Cross Cultural Management and Teamwork

Cross-Cultural Management and Teamwork
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Cross-Cultural Management and Teamwork
Concrete Experience
My experience revolves around seminars we attended with other members of my assigned group, which consisted of seven individuals from drawn from different countries in Asia. Four of us were from China, two from Japan, and one from India. During the experience, we engaged several groups, most of them being Chinese. Further, we learned about several paramount concepts, including Virtual Global Teamwork, Cross-cultural communication, global management skills, and global teamwork. Regarding Virtual Global Teamwork, we learned about the challenges such teams encounter, which included time zone differences, language barriers, and lack of contextual knowledge (Seminar 1: Session B, n.d.). We also looked at the implications of the challenges, which include impaired performance on complex tasks and committing unnecessary errors. As such, we looked at some suggestions to overcome the challenges that global teams experience. One such suggestion was that non-native speakers need to speak more since it is only through practice that they can get fluent. In addition, some participants suggested that managers should allow employees to carry out some tasks using their native languages. On the issue of cross-cultural communication, we analyzed ways through which one can cultivate robust communication in teams that include members from different cultures. To begin, we learned that one must understand what their partners think and feel. Moreover, it is crucial for one to avoid being misunderstood by refraining from using idioms or figurative speech and adjusting presentations (Seminar 3: Session A, n.d.). Further, we learned about effective communication styles, including being elaborate and succinct. On global management skills and teamwork, we gathered crucial insights, which included the new global realities and challenges facing global managers. In the same vein, we explored globalization's negative and positive consequences, including cultural divergence and convergence (Seminar 1: Session A, n.d.). In my experience, I also learned about the challenges and opportunities occasioned by global teams. The challenges include perceptual problems, inaccurate communication, and reduction of trust, among others (Seminar 3: Session B, n.d.). Other challenges include psychological distance, which refers to the lack of connection between members (Curnock, 2023). Opportunities presented by global teams include learning new cultures and broadening one’s cognitive horizons through interaction with diverse people.
In a word, the experience generated positive feelings in me since the insights I acquired will be paramount in the future when I finally join the global market. In this regard, I realized, much to my amazement, that I still need to learn much concerning cross-cultural management and global teamwork. To be precise, I felt that the seminars were a step in the right direction for several reasons. For instance, I now clearly understand how to employ effective communication skills to cultivate sound interpersonal relationships. As put by Sivunen and ...