Intercultural Business Communication

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Unit 6 Synthetic CulturesSection B

• Intercultural Business Communication
• Instructor Hsin-Hsin Cindy Lee, PhD

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Dimension III Gender
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Gender

• In different cultures, people are given different
  roles, expectations, rights or duties according
  to their gender.
• In some cultures, men and women do not share the
  same rights.
• In other cultures, men and women enjoy equivalent
  status and rights.
• The relevant status of men and women shape
  different kinds of culture.

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Gender

• Masculine Culture
• Achievement-oriented Culture

• Feminine Culture
• Care-oriented Culture

• If men and women are more equal, the result is to
  see more feminine qualities within the society
  such as caring and compromises.
• It is also common to more female executives in
  the working place.

• In all countries in the world, an unequal role
  distribution between men and women coincides with
  a tougher society.
• In such Masculine country with unequal role
  distribution, there is more emphasis on
  achievement and fighting than on caring and
  compromise.

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Examples

• Feminine Cultures

• Masculine Cultures

• Germany
• Switzerland
• Austria
• Colombia
• Most other Latin American countries
• Japan

• Netherlands
• The Scandinavian countries
• Costa Rica
• Portugal
• Thailand
• Britain
• USA

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Dimension IV Truth
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Truth
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Truth

• Truth here indicates how people in a culture cope
  with the unpredictable and the ambiguous.
• Anxiety and the search for truth are closely
  related.
• Anxiety is a basic human feeling, or in other
  words, fear of the unknown.
• This aspect of a culture has been called
  Uncertainty Avoidance and Uncertainty Tolerance.
• Note that uncertainty avoidance is not at all the
  same as risk avoidance if risk can be
  acknowledged and quantified, it is not
  threatening to people from uncertainty avoiding
  cultures.

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Traits

• Uncertainty Avoidance

• Uncertainty Tolerance

• Many people in this kind of a culture believe
  that what is different is dangerous.
• They may not be very friendly to strangers.
• It is also called one-truth orientation.

• People have greater tolerance for differences.
• Strangers are not necessarily bad.
• People tend to accept that many truths can
  co-exist.

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Examples

• Uncertainty Avoidance

• Uncertainty Tolerance

• Russia
• Japan
• Korea
• Mexico
• Belgium
• France
• Germanic countries

• English-speaking countries
• China
• Singapore
• Jamaica
• Denmark

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Dimension V Virtue
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Short-Term VS Long-Term Orientations
The last basic problem in a society is the choice
between future and present virtue.
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Traits

• Short-Term Orientation

• Long-Term
• Orientation

• The issue of virtue is particularly important in
  Asia.
• People in long-term oriented culture tend to
  concern about future virtue and traditions.
• They are willing to save for the future.
• They value long-term partnership.

• People in short-term oriented culture are more
  concerned with truth than virtue.
• They care about present virtue and do not
  necessarily follow traditions.
• They are more willing to spend for the present.
• Good partnerships are not necessarily equivalent
  to long-term relationships.

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Examples

• Short-term Oriented Culture

• Long-term Oriented Culture

• Philippines
• Most European countries
• Most American countries
• African countries
• Pakistan

• China
• Japan
• Many countries of East Asia
• Netherlands (The Dutch)

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Summary
Dimension One Extreme Other Extreme
Identity Collectivism Individualism
Hierarchy Large Power Distance Small Power Distance
Gender Femininity Masculinity
Truth Strong Uncertainty Avoidance Uncertainty Tolerance
Virtue Long-Term Orientation Short-Term Orientation
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Conclusion

• All people are unique individuals, and each
  person is unlike anyone else in the world.
• All people are also social beings, and from early
  infancy on, they are taught how to survive in a
  social world.
• People are taught to cope with the five big
  issues just introduced identity, hierarchy,
  gender, truth and virtue.
• The world of a child in each culture is filled
  with symbols, heroes, and rituals that together
  embody and re-create that culture.
• Behind these manifestations are the values of
  culture.
• The culture values are taught from birth and
  manifest themselves across social settings
  family, school, workplace, and others.

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Final Reminding

• Culture is not a universally accepted notion.
• The cultural value system you learn from this
  session is based on empirical data on national
  cultures.
• There are many subculture groups in each country.
  The subculture groups have their own heroes,
  symbols and rituals, but they share most of the
  values of the national culture.
• Because culture is so complex and dynamic,
  problems of reliability and validity make it very
  difficult to measure.
• Member of a culture may not be able to describe
  that culture accurately and articulately in a way
  that would be accepted by another person who is
  also a member of the same culture!
• Value systems are implicit, and values often defy
  conscious reflection.

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Checkpoint References
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Checkpoint

• 2. What dimension of culture do the following
  extremes represent ?

• 1. What are the five main problems of society?

• 1. _____ Collectivism and Individualism
• 2. _____ Long-term and short-term orientation
• 3. _____ Large and small power distance
• 4. _____ Uncertainty avoidance and tolerance

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Answers

• Five main problems of society

• Dimensions of national culture

• Identity
• Hierarchy
• Gender
• Truth
• Virtue

• 1. Identity
• 2. Virtue
• 3. Hierarchy
• 4. Truth

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References

• Gert Jan Hofstede, Paul B. Pedersen Geert
  Hofstede
• (2002) Exploring Culture. Intercultural
  Press.
• Craig Storti (1994) Cross-Cultural Dialogues.
• Intercultural Press.
• Robert Gibson (2002) Intercultural Business
• Communication. Oxford University Press.
  

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The End

• The End of synthetic cultures