The American workplace can be very diverse, composed of people of different genders, races, ethnicities, and religions all working together. In fact, the United States is oftentimes considered to have some of the most culturally diverse workplaces. To help you with this discussion, review the National Culture webpage to read about Professor Geert Hofstede's research into the six dimensions of national cultures. Next, visit the Countries webpage to look at how the dimensions of national culture in the United States compare to those of other countries.
The multi-cultural workplace provides a lot of benefits through diverse viewpoints and experiences that are brought to the table. However, it can also present us with unique workplace challenges, particularly in regard to cross-cultural communication. In order to understand more about how miscommunications can happen in cross-cultural interactions, please also watch the Intercultural Communication Adventure with Little Pilot video and read "Cultural Communication Barriers in the Workplace."
Based on the websites, video, and article, please address the following:
On Hofstede's Courtries webpage, select a country of your choice and compare it to the United States on three of the six dimensions of national cultures. For each of those three dimensions chosen, answer the following questions:
How is the dimension defined?
Why is this dimension useful to understanding the country's culture?
How does your country compare to the U.S. on this dimension?
Describe an experience you have had involving cross-cultural communication. What tools did you use to navigate your cross-cultural interaction? Did you confront any misunderstandings due to the cross-cultural nature of the communication? If so, what where they? If not, how were you able to avoid any misunderstandings?
What two techniques or skills do you think would help reduce cross-cultural communication misunderstandings in the workplace?
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/cultural-communication-barriers-workplace-13888.html
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/cultural-communication-barriers-workplace-13888.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSt_op3fQck
http://geert-hofstede.com/national-culture.html
http://geert-hofstede.com/countries.html