Influence of culture in business communication

Author: Iloka Benneth Chiemelie

Published: 14/12/2013

In the business settings, the importance of communication can never be overemphasized because it deals with every aspect of how business are being run in the company (Blalock, 2005; Alyssa, 2006; Kotler, 2006; Peason, 1993; Stewart, 1981; Churchill, 1995). The company communicates its valued to the employees (through code of business conduct), the manager ensure that employees are reminded of these values constantly (supervision and training), the employees communicate with each other to solve issues in the business (knowledge sharing), and the company also have to communicate the value of its products to the customers in order to ensure sales (marketing).

In view of the above, the journals by Luo & Shenkar; Ardichvili, Maurer, Li, Wentling, & Stuedemann; and Oosthuizen, are all of the same view. When compared, all the journals stressed that communication is very necessary in the organization as it is the force through which information are passed and the actual organizational process enacted.

However, they also have some contrasting views with respect to how their themes are designed. Luo & Shenkar focused on the importance of communication in organizations and made known that the organization is a multilingual space that is influenced as a result of increasing globalization and internationalization of firms. Ardichvili, Maurer, Li, Wentling, & Stuedemann on the order hand stressed on the information of having a uniform organizational culture that overshadows the individual cultures of employees as knowledge sharing will be enhanced through this means, leading to increased performance. Oosthuizen on the hand focused on market with respect to “think global and act local” strategy that is based on the understanding that companies need to always present their products in the local market’s language in order to ensure understanding.

From the above analysis, two importance factors to consider when communicating with an international audience and they are:

Language is important – in order to ensure clear understanding of the information being discussed, a common language should be adopted or translators should be made available. For instance, watching the UN or EU meetings will clear demonstrate that foreign languages are being translated to the respect languages of countries in the meeting to enhance understanding.

How cultures read meaning in situations are different – even when a common language is made available, there are differences in terms of how cultures understand things. This can be analysed as: high context and low context cultures. High context cultures like USA need clear details and figurative analysis of whatever is being discussed, while low context cultures like China can make use of just diagrams and few words.

For instance, the journal by Oosthuizen demonstrated the importance of language and cultural understanding with some examples: in the 1970s Chevy marketed the Nova in Mexico not realising that Nova meant "no-go" in Spanish. Similarly, the Ford company developed a successful model called the Comet and decided to market it in Mexico as the Cometa, which translates as “street walker”. Thus, companies cannot just move into a foreign market and start communicating with the consumers without knowing the cultures and language patterns of the foreign market or risk blunders like those contained above.

As a manager, I will address this kind issue (where employees have value but lack sensitivity) by creating a common organizational goal and steps that must be followed when introducing new ideas and values to foreign market. The step will include a comprehensive review of every language used with respect to what they mean and how they are interpreted/understood in the foreign market. This will eliminate the kind of issue above.

In terms of reviewing the author’s own culture based on the analysis, it can be said that the author is from a high context culture. This is because the journal presented clear and detailed analysis of all discussed frameworks, together with names of companies, date of issues discusses, level of implication and any other proves needed to validate whatever claim has been made.

Thus, it will be concluded that communication plays a significant role in the organisation, but the effects of any given communication can be either positive or negative. Thus, companies need to have a clear understanding of the language and culture of international market before communicating to them in their local language – as this will ensure that language related errors are eliminated.

References

Alysa, G. (2006). 12 secrets of effective business communication. Posted in HW to’s – 35 comment by Noupe.

Blalock, M. (2005). Listen up, why good communication is good business. Wisconsin Business Alumni update.

Churchill, G. A. (1995). Marketing research: Methodological foundations (5th ed.). London: the Dryden Press.

Kotler, P. (2004). Marketing management. New Delhi: Pearson Education.

Peason, G. J. (1993). Business orientation – cliché or substance. Journal of Marketing Management 9 (3), 233 – 43.

Stewart, D. W. (1981). The application and misapplication of factor analysis in marketing research. Journal of Marketing Research, 18, 51 – 62.