Cross-cultural Communication - Research Paper Example

?Table of contents 0 Introduction 1 Objective of the study............................................................................ 1 1.2 Research questions................................................................................. 1 1.3 Organizational background..................................................................... 2 1.4. Problem ..................................................................................................3 2.0 Literature Review ..........................................................................................5 2.1 Cross cultural communication and conflicts............................................ 6 2.2 Types of communication styles................................................................ 7 2.2.1. Direct v indirect communication style............................................. 7 2.2.2 Attached v detached communication style ........................................7 2.2.3 Concrete v abstract communication style......................................... 8 2.3 Other aspects of communication................................................................ 8 2.4. Conflicts in the workplaces .......................................................................8 3.0 Research methodology ......................................................................................11 4.0 Research findings and discussions..................................................................... 12 5.0 Recommendations and conclusion..................................................................... 14 References ................................................................................................................15 1.0 Introduction Cross-cultural communication is a relatively new phrase that has gained global attention because of increased interaction of people from different cultural backgrounds. In the recent past globalization has produced better and faster methods of transportation that have improved movement of people across different regions in the world. In addition, fast and more efficient methods of communication through electronic and information technology has opened wider avenues for interaction between people of different cultures without the need of physical movement. Currently, most workplaces are multicultural, and this has created the need for establishing a favourable environment to promote good working relations between the employees. In this respect, cross-cultural communication is important in order to develop, nurture, and improve relationships between employees from diverse cultural backgrounds (Tung, 1993: 357). However, Adler (1997: 31) notes that all communication is cultural irrespective of the background of the communicators. Cultural diversity in any organization could be both beneficial and detrimental to its performance. One of the major benefits of diversity in workplaces is that it provides an organization with a wide range of skills and human resources; however, it could cause conflicts that jeopardize the spirit of teamwork in an organization. This research paper investigated conflict and violence among employees in Ovine Medical centre, medium multicultural and imaginary healthcare facility in Singapore. 1.1 Objectives of the study The objective of this paper was to investigate i. Conflict and violence between employees at Ovine medical centre ii. Determine the effects of conflicts and violence on their performance and productivity iii. Establish the effect of cross-cultural communication on the customer satisfaction and retention in the medical facility. 1.2 Research questions i. Is cultural diversity responsible for conflict and violence in the facility? ii. Does conflict affect performance at the medical facility? iii. Is declining client satisfaction and retention caused by the conflict between the employees? 1.3 Organization background Ovine Medical Centre was started by a British Neurologist, Dr Gordon Cook in 1975 in Chinatown, one of the major cities in Singapore. Dr Cook initially intended the medical facility to be rehabilitative, curative and palliative care for patients suffering from spine injuries, in a town that had very high motor medium accident. Kate, a 43-year-old nurse in London and Cook’s wife was the first member of staff at the hospital besides her husband and they relocated from Manchester in Britain and settled in Chinatown during the spring of 1975 with their three-year-old son. During the commencement of the project, the founder encountered several problems, but lack of qualified staff in neurology was the major setback. This situation was compounded by the fact that there were few medical institutions offering the training in Singapore at that time. The few professionals who graduated from Singaporean universities were immediately recruited by the government, which offered them very attractive packages in order to retain them in the public health care sector. In addition, the number of patients suffering from spinal injuries was so high and as soon as the hospital was opened, the available staff was not sufficient to attend to the patients effectively. Most patients attending the facility came with multiple injuries such as fractures, amputations, and severe internal injuries besides the spinal problems. In this regard, Mr Cook was compelled to broaden the scope of his initial plan of treating patients with spine injuries and include bone specialists, plastic surgeons and general practitioners. The situation created the need to recruit more medical specialists but there were very few in Singapore. The human resources manager at the Ovine medical centre therefore decided to recruit international professionals and after the exercise, the centre recruited seven doctors, five were from India and two from China. In addition, the centre hired a team of 14 nurses and an additional 20 assistants in the next ten years. In the past two years, the number of employees in the health facility has reached 250, and they come from diverse cultural and national backgrounds. By the end of 2010, the human resources manager, Mr Hussein Ahmed noted that the employees at Ovine health centre came from the six continents and the entire workforce comprised of 68 nationalities. The middle level employees including nurses and physician assistants comprised the largest group of the entire workforce in the medical facility while specialist doctors represent the least proportion. Due to the high numbers of middle level employees in the health centre, the manager noted that they comprised the widest cultural diversity of the entire staff. However, the majority of middle level employees came from the Asian continent but from over 23 different countries. In addition to the diverse nationalities, the employees in the facility proclaim different faiths, the major religions being Islam, Christianity, and Buddhism. Twenty years after the hospital was founded, it had established itself as one of the best medical care providers in Singapore and as a result, the number of patients being treated at the facility increases year after year. Because of high quality care offered at the centre, it attracts wealthy clients and the management has opened 12 branches in affluent regions across the country. Ovine Medical Centre receives patients from the Asia and Africa, but in the recent years, the numbers of patients from United States and Western Europe is on an increasing trend. Moreover, the number of referral patients from different parts of the globe is increasing. The facility has since expanded and it offers cutting edge medical technology in treatment of serious complications and it conducts complex surgical processes including transplanting liver, heart, treatment of congenital diseases in children, operation in the brain to remove tumours and treatment of patients suffering from cancerous tissue growths. According to the hospital superintendent Dr Khan Suji, the hospital has established successful collaborations with leading medical researchers in the United States, United Kingdom and countries with advanced medical technology. One of the most significant contributions of the collaboration is the application of stem cell technology in providing cure for people suffering from terminal diseases such as Parkinson disease, pancreatic cancer, and cystic fibrosis among other diseases that have no cure or requiring organ transplants. Although this technology is still awaiting authorization from the ministry of health in Singapore, it is one of the major medical breakthroughs in the history of medical technology. 1.4 Problem In the past two years, the human resources department at the Ovine Medical Centre has been receiving many incidents of conflicts and violence between the employees. Moreover, the number of complaints from the patients is on an increasing trend .In the past year alone, the hospital received 483 complaints from its clients, pertaining to poor quality of services, negligence, and being insensitive to their needs. In the same year, Ovine medical Centre lost $ 87 million in lawsuits launched by the customers who successfully contested and won damages arising from negligence of the medical team. The medical facility has many pending lawsuits that are awaiting determination. The human resource manager is concerned that the increasing rates of conflicts and violence between the employees are mainly responsible for the deteriorating performance of the employees at the facility. Moreover, there has been high rate of employee turnover; increasing absenteeism from duty and a growing number of employees have openly expressed displeasure of working in the various teams across the facility. Three months ago, the company hired Peaks Performance Consultants in order to investigate the working conditions of the employees at the facility, identify the possible causes of the conflict and make valuable recommendation of reversing the trend in order to improve their performance and job satisfaction. The consultants established that Ovine Medical Centre had a very diverse and multicultural workforce that caused the increasing level of conflicts and violence among the employees. In addition, the consultants found that the health centre had poor mechanism of addressing the cultural diversity and non-existent conflict mechanism. In addition, the consultants established a high prevalence of both vertical and lateral violence, which was attributed to the failure of establishing effective cross-cultural communication and relationships. 2.0 Literature Review In the current liberalized global economy, multicultural teams play a crucial role in ensuring the achievement of an organization’s goals. According to Abe and Wiseman (1983: 15), human resource managers form multicultural teams in order to enhance the efficiency of an organization in the globalized business environment. Therefore, culturally diverse teams provide an organization with greater potential in terms of skills and giving the organization a more global image. In spite of these benefits, culturally diverse teams often hinder the attainment of organizations goals because they present several managerial challenges. One of the major shortcomings of multicultural teams is the prevalence of conflicts that undermine the spirit of teamwork by hindering smooth coordination across the cultural divide (Adler, 1997: p28). According to Amason and Sapienza (1997), conflict management is one of the most pertinent issues that human resources managers have to contend with in the modern multicultural workplaces. Other challenges that affect multicultural organizations include difficulties in coordinating and controlling the team, maintaining effective communication across the entire organization and challenges in the development and maintenance of cohesive and harmonious teams. To ensure effectiveness of multicultural teams, it is important for the team members and the organization to be proactive in addressing the issues that arise from employees of different cultural backgrounds and nationalities. Aldrich and Herker (1977:51) defined culture as “people’s way of life and in particular, how they design their living by adapting to the physical, biological and social environment”. Culture encompasses the learned, patterned assumptions, concepts and behaviour in addition the material goods or artefacts. Another defining characteristic of culture is that it consists of a system of values, beliefs, norms and material products. Cultural beliefs entail aspects such as oral traditions including myths, legends, stories among other forms of rituals that give insights on people of that particular culture on how they behave feel and think in particular context. The main conspicuous forms of traditional beliefs are usually associated with religion, but other forms of traditional practices such as superstitions, stories, myths, oral traditions form a significant role in defining the beliefs of a given culture (Aldrich and Herker, 1977:54). Besides beliefs, a system of values is another major component of a culture. According to Alan and Seelye (1995: 39) the development of values is founded on how we learned to think how people should conduct themselves especially by portraying virtues such as honesty, openness and integrity. Another defining characteristic of culture is material products that people possess, including food, music and the type of clothing they wear (Anderson, 1983). People from the same cultural background usually share many common behaviours, interpretations values and perceptions. However, culture can also be both universal and personal. Universal culture is demonstrated by the common traits that people from different groups share, and personal whereby every individual has a unique personality from another (Ancona, 1990: 65). Therefore, in any given social place, people experience things that are both familiar and different from their culture. These differences could be slight or vast and this affects how such as person adapts or performs in that particular environment. Bar-Tal (1989) argues that a persons culture provide a view through which we see the world, elucidate order and make sense from the highly diverse environment. In this respect, cross-cultural understanding requires a person to be familiar with his or her won culture in order to comprehend the culture of different people. This is important because in every social place, people will always have perceptions and stereotypes about another person from a different culture. These perceptions and stereotypes play an important part in instigating conflict and violence in workplaces and other social places (David and Inkson, 2004). 2.1 Cross cultural communication and conflicts Communication forms an important component in every social interactions and it entails the way we send and receive messages or information (Biddle, 1979). In every place where there is communication, the messages we send or receive are subject to different interpretations and it is common for people to experience communication challenges irrespective of their cultural background. In this respect, it is common for people to misinterpret our messages no matter how we well we think we are communicating. Culture plays a significant role in causing this communication challenges. For instance, culture determines how we approach and solve problems, how we participate in group activities and interact with people from different cultures. In groups, Black and Mendenhall (1990: 141) noted that different people approach the assigned work from diverse perspective. Moreover, words and behaviour have different meanings not only in different cultures, but also within the same culture. 2.2 Types of communication styles Different people communicate differently, and Forsyth (1990; 83) listed four communication styles that various cultures use during communication process. These communication styles include direct versus indirect, linear versus circular, attached versus detached and concrete versus abstract style. 2.2.1 Direct v indirect communication style According to Forsyth (1990: 95), direct or low context form of communication is a major characteristic in individualistic cultures. Such people are individualistic leading independent lives that have few shared experiences. According to Black and Kevin (1993:207), such people communicate directly, they mean what they say, and they say what they mean. In dealing with such people, Hofstede (2001) noted that a person should not read between the lines in order to elucidate the meaning of their communication. Therefore, direct people are more concerned with telling the truth rather than sparing the feelings of another person. Cultures with indirect or high context communication style are characterized by collectivism or harmonious relationships. In this case, they are usually more concerned with maintaining or saving the face of a person at the expense of telling the truth (Hofstede, 2001: 19). People from indirect cultures imply or suggest what they mean rather than declaring their intentions directly and bluntly (Forsyth, 1990:107). Forsyth (1990) noted that in such cultures, messages are not necessarily conveyed through words and therefore it is common for such people to use gestures and other forms of non-verbal communication. People from indirect or high context cultures present many challenges to other different cultures because in order to understand them, one has to guess meaning from the non-verbal gestures, behaviour and words. In work places, such people could cause conflicts because they undermine communication pathway in their respective teams. Maddox (1993) noted that people from indirect or high context cultures are often averse to confrontation. 2.2.2 Attached v detached communication style Forsyth (1990: 86) notes that people from cultures that use attached communication style usually present their issues with emotions and feelings. This means that such people articulate how they feel about a situation. On the other hand, detached communication style is a distinct feature that is common in people who discuss issues in composed and focussed manner. Such people are not usually prone to emotional outbursts while they are communicating. 2.2.3 Concrete v abstract communication style According to Forsyth (1990: 97) people who apply concrete communication style favour using metaphors, stories and giving examples while communicating with other people. On the other hand, abstract communication style involves the use of data, principles and laws. Biddle (1979: 152) noted that people who use abstract communication style are more emphatic on general issues than on specifics or particular matters. Although particular culture does not necessarily apply one style of communication at the expense of other styles, Forsyth (1990: 61) notes that most cultures have a tendency of using one style more often than the other styles. 2.3 Other aspects of communication There are other aspects of communication besides the communication styles. These aspects include language usage and non-verbal communication. In context to the language use, Tung (1993: 73) noted that a certain word could have different meanings in different cultural backgrounds. Non-verbal communication entails the use of various cues of communication such as posture, silence, gestures, and emotional expressions, mode of dressing, touch and physical appearance of a person among other forms (Tung, 1993: 83). Different cultures regard various forms of non-verbal communication with varying degrees. For instance, a particular culture could regard non-verbal communication with higher emphasis than another culture using different communication style. However, irrespective of the communication style that a person uses, it is important to pay attention to non-verbal communication styles applied by other cultures in order to foster good working relationships and streamline communication in the workplaces. Non-verbal communication cues are usually one of the most misinterpreted forms of communication and they often cause conflicts in social and workplaces. 2.4 Conflicts in the workplaces According to Anderson (1983:209), cultural differences among employees in a given organization do not always result in conflict. However, a study conducted by Jehn (1997) established that multicultural teams increase the likelihood of conflict and violence in the workplaces. To prevent incidents of violence and conflicts in the workplaces, most organizations have conflict resolution mechanisms to resolve the conflict and re-establish trust and confidence among the employees. Steiner (1972:93) defines team conflict as the perceptions among team members that they possess different views or have interpersonal incompatibilities. Steiner (1972: 101), classified conflict in working teams into three classes, which include relationship conflict, task conflict, and process conflict. According to Steiner, (1972:103) relational conflict arises when a person is cognizant about interpersonal differences with other people and as a result, the person experiences feelings of irritation, frustration, and annoyance. In workplaces, different members have diverse skills and abilities in addition to other cultural disparities that increase the likelihood of relationship conflicts. Task conflict arises when a person is conscious of the differences in viewpoints and opinions with another person while performing a task requiring teamwork and finally, process conflict involves being cognizant of the controversies pertaining to the procedure of carrying out and accomplishing a particular task (Steiner , 1972: 85). Steiner (1972) noted that these types of conflicts are very influential in determining the performance or the output of a given team in an organization. Although high performing teams encounter these types of conflicts at different degree, the conflicts do not always undermine performance, but they encourage development of alternative opinions, that make the teams stronger. A research conducted by Mateev and Nelson (2004: 235) established that high performing teams are characterized with lower levels of process conflict and higher degree of task conflict in the middle of their team cycle than at the beginning and the end of their interactions as a team. Moreover, high performing teams have lower level of relationship conflict at all stages of their team interaction compared with low performing teams. Relationship conflict is the most detrimental form of conflict to the performance and productivity of any given team in an organization (Mateev and Nelson, 2004: 241). In this regard, all team must work to eliminate relationship conflict in their organizations in order to maximize their output. In multicultural teams, Mead (1990) noted that the key beliefs and values differ among the team members at varying degrees. This increases the likelihood of creating interpersonal tensions and emotional upheavals in multicultural teams than in teams with limited cultural diversity. Communication is another major challenge that multicultural teams face and Ancona (1990: 63) attributed over 60% of conflicts in the workplaces to communication breakdown and misinterpretation. This is common in relationship conflict and it eventually causes competitive rather than cooperative objectives. Eventually, the team members become frustrated, undermining their performance in the process. Besides these cross-cultural issues, multicultural team consists of members with diverse interests and unique methods of solving emerging issues in the workplaces. Lateral and vertical violence is another consequence of conflict in workplaces common in multicultural environment. Hofstede (2001), defines lateral violence as aggressive behaviour between employees in the same hierarchical level in an organization. Vertical violence is an aggressive or abusive behaviour directed to employees in the lower cadres and senior employees usually perpetrate it (Hofstede, 2001). Employees who use these types of violence usually intend to inflict psychological pain to their working colleagues by using both verbal and nonverbal cues. Some of the main characteristics of the violence include withholding information, verbal confrontation, sabotage and infighting in addition to undermining the activities of another colleague. Moreover, violence in the workplace is shown by backstabbing, broken confidence, disrespecting privacy and scapegoating (David and Inkson, 2004). In view of the increasing conflicts, declining productivity and increasing customer dissatisfaction at Ovine Medical Centre, this study was designed to investigate conflict and its effects at the medical facility. 3.0 Research methodology This research study sought to investigate a) the extent of conflict between employees at the Ovine Medical Centre, b) the effect of conflict on performance and productivity of the employees c) The level of customer satisfaction To investigate the extent of conflict between employees in the medical facility, specially designed questionnaires were sent electronically to 100 employees who were selected randomly at Ovine Medical employee database. The questionnaires were sent to staff at all levels in the facility from the most senior to the lowest cadre. The questionnaires consisted of three sections, A, B and C. In section A, the employees were required to state personal information, including age, sex, nationality (whether Singapore citizen or not), qualifications and the position they held in the organization. Section B of the questionnaire required the employees to state whether they experienced violence and conflict from their seniors and their fellow working colleagues. This section required the respondents to answer affirmatively or negatively. Finally, section C of the questionnaire required the employees to state the effects of the conflict and their response to the conflict they experienced in the working place. The respondents were required to fill and send their responses through email. These results were analyzed qualitatively, and the relevant themes to the study elucidated. To determine the level of customer satisfaction about the services offered at the centre, 50 former patients who had been treated in the past one year at the medical facility were chosen randomly from the quality assurance department at the medical facility. A specially designed questionnaire was sent to the patients through email. The questionnaire comprised of two sections, A and B. Section A required them to fill out their nationalities, age and section B required them to state whether they were satisfied with the quality of service offered at the medical facility or not. If they were not contented with the services provided, they were required to state the reason why it was so. The results were analyzed qualitatively and the relevant themes to the study elucidated. 4.0 Research findings and discussions a) The extent of conflict between employees at the medical centre and effect on performance Out of 100 questionnaires sent to respondents, we received 80 responses. The respondents were classified in two categories, comprising of the senior management and mid level employees. Senior level employees comprised of head of various departments, hospital superintendent, specialized doctors, and chief executive officer. The mid level employees consisted of nurses, technicians and physician assistants. The number of senior employees that responded was 16, and the rest (64) were mid level employees. The results were tabulated below: Table1: Conflict and effect on performance Level of employee No of employees(n) Singapore citizens Experienced violence/conflict Effect on performance yes no yes No affected No effect Senior level 16 6 10 8 8 12 4 Mid level 64 30 34 60 4 56 8 Total 80 36 44 68 12 68 12 From data above, 55 % of all employees in the facility were Singapore residents while the rest came from different countries. Majority of senior employees (80%) were foreigners while foreign middle level employees were approximately equal to Singapore citizens. Those that responded to have encountered conflict in the workplace were 85% whereby 60 out of 64 midlevel employees were found to have encountered conflict and violence from their fellow colleagues. However, the number of senior level employees who had encountered conflict was lower than the mid level staff, at 50% and 93.5% respectively. Regarding the effect of conflict on the performance of the employees at the medical facility, 75% of all employees were negatively affected by the conflict. The mid level employees were more affected by the conflict than their senior colleagues, at 87.5% and 75% respectively. From the findings, it is apparent that mid level employees experience higher level of conflict and violence than their senior colleagues and the conflict adversely affects the productivity of both cadres of staff at the medical facility. The reason why fewer senior employees experience conflict is that they are not answerable to many senior officials in the hospital hierarchical system. b) Level of customer satisfaction From the questionnaires that were sent to the respondents, we received 40 replies, 30 Singapore residents and the rest from foreigners. The level of their satisfaction about the services at the hospital were analyzed in the table below Table 2: Client satisfaction Nationality Number of patients Contented with service Yes No citizens 30 25 5 Non citizens 10 6 4 Total number 40 31 9 From the table above, the 77.5% of all former patients were contented with the service offered at the medical centre. However, the number of Singapore residents that were satisfied with the service was higher at 83.3% compared with foreign patients, 60%. The clients that found the services at the hospital unsatisfactory said that they encountered poor services as result of difficulties in communication with the medical staff and negligence in surgical theatres and recuperating rooms. Patients from Singapore expressed their dissatisfaction with how medical teams worked together while undertaking minor and complex operations on them. They pointed lack of effective coordination between doctors and nurses in the operating rooms and other patients experienced open disagreement between medical teams and their assistants. The response from the customers are not surprising especially taking into consideration their nationalities. Foreign patients were more likely to encounter communication problems, culture shock and difficulties in accessing medical care at the foreign medical facility than the local patients in Singapore. However, the number of patients that were not contented with the service at the hospital was surprisingly lower considering the fact that majority of medical personnel admitted to have encountered conflict that subsequently affected their performance at work. In this respect, comparative research should be undertaken to establish the level of customer satisfaction during the previous period, in order to establish a reliable trend. However, proactive measures undertaken by the management of the organization to address the conflict in the facility could have contributed to lower rate of customer dissatisfactions with the services. These results indicate a direct relationship between cultural diversity and conflict of the employees at the facility and they are in agreement with research conducted by Jehn (1997). . Employees from foreign countries experienced higher level of conflict at their workstations compared with the locals. In addition, employees experienced vertical and lateral violence, with the mid level staff experiencing higher rate of conflict than senior employees do. 5.0 Recommendations This research study was based on the premise that cross-cultural teams are more prone to encountering teamwork problems, such as communication challenges, lack of coordination and employee-to-employee conflicts. In this respect, another research should be undertaken to investigate if teams that are not culturally diverse are prone to conflicts and the poor coordination of the employees. Moreover, another study should be undertaken to analyze the effects of conflicts in the organization on the level of customers’ satisfaction critically. Organizations should acknowledge the crucial role that multicultural teams play in enhancing efficiency. However, they should put in place effective conflict resolution measures to ensure that emerging disagreements are resolved before they undermine the productivity of the teams in the organization. Conclusion It is apparent that cultural diversity in an organization results to development of adverse effects including conflicts, communication problems and lack of good coordination in the teams. These factors undermine productivity and performance of the employees resulting to reduced customer satisfaction. However, multicultural team also enhance productivity in the organization especially where the issues are resolved amicably. Organizations can form high performance teams in spite of the cultural diversity by establishing good human resources management practices that ensures that promote team effectiveness. This could be achieved by minimizing relationship, task and process conflicts. References Abe, H. and Wiseman, R.(1983). 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