Managing Cultural Diversity - Cross Cultural Communication - Research Paper Example

Cross-culture Communication: A Result Of Religious And Spiritual Beliefs The article “Cross-cultural communication for managers” by Mary Munter is an excellent article which takes a broad approach towards the topic of cross-culture communication in management area. The first thing that article talks about is the religious approach of people coming from different cultures towards ‘time’ and ‘will’. This shows that the article is not written just from an academic and logical point of view but intends to shed a light on the ‘illogical’ yet powerful and important aspects of human behavior like religious and spiritual beliefs.

Management is about setting goals and achieving them in the decided time. However, different cultures have different approach towards goal setting and setting deadline, depending on their beliefs of free will or ‘will of God’ (Munter, 1993, para 6). These important aspects are covered in the article in detail. So the article not only looks at the word patterns, body language and behavior pattern of people that are shaped by cultural influences, but also dives deep into the roots of the behavior and reveals that actually, the behavior pattern and psychology stem from the religious and spiritual beliefs of people coming from different cultures.

Another important aspect discussed in the article is the definition of self in different countries, i.e., if people see themselves as individuals or groups. This is extremely important in communication style as it talks about the comfort level a person from individualistic approach might feel while communicating with person having group approach (Munter, 1993, para 17). Also, the article has described how communication does not mean only the verbal or non-verbal communication that takes place between people, but also means understanding the habits of people in their mundane life.

Hence, the author has also discussed the importance of understanding and following the eating habits, as according to the author, food is the major aspect of lifestyle and culture. So food etiquettes also play an important role in communication pattern (Munter, 1993, para 24). Apart from discussing the cross-culture aspects like value, image, credibility psychology and understanding the audience, the author has discussed aspects like religious and spiritual beliefs which seem unimportant in the business world, but which are in fact, more essential if one has to win over the people from different cultures.

Hence, the article “Cross-cultural communication for managers” by Mary Munter is an excellent article to gain an insight into the cross-culture communication. The article “Cross-Cultural/International Communication”, talks about the logical, common factors of the cross-culture communication like language, attitudes, interpretation errors etc. Article “Lessons on cross-cultural communication” written by Leaper is a review of a book by Edmond Weiss (Leaper, 2005, para 1).

It discusses how Weiss has talked about the business risks developed due to misunderstanding the technical and business documents (Leaper, 2005, para 1). However, neither of these articles have taken as deep a look at cross-culture communication as Munter’s article “Cross-cultural communication for managers” has. Hence, by asserting the importance of feelings, beliefs and the faith of human beings in their religious rituals, author Munter has driven the point that if one has to be successful in a logical and rational field like business, one has to respect the importance of illogical and irrational aspects like culture and religious beliefs of human beings.

Without respecting culture, one cannot win over the heart of the people. References:“Cross-Cultural/International Communication”. (2002). Encyclopedia Of Small Business. Retrieved February 5, 2010, fromhttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_gx5201/is_2002/ai_n19121159/pg_2/?tag=content;col1Leaper, N.(2005). Lessons On Cross-Cultural Communication. Communication World. Retrieved February 5, 2010, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m4422/is_4_22/ai_n14887983/?tag=content;col1Munter, M. (1993). Cross-Culture Communication For Managers.

Business Horizons. Retrieved February 5, 2010, fromhttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1038/is_n3_v36/ai_13183249/pg_2/?tag=content;col1