The silent language in Overseas Business - Essay Example

However, owing to its versatility, silent language is often found to be a challenging task for managers acting as a barrier in business negotiations, especially those held in overseas market. In this context, Hall explains five points which can be analyzed to understand the foreign cultures for overseas business from a more in-depth perspective (Hall, “Language of Time”). Time is regarded to be quite vital for every business where different communities or cultures depict differing views towards adherence to time schedules which also replicate a dimension of silent languages.

Globally, it is used as a common channel to communicate during overseas business negotiation. For instance, in the US culture, a delay in replying a communication within the stipulated time would generally indicate a matter of low priority or lack of interest for the allied parties and thereby cause serious disruptions in the negotiation process. While in Arab, time does not usually include fixed schedules like Americans. Time required for the accomplishment of a particular task depends entirely on the relationships between the parties engaged.

Again, in Ethiopia, time required in making a decision is directly related to its importance to that person and thus is based on mutual understanding (Hall, “Language of Time”). Like time, language of space also has its own importance in different business cultures. Where on one hand, larger space may signify the authoritative position of the person; on the other hand, in another culture, it might signify the individualistic perspective of the person. For instance, in America, the top level employees have the perception that being in middle of an overcrowded place (office among the subordinates) would generally mean that there would be various kind of people around them trying to create close associations and obtain bias benefits from them and hence, they prefer greater space in their working environment where only their peers and higher authority will be allowed.

On the other hand, the top executives in France intend to maintain a higher degree of coordination with lower level employees in order to preserve greater confidence among their subordinates and also to maintain a better control over the team performances. On the contrary, in case of the Arabian business culture, the location of the office and its dimension has minimal relation with the importance of the person occupying it (Hall, “Language of Space”). In this dimension, Hall elaborated the notion of ‘things’ as the significance rendered to material possessions.

Illustratively, the Americans believe that if a place is decorated with attractive materials and a large space accumulated with proper surrounding would signify that the people who are living in that premise are dependable as well as successful in their working environment. Contradictorily the French, Germans and the English have their own way of utilizing material possessions. In most instances, these cultures are observed to follow a traditional way of judging dependability and respectability of people rather than referring to their material possessions.

Again, the Middle Eastern businessmen are quite likely to look for personal connections and friendships when assessing the most dependable person rather than taking into account the furnishings. Contextually, Japanese