Cross-Cultural Management or from China to Australia - Essay Example

Cross Cultural Management: China and Australia Name Course Instructor Date Introduction Over the years, the entire human population has always had a diverse cultural orientation. For this reason, the approaches that one society has adopted as a way of doing their things has always differed from one to the next and this turn of events is usually tied on the diverse cultural backdrops that exist. Sleeter (2001) asserts that culture refers to all the aspects of life, acquired through the involvement in a cultural system, that individuals recognize and value. She further adds that it is often a human construction that is often founded on the precepts of power relations. In most societies, a people’s culture usually encompass their principles, norms, philosophies, ways of life, mind-sets, symbols, customs and their artefacts (Tooby and Cosmides 2011). This paper studies the cross-cultural relationship between China and Australia. Kawar (2012) states that culture refers to taken up principles, thoughts and customs that are usually common among people of the same social grouping. He further asserts that culture can be classified into two; generic culture, that which joints all humans and the localised culture, one which pools the social systems and structures. To this end, cross culture refers to the pooling of individuals from diverse backgrounds through common avenues that lead to their integration and thus resulting to unity in the tackling of common issues that afflict their societies. Cross culture can either be global, that which involves the people of different nations or localised and in this case involves the different communities found in a given social setting (Crosscult 2008). Cross cultural Management Management is a word that has often been used in diverse situations to capture diverse meanings. In this case, cross cultural management refers to the organisational analysis of the people within them, and in effect their culture in the varied organisational structures of the globe. Of major study is usually the organisational conduct underlying the world’s countries and how the peoples of these countries interrelate with each other when they find themselves being part of the same organisation and thus they have to pool their individual resources in order to ensure the success, efficiency and effectiveness in that organisation. How these culturally diverse persons relate to each other in the same setting is usually essential to the examination of cross cultural management because it informs the expertise, skills, knowledge and work related processes that are usually exchanged thus resulting in a collective group experience (Ewanlen, Ogedenbe and Rebman 2011). As an effect of the diverse cultural orientation, certain differences in decision making within organisations often arise because some could be putting their cultures into practise as a means of informing their decision, and to that effect, cross cultural management often comes in to harmonise such minor issues. Since organisations cannot fully avoid the idea of taking their operations worldwide, and with this in view, the influence of other cultures on the organisation are usually there and thus cross cultural management comes in handy. Ewanlen, Ogegenbe and Rebman noted that most organisations usually avoid taking their operations global because they are usually wary of the fact that the presence of cross cultural diversity generally informs managerial systems and practises, and as a result scheduling activities, employee recruitment and control processes are usually adversely affected. Although organisations overlook this fact, cross cultural diversity is usually a requirement for organisational success and prosperity. Approaches to Cross-Cultural Management Ewanlen, Ogedenbe and Rebman (2011) note that there are six approaches to the examination of cross cultural management and they include; cross-cultural analysis in America, ethnocentric approach, polycentric approach, comparative studies, organisational approach and cultural synergistic approach. Hypothetically, these approaches vary in their models of study and also in the management viewpoints that they embrace. Of the six approaches, the major one is usually the comparative studies approach because it majors on the examination of the performance of organisations in the diverse settings that they are placed and thus offers a wider approach to the study of cross-cultural management (Korabik, Lero and Ayman 2003). The comparative approach is usually majorly employed when the performance of diverse organisational heads is to be examined and then analysed against the cross-cultural management scale. The comparative approach is usually employed in the study of the systems that are in place in organisations in order to determine their uptake of cross-cultural tendencies into the inner circles of their management systems. This approach is often generally essential in carrying out a comparative analysis of the world’s organisations and in turn arriving at the differences and similarities in the managerial structures and systems that are in place. Studies carried out by Leung (2011) while using the comparative approach proved that outside factors had an effect on the operation of an organisation in the sense that they involved the knowledge, skills, processes and the professional systems of an organisation. Cross cultural diversity in organisations It has been noted that as a corporation advances away from the local scene, its cultural diversity usually increases double fold in the sense that it becomes a worldwide corporation and thus affects the world’s population (Kundu 2001). Cultural diversity usually refers to the mingling and cooperation of people from varied economic, social, political, ethnic and even racial backgrounds in order to achieve common goals. Through diversity, every individual has the right and opportunity of working, studying or transacting business anywhere in the world. Many organisations usually go for cross-cultural diversity because with them, they bring new expertise and talents to the already existing pool of experts. On the other hand, the corporations that fail to address the issue of cultural diversity indirectly propagate social cultural issues that often affect the organisation’s employees together with its clients. Centring on instituting management systems that put in place effective human resource approaches that address the issues of cross cultural diversity often transforms organisations into multinational corporations because by addressing this issue, they automatically acquire international status (Thienderman 2008). Through the embracing of cultural diversity, the tradition of performance and the encroachment on different product and service market often transforms an organisation in numerous ways. Since customers are usually part of an organisation’s success, targeting a diverse clientele is usually essential because it diversifies that organisation’s market and in so doing opens up more a wide range of opportunities for the growth of the business. Moreover, diverse managerial systems are usually required in place in order to facilitate most of the corporate takeovers that organisations are often involved in. This usually ensures that the clients, the stakeholders and the workforce are fully satisfied with the services and products that are offered (Ignatieva and Khvatova 2009). In order to successfully manage cultural diversity, organisations must put in place management control systems that address the inequalities that the diverse individuals could be entering in their personal dispensation of organisational tasks (Roberts 2007). According to the Australian Centre for International Business (2001), encouraging and assisting cross culturally diverse individuals in an organisation is usually essential because their individual capabilities are usually essential in the overall success of the organisation. With regard to the fact that these individuals are usually in environments that diverse from what they have been used to back in their native countries, assisting them to socialize themselves with the way of life in the host country is usually essential because it makes them feel welcomed and appreciated and thus ready to successfully, efficiently and effectively partake in the business that the organisation in question is involved in. The Australian Centre for International Business further asserts that culturally diversifying the operations of an organisation usually come with several benefits; ensures the development of resourcefulness, vision and novelty, enhances organisational communication, introduces finer group teamwork strategies, doubles the opportunities for an organisation going multinational and improves the services and products offered. The Australian Multicultural Foundation (2010) asserts that the Australian enterprises are experiencing numerous impediments in terms of capability and expert pooling, a fete that makes it hard for these organisations to effectively compete on the international front. These disadvantages have been a major setback to the Australian businesses because without cultural diversification, it is often tedious to integrate to the global front because they lack the necessary framework for this move. In order to become accustomed to the global scene, the Australian Multicultural Foundation advices that the Australian set ups should put in place strategies that will ensure that the essential skills and abilities are attained in order to increase their competitiveness and thus be recognised as a pool of experts. Moreover, the foundation is of the view that with the enhancing the general performance of the Australian organisations will be essential in seeing them through, thus increasing their marketability on the world front. Cross-cultural management between China and Australia Based on their diverse cultures, both China and Australia have a flourishing tradition, in that while Australia is Anglo-Saxon, China is Chinese. Moreover, the two have been business partners for a long while. The two countries have been engrossed in several cross-cultural consultations in order to ensure that the business transactions and organisational expert exchange programmes are successfully completed. Overtime, such negotiations have often proved tedious because there are usually no common principles, objectives, welfares, moral principles, cultural suppositions and the differences in language usually add to the problems encountered. Such occurrences are usually the tip of the iceberg because successful views in one culture may end up being ineffective in the other and thus cross-cultural diversity is usually a problem, but which can be easily challenged through meaningful compromises (Zhu and Zhu 2012). There also exists a cross-cultural relationship between the two nations in relationship on educational matter. Equipped with the general view that Asian students are not usually face value students, the Chinese students in Australia perform equally well. According to a study carried out by Smith and Smith (2003), the Chinese students in Australia did equally better than the Australians in their studies because the Chinese seemed more motivated to perform than their native counterparts. Moreover, the research showed that the Chinese students drew their good performances from developmental learning, a thing that had been attained from their resolve to always develop their understanding of whatever subject of study that they were handling. The Chinese students’ performances have been enhanced by the cross-cultural relationship that the two nations share. Australia has ensured that the Chinese student get access to the Confucian reading materials that they require and thus they have been made obtainable in the local libraries. The research moreover proved that the Australian universities, in the spirit of cross-cultural diversification, they have taken it upon themselves to ensure that the Chinese students are included in the Australian learning processes. This is enabled by ensuring that the Chinese group is settled into peer group work discussion forums that facilitate their settling into the Australian way of life. To this end, the Chinese students are usually expected to adequately use the group forums in ensuring that they are successfully integrated in to the Australian cultural dispositions. Through the groups, the students are usually able to try out what they have learnt and thus through such experiences, they are able to actively put them to daily experiences. To ensure that misinformed constructionist tendencies are not picked up by the by the Chinese students, the educators too are usually involved in this process. Moreover, the other issue that usually arise, and often it is a problem that majorly affects the Chinese students, is the issue of making sense of some of the learning constructions that the educators employ. In this case, some of the constructions that the teachers use are not usually familiar with the foreign students due to the cross-cultural diversity and hence those constructions are often imbedded in the host country’s culture thus only the native students make sense of them. To ensure that this problem is adequately addressed, the teachers take the Chinese students through a learning forum that enable them to make sense of the constructions that are often employed in teaching. This usually ensures that effective meaning is associated with the appropriate structures. They are usually initiated into the usage of these structures and thus with reference to them in their class discussion, they get accustomed to their usage. In some cases, in order to attract the Chinese students to enrol in the Australian institutions, deviations are usually made on some of the meanings that the students construct in the sense that they are taken to be meaningful in the capacities that they have been made in. The study further argued that the Chinese students, due to the dread of academic failure coupled with Kolb’s active experimentation, they are disposed to do better than their Australian counterparts. The dread usually drives them to go an extra mile in an attempt to prove to the educator that they can adequately create meaning of the structures in the language of the host state. With reference to Kolb’s learning circle, the students learn how to react to their sentiments and feelings and thus are able to easily notice the symbols and thus relate to them. As a Chinese student in Australia, through the help that the educators and the university offer, I find it a little bit easier to adapt. Putting to practise the Australian symbols and thus employing them in the everyday learning is usually taxing bearing in that I am Chinese, but the help that the university offers is usually sufficient to initiate us into the system. Bearing in mind my own Chinese knowledge, I find it easier relating to the Australian students and through the experiences that we share, it is always easier to relate to their symbols through learning and practise. References Australian Centre for International Business, 2001, Introduction to the Building Cross Cultural for Going Global Toolkit. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.mibru.unimelb.edu.au/templateassets/07/includes/diversity/Building_cross_c ultural_capabilities_toolkit.pdf Australian Multicultural Foundation, 2010, Managing Cultural Diversity: Training Program Resource Manual. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://amf.net.au/library/uploads/files/MCD_Training_Program_Resource_Manual.pdf Crosscult, 2008, Cross-Cultural Management: An Introduction. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.faugeron.online.fr/%23%20Documents/MasterMS1%23INSEEC/Cross%20C ultural%20Management.ppt.pdf Ewanlen, D, Ogedenbe, F & Rebman, C, 2011, Achieving Unity in Diversity Through Cross Cultural Management of Resources. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.swdsi.org/swdsi2011/2011_SWDSI_Proceedings/papers/papers/PA125.pdf Ignatieva, I & Khvatova, T, 2009, Cross-cultural Diversity in the Knowledge Management Concepts of 20-21st Centuries within the Framework of International Dialogue for Creation of a New Model of Knowledge Management. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/ci/intellectuals/int1/Khvatova%20paper.pdf Korabik, K, Lero, D & Ayman, R, 2003, A Multi-level Approach to Cross Cultural Work–Family Research A Micro and Macro Perspective. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management Vol. 3 (3). Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://workfamilyconflict.ca/cms/documents/4/Karen_journal_article.pdf Kundu, S, 2001, Managing Cross-Cultural Diversity: A Challenge for Present and Future Organisations. Delhi Business Review Vol. 2, No. 2. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.delhibusinessreview.org/v_2n2/dbrv2n2e.pdf Leung, K, 2011, Methods and Measurement in Cross-Cultural Management. Retrieved 9/5/2013 http://www.commerce.nccu.edu.tw/iacmr/file/Leung_Methods_and_Measurements_in_C ross-Cultural_Management-chaochen.pdf Roberts, John. Introducing organisational Behaviour and Management. United feature Syndicate. 2007. Sleeter, E, 2001, Culture, Difference and Power: Instructors Manual. Teachers College Press: New York. Thienderman, S, 2008, Improving Relationship among Culturally-Diverse Staff. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.workforcediversitynetwork.com/docs/Articles/Article_ImprovingRelationshi ps_Thiederman2.08.pdf Tooby,J & Cosmides, L, 2011, The Psychological Foundations of Culture. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.cep.ucsb.edu/papers/pfc92.pdf Zhu, Y & Zhu, S, 2012, Communication Barriers to Negotiation: Encountering Chinese in Cross-Cultural Business Meetings. Retrieved 9/5/2013 from http://www.diplomacy.edu/sites/default/files/IC%20and%20Diplomacy%20%28FINAL %29_Part13.pdf Read More