国际商务的环境chapter 6 Cultural environment facing international business.pptVIP

Chapter 6 Cultural Environment Facing International Business Learning objectives Realize the challenge of crossing cultural boundaries Understand why culture matters in international business Illustrate key dimensions of culture learn managerial guidelines for cross-cultural success Text: The Challenge of Crossing Cultural Boundaries In cross-border business, we step into different cultural environments characterized by unfamiliar languages and unique value systems, beliefs, and behaviors. We encounter customers and business partners who display different lifestyles, norms and consumption behaviors. These differences influence all dimensions of international business. Culture cross-cultural risk Culture refers to the learned, shared, and enduring orientation patterns in a society. People demonstrate their culture through values, ideas, attitudes, behaviors, and symbols. Cross-cultural risk is defined as a situation or event where a cultural miscommunication puts some human value at stake. Cross-cultural proficiency Unlike political, legal, and economic systems, culture has proven very difficult to identify and analyze. Its effects on international business are deep and broad. Culture influences a range of interpersonal exchange as well as value-chain operations. Most companies want their employees to leant about other cultures and acquire a degree of cross-cultural proficiency. Ethnocentric vs. polycentric Managers engaged in cross-border business should give up their ethnocentric orientations in favor of a polycentric or geocentric orientation. Ethnocentric tendencies are a characteristic of virtually every society, and entail the belief that one’s own race, religion, or ethnic group is somehow superior to others. Polycentric orientation refers to a host-country mindset where the manager develops a greater affinity with the country in which she or he conducts business. Geocentric orientation refers to a global mindset where the manager is able to unde