商务沟通论文

The importance of Cross-cultural communication in international business communication专业外经系国贸班学号12041120姓名杨金月2014年12月26日ABSTRACTAs the development of globalization，more and more people have opportunities to communicate with each other from diverse cultural background．Therefore，it is essential to understand some cultural factors which affect the interaction among people．This article discusses why cross-cultural communication is vital to study from business negotiation angle．Besides，it offers the concept of the cross-cultural communication, the communication conflict type of person from different country and the reasons. At last, the paper has put forward how the cultural differences impact on negotiations as well as the communication strategies in the international communication.Key-words: cross-cultural; communication; business communication一DefinitionCross cultural communication is defined by Gotland University as “a process of exchanging, negotiating, cultural differences through language, non-verbal gestures, and space relationships. Business communication is the exchange of messages related to companies through symbols, action and verbal words.二ImportanceCross cultural communication in business plays a vital role in successfully establishing the product or service in a different area of the globe. When the communication is effective, the product or service is appropriately tailored to the cultural norms and expectations resulting in the use or purchase of the product. Ineffective communication cross culturally can offend, confuse or send a misunderstood message which could lead to broken relations with investors or employee.As the business world becomes increasingly global, the need for effective cross cultural communication is essential. Cross cultural communication in business plays a vital role in building international customers, employee relations and business partnerships. Cross cultural communication in business requires effort, technique and the addressing of different hurdles that commonly prevent communication from being effective.Cross-cultural communication refers to communication between people with different cultural backgrounds, namely what was going on between people of different cultural backgrounds interact. With the development of social economy, people who have different cultural backgrounds between the cooperation more and more frequent. Modern society with its advanced technology has brought businessmen considerably closer and more opportunities for doing business with each other. People in Eastern countries watch the movies produced by the West; while the Western consumers wear clothes made in the Eastern countries. The enhanced globalization of economy necessitates an increase in transactions across borders. As a consequence, opportunities for international business negotiation are on the dramatic increase. International negotiation involves people from different countries who discuss common and conflicting interests for arriving at an agreement of mutual benefit.Negotiators from different countries conduct business in different ways, which are influenced by their given cultures. Culture forges people's values, beliefs, and guides people' behaviors. Thus, international negotiators tend to act according to their own values shaped by culture. Discussions are frequently hindered because of different communication styles. Negotiators which are from different cultures prefer different approaches to negotiate. So, to enhance intercultural understanding, toovercome the cultural conflicts, strengthen cultural communication and cooperation has become very important.三Conflicts in the cross-cultural communication1 the understanding of time is different"Time is money" is the understanding of time in the west, also is the main feature of western culture. They put the time as linear, prefer to pinch pennies on the time, enjoy busying, and do a lot of things in a short period of time. They live in a quickly and planned life that has an arrangement, without wasting of time. Relatively speaking, the Chinese’s concept of time is not as strictly as theirs. We regard time as a multivariate, consider that we can contact with many people and do a great deal of things at the same time. We emphasize on the people rather than the arrangement of the schedule.2 To emphasize differently on faceEither in China or in western, face was a very important concept. In China, face is the identity of self-esteem, is a person’s honor and the basis of social status. Everyone always care about others opinion of himself and do something to maintain their face. In Chinese business culture, face means the merchant's reputation and social status, and the main tools to measure someone’s social value, including pe rsonal wealth, IQ, appearance, status, and the relationships with others. It also plays a veryimportant role in business, and even can influence people's rational decision. As a result, be sure not to make a fool of oneself in the business negotiation. In the west, people also attach great importance to face, but it is not subtle and complicated like in China. Westerners attach great importance to others opinion of their own personal ability. But others' impression and evaluation, after all, just impression and evaluation, his right is the key.3 RelationshipThe connotation of the "relationship" is "Contacts", "human relationship", which is regarded as a kind of social channel and the resources that people cooperates as well as take advantage from each other in china. Business pays more attention to people not in institutions and system.4 Differences in negotiationFor westerners, the ultimate goal of business negotiations is to pursue the maximization of interests. They like to cut to the chase in the negotiation, put forward their own standpoint straightforward, and launching its own scheme for the initiative. They generally follow the rules of the business, abide by the contract and hope to resolve the dispute through law. But the Chinese tend to avoid collision. While meeting differences in the business, we prefer to use euphemism to present our point of view. The contract is not the most important, but the key is tomutual trust and establish long-term cooperation.5 LanguageLanguage is a tool for human communication, so people cannot leave the language of communication in business. The language differences also brought some obstacles to the business communication. Sentences and word standard features determines the differences of syntactic structure between Chinese and English.In addition, there are differences between Chinese and western in the way of thinking.四Causes of the cultural conflictIn particular, Dutch researcher Geert Hofstede identified five dimensions of culture that help explain how and why people from various behave as they do. Hofstede examined data on values that had been gathered from over 100,000 IBM employees from around the world. To date, over 53cultures and countries have been included in his study. Statistical analysis of this data suggests that the dimensions including Power Distance, Individualism, Masculinity, Uncertainty Avoidance and Long-Term Orientation.1 Power DistanceIn his works, Hofstede talks about inequality in society, thedistance between power and the members of a particular culture. He summarizes the concept of power distance in the following manner: "power distance defines the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally." Countries in which people blindly obey the orders of their superiors have high power distance while organizations in low-power-distance counties generally will be decentralized and have flatter organization structures.2 Masculinity and femininityMasculinity is defined by Hofstede as follows: a situation in which the dominant values in society are success, money, and things. Countries with a high masculinity index, such as the Germanic counties, place great importance on earnings, recognition, advancement, and challenge while countries with a low masculinity index tend to place great importance on cooperation, a friendly atmosphere, and employment security.3 Uncertainty AvoidanceAs the term is used by Hofstede, uncertainty avoidance "defines the extent to which the members of a culture feel threatened by uncertainty or unknown situations". High uncertainty avoidance cultures try to avoid uncertainty and ambiguity by providing stability for their members, establishing more formal rules, not tolerating deviant ideas andbehaviors, seeking consensus, and believing in absolute truths and the attainment of expertise.4 . Individualism and collectivismHofstede is often given credit for investigating the concepts of individualism and collectivism and he defines this global dimension as follows: Individualism pertains to societies in which the ties between individuals are loose: everyone is expected to look after himself or herself and his or her immediate family.5 Long-term Orientation and story-term OrientationLong-term orientation, also known as Confucian work dynamism, includes values that can be called "future-looking", such as perseverance, thrift, observing a hierarchy of status in relationships, and having a sense of shame.Every culture value system, can help people distinguish between beauty and ugliness good and evil. In Chinese culture, people respected modest and polite, pursue the happy-go-lucky, don't like competitive, line above all, a person will not, the collective orientation dominate. While western culture advocate individualism, let it is a sign of lack of enterprising spirit, is lazy incompetent synonym, advocate independent thinking independent judgment, think personal interests supreme.五How cultural differences have impact on business negotiation?From the previous discussions about cultural communication that play an important role in international business negotiations, we can see that culture does influence negotiation in a number of ways.First, Culture affects negotiation even before negotiators meet with face to face. It conditions how they view the negotiation, a human activity based on communication. For instance, Americans see negotiation as a competitive process while a collaborative exercise for Japanese. Americans negotiate a contract but Japanese negotiate a personal relationship. By understanding your counterpart's viewpoints of negotiations, negotiators can make appropriate strategies to arrive at an early agreement.The size of negotiation team and the criteria for selecting negotiators considerably depend on the parties' cultural background. Due to the collective culture and preference for teamwork, Japanese and Chinese teams are usually large, including experts in relevant fields. While in other cultures, like Americans, small negotiating teams are typically preferred. Negotiating teams are usually assembled at the number of two or more. On the other hand, culture also affects the selection of negotiators. Some cultures emphasize age and status when choosing team negotiators while other cultures depend more on knowledge andcompetence. For instance, American culture is low power distant and value egalitarianism. While for the status-conscious culture, such as Japanese and Chinese, they prefer to choose their negotiators on the basis of status and age. If you send lower-level executives to negotiate with them, the negotiating process will be slower because it is difficult for them to believe that a young negotiator has the authority to make decisions.Pace of negotiation process is also affected by some cultural factors when two different cultures meet at the table. Attitude toward time or views on power distance, to a great extent, determines how fast or slowly negotiation proceeds. For example, Japanese and Chinese regard time as unlimited and rarely undertake the deadline. While time is a commodity that cannot be wasted in Americans' eyes. Thus, fast process of negotiation is preferred in one culture while may be much disliked in another. Clash caused by cultural differences often occurs, which is exemplified in the following cases.The task-related exchange of information in negotiation implies a two-way communication process. If one side cannot catch what information the other side delivers, problems will frequently be left at the table. Observations have shown that there are quite a lot of differences in information sharing style between the negotiators from diverse area.六Communication strategy in the effective negotiationsIn the previous parts, we have observed those problems that may appear when people from different cultures come to meet at the negotiating table. Now, we should make a discussion of some communication strategies that may avoid those problems or bridge the gap between understandings of negotiators with different cultural backgrounds, and reach an effective negotiation. In summary, there are five major recommendations: increase awareness of native culture, Knowledge foreign cultures, understanding cultural differences, improving communication and being patient. These would start you on the path to success in international business negotiations.七ConclusionFinally I want to say is that we both in what circumstances, and always will be face to the cross-cultural communication problems, even in a country's different regions, cultures there may be quite different. Understand cross-cultural communication skills make individuals and organizations in the fierce competition in the complex benefit.。