In today’s global business marketplace, the ability to communicate effectively and multi-culturally cannot be underestimated. There is an interesting incident I encountered on my birthday when I went out with my friends to the Italian Kitchen restaurant in Vancouver.

I was overhearing two friends who were Italian and Chinese, talking about their cultures.They had some serious discussion/argument between them. This incident interested me because I noticed the way they were trying to prove their own point of view and each of them had a different body language. I was wondering about how different nationalities can communicate and understand each other in a busy workplace such as the office or during any business meetings. I wanted to know more about cross-cultural communication as I thought that this incident can be related to organisational behaviour, “communication”.

There was a speech given by Pellegrino Riccardi in TEDx. His ideas and observation clarified how communication can be done effectively among nationalities in this global national world .”Perception” is a key element that helps individual see the world differently as it entirely lies in the individual approach.”People see what they want to see and they don’t see what you see” is an interesting phrase that describes how people perceive their views and it is described as ” Accepted and Familiar “.When working across borders, it is important to know their culture and their ‘accepted and familiar’ assumptions as they are very crucial for a successful business environment. For instance, in Singapore Airlines, if the air-hostess bow towards you as a sign of warm welcome it will impress you but at the same time if an air hostess of Emirates bows towards you, it might look different. This change in perception is due to the accepted and familiar pre-assumption based on cultures and tradition.

Another interesting element that is significant while communicating or while working with other nationalities is ” Curiosity “, as it is a key to progress in strengthening cultural relationship across borders that can help people to know about each other. To be a high-profile employee, we need to extend our boundaries by taking the best of all cultures/ nationalities and merge them to create a new culture. When we accept other cultures, rules, feelings and expressions across various nationality, we can create a global mindset. Thus, this is what is needed in today’s world to bring a positive progressive change.

WC : 405

Reference :

1). My Personal Experience in ” Italian Kitchen “.

2). Pellegrino Riccardi | TEDxBergen: https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=YMyofREc5Jk