Mgmt

Introduction

A company's organizational culture has several elements that reflect how individuals think, feel, value, and act. As norms and standards, these can be led by values, beliefs, and attitudes. Finally, they are included in a more significant notion known as cross-culture in the workplace. Different norms and standards are the most critical approach to effective leadership actions (values, attitudes, beliefs, etc.).

Globalization is an undeniably famous theme for organizations in the 21st century. This is bringing an ever-increasing number of advances consistently everywhere all over the world. Connectivity is developing, and nowadays, individuals are more interconnected. Accordingly, there is more foreign exchange, social trade, and the utilization of the internet globally. Globalization has presented numerous difficulties for organizations around the globe, particularly for leaders who are required to act appropriately with socially different workers. The outcome has been that leaders have been compelled to deal with contrasts across societies. Culture is characterized as 'the information on a gathering of individuals' convictions, values, rules, standards, images, and customs. (Bird & Stevens, 2017).

Fruitful leadership requires assertive communication. Diverse errors become more agreeable to deal with when there is an extraordinary communicator in the group. The chances identified with social contrasts form as organizations move into new domains. To improve the different ethnicities functioning, a leader should show helpful, alluring, and extraordinary qualities. Managing corporations where employees come from various societies and cultures need effective global associations, discover significant leaders for these arrangements, and work with diverse employees (House & Javidan, 2004). Whenever leaders decide to coach a group, they ought to understand the needs of their subordinates. This can readily alter their decision-making processes. To influence cross-cultural communication in leadership behavior, motivating, communicating, and directing aspects are placed in the last stage.

This business report utilizes the current realities of multiple cultures and their differentiating leadership processes to give viewpoints. Culture can be portrayed as living, diverse social traditions, existing standards, and contents of a specific gathering (Thomas, 2001). As a multicultural group, this influences the difficulties you face. Subsequently, the person who is all-around educated about different societies and knows about their qualities and standards can impact and intrigue their group.

Driving a multicultural group of representatives presents an assortment of difficulties for a leader. Regarding this issue, we will analyze various models and structures that address cross-cultural differences. We will likewise take a gander at intercultural patterns in communication and systems for adapting to culturally diverse differences as a feature of this business report.

Many research and studies have been directed on cultural differences. Therefore, the essential measurements and qualities of culturally diverse differences have been resolved to utilize different frameworks and theories (Hughes et al., 2018). Numerous frameworks distinguish cross-cultural differences, and we will investigate the most notable frameworks in this part, which includes:

· There may be a variety of cultural frameworks that bring shared value systems, symbols, rituals, and mythologies. There are a few frameworks to consider. They are two of them, according to Lawrence. Two related frameworks are mentioned: The Framework for Cross-cultural Engagement and The Model for Cross-cultural Practices.

· Hofstede's Framework, which is defined as an assessment of cross-cultural differences.

Moreover, three main problems faced by Amazon in their Mexican warehouse were due to cross-cultural differences. The solutions and possible recommendations are described in this report to overcome the cross-cultural differences in an organization.

General Part

Organizational culture in the company has many dimensions that represent how people think, feel, value and act. These can be guided by values, beliefs, and attitudes as norms and standards. In the end, they are introduced to a bigger concept as cross-culture in a company. According to Schein (1986), the seriousness of culture in an organization is as much as occupational culture. Many individuals have different cultures in their working styles, nationalities, age, ethics, sexual orientation in a company. In this case, the interaction of those people with each other is clustered in Cross-culture communication.  

One essential aspect of being a good leader is having good communication in a company and dealing with it. According to Alapo (2017), based on globalization in the 21st century, this pushes all leaders to have a common goal in the organization. In other words, cross-culture communication can have an exact effect on leadership. Even though a multicultural workplace can boost an organization toward growing a business, it can be challenging for leaders. These challenges for leaders are how they can motivate, communicate, and direct their teammates. The most crucial way to be effective in leadership actions is via different norms and standards (values, attitudes, beliefs, etc.). When leaders decide to conduct a team, they must be aware of their teammates’ standards. This can easily change their ways of making a decision. Motivating, communicating, and directing are factors placed in the last step of influencing cross-culture communication in leadership behavior.

Motivating: this is a crucial part of tasks in leadership that leaders should encourage the team and work toward specific their target incorporation. A boss tells employees what they should do, but leaders inspire them to what they must do. They must be aware that every individual has a different way to get motivated based on their culture, which can change. So cross-culture influences how leaders can motivate teammates. 

Communicating: changes in this part are more understandable. Because in a normal situation, leaders, without a shadow of a doubt, must use several tactics to interact with teammates base on their personality. Cross-culture is a lever for leaders because they should determine how they can interact and manage their communications based on his/her culture.

Directing: cross-culture communization effect on how leaders run their teammate. This can quickly arise challenges in this part. When there are some cultures in work, they should cross between their and teammates’ culture, which includes their norms, values. Not only that but also Misunderstood can occur.

Current Trend in Cross-Culture Communication

The business world has tolerated many changes via technology in communications when there are many cultures in their external and internal companies. According to Qin et al. (2018), networking apps can directly impact managers’ insights for their markets to improve localized and globalized strategies in cultural differences. They, these days, can pass their success path via the internet as a common trend to communicate globally with different cultures, specifically in the COVID atmosphere. Because of this pandemic, many organizations are continuing their businesses via distance work. Sophisticated technology leads companies to be closer to their employees. It has more chance to succeed when there are many cultures, even international companies, that must have a mix of internal and external communication with their staff from different cultures. This technology can consist of many communication applications such as Email, Skype, Microsoft teams, etc. In this case, in terms of internal communication, no matter where employees are, even in non-work hours or what their culture is. Because they need to convey their information via a virtual system that can easily have access to their modern smart devices like phones, tablets, in other words, the existence of technology makes business ignore cross-cultural differences in their companies.

Cross-Cultural Differences in Amazon

Problem -1

-Intercultural differences on leadership teams handling Interpersonal conflict among team members in Mexico and the USA. 

-In Mexico warehouse, the leadership team is predominately the US, while the workforce is Mexican. 

- According to Lovelace et al. (2001), Mexicans are highly socialized, seek harmony in relationships with fellow team members, and stand as a significant concern. 

-The leadership team in the Mexico warehouse exhibits a higher task orientation attitude and lower team-oriented behaviours, and more inclined towards avoiding conflicts. The leadership team would prefer to focus on work rather than resolve and address interpersonal relationship issues (Van Vianen, 2001).

Impact on Organization

-High Employee Turnover of 23% recorded in the Warehouse in the last quarter. 

-The Warehouse is running short of skilled labour, increased workload, and stress on the existing workforce. 

-Bad reputation for leadership and low team morale.

-Average productivity down by 8% in comparison with similar warehouses. 

Solution

According to Lovelace et al. (2001), engagement in collaborative communications greatly minimizes the disagreement on task-related items and pushes the drive for team innovation. Improves team behaviours, generates a positive attitude towards the performance goals, and also improves overall team performance. 

         Gabrielidis et al. (2007) Mexicans prefer a collaborative approach to conflict resolution and is an essential factor. Also, Sanchez-Burks et al. (2000) report that socioemotional and improving workgroups are critical factors for improved productivity, lower turnovers, and retaining a highly skilled workforce in Mexican warehouses.  

Problem -2

Lack of intercultural customization on the Amazon website content for products drives poor sales in Asian countries and high in the Amazon U.S.

Niche Markets predominantly Korea sales through Amazon online portal are shallow, accounting for 19% of the sale volume compared to overall eCommerce net sales across various companies in Korea (Singh, 2004).

Korean cultures are in High uncertainty avoidance in nature (Hofstede, 2004). Hence, culturally indifferent themes in Asian markets have difficulties in user perception, processing, and willingness to pay for the product.

Various surveys report 65% of consumer's "willing to pay" factor is low on the Amazon website due to lack of content adaptation to local cultures.

Impact on Organization

-Poor sales lead to Wastage of groceries and other perishable items. In addition, warehouses report slow inventory movements of many food items, causing increased maintenance and wastage costs of 16 million dollars per year.

-The advertising revenue budget of 10 million dollars is not yielding desired results.

-Employee 360 Feedback survey reports 38% of employees express being unproductive due to low sales and a high workforce.

Research evidence

-Higher information content processing fluency facilitates greater willingness to purchase (Hamilton, 2006).

-A Risker purchase is the perception of less fluently processed information delivered in a non-adapted local style leading to user classification of risker and the low tendency for willingness to purchase (Schwarz, 2009).

-Risk is the critical factor for driving purchase decisions. Thus lower risk leads to increased willingness to purchase online and leading to increased sales (Chen, 2008).

-Organizations with Culturally customized websites dominate the current global marketplace (Forbes, 2014).

Solution

As an eCommerce giant running operations around the globe, it is critically essential to incorporate cultural customization in the website contents, social media posts, and user communications as they are the driving influencing factors for consumers and increased sales (Singh, 2004).

According to Hofstede (1984), Asian consumers have a specific set of cultural dimensions and characteristics, which are distinct culturally in the environments of the U.S. and Korea.

As per Hofstede (2004), With Low uncertainty avoidance, U.S. consumers have less effort to process the content despite culturally neutral and are more receptive to conceptions and innovative products. While on the other hand, Korea, one of the highest uncertainty avoidance cultures, prefers less confusion and would like to remain in the status quo on the locally used style of content presentation of the eCommerce.

Strong understanding of cultural compatibility on consumer's willingness for purchase decisions and designing customized websites that aid consumers specifically in the Asian markets helps ease and analyze products sold on websites (Baack, 2007).

These culturally customized websites create trustworthiness, specifically in the higher levels of uncertainty avoidance cultures (Hughes et al., 2018, p. 520).

Bridging the complexity of metacognitive experiences and intercultural relationships, understanding cultural dimensions, congruence, and the impact on consumers their influence on willingness to purchase online decisions can boost Asian (Korean) Amazon markets in similar lines with the U.S. Markets.

Problem -3 

Virtual Teams

          There are many issues that virtual teams face that are not always visible, but they do have an existence. Current research shows that there are four areas in which virtual teams face problems, and those are: culture, technology, project management, and communication. A few issues that arise from different cultures are of social status within the cultures that occur due to employees working from different countries. Different countries have different cultures. There can be many misunderstandings that can arise as people from different cultures may not understand others’ behaviors and stereotype people from different cultures, and this can create distrust amongst them.

There may be countries in which the employees believe in using strict methods to get work done whereas in other countries they do not believe in the same. In America, employees believe in the need for speed, thinly prose, and efficiency of the target when communicating via email. They also expect to receive fast responses. While in Japan, they ensure to have their messages and responses written in a manner to avoid any grammatical errors, should include all the information, and be non-verbal. They craft their messages very carefully. Virtual teams must recognize differences between cultures in order to work effectively and efficiently together. Working in a cross-cultural virtual team can create awareness regarding the cultural differences that affect communication and working situations.

                The time difference is another issue that virtual teams face. The difference in time zones becomes an issue when there are members from different countries in the same team. It creates a problem when members try to synchronize their meetings or activities. This is a problem as every member needs to be on the same page doing the same thing.  It can be hard to get everyone to attend a meeting at a particular time in a country as it may be business working hours for some members, but it could be past midnight for the rest. Members need to plan well in advance in order to conduct meetings virtually and respect the differences in time. Different time zones create distance between the virtual teams, and it is a factor to be considered when trying to stay connected to someone from another country. 

              The availability of technology for virtual teams is another major problem that amazon employees face. In the modern world, the speed of technology is very fast, and it is possible that employees from different regions that are part of the virtual teams may not have access to the latest communication infrastructures like ISDN. Other technical problems involve slow computers, inconsistency on the networks, network traffic, and broadband services.

                 Lastly, for virtual teams to work effectively and efficiently, the issue of language barrier and communication need to be resolved. Amazon has many offices around the world, implying that its employees speak different languages. The employees can have trouble communicating with each other, and this can lead to misunderstandings amongst the employees. Communication is the key factor to building healthy relationships amongst the employees. Communication needs to be carefully handled when taken into account due to the cultural differences amongst members as it is not certainly the same for members in a virtual team from multi-cultural environments. The major issue with communication is how well the information is portrayed amongst the virtual team members.

Solution

The above issues may affect relationships in the organization, and therefore it is required that team leaders are encouraged to find solutions that will help their members be more effective and efficient. Here are a few solutions that can help with the above issues:

-Due to differences in culture, leaders can ensure that there is a common language that is agreed upon that the members can use for communication in order to have smooth communication during virtual meetings.

-Encourage members to undergo cross-cultural training. This ensures differing cultural values and norms are acknowledged and respected.

-Team members need to respect the differences in time zones so that they are not contacting their colleagues during times that are outside their office hours.  Using tools like Sidekick allows employees to schedule emails to be delivered during the recipient’s office hours. The use of google calendar should be encouraged so that employees get notifications regarding public holidays of other countries and reminders of their virtual meetings, which will allow them to be prepared beforehand.

Recommendations

Globalization, marked by internationalization, has made organizations contend with the new challenge of dealing with a workforce constituting individuals of diverse cultural backgrounds. Moran et al. (2011) argue that it is not easy for leaders to handle an increasingly complex organizational context faced with the challenge of handling a vast pool of workers with variable cultural beliefs, norms, and perceptions. In that regard, the researcher provides several recommendations for an organization that aspires to harness challenges underscored by cross-cultural differences for the organization's success. They are examined in the paragraph sections that follow from this.

The first challenge of cross-cultural communication that leadership must address with urgency in the involved organization is related to the leader's role in motivating employees. Because leaders are required to be an inspiring force rather than instructors, they must take cognizance of cultural differences in their organization's employee workforce (Hanges et al., 2016). That is because cultural divergence within an organization necessitates different approaches for motivating individual employees. Hanges et al. (2016) advise leaders to be increasingly wary of this concern which they must address without procrastinating. One way this above-mentioned pinpointed challenge can be addressed with efficacy is for leaders in the organization to demonstrate adaptability with every individual's cultural concern regarding employee motivation. Caligiuri and Tarique (2012) argue that an inspiring leader in contemporary organizational management must demonstrate sensitivity to cultural concerns revolving around the motivation of every individual employee. They can demonstrate such sensitivity by first being aware of the differences in employee perception regarding motivation, after which they must demonstrate adaptability to every individual employee's cultural consideration related to employee motivation (Caligiuri and Tarique, 2012).

Another unique cross-cultural challenge for the organization to address relates to the role of the leader in communicating with the organization's employees, whose cultural differences may hamper the transfer of meaning. Moran et al. (2011) recount that leaders must be highly efficient as messengers for communicating the organization's goals to their employees from a top-down and a bottom-up stance, with the latter involving the communication of feedback. To solve this challenge, traditional literature on handling cross-cultural challenges would advise the leader to be increasingly versatile and adaptable to alter their leadership style as they handle each employee's cultural expectations regarding communication differently (Moran et al., 2011). Nonetheless, contemporary leadership approaches such as global leadership advise the harnessing of core competencies. One such competency is enhancing interpersonal engagement when communicating with employees, while others include the leader's maintenance of non-judgementalism which encourages employees from divergent cultures to believe they are understood and their organization is empathetic to them (Moran et al. 2011). The rationale is that employees from divergent cultures to the most dominant culture at the workplace usually tend to be put off whenever their organization's leaders demonstrate judging them at the expense of showing them empathy. Thus, leaders must demonstrate empathy, non-judgmentalism, and interpersonal engagement when handling cross-cultural communication challenges within the organization.

Elsewhere, another noted challenge leaders in modern organizations face emanates from their role in directing their teammates. According to Caligiuri and Tarique (2012), the more contemporary global leadership approach advises leaders to utilize a critical competency of emotional resilience and tolerance for ambiguity which they believe could harness an understanding of instructions in cross-cultural communication. The rationale is that those from a different culture to the leaders' have a relatively higher likelihood of misunderstanding their instructions hence the need for leaders to demonstrate emotional resilience and tolerance for ambiguity to accommodate such employees.

Finally, the most appropriate cultural communication framework to guide cross-cultural communication in the organization is Hofstede's framework. This framework is based on six considerations: indulgence vs. restraint, power distance relationship, assistance vs. uncertainty, femineity vs. masculinity, individualism vs. collectivism, and time orientation (Hofstede, 2011). It is recommended that leaders seeking to harness the cross-cultural strengths of this model should be competent in the competencies of versatility and adaptability, which are vital in enabling them to identify with and demonstrate empathy for individuals demonstrating cultural traits in this model. Moreover, harnessing these recommendations ensures an organization attaints harmony since employees who are assured that their leaders embrace cultural differences are more likely to produce maximum limits.

Conclusion

To conclude, culture can be recognized as the qualities, convictions, and standards held by a particular set of individuals. For decades, there has been an enormous measure of globalization throughout the world, especially in the period of digitalization. In this business report, two important frameworks were discussed. The Lawrence framework for cross-cultural engagement is a process-oriented framework that can be used in various dimensions of culture. It describes the importance of values by listening and watching.

Furthermore, Hofstede's framework consists of six dimensions: Power distance, Collectivism vs. Individualism, Uncertainty Avoidance, Orientation to Time, Indulgence vs. Restraint, Femininity vs. Masculinity. The findings by Hofstede is one of the complete collections to date. The two frameworks by Lawrence and Hofstede should be integrated to help overcome the cross-cultural difference in the organizational environment.

Few of the intercultural issues faced by Amazon in their Mexican warehouse impacted the organization significantly. Intercultural differences cause the Top three major problems globally for Amazon. The significant business was affected, especially in the Mexican warehouses where the employees and the leadership had greater differences in the cultural standards. Lack of adoption to the regional cultures when dealing offshore areas of Asia made stinking effects on the sales and Morales. In the world of virtual communication and borderless workplaces, understanding intercultural differences is essential for successful team output and growth strategies for Amazon.

A few of the recommendations are provided in this business report to overcome those issues, which should be considered. The leader of the group should have excellent communication skills and should be able to motivate the employees. Sometimes, due to cultural differences, the message delivered can have different meanings, which has been a significant issue. To solve this issue, leaders should be highly efficient messengers, and with their excellent communications skills, the message across the organization should be delivered in a clear and precise manner. The leader must demonstrate empathy, non-judgmentalism while handling cross-cultural communication challenges within the organization.

Lastly, Hofstede's framework should be considered wherein the leader must be competent in the competencies of versatility and adaptability to solve the intercultural issues in the organization.

Harnessing these recommendations in an organization will ensure harmony and synchronization since the employees who are assured that their leaders embrace cultural differences are more likely to have increased productivity.

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