Therefore the consequence for an organisation is they must ensure that during any formal meetings or negotiations, nothing is said or done that may cause offence in that culture. Failing to understand each other’s underlying beliefs and values, and therefore cultural norms, will lead to poor relationships being developed at best. For example, in Japanese culture there are very powerful norms of politeness and therefore it is considered very rude to say “no”. If you wish to refuse something, it should be done indirectly or just delay the decision until the offer is rescinded. In a business context this has significant implications because during negotiations, western managers have often complained about the amount of time wasted during meetings and therefore straining relationships, however it could have been due to their inability to understand and recognise the “no” signals (adapted from Hartley, 1993). This highlights perfectly the findings of Hofstede (1980) in which he concluded national cultures exert a strong influence over organisational culture. Therefore businesses must understand the values of the country if relationships are to be developed because employees take their cultural beliefs to the organisation and therefore will in some way exert a certain amount of influence on the corporate culture (Mwaura et al, 1998). For example, an American company might have an office in Hong Kong, but the organisational culture will differ to that of the American branch because of the national influence.
The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, or linguistic determinism, highlights the importance of the link between language and culture suggesting that language creates mental categories through which humans make sense of the world, and that the regular use of a particular language produces habitual thought patterns which are culturally specific (Baldwin et al, 1999). The point is raised that from this linguistic determinism perspective, language is essentially a prison (Cohen, 2002). Mah (2001) highlights this point excellently as through her own experiences, she recounts a conversation with her Grandfather whereby she attempts to convince him of her Catholic beliefs but struggles to find the correct Chinese words to describe her feelings, and is thus confined by language.
During our talk I repeatedly questioned his Buddhist beliefs with the brash confidence of adolescence. Full of my newfound faith, I tried to preach Catholicism to him with the help of my Bible and the English-Chinese dictionary.
It was an uphill battle. To my dismay, I discovered that many English terms simply did not exist in Chinese. I was unable to explain certain key concepts because I lacked the proper Chinese words to express them. When I looked up the English expressions in the dictionary, the Chinese translations did not represent what I was trying to depict…
We went round and round. Finally I repeated Sister Louisa’s words: “In the end you have to have faith”. “Faith!” he exclaimed. “But you haven’t convinced me yet!”
This passage serves to highlight the importance of recognising the link between language and culture. As she has been preached Catholicism in English, it is very difficult to transfer those beliefs directly to her Mandarin-speaking Grandfather because it is a different language, and therefore completely different cultural perspective that she is trying to communicate with. As it is only through language that we can make sense of events (Watson, 1995), we can see here that language is a prison into which her Grandfather is imprisoned because he is limited to only Mandarin and therefore his views and beliefs are confined. Trying to explain the Religious discourses of the Bible is near impossible because her Grandfather’s meaning making process, i.e. the relationship between signifier, signified and wider social context, is completely different and thus the message is ambiguous and misunderstood, and as demonstrated, completely rejected. Mah also goes on to suggest that the only way for a person to free their thoughts from the prison which language creates is to learn a new language. Therefore, “this new knowledge enables us to view our first language objectively from without, creating fresh insight while further enhancing the interplay between language and thought.” When considered in terms of binary opposites, if one language is a prison, then knowing two languages naturally “frees” a person.
From an organisational perspective, this demonstrates that developing relationships may still be hindered because certain concepts and meaning exist that are culture specific. There will never be directly translatable ideas because each language and culture makes meanings in a different way. Unless you consider what the people living the culture see as significant (Geertz, 1973), misunderstanding and confusion will always result. Even if English were used as a common language, communication would still be difficult because people still make meaning through their own cultural frames (Gudykunst, 1998). Therefore we use cultural assumptions we are familiar with to make sense of signs that may well be based on different assumptions (Cohen, 2002). Even when Chinese people attempt to speak English, they use their own cultural frame of how the Cantonese/Mandarin word order goes and then attempt to translate it. For example, when speaking English, Chinese people often say “he” for “she” or “it”, and vice versa, as they are all pronounced the same in Chinese but their meaning are deduced in relation to other words. As a result they are often mixed up because people are using their own framing devices to make sense of what they are trying to say first in Chinese, then directly translate it to English. Thus there is much confusion caused to the listener. The consequences of this when dealing in an organisational context is ambiguous, imprecise and widely different interpretations can be taken away from meetings and thus developing relationships could become a very time-consuming, frustrating process.
How does culture influence people’s actions?
Through the use of discourse analysis, it can be seen exactly how culture influences the way in which people act. There are many different definitions of discourse and how it can be used for analytical purposes (Keenoy et al, 1997; Cohen and Musson, 2000), however for the purpose of this paper Watson’s (1995) definition of discourse is most relevant. Discourse is therefore understood as “a connected set of statements, concepts, terms and expressions which constitute a way of talking or writing about a particular issue, thus framing the way people understand and act with respect to that issue”. Thus essentially discourse has three main aspects; how language use influences beliefs and interaction or vice versa; how aspects of interaction influence how people speak; how beliefs control language use and interaction (De Beugrande, 1997). The main aspect, which I am concerned with, is how cultural texts influence how people act and understanding why these differences occur.
The culture discourse therefore frames the way in which members of that society talk about topics and act. This emphasises the need to understand a company’s culture because it will determine “how things are done around here” (Mullins, 1999). In intercultural encounters especially, understanding why people act the way they do according to their beliefs will contribute significantly to developing strong relationships. The example of Japanese culture being very polite manifests itself in their unwillingness to say “no”. If foreign managers were able to recognise the “no” signals, then less time would be wasted during negotiations. Also, Mwaura et al (1998) research into the transferability of corporate culture in the hospitality industry found in the American owned Great Wall Sheraton Hotel, the training processes were not directly transferable because of the significant differences in approach to classroom environments. As in the USA, training was done through manuals but the collectivist Chinese culture requires trainees to place relationships before achievement and as a result no one person wanted to appear superior to another in the classroom/training situation. This resulted in continual inefficiencies in service delivery due to the lack of “Sheraton standards”. As this demonstrates, the influence of culture manifests itself clearly through the employees’ reluctance to contribute or respond verbally during the training process. How to act in this setting is significantly different and therefore organisations cannot just transfer exactly the same business practices to different countries because they may hold certain things that are less important to other nations, to be more significant. The Chinese, for example, often do not want to accept responsibility and make a decision (Child and Markoczy, 1993), whereas the Germans can be seen as very direct and to the point (Cohen, 2002). Therefore in negotiations, both parties will bring their own cultural nuances to the table and relationships may well break down because of the directness of the Germans and the inability of the Chinese to conclude anything.
The theory of Linguistic relativity sees language as a comfortable room and it can highlight the social realities in different cultural contexts (Cohen, 2002). The Confucian influence on China emphasises the importance of education, a desire for accomplishment and an obligation to the family (Jones, 1993). Within Chinese families, children are not called by their name, but by their corresponding position within the family. Therefore the oldest son is called “Big Brother”, the next is “Second Big Brother” and so on. The younger siblings are expected to listen to and obey the elders to preserve order in the family; refusal to do so represents disrespect and can lead to a loss of “face” for the family. As a result of these social hierarchies, significant problems can arise within a business context. In the West, individual thinking is very much encouraged therefore junior employees would not have any qualms in questioning the decision of a manager. However in the East, the Confucian understanding stifles creativity, critical thinking and intellectual curiosity (Mah, 2001), therefore junior employees respect the seniority and thus would not consider questioning those who are higher in the hierarchy. This may well lead to a very bias relationship being developed with potentially the Western managers overpowering the Eastern managers, but if the situation continued like that it would not make business sense to maintain it and thus the relationship would break down. Also from the opposite point of view, youth in a manager is seen as unacceptable as it is against the tradition of wisdom and experience coming from age. As Chinese culture defines that only elder members of society can talk knowingly about subjects in both organisational and social contexts, employees therefore do not respect or listen to young managers thus conflict arises and poor performance results (Mwaura et al, 1998).
The concept of “giving face” manifests the Confucian aspect of Chinese culture as this can often lead to many problems arising both in a social context and business. Bond and Kwang (1986) argue that the significance of the “face” concept severely affects the ability of a Chinese manager to make decisions. As they tend to attach great importance to the views others hold about them more than in western cultures, Chinese managers therefore avoid actions that for them are high risk, or about which there is some uncertainty regarding the correctness of the outcome. This can lead to a breakdown in communication because if no employee is willing to take the responsibility for making a decision, effectively the decision just gets passed around until someone forgets about it and then the blame is passed on too. This would cause significant problems during negotiations or when trying to develop relationships with western companies because nothing would get agreed and eventually a lot of tension and frustration would be caused.
However, this concept of giving face can be misunderstood and lead to conflict arising as other cultures do not understand its significance and find it fairly rude. For example, Mah (2001) recounts one occasion when a close friend thought she was “giving face” to the British mother of her future son in law by complimenting on her beautiful gems and asking, “How much they cost?”
In Mrs. Wang’s eyes, she was giving her close relative a big dose of mian zi (face). But to Lady Sutherland, her bold question was merely a vulgar invasion of her privacy.
The significance of this is it highlights how the culture discourse influences people’s actions and how they can be misinterpreted. But an understanding of why people may act differently to what you may be used to will help explain certain behaviours and also highlight what is required in terms of establishing and maintaining strong business relationships. For example, the business practice of exchanging business cards carries more significant symbolic value in Japan than in other countries; it is a sign of respect and social etiquette (Cohen, 2002). By not following this process, conflict will arise within the relationship, as not following traditional formal greetings will immediately cause bad impressions.
Conclusion
As businesses become more international and far reaching, this paper has highlighted the importance of understanding cultural differences when attempting to create relationships, specifically between eastern and western companies. As demonstrated, communication between different cultures is often very difficult because of the differences in meaning making defined by language, and also due to the underlying beliefs and values that influence what is the cultural norm. Therefore to rectify this situation, and thus develop and maintain relationships, organisations must acknowledge the importance of culture and at least make some effort to appreciate that differences are present, and try to gain a degree of “cultural literacy” (Schirato and Yell, 2000), to be able to understand better the intricacies involved in retaining a strong cross-cultural relationship.
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