Challenges In Managing Cross-Cultural Teams And Expatriate Managers In Global Organizations

Managing Cross-Cultural Teams

Discuss About The Cultural Management Foundations And Future.

Cultural diversity is a common phenomenon at the organizational level. There are hardly any restrictions in any country for foreigner workers. The globalization effect, personal needs, passions to work in abroad locations and much other have all compelled people to move to global locations. There has been a good drift of people moving to find the employability solution. They are getting the jobs as well. However, such things have created worries for the global management (Thomas and Peterson 2017). Managers, in particular, are tested for their patience and leadership behaviour. The highly competitive scenario at the global level provides a very less time to make a decision. Managers are often surrounded by numerous other challenges and they normally expect a cooperative workforce. However, this is indeed challenging and hardly realistic. Managers in such circumstances are not even sure of whether any decision of theirs will be acknowledged or else. They are bound to get the conflicting beliefs of the diverse workforce (Bird and Mendenhall 2016).

Considering the fact stated above, it is understandable that organizations with better control on their diverse cultures have the good chances of performing well. A plan never works until and unless it is implemented in the system. The implementation will happen once each of the employees has agreed to the fact. The agreement to a plan brings back the learning process which is basically required for implementing the single of the thought process. The learning process means the flow of knowledge from one level to another (Binder 2016). For example, the implementation of CRM (Customer Relationship Management) will require the support of trained workforce and also the technical experts from the service providers. The trained workforce is attained with the help of giving training to the selected members. Technical experts do take care of the implementation process whereas the trained workforce is responsible for taking care of the post-implementation operation to avoid any unnecessary expenses. These all processes just state that implementation of any thought process is a systemized process which requires the utter supports from the required members (Adekola and Sergi 2016).

Therefore, the study is aimed at understanding the challenges of managing the cross-cultural teams in the global organizations. The study also inspects the challenges to the global managers.

Cross cultural teams create the problems for managers and the recruiters. People belonging to one nation have a different set of cultural practices which differ from that of the people from other cultures. The role of the recruiter is not just confined to asking a few sets of questions to the aspirants. It is rather extended to a wider dimension. Recruiters are also required to judge the body language which expresses the hidden things within the aspirants. However, such skills of recruiters may be extremely tested while recruiting a cross-cultural team. For example, those who are not a proficient speaker of English language they may be delivering a few of their cultural terms. This may be problematic for the recruiters as they might not be versed with such phrases or they do not have the sufficient resources to understand it from elsewhere. If such situation happens the recruiters will then have no clues on how to overcome the circumstances (Moran, Abramson and Moran 2014).

Recruiting Cross-Cultural Teams

Soft skills and behaviour is another issue that generally arises while dealing with the cross cultural teams. Aspirants in most Asian countries are not very open for revealing their achievements while the Americans will generally speak of their achievements. They have their tendency to prove their potentials. Americans can also overstate their achievement just to grab the opportunity while most Asian people would stick around their potentials only. Americans can be found as showing their utmost interest for the job they are applying for. They may be dishonest to their participation and might give an attempt to prove them as the fittest person for the position (French 2015). In all such circumstances, recruiters will be tested for their capability to read the body language, understanding the unrevealed facts and more.

Managing the cross cultural team is even more challenging than recruiting them. Recruitment is a onetime process whereas managers have to deal with such team on a routine basis. The diverse cultures that exist in the workplace have different values and norms (Dragoni et al. 2014). People have the tendency built up in them for not to go against their values and norms. They work in foreign companies to serve their distinguished purposes and hence, few of them are just confined to fulfilling their purposes. The rest others also have the tendency to hang around their norms and values. For example, the Asian people are more or less famous for their hard-works whereas the Australians believe in working intelligently. They are not the hard-workers. They are rather the smart workers (Neal 2016). These are just a few differences in values and norms in between the two cultures; however, there are the lists of other differences as well. Considering the fact as stated about the values and norms in the Asian and the Australian employees, it is understandable that managers need to work separately on how to utilize their diverse workforce. They are not just supposed to work on making the strategic plans for performance improvement. They also need to deal with the diverse cultures and get the best work done from them. The management expertise is tested the most when the diverse people work as a team for a project. The managers might face the challenge on how to effectively lead the project. Such projects normally have the coordination issue between the people and people with the managers (Lisak and Erez 2015).  

Challenges in Managing Cross-Cultural Teams

The essay progresses with identifying the issues which the expatriate managers can face at the global organizations. It also covers the skill sets and the persona abilities which is mandatory for the international managers. It further focuses on recruiting the international managers for which it covers the multivariate analysis. Moreover, the essay also finds the acculturation issues in repatriation and expatriation of the international managers. 

Geert Hofstede had presented a framework to understand the cross-cultural behavior. The framework is known as Hofstede’s cultural dimensions which have extensively explained the cultural differences across the borders. The dimensions of Hofstede are of six types such as power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity vs. femininity, individualism vs. Collectivism, indulgence vs. Restraint and long-term vs. Short-term orientation. Hofstede with the help of these dimensions has given a measurable approach to judging the cultural differences in different countries. The model speaks of many a thing like a manager & people relationship, and the goal setting priorities of people whether they are long-term oriented or else (Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017).

The Lewis Model is now a widely recognized model. Lewis with his experience of visiting 135 countries and working in 20 of them has been able to identify the basis of differences in humans. According to Lewis, people can be divided based on their behavior, not the religion or their nationality. Lewis had divided the behaviors into three segments like Linear-Active, Multi-Active and Reactive. The Linear-Active group is accordingly the English speaking world. The Multi-Active group is widely diverse. It includes Southern Europe, South America, Mediterranean countries, sub—Saharan Africa, India, the Middle East, Pakistan and most part of the Slavs. The Reactive group includes the all major countries in Asia except the Indian sub-continent (Eller 2016).

Both of the models are close to each other in identifying the cultural variance based on the different countries. The Hofstede cultural dimension helps to compare the two countries based on the different behaviours. The Lewis Model also considers the behavioural differences; however, it considers the behaviours as being influenced form a proficiency in English Language.

The expatriate managers are likely to face the challenge to handle the cross-cultural people if the global operations are in a two culturally different countries such as the one identified from the Hofstede’s Cultural Dimension and the Lewis Model. Following are the list of challenges that expatriate managers can face:

Attitude of people: People representing the diverse culture may also have the distinguished attitude. Like the Asian people in most cases are the hard-workers. They also have the desire to grab their dream job at any cost. Americans, on the other hand, are also the hard-worker but, they also portray a false behaviour sometimes to convince or to make things happen in their favour. Australians believe in setting short-term goals while the people living in the Middle East regions have the desire for long-term goals (Thomas and Peterson 2017). It is therefore imperative that the expatriate managers are well versed with such differences. It is also necessary that they have the correct set of skills to exist with such circumstances.

Expatriate Managers in Global Organizations

Religious beliefs: Managers may also be tested for their patience on religious beliefs. People with different religious beliefs have the custom to follow the ritual practices. Asian people, in particular, the South-East Asian countries have a long list of ritual beliefs. They have the tendency to carry such thing at the workplace also. Hence, it is important for managers that they understand such practices and maintain their work schedules accordingly (De Mooij 2015).

enerational differences: This is perhaps the biggest challenge that the expatriate managers face. The global workplace is shared by different generations such as the Generation X, Generation Y, Veterans and the Boomers (Bird and Mendenhall 2016). All generations have diverse behaviours for work. Generation Y, in particular, are highly respected because of their concentration level at work. They are highly dedicated and least bothered about mobile phone uses & other meaningless activities. Generation X is energetic and equipped with technical skills; however, they are not as serious as the Baby Boomers. Moreover, there is a list of factors which hampers their concentration level at work. However, Millennials are the workforce of future with Boomers nearing the age of retirement. Hence, this is important for the expatriate managers that they know how to utilize such a diverse workforce in the global organizations (Bird and Mendenhall 2016). 

The international managers need to have the set of skills as listed below to effectively utilize the workforce (Whittaker and Chee 2015):

Communication skills: Managers need to have the communication skills which mean that there should be the respects for varied cultures. Employees need to believe that they have the expected regards for their beliefs and behaviors. Managers need to appreciate the cultural differences by collaborating with each of the organizational members. 

Networking abilities: Managers need to have a good networking capability. They must consider forming a global network. This will really assist them on several occasions. This will also help them to understand the ways to tackle the cultural differences.

Collaboration: It is necessary that managers do not only have the networks but, they also have a good collaboration within the network. Collaboration opens up opportunities to know the different cultures and the perspectives. The most successful managers are those who are capable of forming good collaboration. 

Adaptive thinking: The global managers must have the adaptive thinking. It helps to collaborate with others representing the diverse cultures. Nevertheless, collaboration is utterly required to form an effective global networking of people.  

Challenges Facing Expatriate Managers

The recruitment for international managers must be done strategically, so that, best skills are found. Considering the challenges which the international managers have at the global level, there must be a strategic way to identify the best possible talent for the position. A Multivariate Analysis (MVA) can effectively help to find skilled international managers. Multivariate analysis is a statistical based analysis of multiple variables which are necessary to identify the best feasible international managers. Multivariate analysis can be used in numerous ways to recruit the international managers (Moran, Abramson and Moran 2014). It can be used for a capability-based design. It means that the recruitment process must have variables to judge the managers on the basis of capabilities. There can be many variables to judge the capabilities that also include manager’s capability to tackle the cross-cultural challenges. MVA can also help in an inverse design which means every variable will be represented as independent variables. It also can be used for Analysis of Alternatives (AoA) meaning the ability to select a variety of skills to fulfill the customer needs or tackle the cultural challenges. MVA also can be utilized for inspecting the applicants on their capabilities to understand the different concepts of change circumstances. It is also useful in identifying the critical drivers of design and coordination across the hierarchical levels (Moran, Abramson and Moran 2014).       

Acculturation issues can be defined as the state of difficulties that people face while expatriation and repatriation. For example, Japanese people dressing the western clothing denote the acculturation issue. In a similar note, French people working in Asian countries like China or Japan expresses the state of acculturation. Acculturation issue in broader term signifies having difficulties to adjust to a new environment or a culture (Holden, Michailova and Tietze 2015). Expatriation means going to a country other than the home country. Repatriation is the state when expatriates return to its home country. Both of the states can have the lasting difference in someone’s work practices and other cultures (Holden, Michailova and Tietze 2015).

Acculturation issue can be the work environment, cross-cultural people, and the workplace cultures. There are evident differences in the workplace environment in China and Australia. People use to work harder and have the least opportunity for the work-life balance. People living in Australia work casually and have ample of opportunities for a work-life balance. In a similar note, managers are expected to find a very different workforce in America and Japan. The power distance between the managers and the employees is quite low. Hence, they love to be casual. Power distance between the managers and the employees is comparatively bigger. Hence, they tend to be quite formal. The workplace culture is also different at the different global places. People working in France are supposed to work for very fewer hours of time. On contrary to this, people working in Japan are supposed to work for long hours (Tjosvold 2017). Considering the stated facts, expatriate managers will be in trouble in acquainting with the foreign culture. They will need to work hard to get used to the workplace behavior in the global organizations. Repatriate managers, after being accustomed to the foreign culture, will find the workplace cultures in their home countries as challenging. They will need to have the adaptive capability, so that, things could become adjustable. They will also find decision making as difficult (Tjosvold 2017).  

Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions and Lewis Model

Conclusion

Therefore, the cross-cultural people are a serious challenge for the global managers. Global managers are expected to face the cultural differences in the global organizations. They need to have skills needed to effectively understand the ways to work with diverse culture. They should have the effective skills required for developing the collaborative networks. They must have the adaptive nature needed to collaborate with the global workforce. Most importantly, they must have a good knowledge of cultural differences which will be required while being in the global organisations. Such knowledge will help the international managers to manage the cross-cultural differences in the global workplace. This is important also for attaining the competency needed for an effective global business. Expatriate managers will face the number of acculturation issue while being in the global organizations. They will require working hard to be adaptive to the cross-cultural differences at the global workplace. Repatriate managers will also find things difficult as they are accustomed to foreign cultures and are adaptive to that workplace culture. They will again need to work hard to adapt the cross-cultures in their home countries.

References

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