The Evolution of Cross Cultural Management and Global Leadership
Discuss About The Quantitative Of Leadership In Multinational.
The current advancements brought to the internationalized business scenario have been influencing the cross cultural communication. It has been observed that the international business scenario has been experiencing the drastic changes in the growing awareness related to the context of cross cultural management. In fact, in keeping pace with such challenges, the ever growing awareness of the cross cultural management is also increasing more specifically. According to Hur, Kang and Kim (2015), the cross cultural communication process generally refers to the maintenance of the cultural diversity during the establishment of the operational process in foreign countries. The article, From Cross-Cultural Management to Global Leadership: Evolution and Adaption provides the insightful ideas about the observable impacts of the cross cultural communication on MNCs. The thesis observed in this study describes the effective practices of cross cultural communication, which has the remarkable essence on the multinational firms. The study would describe the conceptualized elaboration of the context with the special references of multinational corporations and the global leadership practices.
In the past fifty years, the internationalized businesses have experienced the remarkable evolution in terms of developing the conceptual ideas about cross cultural management. The nature of the global leadership practices has changed in keeping pace with the growing consciousness of the underlying challenges. The article is selected to explore the contextual ideas about cross cultural communication and the practices undertaken by multinational companies to deal with such cultural diversity in a larger context. The article defines the historical background of the cross-cultural management that is viewed from a global perspective based on leadership attributes. According to Bird and Mendenhall (2016), global leaders are the emerging professionals who have been operating in either multicultural or international context. It can be implied that the global leaders always have an urge to explore the innovative methods associated with the global organisational scenario. Therefore they tend to deal with the various people from diverse corner of the world and develop the intercultural communication to gain broader perspectives (Caligiuri and Bonache 2016). They generally lead people from multiple regions and engage the diverse group of stakeholders. The global leaders often utilize their potentiality to lead people across the distance, time-zone, culture, and complex structure of the organisation. It is essential for them to develop the broader perspectives and greater understanding regarding the business operation in both domestic and internationalized environment. Eisenbeiß and Brodbeck (2014) suggested that the leaders at the multinational level need to adopt the flexible approaches to identify the futuristic value and achieve success. The global leaders even concentrate on the futuristic values that have the observable impact on the multinational setting. The intercultural factor, on the other hand, determines the interactive approaches between one or more organisational members who belong to different countries all across the world. The leaders of the multinational corporations look beyond such cultural differences and develop the diversity among these members. The obtained idea from the article develops the complete understanding related to the historical evidence on the global leadership that influence the practices of the cross cultural communication (Lisak and Erez 2015). While operating in the multinational level, the global leaders often need to promote the innovative working approaches by engaging people from diverse cultural background.
The Challenges and Benefits of Working in a Diverse Cultural Environment
Muenjohn and Armstrong (2015) pointed out that incorporating the globalised business environment may sometimes create the considerable challenges for the global leaders. In fact, the historical evidence developed in this article suggests that the cultural diversity creates the greater competitive edge for the multinational corporations, which is one of the most significant factors for the globalised business. Hence, along with the identification of the innovative business practices, the global leaders need to identify the underlying conflicts as well. At the multinational level, these conflicts emerged through the cross cultural environment is much severe than the expectation level (Osland, Bird and Oddou 2013). It has been observed that the multinational corporations structure their business functionalities by formulating teams by engaging people from diverse cultural and lingual background. The conflicts may arise where there is the emergence of the barriers in cultural and lingual perspectives. The global leaders have to take the responsibilities of mitigating such merging challenges. Furthermore, the article also elaborates the scenario of the considerable obstructions that are faced in the multinational businesses due to the emergence of the cross cultural scenario.
On the contrary, Zander, Mockaitis and Butler (2012) argued that emergence of the cross cultural communication in the multinational businesses provide the considerable benefits to the global leaders. It is observable that the global leaders avail the opportunities to work with the diverse cultural background. Wood and St. Peters (2014) defined that cross cultural communication is the core practices within the multinational corporation, which enables the process of exchanging, negotiating, and mediating the cultural differences through several non-verbal attributes. The global business scenario keeps the wider views on the establishment of the cross cultural communication practices that helps in identifying more innovative business functionalities. The engagement of the various people from diverse cultural background creates the different perceptions, which may affect the internal atmosphere as a whole. It is true that during the negotiation and the information exchange, the higher level of the communication efficiency is necessary. However, when the people from diverse background are engaged within a team, there is the high possibility of the cultural conflicts. However, the global leaders need to concentrate widely on such situation and develop the cultural diversity to mitigate such conflicts.
The obtained idea from the article defines the three categories of the culture, such as uni-cultural, intercultural, and comparative culture. As explained by Wanasika et al. (2011), uni-cultural perspective is developed when the management operates within the single country. On the contrary, the comparative culture is concerned with the comparison between the cultural perspectives of two different countries. The intercultural factor, on the other hand, determines the interactive approaches between one or more organisational members who belong to different countries all across the world (Rallapalli and Montgomery 2015). The leaders of the multinational corporations look beyond such cultural differences and develop the diversity among these members. Takahashi, Ishikawa and Kanai (2012) observed that the global leaders have the multi-faceted view on the diverse streams associated with the internationalized business scenario. One of these streams is expatriate, which refers to the employees who are sent to different countries to work for an extended period. The expatriates are generally selected based on the technical competency level, previous performance level, and the willingness to accept the offered project. Zhou and Pilcher (2018) developed the understanding regarding the fruitful transformation of these expatriates. It is stated that when the expatriates start working in a country with diverse cultural background, they receive the opportunity to strengthen their cultural competency as well. They gain the potentiality to work in a diverse situation and structure their career path for the long term basis.
Practices Adopted by Global Leaders to Mitigate Conflicts and Promote Innovative Approaches
Another main attributes identified in expatriates is the power of adjustment. The expatriates try to adopt the diverse cultural values while working between the people from different cultures. However, Rallapalli and Montgomery (2015) argued that the expatriate sometimes face the greater psychological barriers in surviving in a different country with the different cultural and lingual values. Their homesickness also creates the significant barriers that affect their mental state. The theoretical argument present in this article provides the insights about the “anticipatory adjustment”, which is a former technique of expatriation and later modified by a number of individuals. This division was characterized by different segments, such as organisational culture, individual job, non-work, and organisation socialization. The effectiveness of the expatriate is measured through the adjustment superiority. According to Ojala (2015), the expatriates often face the challenges to survive in a complex context that usually includes the competing demands and the maintenance of the high level of coordination over time and space.
The third stream of the intercultural context is the comparative leadership, which establishing conclusion that the culture has the considerable effects on the behaviour of the leaders. In presenting the conceptual ideas about such leadership attributes, Dr. Geert Hofstede developed the theoretical framework concerned with the cultural attributes of different nation. The theoretical based analysis of cross cultural communication is presented further:
In representing the ideas of the intercultural communication, Dr. Geert Hofstede developed the considerable ideas about the cultural dimensions. He segregated the cultural aspects into six dimensions, such as power distance, individualism versus collectivism, masculinity versus femininity, uncertainty avoidance, pragmatic versus normative, and indulgence versus restraints. The first dimension is power distance, which represents the degree to which people accepts the unequal distribution of power among the leader and the employees (Nathan 2015). The higher score in PDI (power distance index) indicates that the employees tend to accept the power of the leader in terms of making any specific decisions. The employees even accept the unequal distribution of power by understanding the position in the system. For example, employees from Malaysia prefer to depend on their leaders instead of undertaking the individual decisions at the workplace. The second dimension is individualism versus collectivism, which indicates the extent of cooperating with each other (Kim 2017). The higher score in this segment refers to the tendency of self-orientation instead of developing team work. In Central America, such individualistic tendency is observed among the employees.
Expatriates and Anticipatory Adjustment
The next dimension is masculinity versus femininity, which differs the mental attributes of the associated people, either towards assertive or modesty. The male dominating perceptions tend to view the assertive mentality whereas females are considered as modest (Hur, Kang and Kim 2015). The differences and gaps between such masculine and feminine perceptions are much highlighted in the organisations of Austria and Japan. The next dimension is uncertainty avoidance that measures the extent to which people deal with the anxiety. Country like Greece represents this dimension as people have the tendency to make their life as predictable or controllable as possible. The lower score in this index ensures the open-minded and inclusive mentality (Rallapalli and Montgomery 2015). The next dimension is pragmatic versus normative, which determines the long-term orientation. The extent is measured through the level of explaining the stronger aspects of religiosity or nationalism. The higher score in this factor ensures the urge to develop quick response and short-term goals for instant result. The final dimension is indulgence versus restraints, which refers to the degree of higher encouragement (Wanasika et al. 2011). The lower score in this index indicates the detachment from gratifications. These cultural dimensions provide the considerable attributes observed in diverse countries, especially among the diverse cultural background that have the clear impact on multinational business scenario.
Conclusion
The study develops the enriched ideas about the cross-cultural management that is primarily focusing on the concept of Multinational Corporation setting. The study develops the ideas about the global leaders that have been accepting the drastic changes occurring in the current global business scenario. It is noticeable that the nature of the global leadership practices has changed in keeping pace with the growing consciousness of the underlying challenges. The exploration of the historical evidence present in the article defines that the leaders at the multinational level need to adopt the flexible approaches to identify the futuristic value and achieve success. The cross cultural communication in MNC not only delivers the considerable benefits, it creates conflicts between the management and employees as well. It is noticeable that cross cultural communication is the core practices within the multinational corporation. It is even enabling the process of exchanging, negotiating, and mediating the cultural differences through several non-verbal attributes. The concept of expatriate is highlighted in this study to define the effectiveness of the cross-cultural association. It is stated that the interactive approaches between one or more organisational members who belong to different countries all across the world. The development of the theoretical explanation by Dr. Geert Hofstede, the cultural attributes in the MNCs all across the world.
References
Bird, A. and Mendenhall, M.E., 2016. From cross-cultural management to global leadership: Evolution and adaptation. Journal of World Business, 51(1), pp.115-126.
Caligiuri, P. and Bonache, J., 2016. Evolving and enduring challenges in global mobility. Journal of World Business, 51(1), pp.127-141.
Eisenbeiß, S.A. and Brodbeck, F., 2014. Ethical and unethical leadership: A cross-cultural and cross-sectoral analysis. Journal of Business Ethics, 122(2), pp.343-359.
Hur, W. M., Kang, S., and Kim, M. 2015. The moderating role of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions in the customer-brand relationship in China and India. Cross Cultural Management, 22(3), 487-508.
Kim, S. 2017. National culture and public service motivation: investigating the relationship using Hofstede’s five cultural dimensions. International Review of Administrative Sciences, 83(1_suppl), 23-40.
Lisak, A. and Erez, M., 2015. Leadership emergence in multicultural teams: The power of global characteristics. Journal of World Business, 50(1), pp.3-14.
Muenjohn, N. and Armstrong, A., 2015. Transformational leadership: The influence of culture on the leadership behaviours of expatriate managers. international Journal of Business and information, 2(2).
Nathan, G. 2015. A non-essentialist model of culture: Implications of identity, agency and structure within multinational/multicultural organizations. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management, 15(1), 101-124.
Ojala, A. 2015. Geographic, cultural, and psychic distance to foreign markets in the context of small and new ventures. International Business Review, 24(5), 825-835.
Osland, J. S., Bird, A., and Oddou, G. 2013. The context of expert global leadership. In W. H. Mobley, M. Li, and Y. Wang (Eds.), Advances in global leadership (Vol. 7). Oxford, UK: Elsevier.
Rallapalli, K. C., and Montgomery, C. D. 2015. Marketing strategies for Asian-Americans: guidelines based on Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions. In Minority marketing: Research perspectives for the 1990s (pp. 73-77). Springer, Cham.
Takahashi, K., Ishikawa, J., and Kanai, T. 2012. Qualitative and quantitative studies of leadership in multinational settings: Meta-analytic and cross-cultural reviews. Journal of World Business, 47: 530–538.
Wanasika, I., Howell, J. P., Littrell, R., and Dorfman, P. 2011. Managerial leadership and culture in sub-Saharan Africa. Journal of World Business, 46: 234–324.
Wood, E.D. and St. Peters, H.Y., 2014. Short-term cross-cultural study tours: impact on cultural intelligence. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(4), pp.558-570.
Zander, L., Mockaitis, A. I., and Butler, C. L. 2012. Leading global teams. Journal of World Business, 47: 592–603.
Zhou, V. X., and Pilcher, N. 2018. Intercultural competence’as an intersubjective process: a reply to ‘essentialism. Language and Intercultural Communication, 18(1), 125-143.
Order an Essay Now & Get These Features For Free:
Turnitin Report
Formatting
Title Page
Citation
Outline
