Chapitre 14 - Cultural Diversity in Business
Travailler et vendre dans un monde multiculturel - comprendre les différences culturelles en entreprise.
What Should You Know Before Doing Business Abroad?
A quick look at cultural and business etiquette when exporting internationally.
How Cultural Differences Affect Business
Business speaker Erin Meyer, author of The Culture Map, on why culture matters at work.
While you watch
1. According to the speaker, why can cultural differences cause problems in international teams?
2. Give one example of a cultural difference mentioned in the video.
Benefits of Cultural Diversity in the Workplace
An article from Hult International Business School.
13 Benefits and Challenges of Cultural Diversity in the Workplace
Embracing cultural diversity in the workplace is an important first step for businesses that want to be competitive on an international scale. From the Virgin Group to Disney and PricewaterhouseCoopers, organizations across industries are embracing the benefits of a diverse workforce. But with benefits necessarily come challenges of working across borders, cultures, and languages.
Benefit - Diverse cultural perspectives can inspire creativity and drive innovation
Diversity of thought has been shown to breed creativity and drive innovation, helping to solve problems and meet customer needs in new and exciting ways. A study from Forbes echoed this notion, concluding that "the best way to ensure the development of new ideas is through a diverse and inclusive workforce."
Benefit - Diverse teams are more productive and perform better
The range of experience, expertise, and working methods that a diverse workplace offers can boost problem-solving capacity and lead to greater productivity. As an article in the Harvard Business Review argues, the challenges of working in a diverse team are one of the reasons why diverse teams perform better: "working on diverse teams produces better outcomes precisely because it's harder."
Challenge - Professional communication can be misinterpreted across cultures
While quality translations are key for effective marketing, there can also be a real risk of communication getting lost in translation among multicultural colleagues. Even in an office where everyone speaks English, comprehending a range of accents, or understanding a native-speaker's use of idioms, can be difficult.
Challenge - Different understandings of professional etiquette
Colleagues from different cultures can also bring with them different workplace attitudes, values, behaviors, and etiquette. For instance, the expectation of formality, organizational hierarchy, and even working hours can conflict across cultures.
Source : hult.edu/blog/benefits-challenges-cultural-diversity-workplace - Hult International Business School · Level: B2
Comprehension check
1. According to the Forbes study cited, what is "the best way to ensure the development of new ideas"?
2. Name one challenge of cultural diversity mentioned in the article.
Key Vocabulary
8 essential terms from this chapter.
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