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Effective communication across cultures
The Importance of Understanding Culture Differences in Cross-culture Communications
The Importance of Understanding Culture Differences in Cross-culture Communications
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Recommended: Effective communication across cultures
In our different roles, our beliefs, values and attitudes are regularly related with others; like our friends, family, suppliers, and customers. Sometimes and without thinking we seem to “like" those who share our values and beliefs. Apparently the individual who matches our values is what makes a prosperous relationship whether it is a professional or personal.
As a successful manager I have to be a good thinker. It is a mixture of critical and creative thinking skills and holding the right belief and value system that in turn has the direct impact on motivation and reaching goals of a particular task. The positive attitude is needed in the workplace to be engaged in any task. However, to apply this task management theory it is essential to
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The cross cultural differences could be one of the difficult tasks to deal with. Managers need to operate with a vast variety of employees who posses distinguished beliefs, values and attitudes, Most of the times, seeing things different than us. For a successful manager, it is essential to have positive thinking and keeping in mind that there is a solution to every issue (The Wisest, 2011). The Intercultural communication is a way of sharing information across the different cultures and used to describe the processes and problems that arise within an organization made up of individuals with different backgrounds (religious, social, educational…).
When used with the cross cultural communication, it seeks to understand the way people from different countries, act, communicate and perceive the world around them. The culture determines how we encode messages, how we transmit them and the way messages are understood (Wikipedia, intercultural communication).
Sometimes, the problem of misinterpretation could arise due to other differences like gender, class or standards which also affect the beliefs, values and attitudes irrespective of being from the same
Ting-Toomey, Stella., & Chung, Leeva C. (2012). Understanding Intercultural Communication. Oxford University Press. 43, 159-160.
Martin, Judith N., and Thomas K. Nakayama. Intercultural Communication in Contexts. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2013. Print.
Martin, J. N., & Nakayama, T. K. (2013). Intercultural Communication in Contexts (6th ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
If we aren’t understanding of the variances between cultures and the way they communicate verbally, emotionally, and nonverbally this can create considerable issues. The three primary problems that could arise if we don’t have an understanding of cultural differences are the ways we interpret others comments and actions, how we predict future behaviors, and conflicting behaviors of others (“Differences in Culture,” n.d). Culture plays a significant part in peoples lives because it shapes our personal values and views on the world. Having a perspective and understanding a persons culture is important because each culture is different in respect to personal views and behaviors, but it is key to respect their culture because just like us it shaped who they are. The reason we have stereotypes of other cultures is because of this particular reason, we assume that our culture is superior and the correct way to do things. For example, I have heard the stereotype that French people are impolite, offensive, and they hate Americans, but was this stereotype created because of a misunderstanding between cultures? Cultural differences can be educational because it allows us to understand the uniqueness of a culture and allows us to learn new things. Cultural differences allow people to feel a sense of belonging, which can be empowering knowing
Intercultural communication can be defined as the process in which two or more individuals from different cultures interact and exchange messages with each other. As a branch of communication, intercultural communication includes symbolism, diverse perceptions and nonverbal communication. Most of our cultures determine specific norms and values that limit or define how we communicate, that is why intercultural communication focuses on identifying if cultures are individualistic or collectivist cultures. Individualistic cultures members’ interest are centered in helping themselves, as opposed to members in collectivist cultures who give essential importance to the opinion of important members in their lives (Adler, Rosenfeld, Proctor II, 2015)
With cultures having variances in verbal and nonverbal communication standards it is important to recognise and adapt or the interlace of lifestyles and social cues would hit a hard stop. It is also important to appreciate how one 's culture impacts their view of the self. By expanding one 's perspective of diverse cultural backgrounds one can become a better communicator and expand their social field. The intercultural communication concept of channel gives communicators various avenues with which to share their ideas and target the best channel one for the culture they are trying to impact. The concept of perception is one of the most important communication concepts to take into account it affects how one views the self and how they are supposed to communicate. Standpoint theory explains how individuals set multiple identities with which to view the world, standpoint theory key to understanding how people of various social groups do not develop the ability to view the world from the perspective of those that are oppressed. Territoriality is using one 's environment to communicate a
Intercultural communication studies investigate the effectiveness of communication, especially cross-culturally, and the ways that members from different cultures come into an interaction with different cultural frames. The theory is critical to the understanding of the intercultural studies discipline as it can be applied in intercultural, interpersonal, and cross-cultural communication. The communicators usually have different frameworks in viewing the world which includes the difference in beliefs and values (J. Reichheld, personal communication, February 8, 2016). When anxiety and uncertainty reach the catastrophe point, where stress is too high, communicators are not able to remain mindful and tend to communicate based on their own predetermined frameworks (J. Reichheld, personal communication, October 25, 2016). It can easily offend the other party by not being mindful, leading to ineffective communication or unwillingness to communicate at all (Imamura & Zhang, 2014). It can bring out ethnocentrism since the communicator represents the culture where cultural patterns are shown through communication (J. Reichheld, personal communication, February 8, 2016). The maintenance of an optimal level will allow for effective communication between members of different cultures. Successful communication then allows for cultural
Cultural intelligence assessment will enable the individual to have certain information about himself. It is posited that cultural difference has a greater impact on business effectiveness than we think. That our cultural backgrounds really influence the way we think and act and the way we interpret each others contributions. Our success or failure in communication will depend on the extent at which we understand the different cultural background of the employees and create a fruitful collaboration in situations where cultural differences play a role. To achieve this, we need to act in an appropriate way in multicultural situations coupled with the ability to have an open mind which admits new information and this is curious about difference. We need to both know who we are and be curious about “the other” so that differences can be elaborated rather than smoothed down.
Communication among one another is essential in our everyday lives. Communication across culture, on the other hand, might not be a typical event for every individual. It includes exchanging of information within different cultures where communication among people from different cultures were not restricted by cultural barriers. There are numerous methods to integrating culture into communication theories. Culture can be incorporated with the communication process in theoretical communication. Theories can be considered to designate how communication differs across cultures. It can be created to clarify communication between people from diverse cultures, also known as intercultural communication. It can also be a tool of explanations that have molded and influenced human intercultural communication.
a) Culture can affect communication greatly, and changes the way people communicate with each other especially in a multi-cultural environment. The authors of Culture Barriers to Effective Communications, state many important points on how culture can have an effect on communication, (Ting-Toomey & University, n.d.). The four main points that they make are:
Humans have been communicating since four million years. On the other hand, the birth of culture is estimated to have taken place about 35,000 years ago. Today, both culture and communication have evolved considerably and have become interdependent of one another, to the point that communication is considered to be a product of culture. Thus, our own culture has a deep impact on our thoughts and behaviors. Since each culture has its distinct aspects, intercultural communication can be the cause of conflict and disorder. There are three main issues which are at the root of the problem of intercultural miscommunication : language as a barrier, cultural diversity and ethnocentrism. I will analyze these three notions in situations in which intercultural communication is frequent such as : the workplace, the classroom and vacation trips.
As culture and communication are complex concepts, there are a number of definitions of intercultural communication. One of the basic definitions is presented by Robert Gibson (2010). He defined communication as the process of exchanging ideas, feelings and information between the sender and the receiver. Intercultural communication occurs when the sender and receiver come from different cultures (Gibson, 2010). Due to cultural diversity, there are many barriers that intefere intercultural communication. Hybels and Weaver (2012) determined stereotype, prejudice and discrimination as the primary barriers of intercultural communication. Stereotype is our assumptions, beliefs or mental images about an individual, a group or even a culture. There are positive and negative stereotype based on the knowledge about that group of people. Stereotype become a barrier to
Intercultural communication is unavoidable as a result of globalisation. Today’s classroom, business and community is characterised by communication with other cultures. With the rapid technological advancement, whatever written theses days might be read by a person from a different culture. Being culturally sensitive is significant in any professional field and in consequence knowing how to communicate with other cultures became an essential skill that attention should be drawn to.
You can`t learn culture via schools. We know that communication is an important part in the life. You probably cannot spend one day without communication. You may communicate with yourself if there is no body to communicate with. In fact, we are in new generation that people can communicate with anybody in the world via internet. Also, the globalization started to develop more and more between people from different countries. Therefore, we should learn and acknowledge information about intercultural communication to help us in our future. During my first school period, after spending almost three months in humanities class, I can see that I changed in how I think or in how I see things. Therefore, I would like to share my experience in humanities
Intercultural Communication is a communication between groups of people or individuals whose language and culture is different. communication means the relationship between people through language, and intercultural mean the relationship between people of different cultures. "Intercultural communication is identified as both a concept and a competence. Intercultural competence is the active possession by individuals of the qualities which contribute to effective intercultural communication and can be defined in terms of three primary attributes: knowledge, skills and attitudes. In the context of this document, the acquisition of skills and human attributes likely to enhance intercultural communication is viewed exclusively as a component of language programmes, i.e. as