Cross Cultural Communication - Essay Example

?Annotated Bibliography Berg, N. and Holtbrugge, D. Global teams: a network analysis. Team Performance Management, 16 (3/4), 187-211 Berg and Holtbrugge, through a network analysis of global teams in the automotive and airlines industry, found that interaction of team members from different cultures does not impact the productivity and creativity of teams. Communication media and language skills play a pivotal role in the outcome of global teams. Brandl, J. and Neyer, A. 2009. APPLYING COGNITIVE ADJUSTMENT THEORY TO CROSS-CULTURAL TRAINING FOR GLOBAL VIRTUAL TEAMS. Human Resource Management, 48 (3), 341-353 Anxiety and uncertainty in global virtual teams can be overcome when feeling of mutual trust is developed among the members, according to Brandl and Neyer. The type of cross-cultural training can influence cognitive adjustments in virtual teams. Training should equip the team members to deal with uncertainties instead of enforcing ready-made concepts of culture. Horak, S. 2010. Does The Individual’s Culture Play A Role In The Value Perception Of Members Of Small Multinational Teams? Business and Economics Journal. Horak investigated and found that the culturally influenced work values at country level as discovered by Hofstede do not play a significant role in small multicultural teams. Students being young and dynamic adapt to an international environment and respond positively to convergence of cultures. Kirkman, BD, and Shapiro, DL. 1996. THE IMPACT OF NATIONAL CULTURE ON EMPLOYEE RESISTANCE TO TEAMS: TOWARD A MODEL OF GLOBALIZED SELF-MANAGING WORK TEAM EFFECTIVENESS. Academy of Management Proceedings, 53-59 Kirkman and Shapiro evaluated the impact of national cultures on self-managed working teams (SMWT) and found that national cultures can create different conceptualizations of organizational justice. Moreover, members of SMWT may require different forms of compensation, appraisals, and decision-making structures to reduce resistance due to differences in perceptions of fairness. Mockaitis, AI., Rose, EL. and Zettining, P. 2007. THE DETERMINANTS OF TRUST IN MULTICULTURAL GLOBAL VIRTUAL TEAMS. Academy of Management Proceedings, Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining focused on the development of trust in multicultural virtual global teams and found that national culture, conflict, task interdependence, and communication play a vital role. However, diversity – cultural or demographic – has minor relationship in the development of trust. Cultural diversity is not a barrier to trust. Newell, S., David, G. and Chand, D. 2007. An Analysis of Trust Among Globally Distributed Work Teams in an Organizational Setting. Knowledge and Process Management, 14 (3), 158-168 Newell, David and Chand analyzed trust among IT work teams based on the Newell and Swan threefold typology of trust and found that due to situational factors and socio-psychological dynamics, and ‘Us versus them’ attitude undermines the development of trust. Relationship management can minimize the impact of an inter-group perspective. Puck, J., Rygl, D. and Kittler, M. 2006. Cultural antecedents and performance consequences of open communication and knowledge transfer in multicultural process-innovation teams. Journal of Organisational Transformation and Social Change, 3 (2), 223-241 Puck, Rygl and Kittler evaluated the performance of process-innovation teams necessary in the ever--changing business environment. The study found that national cultural diversity had no significance on intra-team communication and knowledge transfer but both these elements have significant influence on different measures of performance as performance is perceived differently by team members. Sivakumar, K. and Nakata, C. 2003. Designing global new product teams - Optimizing the effects of national culture on new product development. International Marketing Review, 20 (4), 397-445 Since cultural diversity has both positive and negative impact on global new product teams (GNPT), Sivakumar and Nakata developed a framework containing four factors that would minimize the effects of national culture so that product outcomes are favourable. The framework was translated into several mathematical models which identify the variance of cultural values. Zakaria, N., Amelinckx, A. and Wilemon, D. 2004. Working Together Apart? Building a Knowledge-Sharing Culture for Global Virtual Teams. CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, 13 (1), 1-16 To overcome the challenges faced by and to maximize performance of ‘global virtual teams’, Zakaria, Amelinckx and Wilemon, the team must possess a knowledge-sharing culture. The ability to do so, in information technology-facilitated communication processes, rests on maintaining intra-team respect, mutual trust, reciprocity, and positive individual and group relationships. Zhang, D., Lowry, PB., Zhou, L. and Fu, X. 2007. The Impact of Individualism—Collectivism, Social Presence, and Group Diversity on Group Decision Making Under Majority Influence. Journal of Management Information Systems, 23 (4), 53-80 Zhang, Lowry, Zhou and Fu investigated the influence of national culture, social presence and group diversity in a group decision-making context. Through an empirical experiment of 183 groups at multiple sites, the authors found that the national culture of the minorities in the group can impact majority influence and computer-mediated communication can reduce majority influence. Impact of Culture on Global Teams Globalization and internationalization have given rise to increasing number of global teams, in which communication has been facilitated through advanced communications technology. Various types of global teams such as global virtual teams, global new product teams, process-innovation teams, self-managed working teams, can now be found in different organizations. The purpose of global teams is to better fulfill customer demands through internalization of diversity within the organizations (Berg and Holtbrugge, 2010). The operations of global teams have been facilitated with advancement in computer-mediated technology. Different authors and scholars have been conducting studies to find solutions and develop framework to overcome the issues that arise in teams that operate globally. National culture impacts how the global teams operate and achieve the intended objectives. Culture influences communication, culture impacts appraisals and culture influences the level of trust among the group members. This paper investigates the impact of culture on global teams Global teams, also known as global virtual teams, is based on the assumption that team members can engage in and deliver projects with practically no direct physical interaction with other members of the team (Financial Times, 2012). They remain connected through computer-mediated technology and such an arrangement allows multinational corporations to draw on a wide talent pool. Such teams typically have no face-to-face interaction and because they are geographically dispersed, they could come from different national and cultural backgrounds. Culture hence plays a critical role in the outcome of global teams. Hofstede and Trompennars conducted cross-cultural studies and defined the value system. These value systems affect human thinking, feeling, acting and also the behaviour of organizations (Anbari, Khilkhanova, Romanova & Umpleby, 2000) and hence the global team leaders need to have a deeper understanding of these value systems. Global virtual teams are culturally diverse; they work across temporal and physical distance and generally involve two or more nations (Brandl and Neyer, 2009). Such groups are interdependent and effective communication is achieved through technology. It is generally believed that productivity and creativity of the group members would be adversely affected if the group is culturally diverse in nature. However, culturally diverse groups are formed with a purpose. When members of different national and cultural backgrounds converge to work together, the group is expected to promote creativity and innovation (Berg and Holtbrugge, 2010). They are expected to generate a higher team performance due to synergy of complementary skills and cultural diversity (Horak, 2010) and may lead to better results with regards to coordination and performance (Hobman, Bordia and Gallois, 2004 cited in Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining, 2007). Self-managing teams develop the capacity to manage and lead itself; there is unique self-reliance (Kirkman and Shapiro, 1996). Multicultural diversity can lead to enhanced performance if the team members are able to use the cultural diversity to their advantage or result in failure (DiStefano and Maznevski, 2000 cited in Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining, 2007). The overall effect of cultural diversity has been found to be negative by Bettenhausen (1991 cited in Puck, Rygl and Kittler, 2006) as the advantages of creativity are offset by the obstacles and challenges. Global teams do face challenges of different sorts. For instance, because of the differences in national cultures, such teams differ on their views on management practices. The Americans lay emphasis on quick results while the Chinese have a long-term perspective compared to the Americans (Berg and Holtbrugge, 2010). In addition, personal differences may arise; team members may have issues dealing with different technologies, with different time zones. There may be lag in communication due to minimal face-to-face contact and technology-mediated communication (Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining, 2007). Challenges in multicultural environment could arise because different cultures imply different mental programming and these influence the motivation, activities and values (Hofstede 1984 cited in Gilbert and Tsao, 2000). Team building usually undergoes four phases (forming, storming, norming and performing). However, a culturally diverse and a globally dispersed team take even longer to reach the performing stage. This could be due to a more difficult verbal and nonverbal communication between the team members, decreased group cohesion, low job satisfaction, higher levels of stress, mistrust and conflicts (Puck, Rygl and Kittler, 2006). Culturally heterogeneous teams have more potential for conflicts and hence pose greater challenges for the team members (Dunkel and Meierewert, 2004). National cultural differences can also challenges all the four dimensions as specified by Hofstede – power distance, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance and individualism. A study by Berg and Holtbrugge, however challenge this assumption as their analysis of a network study of nine global teams in the automotive and airline industries revealed that difference in national culture does not directly impact productivity and creativity of teams. Advanced information and communications technology helps members of the team overcome challenges while language skills can be overcome through training. This therefore suggests that skills training, is as important in global teams as is cross-cultural training. Brandl and Neyer (2009) advocate that cross-cultural training (CCT) can help overcome feelings of anxiety and uncertainties. Training should equip the team members to deal with uncertainties instead of enforcing ready-made concepts of culture. The authors argue that CCT cannot be limited to country-specific knowledge but the members should be so trained that they are practically able to understand each other. Such cognitive adjustment is essential to feel comfortable and to make effective contribution to the team. Team members often undergo anxiety whether they would be able to adjust with the team. High level of uncertainty can reduce the ability to understand others’ messages or predict other person’s behaviour accurately. Low-level of uncertainty is also not desirable because it suggests that people ignore cultural difference and do not question their interpretations. Zakaria, Amelinckx and Wilemon (2004) give more importance to the human element in global virtual teams than to information and communication technologies in knowledge-sharing, team coherence and performance. Human beings are responsible to develop interactive relational bonds that can facilitate the development of shared knowledge culture. CCT can also foster a collaborative environment and contribute much more than information and communications technology. A shared understanding in virtual teams can enhance performance through shared experiences and similar perspectives. Shared understanding in global virtual teams is essential as they are geographically dispersed and hence differ in their national, cultural and linguistic attributes. However, all members in such teams may not share the same perceptions. To overcome the challenges faced by, and to maximize performance of ‘global virtual teams’, Zakaria, Amelinckx and Wilemon suggest that the team must possess a knowledge-sharing culture. The ability to do so, in information technology-facilitated communication processes, rests on maintaining intra-team respect, mutual trust, reciprocity, and positive individual and group relationships. The multinationals use self-managing work teams (SMWT) in their foreign affiliates as a result of downsizing and working with a lower number of employees. Members of such teams have the responsibility to manage themselves, jointly manage the work and decide who would shoulder what responsibility, and become self-reliant. While there are benefits in using SMWT, employees resist such teams because of negative employee reactions to self-management. Such an attitude is more applicable in high power distance cultures when employees want to be instructed and dictated, in cultures with high uncertainty avoidance, and when employees are not willing to accept responsibility for their decisions and actions. All these stem from differences in national cultures, as pointed out by Kirkman and Shapiro as members from such cultures can create different conceptualizations of organizational justice. Therefore, in high power distance the move to self-managing teams should be gradual accompanied with adequate training and resources. Moreover, members of SMWT may require different forms of compensation, appraisals, and decision-making structures to reduce resistance due to differences in perceptions of fairness. If the powerful influence of national culture is taken into account, the management would be able to handle the resistance to change. Trust is a vital factor in the functioning of global teams. Personal differences among the team members may affect the development of trust (Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining, 2007). Personal differences could arise out of differences in national culture, conflict, task interdependence, and communication. Trust in virtual teams depends on the abilities of individualists and collectivists to work together. The lack of shared understanding may lead to lower levels of trust due to reduced cooperation and personal conflicts. Thus when the membership of the team is more collective in nature, more positive evaluations of trust has been found through the study conducted by Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining. This highlights that culture has a significant bearing on the performance of virtual teams. However, diversity – cultural or demographic – has minor relationship in the development of trust. Cultural diversity is not a barrier to trust, according to Mockaitis et al., but Newell, David and Chand (2007) find that trust building among globally distributed team is a challenge. In a study among IT work teams distributed in the United States, India and Ireland, the authors found that due to situational factors and socio-psychological dynamics, and ‘Us versus them’ attitude undermines the development of trust. This is due to identifiable global differences in national cultures that present themselves as dichotomous value systems. Trust is important for knowledge-sharing and knowledge-sharing depends upon personal connection. However, trust is difficult to establish in a globally distributed project team especially as the onshore workers feel threatened. To overcome this obstacle to development of trust, the project managers have to work on relationship management to minimize the impact of an inter-group perspective. This can be possible by encouraging face-to-face interactions and discussions rather than relying only on electronic communication channels. This would help to relieve the tensions of both the onshore and offshore employees. Another form of team in the ever-changing business environment is the process innovation teams. Members of such teams come from different functional backgrounds to evaluate the existing intra-firm processes and propose solutions for improvement. For process-innovation teams knowledge transfer and open communication are critical processes because of the different functional backgrounds. Puck, Rygl and Kittler (2006) evaluated the process innovation teams in a German sportswear company, where the employee structure was international and all the teams had a strong degree of cultural diversity. This company had 20 process-innovation teams with 237 members with one internal leader who moderated the meetings. All teams were autonomous and granted individual budgets. The study found that national cultural diversity had no significance on intra-team communication and knowledge transfer. This could possibly be due to a strong corporate culture and due to English being the corporate language used by all. Adaptation to the international environment is easier when the team members are young in age as in the case of students as found by Horak (2010). The younger generation is well educated and well-informed, dynamic and has cosmopolitan attitude. Hence as socialization takes place, diversity – both culture and demographic – become insignificant. Socialization helps to overcome the country level work values as demographic diversity does not influence the development of trust (Mockaitis, Rose and Zettining, 2007). Zhang, Lowry, Zhou and Fu (2007) found that the national culture of group minorities has a significant influence on majority influence. They also contend that the use of computer-mediated communication can reduce majority influence. Due to increased competition companies tend to develop new products by taking advantage of the resources and expertise from multiple countries (Sivakumar and Nakata, 2003). Companies such as IBM and Intel employ people from distant sites into their global new product teams (GNPTs). Because of different nationalities, members of such teams differ widely in culture, values, orientations and assumptions. Misunderstandings and conflicts easily arise affecting the outcome and impeding work. If more members of the team come from highly individualistic cultures, the initiation stage could generate alternative product concepts and greater creativity. However, the same individualistic culture could be problematic during the implementation stage as new concepts or approaches at this stage could jeopardize the entire project. Hence at this stage cohesion or collectivism would be desirable. Therefore, cultural diversity has both positive and negative impact on global new product teams (GNPT). Sivakumar and Nakata hence, developed a framework containing four factors that would minimize the effects of national culture so that product outcomes are favourable. These four factors include the intensity of culture values, the heterogeneity of culture values, the consistency of culture’s effects across the two development phases – the initiation and the implementation phases, and the newness of the innovation being developed. All these four factors impact the success of new product development. The Channel Tunnel project had been undertaken several times to link Britain with the Continent but it encountered several failures. There were five complexities encountered in the project and one of the most significant one was that of cultural differences. Cultural differences were perceived in the areas of professionalism and standards. The French engineers, and particularly those that graduated from Ecole Nationale des ponts et chausses, were held in high esteem while the British engineers were considered no more than mechanics (Lentz, 2001). Again, the British hired experienced tunnelers and locomotive drivers while the French hired unemployed workers, trained them to become tunnelers and then retrained them to become locomotive drivers. This was a global project but the British and the French used their own standards in their own territory. The impact of national culture was evident as French, with high power index treated their polytechnics as the cream of the society and the British with low power index, treated their engineers as mechanics. Difference in power index created chaos and the project could not take off as team members could not work in cohesion. Cultures with high power index require someone in authority to handle team members. Lack of shared understanding and lack of development of trust among members was the reason for the failure of this project. National cultures of France and Britain have led to different conceptualizations of organizational justice (Kirkman and Shapiro, 1996). This is the reason that people on both sides of the tunnel had different perceptions and decision-making structure which impacted the outcome. Thus, while global teams are formed with a purpose, if not properly managed, such teams may not be able to achieve the intended objectives. Global teams give rise to creativity, innovation, give multinationals access to a wide talent pool, and enhance performance through synergy of multiple skills. However, global teams require to be efficiently managed as national cultures play a significant role in influencing the outcome. Communication media and language skills play a vital role in the outcome of global teams. Trust is a key component in global teams and the lack of which can cause anxiety and uncertainties among the team members. However, the development of trust depends upon national culture, conflict, task interdependence, and communication. Socio-psychological dynamics also impact the development of trust. Cross-cultural training can help the team members to deal with uncertainties. A knowledge-sharing culture is also essential to maximize performance of global virtual teams. More important than information and communication technologies is the human component in virtual teams as relational bonds give rise to feelings of cohesion, trust and collaboration. The challenges in global teams are many but they are not insurmountable; they just need to be managed. Bibliography Anbari, FT., Khilkhanova, EV., Romanova, MV. and Umpleby, SA. 2000. CROSS CULTURAL DIFFERENCES AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS FORMANAGING INTERNATIONAL PROJECTS. Berg, N. and Holtbrugge, D. 2010. Global teams: a network analysis. Team Performance Management, 16 (3/4), 187-211 Brandl, J. and Neyer, A. 2009. APPLYING COGNITIVE ADJUSTMENT THEORY TO CROSS-CULTURAL TRAINING FOR GLOBAL VIRTUAL TEAMS. Human Resource Management, 48 (3), 341-353 Dunkel, A. and Meierewert, S. 2004. Culture Standards and their impact on teamwork – An empirical analysis of Austrian, German, Hungarian and Spanish culture differences. JEEMS, 2, 147-175 Financial Times. 2012. Global Virtual Teams. Available from: http://lexicon.ft.com/Term?term=global-virtual-teams [Accessed 04 Dec. 2012] Gilbert, D. and Tsao, J. 2000. Exploring Chinese cultural influences and hospitality marketing relationships. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 12 (1), 45-53 Horak, S. 2010. Does The Individual’s Culture Play A Role In The Value Perception Of Members Of Small Multinational Teams? Business and Economics Journal, Kirkman, BD, and Shapiro, DL. 1996. THE IMPACT OF NATIONAL CULTURE ON EMPLOYEE RESISTANCE TO TEAMS: TOWARD A MODEL OF GLOBALIZED SELF-MANAGING WORK TEAM EFFECTIVENESS. Academy of Management Proceedings, 53-59 Lentz, C. 2001. The Rise of Professional Government: Evidence from Large-Scale Public Works Projects. Available from: http://www.politicalreviewnet.com/polrev/reviews/PUAR/R_0033_3352_002_20621.asp [Accessed 04 Dec. 2012] Mockaitis, AI., Rose, EL. and Zettining, P. 2007. THE DETERMINANTS OF TRUST IN MULTICULTURAL GLOBAL VIRTUAL TEAMS. Academy of Management Proceedings, Newell, S., David, G. and Chand, D. 2007. An Analysis of Trust Among Globally Distributed Work Teams in an Organizational Setting. Knowledge and Process Management, 14 (3), 158-168 Puck, J., Rygl, D. and Kittler, M. 2006. Cultural antecedents and performance consequences of open communication and knowledge transfer in multicultural process-innovation teams. Journal of Organisational Transformation and Social Change, 3 (2), 223-241 Sivakumar, K. and Nakata, C. 2003. Designing global new product teams - Optimizing the effects of national culture on new product development. International Marketing Review, 20 (4), 397-445 Zakaria, N., Amelinckx, A. and Wilemon, D. 2004. Working Together Apart? Building a Knowledge-Sharing Culture for Global Virtual Teams. CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, 13 (1), 1-16 Zhang, D., Lowry, PB., Zhou, L. and Fu, X. 2007. The Impact of Individualism—Collectivism, Social Presence, and Group Diversity on Group Decision Making Under Majority Influence. Journal of Management Information Systems, 23 (4), 53-80 Read More