Organizational Behavior, 17e

Cultural Factors

1. 7 Discuss how to overcome the potential problems of cross-cultural communication.

Effective communication is difficult under the best of conditions. Cross-cultural factors clearly create the potential for increased communication problems. A gesture that is well understood and acceptable in one culture can be meaningless or lewd in another. Unfortunately, only 18 percent of companies have documented strategies for communicating with employees across cultures, and only 31 percent require that corporate messages be customized for consumption in other cultures.

Cultural Barriers

There are a number of problems related to language difficulties in cross-cultural communications. First are barriers caused by semantics. Words mean different ...