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Intercultural Conflict and Organizations During our lifetime, we are bound to become part of an organization. With America becoming more and more diverse, it has led to a rise in intercultural organizations. Anytime you have individuals of different ethnic backgrounds, there is a chance for some type of communication conflict. When people from different areas of the world engage in conflict, they often have different expectations of how the conflict should be dealt with. Conflict is a clash of values that is a common theme among individuals.
Intercultural conflict usually starts with different assumptions concerning what is appropriate or inappropriate behavior while approaching a conflict. While we as Americans grow in doing business with international organizations it is expected that there will be communication barriers that will led to tension and conflict. Before we get all worked up over this type of conflict, we must add there are ways that one can minimize intercultural conflict in an organization which we will be discussing later in the chapter.
Communication is important while managing an organization on an international basis. When different cultures come together there are specific things one can do to successfully ease conflict that may arise. In a study done by Ruben and Kealey (Ruben & Kealey 1979) they discussed seven dimensions of communication competence that shows how an intercultural organization can deflate the possibility of conflict. In this section we will briefly discuss these seven dimensions and relate them to how they can be of help for an intercultural organization.
The Longitudinal Studies Display of Respect is simply showing respect along with positive regards for the other parties involved in the organization. It is said that showing respect through things like eye contact, body language, and voice tone is essential when working with international organizations. .Empathy is the ability to understand ones situations along with feelings in order to give back feedback. Empathy is much like showing respect and can be displayed through body language.
An active listener is important in showing empathy so one can give and receive feedback Interaction Management is simply the ability to handle human interaction. This is very important while being part of an organization because you have to have the ability to negotiate topics that are discussed. This step may be difficult when talking about intercultural organizations because cultures vary on how they go about interacting with their members.
Interaction Posture the ability to respond to others in a descriptive and nonjudgmental way. Orientation to Knowledge is the flexibility one can explain things to people of different cultures according to the given situation. This is highly important in international organization because it shows culture awareness along with communication effectiveness. Role Behavior is being able to achieve both relationship and task roles, along with being able to avoid self centered roles.
It is important to develop a working relationship when dealing with intercultural interaction. Above are seven dimensions that are essential to any intercultural organization that wants to be successful, along with avoiding conflict. Not all conflict can be avoided, but by following these seven principles it allows for a more healthy and friendly environment. Now that we have looked at ways we can reduce conflict among intercultural groups, we can start looking at how different cultures around the world handle conflict. {draw:frame}
As we can see conflict is inevitable in any organization. Whenever there is ethnic, geographic and lingual diversities there will always be conflict. With the rise of intercultural organization coming together, we need to keep finding ways to work through conflict; in this section we were able to highlight specific examples of how we can decrease the chance for conflict. It is hard to deny the presence of conflict while talking about intercultural communication, and just like conflict in organizations, there is no way to avoid conflict in the classroom.
It is said that in the United States, conflict in the classroom has grown so much that people have given up on public school system. In the next section we will take a closer look into the widespread problem of classroom conflict. Work Citied Ruben, B. D & Kealey, (1979). Behavioral assessment of communication competency and the Tinsley, C. H. (1998). Models of conflict resolution in Japanese, German, and American cultures, _ Journal of Applied Psychology, _83, 316-323