...psychologist, management researcher, and culture expert Geert Hofstede, early in his career, interviewed unsuccessfully for an engineering job with an American company. Later, he wrote of typical cross-cultural misunderstandings that crop up when American managers interview Dutch recruits and vice versa: “American applicants, to Dutch eyes, oversell themselves. Their CVs are worded in superlatives…during the interview they try to behave assertively, promising things they are very unlikely to realize…Dutch applicants in American eyes undersell themselves. They write modest and usually short CVs, counting on the interviewer to find out by asking how good they really are…they are very careful not to be seen as braggarts and not to make promises they are not absolutely sure they can fulfill. American interviewers know how to interpret American CVs and interviews and they tend to discount the information provided. Dutch interviewers, accustomed to Dutch applicants, tend to upgrade the information. To an uninitiated American interviewer an uninitiated Dutch applicant comes across as a sucker. To an uninitiated Dutch interviewer an uninitiated American applicant comes across as a braggart.”1 Cultural differences, while difficult to observe and measure, are obviously very important. Failure to appreciate and account for them can lead to embarrassing blunders, strain relationships, and drag down business performance. And the effects of culture persist even in life-and-death situations...
Words: 10010 - Pages: 41
...Doing Business in India India is a richly diverse and complex country. Regionalism, religion, language and status are all factors that need to be taken into account when doing business in India. Behaviour, etiquette and approach are all modified depending on whom you are addressing and the context in which they are being addressed. By tailoring your behaviour and approach to doing business in India you maximise the potential of your visit. Indian Society and Culture Language Different states in India each have different official languages. Central government only recognises Hindi as the official language of India. However, when doing business in India, English is the language of international commerce. Hierarchy * Indians are always conscious of social order and their status relative to other people, be they family, friends, or strangers. * All relationships involve hierarchies. The boss is seen as the source of ultimate responsibility in business. Every relationship has a clear- cut hierarchy that must be observed for the social order to be maintained. The Role of the Family * People typically define themselves by the groups to which they belong rather than by their status as individuals. Someone is deemed to be affiliated to a specific state, region, city, family, career path, religion, etc. * Indians maintain very close family relationships. The extended family creates countless interrelationships, rules, and structures. Along with these mutual...
Words: 1381 - Pages: 6
...Different Cultures and Race in India Amanda Johnson SOC/120 Brenda Miller There are many different cultures in India and the different cultures come from the different religions that the people of India believe in. Here are a few of the different religions that are in India; Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism, and Sikhism. Even though there are many different religions, people of different religions worship together. Family is very important to the people in India. In India the parents or guardian of a young person finds a suitable other for their child to marry. The parents do look for a person around the same age, interested in the same things, and in the same social class (wealthy or poor). Marriage is very important to the people of India and they believe that marriage is for life, the divorce rate in India is only around one percent and the divorce rate in the United States is around fifty percent. When looking at how parents teach their children over in India, we can look at Bangalore where Kavitha Cardoza went to visit. Kavitha Cardoza went to ‘Silicon Valley of India’ “Whose children all attend English-medium schools” (Media cultures pg129 ¶3). The parents of India want their children to understand English so they can further their education and have better career choices. Many people in India believe that television is one of the biggest threats to their culture. With televisions becoming more easily to get and more children watching there is a threat to their...
Words: 484 - Pages: 2
...The East India Company and Perceptions of Indian Culture Throughout the 16th century, the Indian Ocean was filled with lucrative trade. Incredible amounts of capital and resources were exchanged all throughout the Indian Ocean from the Middle East to the shores of Japan. At the heart of all this trade stood the Indian subcontinent, whose merchants and monarchs accumulated vast amounts of wealth by taking advantage of their geographic position relative to the international market. Although the larger dynasties of Europe had learned of the vast material wealth of Asia through the travels of Marco Polo and other European explorers as early as the 14th century, it wasn’t until the 1600s that the first legitimate European trading companies set up shop in the east to bring Asiatic commodities to the European continent at a large scale. The first of said companies, the British East India Company, created under Elizabeth I of England, would bring not only great wealth, but also eventual colonization to the people of the India. The British East India Company arrived in the Indian subcontinent with purely economic goals. The merchants in the company adapted to Indian culture extremely well, quickly making friends with the monarchs of different Indian states, adopting and practicing Indian religions, marrying Indian women, and learning the vernacular languages of the continent so that they could seamlessly blend into the already thriving market. As English influence in the Indian economy...
Words: 1682 - Pages: 7
...today are probably the most dominant industry that contributes in the production of popular culture today. What movies show depict what society is like and in turn as well decide what society would be like. Although movies are not particularly a medium meant to impart knowledge or awareness only, however it does do it and when it does it has the most impact compared to any other medium, to say for example books or news. We as mere human beings living our lives isolated by the rest of the world in our own little homes, towns and countries have a fairly little idea of what the world is like outside of our homes. All the knowledge that we have of the world around us is through books, movies, news, TV shows, etc. And among all these forms, movies hold a prominent position in developing the psyche of the common masses....
Words: 1042 - Pages: 5
...A comparative study of political, economic and social-cultures issues of the Russia and India Prepared for: Dr. Joe Zhou Peng Submitted: 11 May 2015 Prepared by: Zahara CitraArifin 006 Table of Contents INTRODUCTION 1 Task 1 1.1 Economy of Russia and India 2 Terrorist aspects of globalization 2 1.2 Political System of Russia and India 3 Discrimination against Woman 4 Corruption 4 1.3 Socio-Cultural of Russia and India 5 Hofstede’s Cultural Dimension of Russia and India 5 Written and Unwritten Laws 6 Task 2 2.1 Culture Shock 7 2.2 Cross Cultural Training ...
Words: 2545 - Pages: 11
...ByeongHo Hwang (Terry) SP14 BUSMHR-4321: International Labor HR Professor Tashlin Lakhani February, 18, 2014 Case Memo : Honda in India (Saini 2006) <Question 1-1> Prior to March 2005, what was the overall business and HR strategy (or philosophy) at Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India (HMSI)? To begin with, the human resource policies of HMSI were influenced by the philosophy of its parent company, HMCL. As a result, HMSI had adopted fundamental beliefs and values from HMCL. There were two core beliefs: “Respect for individual differences” and “Three Joys”. First of all, HMSL had thought that individual contribution would be one of main keys for the company’s success, so they especially considered the independence of spirit and freedom, equality, and respect for human beings. Moreover, HMSL had focused each individual’s capacity to think, to reason and to dream. Second, in alignment with the philosophy of its parent company, HMSL had also accomplished the concept, called Three Joys: the joy of buying, the joy of selling, and the joy of manufacturing. This idea was used to in order to help staff and workers become happy from their daily work. <Question 1-2> What HR policies and management practices were in place and were they consistent with the overall strategy? HMSL had HR policies and management practices, such as performance appraisal system, works committee and employee welfare. First of all, the promotion opportunities for workers ranged from...
Words: 1104 - Pages: 5
...IT from India’ to 'IT for India' Bottom of Form India has come a long way as a supplier of IT services to the world. Analysts say that India has revolutionized the services sector the same way as Japan changed the manufacturing sector. But, Indian IT sector has mainly catered to a global market, and very little was done for the local market in India in the past. India presents a very large untapped market in terms of technology adoption and usage. The scope of technology development for India as a market is at a position when the world was some 15 years ago. The major advantage is that India can start implementing technology from the point where the rest of the world is right now. It can leapfrog ahead of the rest of the world with very little legacy technology to cope with. Indian Market-India should be considered not as a country but as another world in itself. People have committed the mistake of considering it as a single big unit of similar attributes and needs or in other cases, seen little value in understanding the diversity of the country. They concentrated more on the well-off English speaking crowd of the country and never seen any true value in tapping the regional segments. FMCG, Education, Entertainment almost everyone else except IT has understood the value of tapping into the regional segments. This can be mainly attributed to the fact that IT was never meant for the Indian market. While other industries aimed to cater to local demand, IT was basically present...
Words: 1325 - Pages: 6
...India is known to be the chaotic canvas of art and spirituality and this nature of this diversified country delights each and every one with its gaiety. The buzzing nation’s mind-blowing mix of exotic landscapes and intricately woven heritage bristles with compelling art exhibitions, pompous festivals and novel forms of highly creative expression. Behaviour of people, the way they communicate, their dressing styles, food habits form an integral part of the country’s culture, but when it comes to describing the culture of India, it can be said that the country is a cocktail of cultures and that is exactly the beauty of India. India has the proud parent of some of the greatest of religions namely Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism, and the country also embraces Islam and Christianity. People belonging to all these religions live together with harmony and this diversity promises 365 days of joys, colours, rituals and appealing cultural exchange. India is flavoured with the unity of rich culture whilst it takes a dip in diversity of the many religions that live under one sky, and it is true celebration when this sky is painted with joys of people beneath. This is exactly what happens during the international kite festival of Gujarat. Festivals in India form occasions for celebrations that bring everyone together and festivals like Holi, Diwali and Uttarayan which involve fun activities provide a brilliant stage for people from all religions to get together and be the reason...
Words: 584 - Pages: 3
...Case 8-2 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge. 1. How should Marianne Barner respond to the invitation for IKEA to have a representative appear on the upcoming broadcast of the German video program? I suggest Marianne Barner to refuse to appear on the upcoming broadcast of the German Video Program. Every coin has two sides. Accepting this invitation is the opportunity for IKEA to quickly response the child labor issue in public media. In this way, IKEA could assure that they will be more aware of social responsibility and potential upcoming social issues in the future. However, the German Video Program won’t allow the company to preview the video and that the program clearly “planned to take a confrontational and aggressive approach aimed directly at IKEA”. If they go to the invitation with no preparation of what kinds of issue and questions could probably be faced with, it might potentially mislead by the videos or questions they answered in the show. Therefore, Marianne Barner should politely refuse the invitation and respond the video when they have a chance to review and verify the truth in the video. While, in the meantime, IKEA have time to investigate the truth and assign more policies to against child labor issue for their suppliers. 2. What actions should she take regarding the IKEA supply contract with Rangan Exports? IKEA should sent out the investigation term to figure out the truth whether the Rangan Exports failed in compliance with the ethical...
Words: 831 - Pages: 4
...BRANDING OF PAKISTAN The world now a day has become a compact village. Everyone knows everything that is going on in various part of the world. Marketing and branding has become so important that people are putting so much focus on the marketing activities of the product or brand they are affiliated with. Competition in the market is so strong that every organization is giving so much heed towards the innovation so that it can provide its customers with some thing new in order to sustain its already captured customers and to attach new ones with its name. Every organization wants the competitive edge. It is the case with the countries that are in the world. The pool of information available to the people around the globe makes the aware of what is happening in different countries and what is the reason behind it. The governmental bodies these days are trying to make their image better in the eyes of public of not only their own country but also in the eyes of public of other countries so that when they are competing in the elections next time they can get the international support. That can influence the opinion of the people that live in their own country. Pakistan these days is going through the transformational phase. Various positive actions are being taken by the government to improve its image. Pakistan is facing the major crisis in its economic category. People who live in the country and had been the big industrialists are taking their money out of Pakistan because...
Words: 1576 - Pages: 7
... Doing business in a particular nation requires a focus on a multi-dimensional understanding of its culture and business practices. Understanding those differences and adapting to them is the key. In such a richly diverse and complex country as India it is difficult to impart generic conclusions that can be used by those doing business there. Regionalism, religion, language and caste are all factors that need to be taken into account when doing business in India. Behaviour, etiquette and approach are all modified depending on whom you are addressing and the context in which they are being addressed. The business culture of India is a reflection of the various norms and standards followed by its people. Indians have various cultural yardsticks, which extend to their business culture too. Thus, it is important that a person visiting the country has an idea of the business culture of India. Thus, it is important that a person visiting the country has some basic idea regarding the business ethics and customs followed here. Having a good grasp on Indian business culture will ensure that you succeed in maintaining a well-earned affinity with your business counterparts. The following tips will give them an idea of the working and business norms in practice here. These form the basis of doing business in India as well as closely connected to risks of doing business in India. • The 'namaste' forms an important part of Indian etiquette and is generally used while greeting and...
Words: 1213 - Pages: 5
...insecure in their job and negotiate more about financial matters (Shama, 1978). Despite many companies cutting theirs operational costs or reducing employees, McDonald’s in India planned to increase its headcount and strategically do not cut its cost. Taking advantage from the reducing prices of real estates, McDonalds start to gain more market share. McDonald’s management team believed that the economic crisis gives more opportunities to conduct business aggressively. Exploring the case study for McDonalds – Business Strategy in India, a study approach is to explore the whole picture of a successful this fast good chain’s action and strategy to cope with down turn economy. In other words, this case was about to discusses how McDonald’s managed to buck the trend, its early years and business strategy to get more out of its stores in India. On the same time, how McDonald’s can maintain and improve their performance by adjusting their competitive strategy properly. 2. Introduction McDonald's is the leading global foodservice retailer with more than 32,000 local restaurants serving more than 58 million people in around 130 countries each day. 70 percent of our restaurants worldwide are owned and operated by independent, local businessmen and businesswoman. In 1996, McDonald's opened in India for the first time, a country...
Words: 3763 - Pages: 16
...Business Cultural Analysis of India BUSI 604: International Business The nation that I have chosen for this Global Business Cultural Analysis research project is India. India has one of the fastest growing and largest economies despite being one of the poorest countries. “India has emerged as the world's third largest economy, in terms of Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), just behind the U.S. and China, according to a report from the World Bank” (Bawaba, 2014). The academic reason in which I chose India is that it is very interesting in how one of the poorest countries in the world has developed to be in the position of third largest economy. There are five learning objectives I will research in addition to the required four research questions. First of all, I want to explore the overall business culture of India. There are different perceptions of ethical business practices throughout the world. Second, I will research the role the Indian government plays in conducting business. Third, the differences in the United States labor market and India’s labor market. Next, I will determine if India is going to be of any threat to the US economy in future. Last of all, I will explore the business laws and regulations of the Indian economy. What are the major elements and dimensions of culture in India? Communication, relationships, culture and hierarchy are the major elements of culture within the nation of India. “While English is spoken...
Words: 763 - Pages: 4
...This article was downloaded by: [148.85.1.113] On: 16 March 2015, At: 06:02 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/riij20 Contemporary Bhakti Recastings Laetitia Zecchini a a CNRS, France Published online: 03 Jun 2013. Click for updates To cite this article: Laetitia Zecchini (2014) Contemporary Bhakti Recastings, Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 16:2, 257-276, DOI: 10.1080/1369801X.2013.798128 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1369801X.2013.798128 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be...
Words: 10313 - Pages: 42
