Global Business Management - Coursework Example

A Study on International Business Culture: What I Learnt

• Introduction

Globalisation has connected several international economies through trade; thereby, making the world a global market (Kachru, 2009). While going through the cultural dimensions of various countries, I could understand that the relationship between me (as a business consultant) and the clients plays a very important role in setting up a successful international business. Good relationships have the potential of making a small meeting into a big business opportunity. Internationally, it has been noticed that culture of a country, has a profound effect on its business operation. The knowledge of changed cultural practices while travelling to foreign land can help an individual in making a great impression over his or her foreign partners.

During the course of this group work activity, I learned that every culture is different from the other. We need to understand the ongoing relationships in order to develop successful business. The experience of working together as a team was also enriching, since it not only tests our ability to work with each other, but also proves to be useful for future group work (Kennedy and Nilson, 2008).

This paper focuses on our learning experience about the various differences of international business culture and how we completed our assigned task by working as a team. This paper also provides for a section that illustrates the things which could have been improved.

• The Learning Experience

The knowledge of international business culture gave us the scope to get to know about the differences in traditions and values in every culture. It also informed us how influential cultures can be while shaping a country’s society as well as business environment. When we stepped into the shoes of business consultants, my colleagues and I understood the fact that we are required to present our clients with quality service. If we have to secure good business relationships we have to understand their need and provide them with the solution that will be aligned to their practices. Otherwise, in future, they might turn to any of our competitor who will provide them with more customised solution.

Quality of our service is the most significant factor in starting and maintaining a business relation. It will encompass everything starting from the speed at which we are able to deliver a particular product to the products usability. If we; as a business consultant, fail in providing any one of the aspects then we might have to lose our business to one of our rivals. The budget forms our most critical constraint, because often in order to keep within the limits we have to sacrifice in terms of quality. However, current business competition has taken that luxury away, now we have to meet each criterion even if we have to cut our profit margin. This is because of the speculation that, if we provide quality products to our existing clients and build a good business relationship with them, then it will open the future prospects for a new business. Business contacts and ongoing trade render fruitful result in the long-run.

After researching about International Relations in the four countries namely, United Kingdom (UK), China, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, we managed to identify that when we are engaged in international trade, then it is evident that we will have international business partners. Their backgrounds vary from us and we need to respect their organisational structure and practices. It also came to our knowledge that if we unknowingly do something different while we are in the presence of people from other cultural background then it may seem disrespectful to them and this may cost us in terms of our business.

There is an old English proverb, “when in Rome, do as the Romans do”; following the host can avoid the chance of any unintentional disrespect pertaining to our behaviour (Skipper and Kwon, 2008). Another way that could be used is, to gather as much information as possible about the country with which we are connected through business. Research on their business culture gives us the required knowledge and understanding about their perspective and cultural differences. This knowledge can help us in improving our communication and intents with our international partners making stronger business relation.

During our group work, we discovered how to attain success through delegation of task. We equally divided the task among five members. At the beginning of the project we had decided that we would meet twice a week, so that we could understand the progress of the project and how each member was coping with their individual work. Confusion or doubt regarding any particular part was clarified during these meetings. When any of our team members got stuck while working on his or her individual part, we helped each other. This method helped us to maintain quality of the project and complete it within the deadline.

• Difficulties Faced During Group Work

Group work always provides the opportunity to work and share ideas with our friends but sometimes there are complexities as well (Burke, 2011).

• We were not able to meet for discussions because of classes - Although we had decided to meet twice a week to check upon the progress of the project yet due to our strict scheduling of classes sometimes we were not able to meet. This resulted in delay to address and solve the doubts that have arisen while working on our individual parts.
• Sometimes clash of ideas leads to conflicts – Another problem that sprouted was that there were clashes regarding whose ideas to choose and what to choose while sharing our individual views regarding any particular part. We were only required to include the valid points and eliminate stale ideas. The waits for successive meeting worsened the situation because confusions needed to be cleared at the earliest to complete the project in time.
• Delay in discussion session, stalled the progress of our project- Conflict of ideas and strict scheduling of classes and prevented us from continuing the progress of our project. Lack of communication because of less frequent meetings was the root cause behind persistence of doubts. We accepted most of the suggestions when all the members accepted them because we wanted to include everybody into the discussion. A team cannot reach its objective, if all the members are not included and exclusion results in hatred and disrespect within a team (Phillips and Gully, 2013).

In the event of any conflict, I acted as the mediator and asked both the parties involved in conflict to present their views independently in front of the group, so that confusions could be cleared and we all could come to a consensus regarding which points to incorporate and which ones to ignore. The performance of a team depends on the ways through which they try to resolve conflicts (PsychPress, 2014). These open discussions, allow us to reach to the root of the problem so that occurrences of such incidents can be avoided in future. It not only strengthened mutual trust, but also helped in developing harmony among the team members. On some occasions, if a member was raising a doubt regarding any point (specifically while acting as consultants) we used to asked the concerned person how he or she would have behaved in the respective situation. This proved to a good mechanism in understanding what a member wanted to convey.

• Things to Improve

In future, during group works I would try to organise more open discussion sessions, so that the project could get completed quickly without any mistakes. I believe that the more a particular thing is discussed the greater is the chance of observing small details associated with it. Personality traits are very important while working as a team because behavioural characteristics influence how a person will act in a given situation (Schermerhorn, 2011). While working together, mutual trust and bonding helps in avoiding clashes and conflicts. Although we all study the same course yet we needed to understand each member’s strength and weaknesses in order to build a strong team utilising our strengths.

In future I would take into account to arrange for more knowledge sharing meetings. It will allow the members to know more about each other. This will bridge the gap of communication within the team and will make the members more comfortable while working with each other. This will also help while allocating individual assignments.

• Conclusion

After observing and analysing each individual culture, a conclusion can be drawn that the knowledge of foreign culture is the key to develop successful business relations. In the age of globalisation, in order to sustain in this highly competitive world, contacts are very important and they can only be developed if both the country’s representatives can respect and value each other’s culture.

This group work gave me the opportunity to get to know about the various business cultures across the globe and how important it is for each country to know about the practices of the clients in order to build successful business. In spite of conflicts, it was our joint effort and dedication that helped us to complete the project within the deadline. In future, I would definitely try to be more participative and improve my communicating ability so that conflicts while working as a team can be avoided ensuring quality work from the team as a whole.

Reference List

Burke, A., 2011. Group Work: How to Use Groups Effectively. The Journal of Effective Teaching, 11(2), pp. 87-95.

Kachru, U., 2009. Strategic Management: Concepts and Cases. New Delhi: Excel Books India.

Kennedy, F. A. and Nilson, L. B., 2008. Successful Strategies for Teams. [PDF] Available at: < http://www.clemson.edu/OTEI/documents/teamwork-handbook.pdf > [Accessed 22 June 2016].

Phillips, J. M. and Gully, S. M., 2013. Organizational Behavior: Tools for Success. Boston: Cengage Learning.

PsychPress, 2014. 5 steps to handling clashing team members. [PDF] Available at: < http://www.psychpress.com.au/newsletter/files/NWS-JUN2014/Jun2014_5-Steps-to-Handling-Clashing-Team-Members.pdf > [Accessed 22 June 2016].

Schermerhorn, J. R., 2011. Introduction to Management. New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Skipper, H.D. and Kwon, J., 2008. Risk Management and Insurance: Perspectives In A Global Economy. New York: John Wiley & Sons.