E. Managing Uncertainty
Uncertainty is defined as “a cognitive response and refers to the inability to predict or explain the behavior of others.” [J2] Personality of team members like degree of empathy, emotional reaction and interest towards other cultures influence how they manage uncertainty. The level of uncertainty avoidance varies between different cultures. American culture is low on uncertainty avoidance compared to Russian culture. According to [J1], when people have a high level of uncertainty, their ability to understand another person’s message is decreased and they face a hindrance to predict the other person’s behavior perfectly. Increasing anxiety follows this high level of uncertainty. [J4] To understand effective communication
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When people meet strangers having unfamiliar culture, uncertainty is higher. [J4] When a team has just started, uncertainty is strongly related to communication with others, especially people who came from different cultures. So, managing uncertainty is a crucial process for team building. While people do not express any inconvenience when they have a conversation with people having the same culture, they show difficulty of conversation due to higher uncertainty with strangers from different cultures. [J4] When a team is able to minimize misunderstandings, the team will have effective …show more content…
Note that many of these skills could be adversely affected by having multiple cultures on a team. For instance cultural communication issues can negatively impact common purpose, quantifiable clearly defined goals, role clarity, and mature communication.
Siakas and Siakas [M10] suggest that effective teams go through a number of steps in moving towards being more effective. The second step is becoming aware of “cross-cultural and multi-disciplinary characteristics”, which they say is essential for multi-cultural teams.
Butler and Zander [M2] formulate a model for multicultural team effectiveness based on Composition, Communication, Conflict, and Creativity. Their model is useful but does not fully take into account past experience and is based on current activities that are used by the team members, rather than past experience from intercultural orientation. Although they do say that the cultural background of team members can positively impact the team 's
Team member will sometime become defensiveness, guilt, project, misreading of body language, tone and other nonverbal communication. Power struggles in the team (two chief) not enough Indians. Some team member could bias which include stereotyping. Stereotyping is the most common. Experience of individual members on the team can effect communication. Cultural different can effect team communication.
One of the disadvantages of a multidisciplinary team is that problems can be encountered when different professionals work together, there can be unclear goals, lack of direction and poor leadership (D...
Miscommunication is one of the biggest issues present in the workplace. Poor communication skills lead to things being done incorrectly. The communication process can be easily interrupted by noise interference. Communication between people of two different cultures can prove difficult to decode. Your canned plan, or frame of reference, plays a huge roll in our process of cummunication.
Hyun, Jane. “Leadership Principles for Capitalizing on Culturally Diverse Teams: The Bamboo Ceiling Revisited.” Leader to Leader. 16 Mar. 2012: 14-19. Web. 2 Apr. 2014 < http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ltl.20017/abstract >
Uncertainty Reduction Theory relies on the participants to be of the same culture. Well, what happens if they are from different cultures? William Gudykunst's Anxiety/Uncertainty Management takes a look at this dilemma. If you would like to view an application of Anxiety/Uncertainty Management by another student from Dr. Lee's, Inco 234 course then
Analysis of the Uncertainty Reduction Theory on Interpersonal Communication. Through this paper, I will conduct an analysis of the uncertainty reduction theory and will then apply it to my own experience here at Colorado University. This theory has been subject to many articles and studies in the communication and social departments. Indeed, studying this theory can help us understand human relations in interpersonal communication.
According to research, uncertainty is higher in intercultural encounters than in intracultural encounters. There are three major factors that influence communication between people from different cultures. One is cultural similarity/dissimilarity. The second is second language competence. Last is previous experience in the other culture. Depending on how similar two cultures are can influence a variety of things. It can influence how one culture learns the language of another culture. The overlap of communication networks is also influenced. Attributional confidence, which is known as the inverse of uncertainty, is another factor influenced by cultural similarity. Research indicates the more similar another culture is to yours the easier it is for you to learn that culture. Gudykunst's research also indicates that...
Cultural diversity is an essential piece of the team-building puzzle. As stated earlier, a heterogeneous team usually equals a successful team. A culturally diverse team brings the obvious cultural differences in language, dress and traditions to the table. In addition, less tangible characteristic such as moral values are equally, if not more important. These different methodologies and teachings help influence the team's direction. Persons of Western culture will have a different set of beliefs and methodologies from those of Middle Eastern or Eastern ethnicity. When team members take the time to learn and understand each culture's moral value, the result is a strong team foundation. High performance teams take and incorporate these cultural differences and use these different beliefs and values to attain the team goal.
There are several factors that are important if a culturally diverse business team is to flourish and realize its vast potential. Di Stefano and Maznevski (2000) claim that there are three imperative steps to achieving multicultural team success; namely, mapping the team; where the team members need to clearly understand their cultural differences in how they work and view success. This is often led by the team leader. Next, the team must bridge, that is, to communicate with one another, bearing in mind their cultural differences. Finally, the team must integrate, meaning that they bring together these differences and leverage on them to succeed.
The Effects of Cultural Diversities On Team Cohesion Among Male Baseball Players Culturally diverse teams can be seen as harmful or helpful according to Klein (2012). People may struggle to understand, trust, or relate to others with different upbringings or views. Team performance can be jeopardized if there is a lack of cooperation or communication. On the other hand, cultural diverse teams can be benefitting because team members may have different ways of seeing things as well as hold different levels of knowledge.
The members of this society are portrayed to attempt to cope with anxiety by minimizing uncertainty. People in cultures with high uncertainty avoidance tend to be more emotional as they try to minimize the occurrence of unknown and unusual circumstances by implementing rules and planning. However, in low uncertainty avoidance cultures, individuals accept and feel comfortable in unstructured situations. They are more pragmatic and tolerant of change. In a high uncertainty avoidance society, the employees are restricted under rules and regulations and a structured working environment. However, in low uncertainty avoidance, the employees accept uncertainty and adapt more quickly to abrupt changes. They will be more able to make wise decisions and improve efficiency of
Realizing that a group can become a high performance team is important. Accomplishing this goal is invaluable, advantageous and profitable. Once able to operate from a group to the high performing team is a great step into preparation into the big business world. Leaders and members must also realize not only how to accomplish this but that some problems will and can arise from different demographic characteristics and cultural diversity. That is if one is in such a group, which the probability would be quite high.
In today’s globalized world, multicultural teams accomplish a significant proportion of organizational work. Multicultural teams are formed because they improve organizational effectiveness in the global business environment. As such, multicultural teams offer huge potential to organizations. The most critical and practical challenge multicultural teams face is managing conflicts across members’ national cultural boundaries. Other cultural challenges in multicultural teams include dealing with coordination and control issues, maintaining communication richness, and developing and maintaining team cohesiveness. For multicultural teams to be effective, members must learn to address the challenges that arise from team members’ differing nationalities and cultural backgrounds.
Many people who go to visit or work in another country suffer some misunderstanding from the local people, because they have a different culture. Different culture will cause disparity points of view about almost everything. In the article, Intercultural Communication Stumbling Blocks by Laray M. Barna, there are five stumbling blocks mentioned that are seen in a cross-culture communication. These blocks are: language, nonverbal signs and symbols, preconceptions and stereotypes, the tendency to evaluate and high anxiety. Barna wants to use these stumbling blocks to show the common blockades between different cultures. I agree with what she thinks about the language, nonverbal signs and symbols, preconceptions and stereotypes, and the tendency
Many businesses place an emphasis on the importance of teamwork. A good team consists of people with different skills, abilities and characters. A successful team is able to blend these differences together to enable the organisation to achieve its desired objectives.