Intellectual communication entails the verbal and non-verbal interactions amongst people hailing from diverse cultural backgrounds (Martin & Nakayama, 2013). This kind of interaction is intended at allowing interactions that are not only productive but also positive. When an individual is intercultural competent, they do not get admission into another culture, nor do they abandon their own. Instead, intercultural communication equips them with the skills to work in diverse environments. Intercultural competence thus helps in avoiding misunderstandings and also offences at work ( Neese, 2016). The differences addressed by intercultural communication include personal values and beliefs, practices, religious customs, mannerisms and attitudes. Critical incidents refer to the tools employed to increase human awareness and enhancement of the understanding of interactions, attitudes, behaviors and expectations. For my assignment, I selected critical incidents t2, 3 and 8 for my analysis.
Critical incident 2
Samantha liked her new job, but she felt that the environment was very cold. Samantha said that no one talks about their family or their personal lives, only about work. She feels it is challenging to work in such an environment, and she wishes her colleagues would share more with her. What kind of culture is Samantha in, and how is she responding?
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There is a likelihood that Samantha belongs to the higher individualistic environment. She craves team cohesion. The extent to which one feels independent and not interdependent as members of larger groups (Economides, 2008). Samantha’s concern is her colleagues’ disinterest in personal and families’ affairs and total concentration in work issues. It is clear that her expectations of joining a warm and caring team have not been met. This can be a result of cultural dimensions and their influence in a personal relationships and world intercultural communication (Kim & Gudykunst, 1988). The concept of individualism has been heavily explored by Hofstede (1982) and notes that it prioritizes individual needs. Samantha describes the environment as cold. This implies that her colleagues prefer to be bothered the least. Team and relation-building are the last concerns in Samantha’s organization. The organization’s present environment cannot easily support fundamental awareness to improve cross-cultural communication. Further, the environment cannot offer greater satisfaction because social relationships are ignored.
Samantha could be on her first job and hence is surprised by her new work environment. It is quite unsettling thriving in the individualism environment. According to uncertainty theory, people like to learn about others so that they can get their uncertainty levels to reduce (Bajracharya, 2020).This implies that Samantha could be suffering from the unpleasantness of the lack of knowledge about the actions and behaviors of her colleagues. The solution to this uncertainty is interpersonal communication. The understanding of how different environments function can assist employees such as Samantha in scaling down their expectations, consequently preventing disappointments. It is thus the work of the manager needs to launch intervention measures. For example, Samantha may benefit most by getting involved in collaborative activities with her colleagues. Therefore, her organization should rethink teamwork and experiential activities for members to develop teamwork.
Critical Incident 3
One of Tim’s employees is always late. Besides being late, he tends to go on and on when talking and wastes valuable time at work. Sometimes Tim has to cut him off. The employee seems to feel offended and thinks Tim is rude. Tim believes that they are on a strict schedule and things have to be done by a certain time; as well, things are scheduled to take a certain amount of time.
Chronemics is the cross-cultural concept explored in the above critical incident. The concept explores how time is utilized in non-verbal communication (Pîrjol, & Ionesc, 2019). Time usage affects daily living, lifestyles, agendas and even the speech of speed. Chronemics also covers time perceptions, such as interactions and punctuality. Two categories of chronemics cultures are monochromic and polychromic cultures. The differences in the two cross-cultural concept can be observed in Tim and his employee, aided by their differing approaches on time. Monochromic behavior is what Tim portrays since he wants to deal with one thing at a time. That is why he cuts his colleague off so that he can concentrate and work in an orderly manner. He does not want to be interrupted because he values his work and is committed. On the other hand, polychromic culture is exhibited in Tim’s colleague. He seems to favor a culture where many things are running at the same time, distraction are the order of the day, and plans are flexible.
A polychromic culture is based on people and the development of relationships. In polychromic culture, values like commitment and promptness are founded on a relationship and not objectives. Therefore, Tim and the employee exhibits contrasting communication behavior and approaches to work. Tim’s rigidity in time approach is a total contrast of the employee. His polychromic culture has no strictness in agenda and is time waster who talks much and roams a lot. To him, relationships are more valuable than the job.
Critical incident 8
Jay was surprised to come into his new workplace and find a framed picture of himself entitled “Employee of the month”. Jay felt extremely embarrassed and could hardly work that day, especially when clients came into the store and recognized him in the picture. Jay finally ended up going to his manager and asking him to take down the picture. What are the values at Jay’s workplace, and how are they conflicting with Jay’s own values?
Coming to the office and finding a framed picture with a title “employee of the month” made Jay embarrassed. This tells more of the personal values and beliefs instilled in jay from his upbringing. Further, it is an indicator that communication and appreciation are done differently. In Jay’s present workplace, competitiveness is valued and is characterized by task accomplishments and valuing work so that career success can be achieved (Martin & Nakayama, 2013). It is also clear that this employee has fulfilled those requirements and is now crowned the best employee for the month. Notably, different organizations practice varied organizational cultures (Hofstede, 2010).
Displaying such achievement must be an organizational culture, and hence the reason why without consultation, the manager surprised jay, with a framed photo of himself. Crowning employees is a practice of celebrating the proud moment when an employee performs exemplarily. However, the management failed to consider how this employee will react to the news when the framed photo catches the attention of workmates and clients. Since competitive is regarded as masculine, Jay’s work environment may be a masculine versus feminine. The manager thus lacked the understanding to share the ideas with Jay to find out how he feels about the open recognition. Understanding is defined as being sympathetic to other woes through communication. The manager would have understood Jay’s perception and interpretation, thus making a better decision. Individualism is what characterizes jay, where his upbringing emphasized on individual and not collective rights. It was thus against his values to be blinded by a photo of him in the office and was the source of conflict. Jay could also have been used to workplaces where performance is evaluated individually as opposed to collective evaluation and open display of performance. Thus. The solution to the incident is rooted in communication between the manager and the employee.
In sum, intercultural communication is paramount in modern society. One characteristic of globalized organizations is diversity, where people from different backgrounds are united by work. Dealing with such individuals requires an understanding of their cultural sensitivities so that coexistence is natured and deliberate offences are eliminated. Humans have a responsibility of understanding each other. The three critical incidents above exemplifies the importance of managers to have intercultural communication skills for effectively sharing information and living with people from social groups different from their own.
References
Bajracharya, S. (2020). Uncertainty Reduction Theory - Definition and examples | Businesstopia. Businesstopia. Retrieved 10 June 2020, from https://www.businesstopia.net/communication/uncertainty-reduction-theory-definition#:~:text=The%20theory%20says%20that%20people,reduce%20uncertainty%20through%20interpersonal%20communication.
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