Intercultural business communication (стр. 1 из 3)

THEBASIC FORMS OF COMMUNICATION

AsDavid Glass is well aware, effective communicators have many tools at theirdisposal when they want to get across a message. Whether writing or speaking,they know how to put together the words that will convey their meaning. Theyreinforce their words with gestures and actions. They look you in the eye,listen to what you have to say, and think about your feelings and needs. At thesame time, they study your reactions, picking up the nuances of your responseby watching your face and body, listening to your tone of voice, and evaluatingyour words. They absorb information just as efficiently as they transmit it,relying on both non-verbal and verbal cues.

NON-VERBALCOMMUNICATION

Themost basic form of communication is non-verbal. Anthropologists theorize thatlong before human beings used words to talk things over, our ancestorscommunicated with one another by using their bodies. They gritted their teethto show anger; they smiled and touched one another to indicate affection. Althoughwe have come a long way since those primitive times, we still use non-verbalcues to express superiority, dependence, dislike, respect, love, and otherfeelings.

Non-verbal communication differs fromverbal communication in fundamental ways. For one thing, it is lessstructured, which makes it more difficult to study. A person cannot pick up abook on non-verbal language and master the vocabulary of gestures, expressions,and inflections that are common in our culture. We don't really know how peoplelearn non-verbal behaviour. No one teaches a baby to cry or smile, yet theseforms of self-expression are almost universal. Other types of non-verbalcommunication, such as the meaning of colors and certain gestures, vary fromculture to culture.

Non-verbalcommunication also differs from verbal communication in terms of intent andspontaneity. We generally plan our words. When we say "please open thedoor," we have a conscious purpose. We think about the message, if onlyfor a moment. But when we communicate non-verbally, we sometimes do sounconsciously. We don't mean to raise an eyebrow or blush. Those actions comenaturally. Without our consent, our emotions are written all over our faces.

Whynon-verbal communication is important

Althoughnon-verbal communication is often unplanned, it has more impact than verbalcommunication. Non-verbal cues are especially important in conveying feelings;accounting for 93 percent of the emotional meaning that is exchanged in anyinteraction.

Oneadvantage of non-verbal communication is its reliability. Most people candeceive us much more easily with their words than they can with their bodies.Words are relatively easy to control; body language, facial expressions, andvocal characteristics are not. By paying attention to these non-verbal cues, wecan detect deception or affirm a speaker's honesty. Not surprisingly, we havemore faith in non-verbal cues than we do in verbal messages. If a person saysone thing but transmits a conflicting message non-verbally, we almostinvariably believe the non-verbal signal. To a great degree, then, an individual'scredibility as a communicator depends on non-verbal messages.

Non-verbalcommunication is important for another reason as well: It can be efficient fromboth the sender's and the receiver's standpoint. You can transmit a non-verbalmessage without even thinking about it, and your audience can register themeaning unconsciously. By the same token, when you have a conscious purpose,you can often achieve it more economically with a gesture than you can withwords. A wave of the hand, a pat on the back, a wink—all are streamlinedexpressions of thought.

The functions of non-verbalcommunication

Althoughnon-verbal communication can stand alone, it frequently works with speech. Ourwords carry part of the message, and non-verbal signals carry the rest.Together, the two modes of expression make a powerful team, augmenting, reinforcing, and clarifying eachother.

Experts innon-verbal communication suggest that it have six specific functions:

• To provideinformation, either consciously or unconsciously

• To regulatethe flow of conversation

• To expressemotion

• To qualify,complement, contradict, or expand verbal messages

• To control orinfluence others

• To facilitate specific tasks, such as teaching aperson to swing a golf club.

Non-verbalcommunication plays a role in business too. For one thing, it helps establishcredibility and leadership potential. If you can learn to manage the impressionyou create with your body language, facial characteristics, voice, andappearance, you can do a great deal to communicate that you are competent,trustworthy, and dynamic. For example, Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton hasdeveloped a homespun style that puts people at ease, thereby helping them tobe more receptive, perhaps even more open.

Furthermore,if you can learn to read other people's non-verbal messages, you will be ableto interpret their underlying attitudes and intentions more accurately. Whendealing with co-workers, customers, and clients, watch carefully for smallsigns that reveal how the conversation is going. If you aren't having theeffect you want, check your words; then, if your words are all right, try to beaware of the non-verbal meanings you are transmitting. At the same time, staytuned to the non-verbal signals that the other person is sending.

VERBALCOMMUNICATION

Although youcan express many things non-verbally, there are limits to what you cancommunicate without the help of language. If you want to discuss past events,ideas, or abstractions, you need words—symbols that stand for thoughts —arranged in meaningful patterns. In the English language, we have a 750,000,although most of us recognize only about 20,000 of them. To create a thought withthese words, we arrange them according to the rules of grammar, putting thevarious parts of speech in the proper sequence.

Wethen transmit the message in spoken or written form, hoping that someone willhear or read what we have to say. Figure 1.1 shows how much time businesspeople devote to the various types of verbal communication. They use speakingand writing to send messages; they use listening and reading to receive them.

Speakingand writing

When it comes to sending business messages, speakingis more common than writing. Giving instructions, conducting interviews,working in small groups, attending meetings, and making speeches are allimportant activities. Even though writing may be less common, it is importanttoo. When you want to send a complex message of lasting significance, you willprobably want to put it in writing.

Listeningand reading

It's importantto remember that effective communication is a two-way street. People inbusiness spend more time obtaining information than transmitting it, so to dotheir jobs effectively, they need good listening and reading skills.Unfortunately, most of us are not very good listeners. Immediately afterhearing a ten-minute speech, we typically remember only half of what was said.A few days later, we've forgotten three-quarters of the message. To someextent, our listening problems stemfrom our education, or lack of it. We spend years learning to express ourideas, but few of us ever take a course in listening.

FIGURE 1.1 Forms of Business Communication

Similarly,our reading skills often leave a good deal to be desired. Recent studiesindicate that approximately 38 percent of the adults in the United States have

trouble readingthe help-wanted ads in the newspaper, 14 percent cannot fill out a checkproperly, 26 percent can't figure out the deductions listed on theirpaycheques, and 20 percent are functionally illiterate. Even those who do readmay not know how to read effectively. They have trouble extracting theimportant points from a document, so they cannot make the most of theinformation presented.

Collegestudent are probably better at listening and reading than are many otherpeople, partly because they get so much practice. On the basis of our ownexperience, no doubt realise that our listening and reading efficiency variestremendously, depending on how we approach the task. Obtaining and rememberinginformation takes a special effort.

Althoughlistening and reading obviously differ, both require a similar approach. Thefirst step is to register the information, which means that you must tune outdistractions and focus your attention. You must then interpret and evaluate theinformation, respond in some fashion, and file away the data for futurereference.

The most important part of this process isinterpretation and evaluation, which is no easy matter. While absorbing thematerial, we must decide what is important and what isn't. One approach is tolook for the main ideas and the most important supporting details, rather thantrying to remember everything we read or hear. If we can discern the structure of the material, we canalso understand the relationships among the ideas.

BASICSOF INTERCULTURAL BUSINESS COMMUNICATION

As Bill Davilaknows, the first step in learning to communicate with people from othercultures is to become aware of what culture means. Our awareness ofintercultural differences is both useful and necessary in today's world ofbusiness.

UNDERSTANDINGCULTURE

Person may not realise it, but hebelongs to several cultures. The most obvious is the culture he shares with allother people who live in the same country. But this person also belongs toother cultural groups, such as an ethnic group, a religious group, a fraternityor sorority, or perhaps a profession that has its own special language andcustoms.

Sowhat exactly is culture? It is useful to define culture as asystem of shared symbols, beliefs, attitudes, values, expectations, and normsfor behaviour. Thus all members of a culture have, and tend to act on, similarassumptions about how people should think, behave, and communicate.

Distinctgroups that exist within a major culture are more properly referred to as subcultures.Among groups that might be considered subcultures are Mexican Americans in EastLos Angeles, Mormons in Salt Lake City, and longshoremen in Montreal.Subcultures without geographic boundaries can be found as well, such aswrestling fans, Russian immigrants, and Harvard M.B.A.s .

Culturesand subcultures vary in several ways that affect intercultural communication:

• Stability.Conditions in the culture may be stable or may be changing slowly or rapidly.

• Complexity.Cultures vary in the accessibility of information. In North America informationis contained in explicit codes,including words, whereas in Japan a great deal of information is conveyedimplicitly, through body language, physical context, and the like.

• Composition.Some cultures are made up of many diverse and disparate subcultures; otherstend to be more homogeneous.

• Acceptance.Cultures vary in their attitudes toward outsiders. Some are openly hostile ormaintain a detached aloofness. Othersare friendly and co-operative toward strangers.

As you can see,cultures vary widely. It's no wonder that most of us need special trainingbefore we can become comfortable with a culture other than our own.

DEVELOPINGINTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION SKILLS

Whenfaced with the need (or desire) to learn about another culture, we have twomain approaches to choose from. The first is to learn as much as possible—thelanguage, cultural background and history, social rules, and so on—about thespecific culture that you expect to deal with. The other is to develop generalskills that will help to adapt in any culture.

The firstapproach, in-depth knowledge of a particular culture, certainly works. Butthere are two drawbacks. One is that you will never be able to understandanother culture completely. No matter how much you study German culture, forexample, you will never be a German or share the experiences of having grown upin Germany. Even if we could understand the culture completely, Germans might resent our assumption that we know everythingthere is to know about them. The other drawback to immersing yourself in aspecific culture is the trap of overgeneralization, looking at people from aculture not as individuals with their own unique characteristics, but asinstances of Germans or Japanese or black Americans. The trick is to learnuseful general information but to be open to variations and individualdifferences.

Thesecond approach to cultural learning, general development of interculturalskills, is especially useful if we interact with people from a variety ofcultures or subcultures. Among the skills you need to learn are the following:

• Taking responsibility for communication. Don'tassume that it is the other person's job to communicate with you.

• Withholding judgment. Learn tolisten to the whole story and to accept differences in others.

• Showing respect. Learn the waysin which respect is communicated— through gestures, eye contact, and so on — invarious cultures.

• Empathizing. Try to put yourselfin the other person's shoes. Listen carefully to what the other person istrying to communicate; imagine the person's feelings and point of view.

• Toleratingambiguity. Learn to control yourfrustration when placed in an unfamiliar or confusing situation.

• Looking beyond the superficial.Don't be distracted by such things as dress, appearance, or environmentaldiscomforts.

• Beingpatient and persistent. If you want to accomplish a task, don't give upeasily.

• Recognizingyour own cultural biases. Learn toidentify when your assumptions are different from the other person's.

• Being flexible. Be prepared tochange your habits, preferences, and attitudes.

• Emphasizingcommon ground. Look for similarities to work from.

• Sendingclear messages. Make your verbal and non-verbal messages consistent.

• Takingrisks. Try things that will help you gain a better understanding of the otherperson or culture.

• Increasingyour cultural sensitivity. Learn about variations in customs and practicesso that you will be more aware of potential areas for miscommunication ormisunderstanding.

• Dealingwith the individual. Avoid stereotyping and overgeneralization.

DIFFICULTIESOF INTERCULTURAL BUSINESS COMMUNICATION

The moredifferences there are between the people who are communicating, the moredifficult it is to communicate effectively. The major problems ininter-cultural business communication are language barriers, culturaldifferences, and ethnocentric reactions.

LANGUAGEBARRIERS

If we're doingbusiness in London, we obviously won't have much of a language problem. We mayencounter a few unusual terms or accents in the 29 countries in which Englishis an official language, but our problems will be relatively minor. Languagebarriers will also be relatively minor when we are dealing with people who useEnglish as a second language (and some 650 million people fall into thiscategory). Some of these millions are extremely fluent; others have only anelementary command of English. Although you may miss a few subtleties indealing with those who are less fluent in English, we’ll still be able tocommunicate. The pitfall to watch for isassuming that the other person understands everything we say, even slang, localidioms, and accents. One group of English-speaking Japanese who moved to theUnited States as employees of Toyota had to enroll in a special course to learnthat "Jeat yet?" means "Did you eat yet?" and that"Cannahepya?" means "Can I help you?"

Thereal problem with language arises when we are dealing with people who speakvirtually no English. In situations like this, we have very few options: We canlearn their language, we can use an intermediary or a translator, or we canteach them our language. Becoming fluent in a new language (which we must do toconduct business in that language) is time consuming. The U.S. StateDepartment, for example, gives its Foreign Service officers a six-monthlanguage training program and expects them to continue their languageeducation at their foreign posts. Even the Berlitz method, which is famous forthe speed of its results, requires a month of intensive effort — 13 hours aday, 5 days a week. It is estimated that minimum proficiency in anotherlanguage requires at least 240 hours of study over 8 weeks; more complexlanguages, such as Arabic and Chinese, require more than 480 hours. Languagecourses can be quite expensive as well. Unless we are planning to spend severalyears abroad or to make frequent trips over an extended period, learninganother language may take more time, effort, and money than we're able tospend.