Lesson 3 Communication and Globalization
Local and Global Communication in Multicultural Settings
Lesson Learning Outcomes:
At the end of the learning engagement, you should be able to:
1. explain the concept of culture and globalization,
2. discuss how cultural and global issues affect communication,
3. participate in activities to enhance communicative competence, and
4. appreciate the significance of understanding how culture and globalization affect
communication.
Boost Your Word Power!
Do It Yourself: The following exercise contains sets of words that are related to the term
“globalization”. Fill in the blanks using the words provided to complete the meaning of each
short paragraph.
access
inflows
availability
integration
1. Among the
connectedness
ownership
indicators
of the level of globalization is technological
; measured in terms of computer
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and
Other indicators are regional economic
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of population, workers, and goods across borders.
capabilities
economists
financial
2. Governments, interest groups and
should work together to find ways for that country to
system and build up its technological
upgrade
in any particular country
its
.
37
assets
3. In
order
local
profile
to
a
raise
country’s
global
economic
, it is necessary to encourage
businesses to invest globally and purchase foreign
.
Fast talk: What are the most important characteristics of the following?
1. A globally competitive student
2. A globally competitive education system
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Keep Calm and Read on!
Read the following article by Leaf Group, Ltd.. (Source: https://bizfluent.com/facts7601794-definition-global-communication.html)
A Definition of Global Communication
By David Weedmark, Leaf Group
© 2019 Leaf Group, Ltd. U.S.A.
(Printed with author’s and copyright owner’s permissions.)
Today, the internet and advances in communication technologies have opened new
opportunities for both large and small businesses that would have been unthinkable 50 years
ago. With a single web page and a cellphone, any business person can reach new customers,
partners and suppliers anywhere in the world. However, communicating with people on a
global scale is not the same as communicating with people locally. Not only are there more
technological hurdles to overcome, but you also need to address language barriers and
cultural nuances.
Global Communication Definition
At its root, global communication can be defined just as any communication can: a
message is sent from one person or group to another anywhere in the world, which can be
described as a five-step process:
(1) A person or an organization in one country sends a message.
(2) The message is encoded.
(3) The message travels through a channel or medium.
(4) The
receiver
in another country
decodesCyan
the message.
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(5)
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it comes to communicating globally, it is usually in the encoding and decoding
that problems occur. As with any communication, ensuring that the message is received as it
was intended, is the responsibility of the sender.
Examples of Global Communication
One of the most common forms of global communication is an email. A person in
one country types a message and clicks the send button. The message is then encoded into
packets which are sent across the internet to the recipient. In another country, the receiver
logs in and decodes the message by opening the email, and retrieves the message.
When someone from another country reads your company’s web page, this too is an
example of global communication. The message is written and encoded in HTML, uploaded
to a server, which is then accessed across the internet and decoded by a web browser – and
perhaps a translation plugin – before the recipient reads it.
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In both of these examples, noise can distort the message or make it undecipherable. In
electronic communication, noise can include anything from typos that change the context
of a sentence, to a failed internet connection, which could make it appear that you are not
communicating anything at all.
With global communication, encoding and decoding the message can be more
complicated than when you are communicating with someone in your own country due
to differences in language and culture. If either the sender or receiver isn’t proficient in the
language being used to send the message, translation issues can add noise, distorting the
message. Even small cultural differences can add noise. While most Americans, for example,
associate the word “cheers” with drinking, someone from the UK may informally use the
word as a way of saying thank you, or goodbye. In Quebec, Canada, a car is often called “un
char,” which most translation services decode as a “chariot” or a “tank.”
Global communication becomes more complicated when there are multiple recipients
from different cultures with different languages all receiving the same message, as well as
when there are more layers added to the channel. For example, if a world leader makes a
speech broadcast across the globe, people from one region may rejoice at the news, while
others may find it offensive. In this case, the channel itself can involve many different layers,
as translators, news, editors and commentators each interpret the message differently before
passing it on to the intended audiences.
Global Communication in Business
Because there are so many different ways communication can fail in a global context,
businesses must be diligent in reducing as many potential errors as possible, especially those
related to differences in language and culture.
Before attempting to do business with people in another country, organizations should
become familiar with cultural differences that can arise in different contexts. It may be
necessary to hire consultants who are experienced with that country.
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ventures,
like a major product
launch
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of Purdue University, recommends hiring a team of local specialists from that country,
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3 a corporate law firm
3 a protocol and etiquette specialist
3 a media consultant
3 a human resources and labor law expert
3 a management consulting firm
3 a corporate anthropologist
3 a market research firm
Each of these specialists is able to give insights into local laws and customs to help
ensure the new venture doesn’t result in unnecessary complications or liabilities that could
destroy a company’s reputation before they even get started. Small businesses may not have
the budget to bring on a team of specialists. However, they still need to be familiar with local
laws, culture and language.
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Language Barriers in Global Business Communication
Whenever you are communicating with someone in their language, it is your
responsibility to ensure that the words you use are correct. This includes advertising
and marketing. Over the past several decades there have been many large and successful
companies that have made mistakes when translating what they wanted to say to a different
language, often with offensive, or even hilarious, results. Here are a few examples of some
translation misfires:
t Germany: Clairol marketed a new curling iron named “Mist Stick.” In German, mist
means manure.
t China: Coca-Cola’s name was mistranslated when it began selling its product to the
Chinese, who were told to “bite the wax tadpole.”
t Ethiopia: When Gerber began selling its baby food here, they used the same label design
as in other countries, featuring a cute infant. In Ethiopia, however, where not everyone
was literate, the custom was that images on a label only depicted the jar’s contents.
t Mexico: When Parker Pen began marketing its pens to this Spanish country, its motto,
“It won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you” was translated to, “It won’t leak in your
pocket and make you pregnant.”
t Thailand: Ikea entered this market using the same Swedish names for its products that
it used all over the world. However, many of these names in Thai mean “sex,” or have
sexual implications, like “getting to third base.”
Cultural Barriers in Global Business Communication
A common way small businesses first become involved in global operations is by hiring
a firm or consultant from another country, like a company in the United States hiring a
software development team in India with more affordable rates than those who are available
locally.
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initial conversations,
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project requirements, timelines and deliverables. The Indian manager, on the other hand,
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may be more focused on building a solid relationship with a new client. After the American
manager carefully explains the project requirements and deliverable in terms she believes
are easy to understand, the Indian manager has many questions but does not ask them.
Instead, he says, “Yes,” and agrees to take on the project. Weeks later, when the Indian team
completes the first phase of the project, it does not meet the Americans’ expectations and the
relationship falls apart.
This was caused by a cultural nuance, in which the word “Yes” did not necessarily mean
that the Indian manager understood everything and was in agreement. It was simply a word
that he used to move the relationship forward. Had the American manager understood this,
she could have invested more time in fostering their new relationship before assuming that
they were in agreement, thus avoiding the problem.
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Complications Inherent with Global Communication
Increasing communication from a local to a global scale has many ramifications beyond
cultural pitfalls and language barriers. One example is the increase in emails and other
messages people receive every day, many of which are sent from different time zones, often
when the recipient is not even awake to read them in a timely manner. Many business people
now receive up to 200 emails each day, which is too many to read carefully and respond to in
a thoughtful manner. The result is that many emails are merely scanned before being deleted,
or filtered away by software, never to be even read.
Business people must be diligent in trying to ensure that the most important emails don’t
get lost in the volume. A legitimate query from a potential new client could get mistaken for
spam. An important question from a business partner could get lost in a series of replies in
an unrelated thread of messages. Additionally, when sending an email, business people have
no assurances that the message will be received and read by the recipient.
Another complication in global communication for businesses is overcoming the
disadvantage you have when competing with local companies. While face-to-face meetings
can be replaced with video conference calls, subtleties of body language can’t always be
captured on video. A frown from an executive during a presentation, for example, is a
crucial piece of visual information that you could easily miss on video, particularly when
that executive may be off-camera at that moment.
There are many other pieces of important information that get lost when you are
interacting with someone across the globe. When doing business locally, it’s usually quite easy
to discern between a company located in the business district, whose ads you have noticed
on billboards and local radio for a number of years, compared to a business located in an
apartment building on the outskirts of town. On the other hand, when you are approached
by a company located in a different country, you may not have much to go with beyond what
they state on their website. Finding out more about a foreign firm usually requires much
more time and research.
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t How strong
is their currency?
t Is the local economy stable?
t Are there trade agreements or tariffs that would affect your business?
t What recourse will you have if they don’t pay their bills?
t How will you find out if there are changes in any of these answers?
Benefits of Global Communication
Despite the risks, operating a business on a global level has many benefits that far
outweigh those risks. Not only does doing business on a global level open up new markets
for selling products and services, it can give you access to resources and talent that may not
be available locally. While every business is different, it’s worthwhile to note that Coca-Cola
didn’t stop selling their products worldwide because of a few translation problems.
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As the world has continued to become more tightly connected and communication
technologies have continued to evolve, the benefits as a whole can be illustrated by the
market penetration of these new technologies themselves. The more globally connected the
world has become, the faster people have adopted new global communication technologies.
The telephone, which was the greatest global communication technology of its time,
replacing the telegraph, took 71 years to reach a market penetration of 50 percent of homes.
Electricity took 52 years to reach the same penetration. Radios followed, taking 28 years.
Color televisions took 18 years. Personal computers took only 19 years. Cellphones took 14
years, while internet access took only 10 years to reach 50 percent of all homes in the U.S.
Because a growing number of companies are already competing on a global level, any
business that wants to compete with them must also open its channels to communicate
effectively with the entire world.
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