This report presents the cultural dimensions of management. It also illustrates the factors affecting the cross-culture interaction at the workplace. This report critically evaluates the ways for successful decision making in cross-cultural interactions. It also discusses effective participation within a multi-cultural team. Cross-cultural management is an important concept for the companies operating at international level because workforce diversity is the only attribute through which organization could be able to originate numerous options for the accomplish of tasks. As per general terms, disputes and conflicts arise amongst the people when they work together. The major reason behind this is the difference in their culture, upbringing, and various other factors like surroundings, thinking style, etc. When people with different backgrounds work together, it generates various new options for the organization in order to grow and on the other hand, it also leads to generate issues which diminishes organizational performance.
Thus, it is necessary for the organization to manage their employees from different background in order to gain positive outcomes along with eliminating the challenges and issues which might occur due to difference in cultural background, ethics, behaviour, etc. Providing training and development sessions in relation to the coordination and teamwork as these are the primary objectives for organization in terms of generating positive outcomes. Along with this, organization could also adopt measures with regards to the cross cultural management and some of those measures will be discussed in this report. Fonterra Co-operative Group Limited is one of the largest dairy product companies across the globe and it is merger of two dairy companies i.e. New Zealand Dairy Group and Kiwi Cooperative Dairies along with New Zealand Dairy Brand. Number of employees works with the organization from different cultural backgrounds and in relation to this, evaluation of cross cultural management aspects will be discussed in this report.
Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory is a structure for cross-culture interaction, which is developed by Geert Hofstede. It explains the impact of the culture of society on the values of its members along with, how these standards are associated with attitude by using a framework originated from the assessment of factor (Prasad, 2015).
Following charts depicts the cross-culture dimension in New Zealand:
(Sources: Purnell, 2018).
This dimension deals with the evidence that all people in communities are not equivalent. It demonstrates the attitude of culture with respect to inequalities amongst us. Power distance is illustrated as the extent at which the less powerful member of organization within a nation expects and accepts that power is allocated unequally. It is based on the fact that inequality of society is encouraged by the followers as much as by the leaders (Kinloch and Metge, 2014).
From the chart, it is stated that New Zealand has scored very low in this dimension i.e. 22. Within Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd, the hierarchy is developed for convenience and top authority are always available together with managers depend on individual workforces and teams for their proficiency. In this organization, both workforces and managers predict to be consulted and the information is allocated regularly. Moreover, communication can be direct, participative and informal at the workplace (Purnell, 2018).
The key concern identified by this dimension is the extent of interdependence that a society keeps between its members. This dimension is also demonstrated whether self-image of people can be illustrated in terms of ‘I’ or ‘we’. Under individualist societies, an individual is believed to look after only themselves and their family. In collectivist societies, an individual belongs to ‘in-group’ that care of them in terms of loyalty (Kälin, 2017).
In this dimension, New Zealand has scored 79 that indicate individualist culture in this nation. This translates into a loosely-knit society where the expectation is that people take care of themselves and instant families. In Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd, workforces are projected to be independent with demonstrating the initiatives. Moreover, within the exchange based global work, promotions and recruiting decision is relied on the benefits and evidence of what one has done or can perform in Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd (Teunissen, Gravenhorst, Dowrick, van Weel-Baumgarten, Van den Driessen Mareeuw, de Brún, and O’Reilly-de Brún, 2017).
Masculinity
In the Masculine dimension, the high score shows that the societies would be led by achievement, competition, and success with success being defined by the best in field and winner. This value system initiates in school and continues throughout the life of an individual both in leisure pursuits and work.
A low score shows the feminine dimension and indicates that the dominant value in society is caring for others and quality of life (Arvizu, and Saravia-Shore, 2017). A feminine society is one in which quality of life is the indication of success and standing out from the crowd is not estimable. The key concern here is what encourages people, wanting to be best (Masculine) and liking what you do (feminine).
The above chart depicts that New Zealand has scored 58 in this dimension which means there is Masculine society. In addition, deeds in work, institution, and play are based on the distributed values that people should strive to finest they can be and that the success takes all (Adler and Graham, 2017). New Zealanders feel proud in terms of getting success and attainment in their career. It provides a basis to Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd for making recruitment and promotional judgment within an organization. In addition, conflicts could be resolved at the personal level and the goal is to succeed.
The dimension of uncertainty avoidance has to perform in the way that a society deals with the evidence that the upcoming time can never be identified (Zhao and Tam, 2015). In this way, the company needs to control the future by making an effective strategy. This vagueness brings concern hence diverse culture have learned to deal with this anxiety in certain ways. The degree to which the member of culture feels threatened by unknown situations or vague and has generated institutions and beliefs that try to eliminate these is denoted in the score of Uncertainty avoidance (Kramsch, 2014).
In this dimension, New Zealand has scored 49 that do not indicate the preference.
This dimension can be illustrated as for how every society has to keep some associations with its own precedent when dealing with the challenges of the present and future phenomenon. Furthermore, those country get high score indicates that societies give priorities to long-term orientation. Furthermore, the low score shows the normative dimension such as preference to keep time-honored tradition and customs while viewing the societal alteration with thought (Young and Schartner, 2014). High score nations use a pragmatic approach and lead efforts and thrift in a modern institution as a manner to practice for the future.
In this dimension, New Zealand has scored low that shows normative country. People in such nations have a strong concern with developing the absolute truth. These people are normative in their opinion. They also demonstrate high admiration for customs, a moderately small propensity to save for the future, and focuses on attaining the prompt outcome (Tombleson and Wolf, 2017).
The key challenge that is faced by an individual is an indulgence and it shows the extent to which small family is socialized. Without the socialization, an individual cannot become human. This dimension illustrates the extent to which an individual is making efforts to control their impulses and desired. It is based on the way through which people grow. Moreover, relatively weak control is known as an indulgence and relatively strong control is known as restraint. Thus, culture could be restrained or indulgent (Piri, Rasekh and Pishghadam, 2017).
In this dimension, New Zealand has obtained 75 scores which illustrated that its culture is one of indulgence. People in this society are categorized by a high score in Indulgence. It depicts the willingness to realize their desire and impulses with respect to enjoying life and having fun. This nation possesses a favorable attitude and has a tendency with respect to optimism. Moreover, they possess a favorable attitude and have a tendency with regards to optimism. Moreover, they place a higher extent of the significance of leisure time and act as they spend money as they desire (Kreuz and Roberts, 2017).
Factors affecting the cross-culture interaction at the workplace
Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd can focus on the difference in culture in the workplace. This business involves basic gestures, customs, and mannerisms. For illustration, when a salesperson approaches a meeting for understanding the cultural background of customers then body language, actions, and their words can be adapted by the salesperson. This may increase the opportunity of sales’ person to effectively deal with the customers (Gehrke and Claes, 2014).
In New Zealand, it is general for an individual to speak loudly and be more aggressive and assertive when giving direction and sharing ideas. In nations such as Japan, individuals speak sensitively and are more reflexive regarding sharing of ideas and making recommendations. When communicating with people from diverse culture, there is a need to speak in a neutral tone and needs to make conscious efforts towards the consideration of other’s input. This can assist the Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd for improving the business communication (Greenfield and Cocking, 2014).
People from different cultures and nations are involved in conducting the business with each other because of globalization. Technology makes competent to an individual for connecting without difficulty with others around the global level, however; there is an only certain rule to remember before making liaison with others.
When making a global phone and video conferencing call, then the company needs to be conscious with the difference of time zone and ensures to set a reasonable time for all involved parties to cooperate (Petersen, 2017). It is significant to remember that cultural difference can influence the availability. For example, if Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd schedules a conference call for the middle of the business day then, it does not mean that the time would be positive for an individual with whom the company is conducting the business. There are certain Spanish cultures that have a longer lunch break as compared to New Zealanders. It indicated that there may be two to three hours’ time period during the day in which an individual is unavailable to whom company like to meet (Thomas and Peterson, 2017) Hence, Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should ask prior to making the call as it is the best method for avoiding the confusion. Furthermore, the manager should speak clearly and slowly in order to connect with the diverse culture of people.
Mana is a principle and aspect in which many shades of meaning involve such as control, authority, prestige, influences and power. There are certain kinds of Mana where none of which are independent from each other (Kälin, 2017). In opposed to this, the key expressions of Mana are Mana t?puna, Mana whenua, Mana Atua, and Mana Tangata. Mana enhancing and maintaining strategies leads practitioners for demonstrating the therapeutic liaison and the factor that builds liasions (Teunissen, et. al., 2017).
Organizations that involve employees of different culture could perform admirably as compared to other companies where the workforce has a similar culture. Creative and advanced techniques could be enhancing by diversity as, it involves several skills, experience, and views (Tjosvold, 2017). Apart from these, a diverse team could negatively affect the comfort zone of staff because they face trouble against workfellows with various views, approaches, and outlooks. Hence, Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd could obtain the advantage of diversity and eliminate any difficulties with good management. In order to this, Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd could also conduct some meetings to expose their workforce to various cultures (Ang and Van Dyne, 2015). It could facilitate a good environment at the workplace by representing employees who would be doing their job together with a decent relationship for a long time. Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should also prepare their workforce to deal with problems that are created by their selves and develop adequate behavior through learning about rules, regulation, and language of another culture. Working relationship could be encouraged by altering biases from the organization. The organization could conduct events to illustrate the dependency of language (Carbaugh, 2016).
Listening skills is imperative as, it supports to resolve the problems regarding cultural communications hence Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should concentrate on this skill with an open mind. It should concentrate on words that are practiced in a discussion and other methods of conversation could assist to determine these difficulties. It is also analyzed that concentration on the quality of the conversation and background of the communication is also imperative in Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd (Lee, Mader, and Morley, 2015).
Active manager supports to construct a creative team environment by motivating workforce to eliminate their differences and paying attention to accomplishing the aim and objectives of Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd. The manager can bring a diverse group in social condition and allows the workforces for addressing that differences are not affecting. Furthermore, the supervisor helps their team to cohesively back on the career. Moreover, workforces who accept their diversity and adapt their attitude to adapt the style of another culture that tends to get better outcomes. By implementing the aspect of another culture into their own, workforces enrich their cultural identity and competency to succeed in any circumstances (Stahl and Tung, 2015).
Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should deal with the intercultural communication that entails everyone in the procedure. Workforces can maintain the lucrative working atmosphere by emphasizing on recognizable conduct. By selecting the word cautiously, not developing assumption regarding intention and building adjustments helps to make feel recognize the employees at the workplace. This can aid the team member to negotiate with other people from different backgrounds. Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should motivate the workforces to address their communication skills, involving the online surveys like the one offered by the websites (Bird and Mendenhall, 2016). Managers should permit the workforces to identify their weakness and strength. The manager should stimulate the game and conduct workshop that aids to attain the employees at the workplace. Employees can get favorable experience by different rules and learns to settle the differences and work together successfully at the workplace.
The manager can also meditate their employees for avoiding the cultural misunderstanding and avoiding the conflict at the workplace (Prasad, 2015). They can also facilitate the opportunity to workforces for responding towards the situation from a viewpoint different as compared to their own. The manager can also classify the set of people into pairs in order to conduct role-playing exercises. It permits the team members for acknowledging the existed cultural difference. The manager can also motivate each employee to think regarding the conflict they have experienced currently because of cultural diversity (Kinloch and Metge, 2014).
Effective participation within the multi-cultural team helps to handle the issues. For example, in Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd, people belong to a different culture as it will aid team member for solving the problem in an effective manner. Because, different culture thinks differently on the same perspective as it would aid in generating creativity (Purnell, 2018).
Furthermore, multicultural team experiences similar awkwardness with the unfamiliarity of other ethnic groups and they might take little longer to get to know and comprehend each other. However, the end outcome is well appealing the extra time. Furthermore, differing views provides the richness and creativity for making a decision and solving the issues (Kälin, 2017).
Multicultural team members perceive the issues from different perspectives because of different cultural background. It facilitates the team with a wider range of toolkit for solving the problem. In addition, diverse team members provide the deeper knowledge of their culture that may enhance the ability of the company to market to diverse ethnic audiences. It might bring useful language skills among team member (Teunissen, et. al., 2017).
Management should develop the clear expectation regarding ensuring the effectiveness of the team because of diverse perceptions and values of the culture. For illustration, managers should clear the deadlines and deliverables in order to address the diverse aspect of time. Along with this, managers should allow extra time for team members in order to learn regarding each other and build a bond (Adler, and Graham, 2017). Hence, acknowledging the diversity is the key method to deal with team members, hence managers should not sidestep diversity. Insist on highlighting the value, the company should place on it. In addition, managers should effectively assess the performance of the team and intervene if required in the event of inappropriate behavior and tension (Arvizu, and Saravia-Shore, 2017).
Cultural diversity in communication can have an impact on the performance of the team. For illustration, people from New Zealand background tend to communicate directly and gives value frankly. In contrast to this, individual who trace their backgrounds to Latin America and Asia tend to be more unplanned and to hide their feelings. It could be complex for a team member of New Zealand to recognize the unhappy situation and identified the issues. Along with this, Latino may address it complex for dealing with brutal trustworthiness that New Zealander descent highly values. An individual who gives indirect communication may treat other with admiration and rarely will cause the pressure on the team (Zhao, and Tam, 2015).
New Zealanders have high valuable time and observe the punctuality as a sign of reliability and respect. In contrast to this, other cultures have a different concept of time. Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd focuses on the events and relationships and gives their maximum time on each activity. Deadlines are not a part of this aspect. New Zealanders view relationships as a key element and will not inadequate communication due to organizing the constant meeting. They observe this as impolite. Additionally, time projection may demonstrate a challenge to the multicultural team. Moreover, cultural awareness with communication aids to overcome the obstacles (Kramsch, 2014).
Multicultural team members may have a diverse method of performing the work. For illustration, some culture gives preference to a slow-paced style that emphasizes on a complete agreement between all the team members whereas another culture emphasizes on complete agreement amid all the team members whereas another culture emphasizes on promptly and efficiently solving the issues. Developing the clear standards on what employees should attain them in a different type of work attitude that is desired of them. It brings the team member to the same platform and aids to decline the conflicts (Young, and Schartner, 2014).
Intervention is beneficial for a team member to avoid the conflict and resolving the issues on their own. Furthermore, intervening in every conflict may lead to the overdependence on the management of the company. When conflicts are escalated then managers should address the issues as it aids the team member for understanding how to work together. The manager should train the human resource department in order to resolve the multicultural conflict as; it will aid to handle similar issues in the future (Tombleson, and Wolf, 2017).
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be concluded that the Hofstede model is used for the cultural dimension of management. It can be summarised that there are certain factors that may affect the cross-culture interaction within an organization such as customs, language barriers, and technology. It can be evaluated that there are different ways for decision making in cross-culture interactions such as listening skills, develop intercultural sensitivity, and focus on behaviour. It can be also concluded that there are certain ways for effective participation within a multi-cultural team such as identifying roles and responsibilities, communication, the perception of time, work processes and interventions.
It can be recommended that Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should make efforts for obtaining the sustainable benefits. It should emphasize on this skill with an open mind. The supervisor can bring the diverse group in social circumstance and permits the employees for identifying that differences are not affecting. It can be also suggested that Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd should encourage the workforces in order to identify their skills, communication and entailing the online surveys like providing offers through websites (Young, and Schartner, 2014).
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