What is Culture???Provides patterns of acceptable behavior & beliefs.May be based on.NationalityRace and ReligionHistorical RootsAll of the Above

CultureCulture is the "lens" through which you view the world. It is central to what you see, how you make sense of what you see, and how you express yourself.Culture" refers to a group or community with which you share common experiences that shape the way you understand the world.

CommunicationDerived from word communis means to exchange.

It means communication is the process of exchanging ideas,feelings,opinions and information from one person to another through a medium.

ContextChannelSenderMessageAudienceFeedback

Cross cultural communicationInteraction, communication, and other processes which involve people or entities from two or more different cultures

CROSS CULTURAL COMMUNICATIONCross-cultural communication exists when people from differing cultures have reached a certain degree of understanding regarding their differences. For understanding to take place, both people must have some form of knowledge or awareness regarding the norms or customs that exist in each other's culture.

HIGH CONTEXT VS. LOW CONTEXTCULTURES

High Context CulturesEmotional expressionsTouching Body orientationSilence Maintaining harmonyIndirectEmphasis on how something is saidEg:Japan,India.

Low Context Cultures Intelligence; Expert knowledgeIExplicit logic, proof, linear organizationSilence = disagreement, rejection, hostility, weakness, unwillingness to communicate, shynessEmphasis on what is said, specificityEg:Europe,Latin America

Summary of Verbal Styles

Negotiation Styles from a Cross-Cultural PerspectiveAdapted from Table 77: Negotiation Styles from a Cross-Cultural Perspective

Cross-cultural BenefitsBuilding Relationships

Globalisation

Workforce Diversity

Creativity

6 Barriers to Intercultural CommunicationHigh anxiety: When a person feels inconvenient, when he or she does not know how to behave in some situations. The result is that the communication transaction fails.

Assuming similarity instead of dissimilarity: In order to prepare yourself for various circumstances it is very important to assume laws, habits, and attitudes of another society.

Ethnocentrism : It is based on the idea that your own race, nation, or group is better than any other. Usually ethnocentrism is common for people who come across the culture shock

Language problems: There are five actual factors that generally produce the difficulties in the translation. They are lack of equivalences in vocabulary, idioms, grammar and syntax, experiences, and concepts.

Nonverbal misinterpretations: it can be stated that in a conversation this is more problematical to understand the nonverbal symbols without sharing the same nonverbal codes.

.

Stereotypes and Prejudices : Stereotypes are the perceptions about that certain people have particular qualities or abilities because they belong to a particular race, sex, or social class. Positive examples : Japanese people are good in mathematical sciences. Negative: Russians Mafia Vodka Prostitution Cold winter; the Arabs are terrorists.Prejudice can be defined as an unreasonable dislike and distrust of people who are different from you in some way, especially because of their race, sex, religion.Example: Indian people in Arabic countries, it can be affirmed that Indians do get less salary than other nationalities.

Ten Commandments of Intercultural CommunicationBe aware of differing social values; Be aware of differing status symbols and how to demonstrate them; Be aware of decision making customs: not all people like to make decisions quickly and efficiently; Be aware of concepts of time: not all people like to see time as money; Be aware of personal space: people from different cultures have different comfort zones'; Be aware of cultural context

Be aware of body language: learn the basic differences in the way people supplement their words with body movement; Be aware of different etiquette rules or manners: what is polite in one culture may be considered rude in another; Be aware of legal and ethical behavior; Be aware of language barriers: English is the most prevalent language in international business, but it's a mistake to assume that everyone understands it.

CROSS-CULTURALCOMMUNICATION ISSUES ININDIA

Cross-cultural misunderstandings can be seen among people working across MNCs with diverse cultural backgrounds. These misunderstandings often tend to create repetitive phenomenainvolving cross culturalconflicts,dissatisfaction leadingto communication problems, and reduced employee performance.The management techniques learned anddeveloped by amanager inhis originalor home culture donot apply equally in other cultures and thus produce several clashes and ambiguities.

Examples Hondaintroduced their new car "Fitta" into Nordic countries in 2001. If they had taken the time to undertake some cross cultural marketing research they may have discovered that "fitta" was an old word used in vulgar language to refer to a woman's genitals in Swedish, Norwegian and Danish. In the end they renamed it "Honda Jazz".American Motors tried to market its new car, the Matador, based on the image of courage and strength. However, in Puerto Rico the name means "killer" and was not popular on the hazardous roads in the country

Some Humourous examplesThings weren't much easier for Coke's arch-rival Pepsi. When they entered the Chinese market , the translation of their slogan "Pepsi Brings you Back to Life" was a little more literal than they intended. In Chinese, the slogan meant, "Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back from the GraveGeneral Motors had a perplexing problem when they introduced the Chevy Nova in South America. Despite their best efforts, they weren't selling many cars. They finally realized that in Spanish, "nova" means "it won't go.

Tips for improving cross cultural communication skillsSlow Down : Slow down, speak clearly and ensure your pronunciation is intelligible.

Separate Questions: Try not to ask double questions such as, "Do you want to carry on or shall we stop here?

Avoid Negative Questions: misunderstandings have been caused by the use of negative questions and answers. In English we answer 'yes' if the answer is affirmative and 'no' if it is negative. In other cultures a 'yes' or 'no' may only be indicating whether the questioner is right or wrong. For example, the response to "Are you not coming?" may be 'yes', meaning 'Yes, I am not coming.'

Write it Down: If you are unsure whether something has been understood write it down and check. Be Supportive: Giving encouragement to those with weak English gives them confidence, support and a trust in you.Check Meanings: When communicating across cultures never assume the other party has understood. Summarise what has been said in order to verify it.Avoid Slang: Even the most well educated foreigner will not have a complete knowledge of slang, idioms and sayings.

Maintain Etiquette: Many cultures have certain etiquette when communicating. It is always a good idea to undertake some cross cultural awareness training or at least do some research on the target culture.Example, in a society where people dont kiss when they greet each other, a kissing person might be judged as a vulgar and without manners

Good Intercultural Communicators Are.Aware values & behaviors not always right.

Flexible & open to change.

And..Sensitive to verbal & nonverbal behavior.Aware of values, beliefs, practices of other cultures.Sensitive to differences within cultures.

ConclusionIn the end we conclude that culture is the lens through which we view the world in a same way.So we should respect the cuture of every country in order to eliminate conflicts and barriers.In this diversified environment productivity and satisfaction can be achieved when people of different cultures working in an organisation works in harmony Cross cultural communication is about dealing with people from other cultures in a way that minimizes misunderstandings and maximizes your potential to create strong cross cultural relationships.

***Collectivist cultures encourage relationships and knowing position status.People pay close attention to context silence is goldenIn Japan, it is believed that putting deep feelings into words somehow lowers or spoils their value and that understanding attained without words is more precious than that attained through precise articulation

High Contact Cultures, e.g., Arab culture.Low Contact Cultures, e.g., Northern EuropeMiddle Eastern/Arab men, followed by Latin American men, and Southern European men, tended to have the smallest distance between themselves when talking, whereas Asians, Indians-Pakistanis, and Northern Europeans had the greatest distance between them when talking. Touching is acceptable in cultures around the Mediterranean.What can be touched differs cross-culturally too.Body orientation refers to the angle of the bodies. High Contact cultures tend to have more face to face interactions than low contact culturesGender matters too: Japanese females will use more distance than Japanese males.

Best arguments presented first (anticlimactic organization)get to the pointstop beating around the bushcut to the chase****