Post Graduate & Mid-Career Development Unit

Faculty of Management & Finance

University of Colombo

MBA-IB Program
Trimester V – (2017/2019)

MBAIB 5213 – Cross Cultural Management

(Course Facilitators: Prof. Gamini De Alwis/ Dr.M.P.P Dharmadasa)

Group Assignment
on

Study on Cross Cultural Management Practices of an Individual

Submitted on
31st August 2019
By
Group I
1) K.A.A. Gunarathna 2017/MBAIB/01
2) S.R.J Fernando 2017/MBAIB/02
3) J.N. Punniyalingam 2017/MBAIB/03
4) J.Nilani 2017/MBAIB/04
5) S.M.U De Silva 2017/MBAIB/05
Table of Contents

1.0 Acknowledgement .......................................................................................................... 3

2.0 Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 4

3.0 Personal Profile ............................................................................................................... 4

4.0 Introduction to Culture.................................................................................................... 5

5.0 Why Cross Cultural Management in International Business? ........................................ 7

6.0 What is Cross Cultural Management? ............................................................................ 8

7.0 How Cross Cultural Diversity is managed in International Business? ........................... 8

8.0 Organizational Culture and Personal Culture ............................................................... 10

8.1 Culture in Three Perspectives ........................................................................................ 10

8.2 Hofstede’s Value Dimensions ........................................................................................ 10

7.3 Criticisms against Hofstede’s Value Dimensions .......................................................... 11

7.4 Impact of International Culture ...................................................................................... 11

9.0 List of Cross Cultural Problems encountered and Solutions ........................................ 12

10.0 Findings......................................................................................................................... 19

11.0 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 20

12.0 References ..................................................................................................................... 21

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 1.0 Acknowledgement

We would like to express our deepest appreciation to Mr. Anuradha Manathunga Senior ERP
Consultant of Fortude, a subsidiary company of the Brandix Lanka Limited Sri Lanka for
providing us with useful and valuable information with regards to the Cross Cultural
Management by using his cross cultural working experience in India, Bangladesh, Lithuania
and United States of America.

Further, we would also like to acknowledge with much appreciation for the guidance and
classroom learning gained through by the lectures and handouts provided by Prof. Gamini De
Alwis and Dr. M.P.P Dharmadasa.

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2.0 Introduction

The objective of this report is to understand the issues and challenges faced by a selected
individual/expatriate who has been working for more than five years outside Sri Lanka and
what are/were the Cross Cultural differences he/she faced with his placement and how he or
she has managed the overseas operations.

We selected a senior consultant who has been exposed to European, Asian and American
cultures and how he has been able to work with different nationalities during his placements.
Further, the report has discussed various issues faced by Mr. Anuradha Manathunga Senior
ERP Consultant of Fortude, a subsidiary company of the Brandix Lanka Limited Sri Lanka.
Additionally we have also discussed as to how he managed overseas operations along with the
strategies imposed to tackle cultural problems and overcome such issues. We managed to
obtain valuable and interesting information on the various differences of cultures, issues came
across and the strategies adopted to overcome those issues during his 6 years of overseas
experience in India, Bangladesh, Lithuania and United States of America (USA).

3.0 Personal Profile

Mr. Anuradha Manatunaga works for Fortude Sri Lanka which is a subsidiary company of the
Brandix Lanka limited, he has 6 years of experience in his current role and overall he has more
than 10 years of experience in the field of information system consultations. He is currently
working in USA for an implementation of a consultation project given by Fortude Sri Lanka.
He is graduated from Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT) in Information
Systems stream, he is a passed finalist of Charted Institute of Management Accountants
(CIMA) in UK and also a post graduate from University of Colombo in Information Systems.
He is by profession an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) consultant and is expertise in
banking and finance, supply chain domains and fashion manufacturing ERP solutions. He has
a proven track record of ERP implementations, System integration, performing a business
analysis role in developing external programs and information system auditing in a vast area
of industries. Anuradha’s Key technical highlights as a consultant could be mentioned as;

 Product sales and demonstration

 Designing the business solution with ERP
 Configuring ERP system to match the business requirements-presenting and
demonstrating beat solutions of the ERP system
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  Identifying the GAP’s involved with the business process and ERP system
 Identify solutions to minimize the GAP’s identified
 Identifying modifications or external applications which needs to developed or
integrated
 Conducting training for the key user and end users and documentation of project
deliverable
 Designing and conducting data migration strategies
 Training users and end users on manufacturing and planning modules
 Providing post live support for the project until the project handover to the support
team
 M3 certified consultant on manufacturing, planning, customer order processing and
procurement and warehousing

4.0 Introduction to Culture

The culture could be referred as the ideas, customs, and social behavior of a particular people
or society. In other words it could be explained as something that is shaped by all or almost all
members of some social group. It could be seen as the arts and other manifestations of human
intellectual achievement regarded collectively e.g. "20th century” considered being a popular
culture. Thus simply we could mention that the culture is the way how a group of people behave
in an organization, country, location or anywhere.

Further, culture can be identified as the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes
the members of one group or category of people from another. It could be about what is evil
and what is good, dirty and clean, immoral and moral, irrational and rational. Relationships
between people in a society are affected by the values and these values differ among societies,
but within a society they are remarkably stable over period of time.

What is done as an organization in an organization is been constrained by the culture, and will
be decided by the culture. Similarly the knowledge is also based on organizational and national
culture. We are bound by the national culture and the organizational culture. When cultural
values does not tally there will be cultural constrains which will affect the organization.
Therefore, national culture affects organization culture and the organization culture affects the
organization and also organization cultures affects national cultures as well.

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According to anthropologist “culture is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief,
art, law, morals, customs, and any capabilities and habits acquired by a man/women as a
member of society”. The society could be divided based on cultural differences as shown in
the below division.

The western culture is based on Christianity whereas eastern culture is based on eastern religion
such as Buddhism and Hindu. Culture is also arrangement more or less stereotype patterns of
learned behavior, which handed down from one generation to the next through the means of
language and imitations (e.g. Parents pass customs to their children).

In addition, culture consists of patterns, explicit and implicit ways of expressing feelings, and
behavioral patterns that are being acquired and transmitted by symbols. The culture influences
the behaviors of society, people, organization and country. Therefore, culture creates values,
attitudes and it affects the behavior of people as an example living together concept could be a
culturally accepted or unaccepted practice for some eastern and western countries.

Values are relatively general beliefs that either define what is right and wrong or specify
general preferences. Values can be both consciously and unconsciously held. For example;

i. Language as a value - India’s main language is Hindi but, not all Indians speak
Hindi.
ii. Following a religion - Chinese people do not strongly follow a religion which
is a unique value.
iii. Preference over another product or service – belief of Japanese cars better
than Indian cars or not preferring Indian doctors for hospitals.

An attitude is a construct that expresses values and disposes a person to act or react in a certain
way towards something. Attitudes are the present relationship between a person and some kind

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of object and developed from developed from cultural conditioning, ecological conditioning,
demographic makeup, religion, education, and ethnic conditions.

Culture defines how people behave both around others and when they are alone, and it reveals
in what people do and say. (E.g. our class room behavior, in a function/ cocktail, funeral).

When considered the culture can be conceptualized as given below diagram based on classroom
learning;

5.0 Why Cross Cultural Management in International Business?

Globalization has brought people and businesses much closer, therefore, the impact on
international business in the global economy is in this era has become extremely significant.
International business has both taken advantage of globalization and contributed to its
development immensely.

As the word suggest international means doing business across different nationalities which
are having drastic differences in their values, beliefs and thought processes. Which in other
words called as cultural diversity. Hence with the development of international business cross
cultural management have become an important element in order to be successful in

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international business. Without a proper understanding of the cultural diversity you will not be
able to expand your business globally neither will not be a successful global leader.

6.0 What is Cross Cultural Management?

Cross cultural management is considered as the study of the behaviour of people in

organizations located in cultures and nations around the world (Nancy 1983, p.226). Cross
Cultural management is increasingly gaining importance due to the globalization effect.
Expansion of international trade, emergence of multinational companies, and development of
emerging economies and emigration of people across countries has resulted in the work place
filled with people from diverse cultural backgrounds. Companies from different parts of the
world are operating across many countries, forming mergers, forming joint ventures and
strategic alliances to participate in the global marketplace. Therefore, Cross cultural
management has become a necessity for many organizations as they become more globalized.

Through the Cross Cultural management you are expected to understand how the national
cultures influence management practices in managing a global company and will aid to
understand the similarities and differences among across cultures around the world which will
lead to effective management of international teams.

7.0 How Cross Cultural Diversity is managed in International Business?

In Cross Cultural Management there are there are three basic steps that was seemingly followed
by most of the global managers including the person we have interviewed for this assignment
purpose. These steps can be identified as below.

 Recognition of the differences: Helps to increase the awareness of cultural

differences. Before doing a business with a person from a different culture need to
assess what do we know about their culture? First need to select which cultural
dimensions are to be examined, and then assess their impact on the specific business
you are in.

E.g.: A situation where American company gets in to a negotiation with a company

in Brazil. Americans are highly individualistic compared to Brazil where the
collectivism is valued. In this case Brazilians will consider importance of
relationship and will keep the same team throughout the negotiation where
Americans might change the team during the course of the negotiations. In order to

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 have a successful outcome it’s important for the American company to recognize
this difference in cultural value of Brazil and to maintain the same team throughout
the negotiations.

 Respect differences: Appreciate the cultural differences by identifying key

differences and by adopting to certain cultural values. Adaptation is important
when you are in a different culture in order to avoid culture shock and failures.

E.g.: In Samsung Corporation the top foreign managers were very good in
recognizing the differences. However they have often used this understanding as a
way to stereotype their local Korean colleagues. They replied on only one or two
cultural dimensions such as Koreans are hierarchical and collectivistic as examples
and oversimplified the cultural differences which lead to erroneous judgements and
lead to many issues which directly affected the business.

Better approach was to find and appreciate the positive differences between the
foreign managers and locals and appreciate them which could lead to organizational
success.

 Reconcile differences: Increase awareness of cultural differences. Here the

knowledge and cultural empathy is being combined to form a common ground or
shared understanding by negating the cultural differences and to develop harmony
to achieve organizational objectives.

Cultural knowledge only cannot overcome cross cultural differences. A global manager in Shell
Oil Company quoted as saying “We can get people to share knowledge from cultures all day
long, but when it comes to actually implement those ideas they completely shut down”.

Shared understanding is important to avoid a situation in a global organization where people

from one culture would resist to implement new ideas from a different culture. It will help
everyone to focus organizational goals.

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It can be mentioned that in cross cultural management success comes from not by suppressing
the cultural differences but by using those differences to gain new insights to solve problems
that will lead to the overall success of the organization.

8.0 Organizational Culture and Personal Culture

8.1 Culture in Three Perspectives

Business environment ideology and country culture have been identified as the primary forces
that shape one’s values.

1. Convergence Theory - Ideology of the work place drives values

2. Divergence theory - Country culture, not work place ideology, drives values
3. Cross-vergence theory - Work ideology and country culture interact to create a new
and unique value systems that is based on the melding of both cultural and ideological
influences

8.2 Hofstede’s Value Dimensions

Hofstede studied on national cultures and then he divided cultural aspects in to five dimensions.
The first dimension is labelled Power Distance, and it can be defined as the degree of inequality
among people which the population of a country considers as normal: from relatively equal
(that is, small power distance) to extremely unequal (large power distance). All societies are
unequal, but some are more unequal than others.

The second dimension is labelled Individualism, and it is the degree to which people in a
country prefer to act as individuals rather than as members of groups. The opposite of
individualism can be called Collectivism, so collectivism is low individualism. In collectivist
societies a child learns to respect the group to which it belongs, usually the family, and to
differentiate between in-group members and out-group members (that is, all other people).
When children grow up they remain members of their group, and they expect the group to
protect them when they are in trouble. In return, they have to remain loyal to their group
throughout life. In individualist societies, a child learns very early to think of itself as "I" instead
of as part of "we". It expects one day to have to stand on its own feet and not to get protection
from its group anymore; and therefore it also does not feel a need for strong loyalty.

The third dimension is called Masculinity and its opposite pole Femininity. It is the degree to
which tough values like assertiveness, performance, success and competition, which in nearly

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all societies are associated with the role of men, prevail over tender values like the quality of
life, maintaining warm personal relationships, service, care for the weak, and solidarity, which
in nearly all societies are more associated with women's roles. Women's roles differ from men's
roles in all countries; but in tough societies, the differences are larger than in tender ones.

The fourth dimension is labelled Uncertainty Avoidance, and it can be defined as the degree to
which people in a country prefer structured over unstructured situations. Structured situations
are those in which there are clear rules as to how one should behave. These rules can be written
down, but they can also be unwritten and imposed by tradition. In countries which score high
on uncertainty avoidance, people tend to show more nervous energy, while in countries which
score low, people are more easy-going. A (national) society with strong uncertainty avoidance
can be called rigid; one with weak uncertainty avoidance, flexible. In countries where
uncertainty avoidance is strong a feeling prevails of "what is different, is dangerous." In weak
uncertainty avoidance societies, the feeling would rather be "what is different, is curious."

7.3 Criticisms against Hofstede’s Value Dimensions

i. Generalization- it is a set of likely reactions of citizens with a common mental
programming.
ii. Confusing individual level with community level- ecological mistake
iii. Individual level has been taken into consideration- for the study of cultures must be
compared at the country level.
iv. Timing- the results are based on a scenario which dates back to thirty years
v. Five dimensions were used precisely- each country should be free to establish their
own culture dimensions

7.4 Impact of International Culture

Culture is "the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one group
or category of people from another’’. When considering the National Culture it is the mental
programming at the national level, derived from one’s country (Hofstede, 1991). There is
something called management in all countries, but its meaning can change to country to
country. Conversely international culture is the culture that extends beyond national borders.
There are no such things as universal management theories, validity of theories may stop at
national borders. Some authors are of the opinion that cultural backgrounds of managers do
have an influence on their working. Gonzale and Mc Millan concluded in their study that

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‘management philosophy is culture- bound.’ They were also of the opinion that external
environmental forces affect the management philosophy. W. Oberg also came to the conclusion
that the applicability of management principles is limited to a particular culture.

9.0 List of Cross Cultural Problems encountered and Solutions

The concept of cross culture has been widely spread around the world after the internalization
of business activities. When business or individual moves to internalization, respective body
should be flexible to adopt another country’s culture to achieve the ultimate goal. It’s obvious
that there will be the clash between two cultures and there will be problems in adapting another
culture for the organization/individual. We have had an interview with Mr.Anuraddha, ERP
Consultant on the cross cultural problems.

Anuraddha, worked as ERP Consultant in Brandix Fortude. He got the opportunity to work in
overseas through his employer as a team and his first overseas country was Bangladesh and
then he moved to India, Lithuania and United States as well. Initially he said to be very excited
about his overseas break, as he thought that it will really help to boost his career considering
the international exposure. If you consider the generational values in today’s context
Millennials and the youngsters belongs to generation Z seems to be more interested in taking
overseas assignments than their predecessors. As a millennial our interviewee too might have
had a similar kind of interest to work as an expatriate.

Bangladesh is a country which consist of a diverse culture that has evolved over time with
influences from diverse social groups. There are more similarities between Sri Lanka and
Bangladesh, other than the language. As per Anuraddha, language has caused communication
gaps which had played a major role in the issues he’s faced in Bangladesh. Bangladesh use
Bengali as their mother ton and English speaking ability is extremely less compared to that of
Sri Lanka or India. As Anuradha was dealing with all levels of the company where he worked
this language barrier forced him to get the help of translators most of the time. Further,
compared to Sri Lanka the concern on punctuality, understanding of the technical matters were
very poor in Bangladesh which lead to several embarrassing situations during his tenure in
Bangladesh. As in most parts in Asia mutual trust and personal relationships are essential when
you are doing business or work in Bangladesh.

As one incident he mentioned during a meeting with one of his clients they were unable to
come to a final decision on a project due to the fact that the client’s Managing Director was not
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in the meeting and also they experienced about the fact that during the meetings there were lot
of disturbances where the clients team members were answering to the phone calls during the
meetings the subject matter was not properly discussed. As a result he was disappointed as he
had to go through several round of meetings to finalize one project. When we dig deep into
Bangladesh cultural values it was found that their businesses are very hierarchically structured
and the disturbances during meetings were well accepted according to Bangladesh culture.

Then Anuraddha’s team has moved to India. In India, they mostly prefer Hindi as a language,
despite they are much better in English language (both verbally and written) than the
Bangladeshis. However, in meetings Indians were speaking in their own language despite the
presence of foreigners. In terms of food, each part of the country having different kind of food
habits. In some parts, as per Anuradha it was easy to get similar food like in Sri Lanka as
Indians too are fond of eating Rice and curry as one of their main meal which is mostly for
lunch. In other parts they had to stick to their food habits. For everybody it may not be easy to
adopt to these different food habits but when you travel or work across countries you’ll not be
able find alternatives rather than adopting. As both India and Bangladesh are sub continental
countries there are many similarities in culture when compared to that of Sri Lanka. For
example all these three countries do not bother much about the punctuality and advance
planning in contrast to that of Americans or Europeans.

In terms of work, Indians are mostly hard working and highly object oriented. They will forget
about their food when they are on the work and will. As a Sri Lankan we have used to have our
food on time in any kind of situation especially when there’s a foreigner working with you.
However, in India you can’t expect the same thing and you might have to wait till the job is
done. In the initial stages, Anuradha and team found it really tough but as the time went on
they got adopted by having a heavy breakfast in the morning. As Anuradha worked in Delhi
the air pollution made him really uncomfortable and at times he had to stay in his apartment
due difficulties in breathing. Further, they had to spend more time on transport than in Sri
Lanka due to the unsystematic town planning which is causing heavy traffic in almost all the
main cities around the country.

One interesting example which lead to a big problem with their Indian counterparts was when
one of the team member from Anuradha’s team openly critised India’s actions on Pakistanis
and one of the famous cricketer of India (Virat Kholi). This had led to a heated argument and
ultimately the client had rejected the business offer due to that particular incident. It was a good

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lesson for them as it is said that in India cricket and cricketers are considered as a religion and
they do not like any criticisms against them. Further, in India there are three main things that
you should not openly discuss as i.e. topics concerning Kashmir, Pakistan and the caste system
where most of the Indians find difficult to change their opinions.

(Hofstede-Insights, n.d.)

Hofstede cultural dimension comparison of Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka

As per above graphs, in term of power distance, long term orientation and uncertainty
avoidance both countries share similar characteristics as Sri Lanka. Bangladesh is more
towards collectivist society, whereas India and Sri Lanka were moving towards collectivist
culture. India and Bangladesh people work more towards their personal career advancements.
Anuradha and team found it hard to get inputs on their project as both Indians and Bangladeshis
were reluctant to spend time in the project. They felt that spending time with Anuradha and
team won’t help them to advance in their personal career and they thought it is the top
management that should take care of it. As a result of this hierarchical nature in decision
making most of the projects were unable to complete as per the target timelines and
interviewee’s team had a difficult time with their Sri Lankan owners in explaining this situation
which was due to cultural differences.

Anuradha next overseas assignment was in the Republic of Lithuania, a European country
nearby Sweden and Denmark. Their official language is Baltic language of Lithuanian.

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Belarusian, Poles, and Russian are other minority languages. Lithuania is a country which has
got influenced by Nordic, Germanic and Slavic cultures. More than 80% of the population was
identified as
ethnic Hofstede cultural dimension comparison of Lithuania and Sri Lanka

Lithuanians.

(Hofstede-Insights, n.d.)

Considering the outcome from the Hofstede’s study, Lithuanians show tendencies to prefer
equality and a decentralization of power and decision-making in contrast to India and
Bangladesh. They are a society who do not prefer to have control and supervision on them,
especially the current younger generation. Due to the experience in Russian and soviet
dominance Lithuanians shows loyalty and respect towards authority. They have a highly
individualist culture. They value the family relationships and have a tendency to give a space
to others. Population has shown less dependency on traditional agriculture, more modern
technology, more urban living, more social mobility, better educational system, and a larger
middle-class. Lithuanians shows feminine characteristics like feel stubborn about giving and
receiving praise, arguing that they could have done better, or really have not achieved anything
worthy. They are considered to be from very reserved culture. As per Lithuanians, managers
are manager who have capacity to manage anything in any situations. So they more concern on
qualification and formal titles. Lithuanian culture is extremely pragmatic in nature. They are
from restrained society and don’t put much emphasis on leisure time and control the
gratification of their desires.

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As per the Anuraddha, Lithuanian are more aggressive and hard to convince. They feel very
hard to communicate with them as well, due to the language constraints. He explain an incident
which happened to them in Lithuania; “As part of their project their team had meeting with
Lithuanian team and both parties have agreed to the specific tasks and they have signed of as
well. After the execution of the task by Anuradha’s team, Lithuanian team has rejected their
final output saying that it is not as per their agreed proposal. Later Anuaradha’s team faced to
rework on that assignment”. As per him this incident made him and his team very stressed and
entire team was depressed. Until end of the project team was afraid about the quality of the
project, as they couldn’t able to understand what they are expecting from us. As entire team
was depressed, there are no one to console them. They didn’t find any way to re-motivate them
self to work in enthusiastic way and it may be correct to state that they felt like they had to deal
with a cultural shock. Further, Anuradha had a difficult time due to contrasting food that he
came across compared that in either India ,Bangladesh or in home country ,Sri Lanka.
Lithuanian cuisine features products suited to the cool climate and moist northern climate of
Lithuania like barley, potatoes, rye, beets, greens, berries and mushroom .Further Lithuanians
tend to eat lot of meat especially pork and beef unlike the subcontinent peoples. All these have
caused a situation where Anuradha felt that he needs to go their home country immediately.
For the first time he felt like he’s badly missing his loved ones and did not have any respite as
they somehow needed to finish the project which was assigned by the company. As per
Anuradha, it was the one of the horrible days he had during his overseas work and during the
later stages of the project he understood that even though the Lithuanians seemed like
aggressive it was their nature and with some understanding about the behavioral patterns he
was able to come to terms with their clients as there was no other alternative but to positively
take the cultural differences they faced and consider as a new challenge.

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United States is a country which consist people from various countries and having a
multicultural environment. The people who are being influenced by native culture do not
represents themselves much in the main cities.

(hofstede-insights, WHAT ABOUT THE USA?, n.d.)

US organizational hierarchy is setup for the convenience, superiors are easily accessible and
rely on individual employees and teams for their expertise. Some of the traints that pop up in
descriptions in US business culture again and again are as below.

- Individualism
- Competitiveness
- Efficiency
- Informality
- Openness to innovation and change

Society tend to look after themselves and their immediate family and they don’t expects much
support from authorities or government unlike in Asian countries. They are very free to
approach others, if they need any help from someone else. Employees are expected to be self-
reliant and display initiative. Informal communication is highly visible and valued in USA as
one of the traits coming from their culture. In organization, they look for the knowledge,
qualification and their performance when coming to the hiring, promotion based decisions. US
society is very much towards masculine society. Americans are considered as very blunt
compared to Europeans or Asians and don’t afraid to tell straight to another’s face even if it
creates a negative feeling. Americans are always believe on that there will be a better way to
complete the task and their policy is to ‘live to work’, which they think that it will direct them

17
to higher status and huge monetary rewards. Top management is very flexible with their
employees and they will listen to them regarding new ideas, innovative products and a
willingness to try something new or different.

As per the Anuradha, they are more free to approach and very helpful if they have a trust on
you. They will express their views and even they don’t hesitate to tell bad comment also.
Building trust is the huge challenge, as there are Indians who is ready to work for the same
work as us with low cost. In that case American thinks that we are trying to cheat us by charging
them a higher price. So we have to work hard and should ready to give maximum from short
time period. As there are the representative from many countries, in organizations they tend to
adapt their own organizational behavior. It will differ between organizations. You should be
ready to accept two kind of extreme weather conditions. In a season, you will witness severe
drop in temperature during the winter and in another season you will feel extremely hot. Further
their food habits are very much contrast to that of Sri Lankans. Though they were able to find
restaurants which provide food for less cost, but it is Americans authentic foods such as
sandwich, burger, submarines, meat etc which in long run will not be tolerated as a Sri Lankan.
Else you should have capacity to cook your own food in your boarding place. In Sri Lanka, we
don’t much occupy with the daily task such as cooking washing clothes, cleaning home and
buying things. In US you have to do everything in your own, else you should ready to spend
money to fulfil that particular task. The cost we have to allocate for these task is almost equal
to what we earn therefore Anuradha had no other option but to adopt to their lifestyle and to
get used to do your household tasks by your own.

There are some views with Americans where they think that we don’t know anything as we are
from third world country Anuradha stated during his interview with us. In that case, he faced a
huge challenge where he had to prove himself that he’s knowledgeable and technically sound
in the related subject, where he actually specialized. Further Anuradha found that still there’s
some discrimination on skin color but he was able to withstand against those rejections in
certain situations when he had to deal with the local community.

Considering the inputs from Anuradha it was understood that unlike the most of the Asian
countries American business culture is primarily money oriented and they are often very
individualistic and motivated by their careers. Also they can be powerful, open and persuasive
during communications. Further in case of any disputes they talk directly and privately with
the concern person and talk about the problem only in the specific context that it has occurred

18
to avoid making it seem like a criticism of their character. Also most of the Americans seems
to be culturally unaware especially that of sub continental nations and therefore assume that
the American way is the right way which may lead to disagreements and misunderstandings.

Despite these unfavorable aspects as per Anuradha out of the countries he worked he mostly
preferred the Americans due to the straightforwardness unlike in Asian cultures where implicit
behaviours are important and he’s found Americans to be more friendly and easy to
communicate mainly must be due to his fluency in English language.

10.0 Findings
Based on the details revealed by Anuradha during his interview with us and through the study
of the cultures in India, Bangladesh, Lithuania and USA and when comparing same with that
of Sri Lankan culture it could be stated that our resource person has put up a commendable job
in dealing with the people from these various cultural backgrounds.

It could be argued that Anuradha was able to handle these cultural differences to a satisfactory
level despite some embarrassing situations as he got prepared mentally for any surprises or
sudden shift in lifestyle before going to that particular country. As he said got used to google
the dos’ and don’ts in the particular culture before going which has made him less vulnerable
for any terms of cultural shock or surprises.

In other words understanding of the culture , how they work in different cultures, what type of
work to be done ,what are their expectations is really important to get to know beforehand to
avoid cultural shocks.

Another factor which made Anuradha to overcome all these cross cultural diversity might be
the fact that he belongs to millennial generation and it’s said that it can be due to inherent
characteristics of this generation where they are more likely to focus on being more inclusive
due to characteristics such as respecting identities of individuals, ideas, thoughts and opinions
than their earlier generations. Hence it’s found that being a millennial has given Anuradha an
advantage to perform well in cross cultural setup.

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11.0 Conclusion
Considering the literature review and the practical insights gained through the interview had
with Mr.Anuradha it could be stated that in order to be successful in a culturally diversified
setup you should develop cultural empathy towards people from different countries and it’s
said that in a culture there’s nothing as good or bad but it’s the difference that matters.

As a manager who wish to be succeeded in todays highly globalized and dynamic business
environment cross cultural understanding is a critical factor which will decide your success or
failure.In order to be a an effective global leader cultural intelligence or CQ is needed to be
developed as a capability and such leaders will contribute to their firm’s bottom line by
enhancing its competitive advantage in the global market place.Cultural Intellginence is
important to interact effectively with people from diverse cultures across the globe in various
situations.

Unlike intelligence quotient (IQ ) , CQ is an ability that you can learn by enhancing your
cultural self awareness developing certain cultural skills and learning about different cultures.
As in case of Anuradha due to the cultural intelligence he’s developed by working with people
from contrasting cultures in Sri Lanka, India, Bangladesh, Lithuania and USA has said to have
allowed him to view the world, situations and people from various perspectives which
eventually create and enhance possibilities to deal with uncertainty ,conflicts, dilemma
reconciliations, stereotyping, cross cultural communication or even business myopia.

Hence developing competencies in cross cultural management is not something that it nice to
have in todays business world but it is something that every manager should possess in order
to be succeeded in this highly interconnected world.

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 12.0 References
(n.d.). Retrieved from Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/annajohansson/2017/06/16/how-
millennials-separate-diversity-from-inclusion-and-why-that-matters/

Hofstede-Insights. (n.d.). COMPARE COUNTRIES. Retrieved from Retrieved on 27th August,

2019 https://www.hofstede-insights.com/product/compare-countries/

hofstede-insights. (n.d.). WHAT ABOUT LITHUANIA? Retrieved from Retrived on 27th

August 2019. https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country/lithuania/

hofstede-insights. (n.d.). WHAT ABOUT THE USA? Retrieved from Retrieved on 27th August,
2019, https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison/the-usa/

ICOL, C. O. (n.d.). Countries and their culture. Retrieved from www.everyculture.com:

Retrieved on 27th August 2019, https://www.everyculture.com/Ja-Ma/Lithuania.html

Manathunga, A. (2019, August 23). Cross Cultural Experiences. (S. &. Ushan, Interviewer)

Mulder, P., & Schein., E. (2013). Organizational Culture Model.

Schein, E. (1992). Three levels of cultire. Retrieved from Value based management.net:
Retreived on 27th August 2019,
http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/methods_schein_three_levels_culture.html

Schein, E. H. (1992). Organizational Culture and Leadership.

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