Search results

The purpose of this paper is to present a hypothetical case study which provides an opportunity for students to conduct realistic business analysis applying subject material related to cross‐cultural issues presented in the international business, international management and management courses.

The hypothetical case study requires students to review and analyze cross‐cultural issues related to the appointment of the senior executive for a foreign office of a global business enterprise. A hypothetical Chinese maritime enterprise and its publicly‐traded subsidiary are profiled. Cross‐cultural considerations come into play as the senior executive for two foreign offices must be appointed.

The case reflects refinements based upon its use during the past few years. Students are provided a realistic experiential exercise. Student feedback indicates a heightened sensitivity to cross‐cultural considerations that transcends their assigned textbook readings and traditional testing.

As with any classroom exercise, differences do exist with “real‐world” business practice. Students do not fully appreciate the pressures and tensions experienced by business professionals with respect to recruiting, selecting, appointing and developing a senior executive for a foreign office assignment.

The case study provides an experiential exercise for students to apply theories and concepts learned from the textbook and the instructor's lectures.

The case study offers a complex view of myriad cross‐cultural considerations inherent in an international business firm, providing value to instructors and students as it reinforces discipline theories and concepts in a meaningful way, creating an active learning environment fostering academic excellence.

The purpose of this paper is to offer a framework for the analysis of the power dynamics shaping the emergence of hybrid management systems in sub‐Sahara Africa. It aims to achieve this by showing how insights from postcolonial theory can further enrich cross‐cultural management theory.

The mainstream perspectives in current cross‐cultural management literature are reviewed as a basis for the development of a theoretical framework that emphasises cross‐cultural interaction and a consideration of the power dynamics surrounding non‐profit organisations operating in a sub‐Saharan African context is integrated. Drawing on the metaphors of mimicry and hybridity, this paper argues that postcolonial theory offers an avenue for theorising cross‐cultural interaction and the power dynamics surrounding these cross‐cultural encounters. Examples chosen from the author's ongoing work in the NGO sector in the Eastern Cape, South Africa serve as illustrations of how the analytical framework might generate insights into the workings of power dynamics shaping the emergence of hybrid ways of managing and organising.

It is argued that through a focus on interaction and the surrounding power relations, this framework allows for a more contextualised understanding of the emergence of hybrid management systems in non‐profit organisations.

The paper shows that, f cross‐cultural management theory hopes to inform the practice of non‐profit management in sub‐Sahara Africa, it is imperative the power dynamics at work are clearly understood.

The study investigates extreme response style (ERS) in cross‐cultural research. Through a four‐country application of the Greenleaf ERS measure, finds that ERS varies between cultures and across response formats. Evidence is also found that the acquiescence response style (ARS) varies between cultures and response formats. Through a series of ANOVAs, it is shown how a post hoc response style adjustment can be used to minimize between‐group differences for ERS and ARS. Finally, this study illustrates how cross‐cultural market researchers, using a marketing‐oriented survey instrument like the CETSCALE, could reach erroneous conclusions by failing to adjust for between‐group difference in ERS. Implications for cross‐cultural marketing research are discussed.

Disorders of speech and language include myriad diagnoses that vary in incidence and prevalence across age span and cultures. Disorders can range from those that do not impinge upon general communication, learning or psychosocial function, such as a mild speech disturbance, like a lisp, to global aphasia with a complete lack of communication ability. The short- and long-term effects of these impairments are often directly related to the age at onset, duration, co-morbidities, access to intervention by qualified professionals, and the societal response to the disability. In cultures that take a dim view of any type of deviation from the norm, there may be less access to diagnosis and treatment, as well as a hesitancy to seek out available options for treatment. Additionally, for those countries in which there are larger issues of general health, economic support, and quality of care, the nature of the disability may receive little or no attention simply due to national priorities or limited access to resources. Although, globally, disorders of speech and language are not exclusively limited to those countries with poorer health outcomes, in general, speech and language services may be less accessible or absent in poverty-stricken nations of the world. In many cases, these countries are at greater risk for many of the disorders simply due to environmental and social conditions, such as lack of early access to health care and preventative interventions. This chapter explores Global Perspectives on Speech and Language Impairments.

At the core of an international marketing strategy is the internet firm's goal of building and sustaining a competitive advantage. The purpose of this paper is to present an integrative framework to explain the role that customer behavior and customer relationship management (CRM) play in developing a profitable, sustainable competitive advantage for internet companies.

The integrative framework utilizes existing theoretical concepts from the areas of strategy and internet marketing and develops a framework to provide firms with insights into how they can gain the competitive advantage.

This paper links global customer behavior to the firms' business value chain and provides guidelines for strategic implications. In this conceptual paper, it is discussed that understanding consumer decision‐making behavior on the web and managing these relationships are critically important to achieve a superior performance.

This is not empirical research. A theoretical model is presented for future testing by researchers using statistical techniques such as structural equation modeling.

The framework provides managerial insights into building and sustaining a competitive advantage using a consumer‐centric approach, coupled with CRM technology on a global scale. Managerial value is derived by providing an understanding of the link between a sustainable competitive advantage, customer‐focused strategies, consumers' needs and wants, the firm's performance, and shareholder value.

It is important for global marketers to understand how consumer decision‐making on the web affects strategic and financial performance. This paper extends the current literature by integrating consumer decision behavior on the web, CRM, and the firms' performance. This framework explains the creation of a sustainable competitive advantage using customer‐focused strategies to develop customer loyalty for superior firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to provide international business students with a deeper appreciation of cross‐culture issues that might impact their future management practice. Specifically, it considers the use of action research as a driver of the learning dynamics of a course in cross‐cultural management.

The course was designed around core readings and assignments that suggested action research as a way of coming to a more authentic appreciation of cross‐cultural management scenarios. Action research was not, however, formally discussed or introduced. In this initial study, participant reflections were collected and analyzed from a phenomenological perspective.

Results suggest that students, when forced into situations that required them to explore a new cultural dimension, were able to implicitly use action research models. This led participants to a deeper appreciation of their own national culture (predominantly Russian) and a more nuanced approach to considering novel cross‐cultural contexts.

Lack of experimental controls, pre‐ and post‐testing, and limited sample size all tend to limit the generalizability of the findings. Initial findings, however, do suggest that deeper explorations of national culture might reduce stereotyping.

Limited engagement and stereotyping are often associated with teaching cross‐cultural management. Action research, as a course drive, potentially increases engagement, forces deeper consideration, and allows participants to reflect on their own cross‐cultural experiences. The use of action research may be useful in college‐level programs, study abroad situations, and vocational or institutional cross‐cultural training.

This study argues for more dynamic ways of teaching cross‐cultural competencies. It seeks to move students beyond stereotyping to a more authentic consideration of dealing across national culture boundaries.

This research explores the existence of consideration sets as a marketing universal by evaluating consideration set sizes for a shopping good in a cross‐cultural context. Previous studies of marketing universals investigated consumers’ use of product quality signals for shopping goods. This study used two operational definitions of a consideration set and found that both the average number of brands considered and the number of brands tried on were statistically equal for two matched samples in different cultures, supporting the status of consideration sets as a marketing universal.

The aim of this article is to address some aspects of a cross-cultural interview study conducted in a PhD research project. This is done by reflecting on and discussing the influence of language and culture on the research process, as experienced by the researcher.

The experiences have been taken from an interview study with fifteen American participants in which the researchers were Norwegian. The interviews were conducted in English.

By offering insights into experiences of the research process in a cross-cultural interview study, the article connects the discussion to the concepts of positionality and reflexivity. These concepts are found to be especially relevant when managing differences between the researcher and participants in cross-cultural studies, and for improving the trustworthiness of the research.

The experiences and reflections discussed in the article may be useful to other researchers in similar (cross-cultural) research contexts and situations.

This article has been inspired by the experience of conducting research in a second language and in a different country. By drawing on a researcher’s point of view, this article reflects on these aspects when working as a visiting researcher doing international research.

Methodological consistency and rigour continue to be remaining challenges in cross‐cultural research. Scholars need to reach a degree of standardization in the choice and application of research methods in conducting research across national and cultural boundaries. Seeks to propose a general framework for conducting cross‐cultural research and to demonstrate the use of such a framework to a specific research domain ‐ global sourcing activities. In the process reviews the existing empirical work in global sourcing and illustrates the application of appropriate research procedures.

The purpose of this case study is to provide an opportunity for students to conduct realistic business analysis applying subject material related to cross‐cultural issues presented in the international business and international management courses.

The hypothetical case study requires students to participate in a complex international business negotiation while treating cross‐cultural issues. Two profiled hypothetical companies are negotiating to transport product from Japan to the USA. Negotiation issues are identified and national cultural considerations are emphasized.

The case reflects refinements based upon its use during the past few years. Students are provided a realistic experiential exercise. Student feedback indicates a heightened sensitivity to cross‐cultural considerations and business negotiation skills that transcends their assigned textbook readings and traditional testing.

As with any classroom exercise, differences do exist with “real‐world” business practice. Students do not fully appreciate the pressures and tensions experienced by business professionals with respect to selecting a particular revenue stream from a series of potential revenue streams and resource limitations constraining managerial decision making.

The case study provides an experiential exercise for students to apply theories and concepts learned from the textbook and the instructor's lectures.

The case study offers a complex view of the myriad of cross‐cultural considerations inherent in an international business negotiation. The case study provides value to the instructor and the students as it reinforces discipline theories and concepts in a meaningful way creating an active learning environment fostering academic excellence.