a knowledge management solution. This will then help capture all the
valuable information, utilize data and insight (Eisenhauer, 2014). It will also help the employees
offer support to clients, thereby leading to greater customer satisfaction and enhanced profits.
Most importantly, it would bring about an increase in employee morale and, hence, productivity
(Eisenhauer, 2014). Additionally, it would lead to increased efficiency, smoother communication
and enhanced information flow.
It is also worth pointing out that a company’s knowledge base could function like a
repository in a manner that it contains vital information for the daily functioning of the business
and the long-term as well. However, to create a relevant online knowledge base, the MNC must
add important information alongside major guidelines and frameworks within the company. In
order for the employees to obtain important information from the knowledge base, it is crucial

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for it to be updated regularly (Signh, 2018). This way, workers would be able to able to get new
insight and data when there is new information available.
The knowledge management software may also be structured in a way that allows the
employees to share relevant information externally using social share technologies (Eisenhauer,
2014).. All in all, a good knowledge base would make sharing information within the
multinational corporation to be simple because the employees would no longer waste time
looking for files since they can access all relevant data on any topic in one location (Bradley and
McDonald, 2011).
Using social media for task management. The multinational corporation can also use
social media to solve its task management issues. This would be particularly useful in supporting
timely and faster communication between the managers and the staff (Jiwat, n.d.). Mainly, social
media may come in handy in task management by playing a critical role in the planning,
execution and delivery of tasks through communication management, task update management,
and knowledge management. It is vital to point out that communication plays an important role
in the success of any task within an organization (Oyza & Edwin, 2015). As a result, managers
spend approximately 90 percent of their management time communicating information to their
teams. Therefore, they can utilize social media apps to facilitate audio, text or video based secure
messaging to communicate useful information and instructions to the firm’s employees wherever
they are. These social media platforms may also be used by the staff to obtain clarifications on
the tasks they have been assigned. In the end, the social media platforms would empower the
management to manage their communication to staff members more effectively.

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Resolving client feedback issues
In order to resolve the various communication challenges arising from the lack of constructive
feedback from its clients, the firm may undertake the following measures.
Develop a customer feedback survey. The organization may develop a client feedback
survey to help bridge the communication barrier between the company and its clients. Today, the
web has made colleting surveys easier by letting firms test longer and more traditional surveys as
well as shorter ones when they visit their website. For long surveys, the company may use tools
such as Google Surveys, Typeform, and Survey Monkey, among others. For short surveys, the
MNC may utilize tools such as Qualaroo to conduct simple polls and ask clients brief questions.
This way, the firm would achieve its goal of obtaining useful responses from customers who are
active on its website.
Email and customer contact forms. It is imperative to point out that the organization
may also utilize customer contact forms and emails to obtain useful feedback from its clients all
over the world. As such, the company may improve the way its customers reach out through
email by maximizing on its effectiveness. When seeking feedback through emails, the company
should assure the customers of a speedy response. It should also develop an organized customer
feedback system to provide clients with immediate response and send candid follow up
messages. In so doing, the company would be able to obtain candid feedback about their
products from the customers point of view, and know how to improve the product as well as
service delivery.

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Exploratory customer interviews. An exploratory customer interview comprises of a
direct outreach to the client to obtain feedback. This method would help the firm in
understanding its customers by simply talking to them and obtaining their views about the
products. Furthermore, it may also facilitate in filling in the gaps that less personal forms of
feedback tend to create. However, when conducting these one on one interviews for feedback, it
is important for the one obtaining the information to focus on user attitudes. Here, it is crucial for
the company to explore how clients think about the firms agricultural machinery. Also, the
interviewer should use the critical incident method to inquire from the clients those specific
instances which they faced difficulties when using the firm’s products, or a great quality of the
product. By so doing, the direct approach would yield a great feedback for the company, which
would then be useful in improving the products as well as customer delivery across all its
subsidiaries in the five countries.
On-site activity survey. Given the nature of the company’s products (agricultural
equipment), the most suitable method to obtain feedback would be to conduct an on-site activity
survey. Basically, this involves obtaining feedback in the field when the customers are actually
using the product (Ciotti, 2016). By visiting the clients in their farms, the company will know if
their equipment is functioning properly, or if they break down easily. It would also help the firm
know if its equipment are efficient and useful for the clients in the tasks that they are intended
for. Most importantly, the activity would allow the firm to obtain useful insights on how it can
improve its equipment to satisfy the farming needs of its clients. By so doing, therefore, the
corporation would be able to break the communication barrier that exists between the
organization and its clients and, in turn, allow it to make improvements on the equipment while