Cultural Differences Study of China, Nigeria and Brazil - Essay Example

 Cultural Differences Study of China, Nigeria and Brazil As the members of BRIC, China and Brazil have the fastest growth rate of economyin the world. At the same time, Nigeria has the largest population and second largest GDP across the Africa. With the rapid growth of economy and purchase power, these three countries have been viewed of the largest potential markets over the world and attract more and more investment from multinational companies. However, cultural differences of these markets have baffled the managers of these companies. Understanding how and what cultural differences may influence the workplaces and businesses has become imperative in global operation. Bright Bridge Healthcare must successfully fit into each of the prevailing cultures that await it in these three countries. This internal report is thus produced to inform the management about some key potential opportunities and challenges that awaits the company as it crosses carpet into these three markets. Contents 1.0 Introduction 1 2.0 Theoretical exploration of potential opportunities and challenges 1 2.1 Opportunities 2 2.1.1 Increased Knowledge 2 2.1.2 Encouraged Innovation 2 2.1.3 Broader Skills and Perspectives 3 2.2 Challenges 4 2.2.1 Differences in Value System 4 2.2.2 Use of Stereotype and Preconceptions 5 2.2.3 Decision-making and problem solving 5 3.0 Practicality of Literature to Relevant Scenario 6 4.0 Conclusion 8 5.0 Recommendation 8 References 9 1.0 Introduction As the human Resource (HR) manager of Bright Bridge Healthcare (which is an imaginative healthcare service provider) in my country of origin, UK, I am responsible for ensuring that all issues pertaining to the successful coexistence between employees, and between employees and their external stakeholders go on successfully. For this reason, I have a lot of responsibility to play in the current instance where the company is seeking a cross culture expansion to China, Nigeria and Brazil, all of which are countries with cultural compositions that are totally different from the parent country. Studies conducted on the proposed destinations of the company shows that not only are countries like China and Nigeria located outside the parent continent and have different cultures from where the company has long operated with excellent adaptation but that these are single countries made up of many different cultural and ethnic backgrounds (Wilson and Dalton, 2007). This means that the organization must successfully fit into each of the prevailing cultures that await it in these three countries. This internal report is thus produced to inform the management about some key potential opportunities and challenges that awaits the company as it crosses carpet into the culture rich African nation of Nigeria, culturally dynamic South American country of Brazil, and the hetero-cultural Asian country of China. The opportunities are not a goldmine and the challenges are not dungeons but are all raw variables that the company can take advantage of or allow to become hindrance to its growth. The report therefore contains recommendations on the best ways to turn the challenges into and tap into the opportunities by use of various theoretical explorations, drawn from literature of Hall’s two cultural contexts, Hofstede’s five dimensions, and Trompenaar’s seven dimensions of culture. 2.0 Theoretical exploration of potential opportunities and challenges Crossing into new cultures with the Bright Bridge Healthcare dream of offering differentiated health service to the ordinary citizen, there are three major opportunities and three major challenges that are perceived upon arrival, especially as it has to do with leading or managing people in those countries who may either be internal stakeholders or external stakeholders. This section of the report therefore captures the three opportunities and three challenges in detail and gives theoretical exploration to them, using various models in literature. 2.1 Opportunities 2.1.1 Increased Knowledge The first opportunity that the cross cultural move presents to the organisation is increase in knowledge, which is expected to come about as a result of sharing of information and experience among the people of the three different cultures (Weaver, 2004). In this, Hall’s cultural factors can be used to study the cultural differences that exists between the three countries in term of the sharing of information and experience, which is expected to bring about increased knowledge. Given the two cultural contexts that Hall gives as high context and low context, Brazil and Nigeria are identified to be part of the high context, where very little explanation is needed because much is taken for granted (Miller and Donna, 2002). Because the people of these two countries have many different contextual elements that helps them to understand the rules, they find it a good thing to easily share with others what they have, including information and experience, making it an opportunity to tap knowledge easily (Drucker, 2004). China on the other hand is low context according to Hall’s cultural factors and thus takes very little for granted. In comparison to the parent country which is U.K. it would be said that in terms of this cultural dimension, China will be considered as the preferred choice, given that U.K. also belongs to the low context and takes very little for granted (Drucker, 2004). But because the people are highly particular about almost everything that goes on around, they love to share their experience and information so that visitors can easily understand and cooperate with them (Lacity and Willcocks, 2001). 2.1.2 Encouraged Innovation Foster (2000) posited that heterogeneity of cross-culture organisational interactions is a useful opportunity that encourage innovation. It would be noted that innovation is the birth of new and genuine ideas that are born out of creativity to encourage and promote growth (Noll and Wilkins, 2004). Using Hofstede’s five fundamental dimensions, one of the dimensions that can be used to draw difference between the countries is achievement-orientation, where Hofstede sees one side of the dimension as masculine and the other as feminine (Hofstede, 1996). Just like the U.K, Gopal, Mukhopadhyay and Krishnan (2002) argued that both Brazil and China are at the masculine end of the continuum, being very achievement oriented and placing value on issues that has to do with achievement, success and money. Because of this, people in these two countries always strive to come up with new and creative ideas that promote innovation, knowing that when they keep doing things the same way, no different results will be produced (Garvin, 2008). In terms of the achievement orientation of the three countries in comparison to the parent country, it would be noted that the company and its workforce that will be going to the new target countries will find themselves conforming easily to the system that prevails in China and Brazil. Unfortunately, not the same can be said about Nigeria in this context. This is because Nigeria is not a very achievement-oriented country but Massey, Hung, Montoya-Weiss and Ramesh (2001) noted that it is still possible to encourage innovation but this will take much motivation from leaders of the organisation to get employees coming up with new ideas. Part of the motivation would include both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation but intrinsic motivation that uses training can be guaranteed for the best of results. 2.1.3 Broader Skills and Perspectives Crossing culture means an opportunity to learn new skills and perspectives about life. More importantly, organisational skills such as interpersonal skills are easily acquired as a person works in a new cultural environment and comes into contact with new people whose style of relations is different. Basing on idea of culture capital proposed by Bennett et al (2009), China would be identified to be a country where the emphasis of culture in relation to class is taken very seriously. This means that class and culture are related and determines how people get along with each other. The effect of this on the acquisition of interpersonal skills is that people must always learn to be at the levels of other people they want to relate to (Kryssanov, Tamaki and Kitamura, 2001). At the organisational level, Bright Bridge and its staff would have a responsibility of portraying this way of life by coming to the levels of its stakeholders both internally and externally, especially when it comes to people who are thought to be of lower class. Once this level is reached, clients will find it very easy in doing business with the organisation and this will bring about growth. Brazil and Nigeria on the other hand have a free flowing culture that does not link culture with class. This means that it is easy to penetrate the cultural boundaries of people and easily do business with them (NAFSA: Association of International Educators, 2003). Given the social class order of the U.K. that is referred to by Kryssanov, Tamaki and Kitamura (2001), one would say that there is much similarity between Nigeria and Brazil in terms of broader skills and perspective, as against China. This is because even though there is some form of class stratification in the U.K, this is hardly translated into thee work environment and that once work is to be done, all are seen to be same, regardless of class (NAFSA, 2003). 2.2 Challenges 2.2.1 Differences in Value System Because people’s values are expressed through the things they say and do, people who are from different cultural backgrounds approach and execute work in much different ways based on their cultural values (Olson and Olson, 2003). As Bright Bridge crosses culture to these three countries, there is the potential that the differences in value system will affect the way its external and internal stakeholders react to work, especially when viewed from the hierarchy dimension of Hofstede’s five fundamental dimensions to national culture. In this dimension, Hofstede notes that cultures that value hierarchy place much emphasis on leader status and expect the leader to provide direction. Meanwhile, Merryfield (2005) noted that in cultures like Brazil and Nigeria where this dimension exists, the challenge is that creativity may be killed at the employee level as employees would always wait for orders to come from a higher authority. In relation to the parent country which is U.K, the opposite exists because there is high premium placed on value system, where employees hardly wait for instruction to be issued before doing what is expected of them. Over here, employees see the need to be independent at work as a means of value creation. The U.K system is thus similar to what prevails in China but there are still some levels of challenges with this system. This is because in where employees do not value hierarchy, the challenge is that employees always want much freedom and engagement, which in an instance of new company, may mean a total deviation from the way the parent organisation originally runs its operations. For example there will be much questioning of authority and rules that are given in China, which could be a recipe for employee-employer conflict (Sutton, 1999). 2.2.2 Use of Stereotype and Preconceptions The issue of stereotype and preconceptions have been identified by Osland and Bird (2004) as factors that threaten growth and development within organisations. This is because they bring about apathy and kills the sense of belongingness emanating from the fact that people tend to take the position that roles assigned to people are exclusively theirs and must not be interfered by others (Dosa, 2013). Using individualism versus communitarianism dimension of Trompenaar’s seven dimensions of culture, the three countries can be compared to have a better understanding of how each of them pose a challenge with use of stereotype and preconceptions. In a country like Brazil where there is communitarianism, people hold the belief that the group is more important than the individual. Unfortunately though, when people are effectively working in groups, they make preconceived notions about how they ought to be rewarded by management (Pfeffer, 2004). They also make several preconceived notions about the outcomes of their work. Where their expectations are not met, it becomes recipe for withdrawal from commitment. In China and Nigeria also, the general perspective is one of individualism and this is very similar to Gliozzo (2002) noted about the U.K. where people believe in personal freedom. But regardless of the fact that this system is similar to what prevails in the U.K, there is some level of challenge to the parent once it opens its outfit in China or Nigeria. The challenge here is that the belief in personal freedom comes with a sense of stereotype where certain individuals are believed to be good only with certain roles, limiting the sense of dynamism within the organisation (Deardorff, 2004). 2.2.3 Decision-making and problem solving Decision-making and problem solving are two important elements for successful growth of any new entrant, especially in new cultures (Green, 2000). For Bright Bridge Healthcare, the measure of its competitiveness can be taken directly from the degree to which decisions are made from a collective and consensus basis and problems are solved from the same paradigm. But from the universalism versus particularism dimension of Trompenaar’s seven dimensions of culture, one can see that the people of China and Brazil are very similar to the U.K who is on the universalism side. These three countries place so much premium on laws and the need to make the laws prevail over the order of the people. The challenge with this however is that once laws are made, it is difficult to convince people to penetrate the laws for decision making and problem solving purposes to find new solutions to prevailing problems (Cummings, 2001). But the health care industry is a rapidly changing one which requires much dynamism with decisions that are taken among service providers (Ligos, 2000). On the part of Nigeria which belongs to particularism side of Trompenaar’s dimension, where change with decisions can come at any time, the high level of individualism as seen above makes people very reserved in taking group based decisions, which has been identified to be the most ideal for solving problems within the health sector (Dosa, 2013). Once the company goes to Nigeria, even though there may be difficulty with adaptability to particularism, learning to make decision making group based will help in ensuring that consensus building in decision making leads to the application of shared responsibility (Dosa, 2013). To overcome the challenge of decision-making and problem solving therefore, Nigeria would be the most preferred destination. 3.0 Practicality of Literature to Relevant Scenario Based on the opportunities and challenges that have been identified in relation to literature and models above, there are ways in which they conform and contradict with the practical instances of Bright Bridge Healthcare. For the opportunities, it would be noted that increased knowledge and broader skills right fit and conform to the case of Bright Bridge Healthcare. This is because as healthcare provider, it is important to have in-depth knowledge on health issues, as and how they pertain to specific demographics such as the new countries the organisation will be going to (Godbey, 2002). It is therefore right to say that it is an opportunity that new knowledge will be acquired from the people already in those countries and knowing much about the demographic health needs of their people. The same applies to the skills that are needed to easily penetrate the cultural and interpersonal boundaries that will be built around the new stakeholders, especially customers. Coming from U.K. where most cultural systems are different from the targeted countries, it will be true to say that if the company does not have a very good understanding of how to approach its new customers through the application of basic interpersonal skills it will be difficult to introduce the services of the company to them (Lambert, 2006). With this said, there is contradiction on the literature on encouraged innovation. This is because as much as the organisation needs innovation, the health sector is such that it takes its innovation from the larger scientific practice based on experimentation, empirical studies and best practices (Osland and Bird, 2004). Because of this, not much is expected of the people within the new cultures in very direct sense when it comes to innovative contributions. On the challenges, almost all three that are referred to in literature will be agreed with. With the differences in value system for example, it can be seen that the different values that people have at work have always influenced their perspective and attitude to work. Some of these differences have even been exhibited in terms of how they spend time at the work place and how they relate to other people. Issues of how people make interpretations of language, both spoken and implied have depended to a large extent, on their value system. The key challenge then remains for the company to have a means of penetrating the different value systems as presented in literature through the Hofstede’s dimensions to ensure that provisions are made to cover each person’s differences. The issue of stereotype and preconceptions may also affect people’s general input to work when the company goes to a country with differences in stereotype and preconceptions from U.K. In such destinations, people are most likely to be restrained from giving off their very best because they may conceive that certain tasks are not meant for them. Once this happens, productivity may be affected and creativity will be killed. To solve this challenge, it will be important to give mixed roles to all people within the organisation at one point in time or the other. Finally, decision-making and problem solving form part of the routine running of organisations. To this end, it can be agreed and confirmed in literature as presented by Trompenaar’s dimension that any differences that emphasise on withdrawal from decision making will hamper the successful growth of the organisation. 4.0 Conclusion Based on the discussion on opportunities and challenges presented above, it can be concluded that the true call for cross cultural success depends on the institutionalisation of a cross-culture management system. This is because there are very little changes that the existing cultural parameters of the three countries will change in any way. However, with cross-culture management, it will be easier for the parent country, which is U.K and its entire organisational culture, workforce and management principles to easily fit into any of the three countries, particularly China, where there is much similarity with U.K. with cross-culture management also, it will be possible for the company to manage cultural differences from Brazil and Nigeria. Instead of being frightened by the challenges therefore, the company must be motivated by the challenges as a new opportunity for them to apply creative thinking in taking chances by turning the challenges into opportunities. For the existing opportunities, it will be important for the company not to see them as a foregone conclusion for success. Rather, should be a sense of diligent service that is taken towards them in refining them from mere opportunities to success variables. Based on this, it will be concluded that the company should be in a position with its current status to venture into new cultures. 5.0 Recommendation For the conclusion to venture into the new cultures to be adequately utilised, there are some factors that must be taken into consideration based on the following recommendations. 1. It will be important to avoid any form of instant judgement and assumptions when dealing with people in Brazil, especially when it comes to individual and working style. 2. For people in Nigeria and China, the safest way to getting along with people should be taking time to check out issues that have to do with culture, which the organisation is not aware of. This is because of the abundant cultural perspectives that exist in these countries. 3. It is important to think through information intended for public communication in knowing how they will be received by different people before making them 4. The selection of methods of communication and engagement should be based on the individual differences that exist among people in each culture. 5. Accommodation of individual differences must be a constant part of the running of the organisation in new cultures. 6. Roles must be assigned based on people’s individual strengths and weaknesses. References Bennett et al. (2009) Culture, Class, Distinction (Culture, Economy, and the Social). Routledge: London Cummings, W. (2001) Current Challenges of International Education. 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