Cross-Cultural Communication Skills at the Workplace

There’s little doubt that communication skills can endear you to people around you, whether your peers or superiors. They help you make your point cogently and precisely and in the business world that a skill that can often decide your career path. Impressive communication skills can carry to the zenith of success.

Whether Mark Zuckerberg or Ratan Tata, what they say—and the way they say it—has a wide-ranging impact on all of us. Their precise words are quoted exactly and many people draw inspiration from them.

The world is becoming a global village and cross-cultural communication has become important for companies. It helps in growth of their business and their forays across geographical boundaries. Understanding diverse cultures therefore is key.

There are two parts of cultures. One is visible and other not so. The visible is not that complicated because it manifests itself in various visual cues. Women in India, for instance, wear bindis, and that is a physical marker that people quickly recognise.

What you can’t see

However, more than three-fourths of our culture rests in things you can’t see—values, attitudes and beliefs. Professor Gert Jan Hofstede has given us six parameters of cultural differences based national cultural preferences rather than individual cultural preferences. It talks about High-Context vs Low-Context Culture. India is a High-Context culture country because we have years of civilisation behind us.

Another parameter is Power-distance Index (PDI), which defines hierarchical distribution of power, and that people understand “their place” in the system. India is a high PDI country. Take, for example, when we go to a doctor in India we wait patiently for doctor to tell us the diagnosis, we do not question him/her. There is an innate respect for the person. Whereas, a low PDI score means that power is shared and is widely dispersed, and that society members do not accept situations where power is distributed unequally.

For instance, in the US and the Nordic countries people call each other by their first names. They are comfortable sitting with those in high PDI across the table.

Keeping these cultural sensitivities in mind results in:

• Building better teams
• Preventing misunderstanding and conflicts
• Promoting harmonious environment
• Raising cross cultural proficiency and the productivity of internal meetings.

Let’s talk about cross-cultural barriers

• Language barrier: We Indians generally know two languages, but the person you are dealing with might not know the same languages.
• Stereotyping For example, there are Chinese people you are meeting with but you think that they are secretive and you eye them with suspicion.
• Egalitarian vs Hierarchical: Western countries are generally egalitarian.
• Formality vs Informality.
• Structured vs Flexible Scheduling: In some countries 8am doesn’t mean 8am, they think 10-15 minutes here and there is all right. For example, Japanese nationals are always on time even when they are in foreign countries.

Now, semantic barriers

So, what are semantic barriers? The word semantic means anything concerning the language. And the use of difficult and multiple use of languages, words, figures, symbols create semantic barriers. In western culture, people are generally to the point, they find it productive but Asians may find it rude. Then there’s the use of jargon. Use of technical and unfamiliar language, or words and phrases, creates its own barriers.

Business English

English is a global language. It is also recognised the world over as the language of business. While that is by and large true, and therefore also business teams have a common language, but when some people are more fluent than others, it creates social distance between members.

In global teams, people who are less fluent in English tend to withdraw from communication, which means the team may not get all the inputs they need. Understanding what’s said can be challenging if people speak too fast or use too much slang. This also might have an influence on how people’s competence and performance are perceived.

Types of Communication

• Verbal: In this type of communication the professional uses language as a vehicle of communication.
• Non-verbal: When a message is communicated without using a word, the process requires non-verbal cues to be transmitted and received. These include facial expressions, posture, touch, body language, etc.
• And then there’s written communication as well as visual communication.

So, Dr Albert Mehrabian’s 7-38-55 Communication model says 7% of communication is words, 38% through tone and voice, and 55% through body language.

Storytelling works across cultures

Storytelling is a powerful communication tool. It is both interesting as well as persuasive.

• It helps in constructing common meanings for individuals within the organisation
• Provides social proof
• Inspires and unites people
• Provides clarity
• Introduces the thread of human connection
• Uses emotions and imagination that can rewire our brains.

Importance of storytelling as an engagement tool in multicultural settings cannot be overstated. The reason is that stories can reinforce your business priorities and values. Using storytelling principles when designing and delivering programmes in different countries to a diverse audience brings consistent benefits, which helps create meaning and can trigger people to act.

(Blog written by: Mohita Datta is a Delhi-based communication coach and soft skills trainer.)

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