Intercultural Competence

1 Intercultural Competence I am an international business person. Cultural diversity has been the core of my work, interactions, and professional relationships. China forms a substantial basis for my businesses both regarding supplies and the customer market., hence, Asian culture is remarkably predominant in my business interactions and international relationships. However, Chinese cultural orientation is significantly different from Americans' approach to business, competition, relationships, and philanthropic work. For example, the American culture is motivated by capitalism, competition, and the desire to thrive, make profits, and succeed at the personal level, which manifests in community development in the long term. This is contrary to Chinese culture centered on harmony, selflessness, and prioritization of community progression.

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With the evolution of the business world and the transition of China to a global economy, the communist ideology has significantly been challenged, so now, Chinese traders are just as interested as Americans are winning competitions to make profits. Even with this change, I acknowledge my bias toward the Chinese culture of communism, harmony, selflessness, and community wellness to individual prosperity. This has manifested in my biased and prejudicial treatment of Chinese workers relative to American workers.

Assuming that Chinese people prioritize community work and harmony lays the basis for my biased thinking about the Chinese people, including an assumption that the Chinese are willing to work for less than fair wages. For the longest time, I also assumed that the Chinese were an unassimilable culture that was more committed to retaining these social structures and not open to diversity. These biases laid the basis for discriminatory practices against Chinese workers relative to American workers. For example, unlike Americans who lobby for fair wages beyond the minimum wages, I assumed that the Chinese workers would accommodate less pay, allowing my business to make higher profits on international platforms. I also consider the Chinese a closed community that does not celebrate diversity, contrary to the American culture, which is known for diversity. The latter also influences my decisions in the international business space so that I am open to introducing new ideas to Americans and perhaps consider Chinese input in implementing an idea that has already been conceived. The biased perspective of Chinses unassimilable culture also influences my hiring and promotion decisions. For example, I

3 prefer Chinese workers for firms based in China, while I am open to hiring Americans to work in any country.

How I Intend to promote intercultural Competency with Chinese The importance of intercultural competence when working in a global space marked by diverse people cannot be overemphasized. Chen and Starosta (2012) explain intercultural competence as the ability to interact, work and coexist with people with different cultural orientations. It implies the ability to think and act appropriately in the midst of diversity. As an entrepreneur dealing with diverse societies, developing intercultural competence is a significant competitive strategy to thrive in the larger global society. I intended to develop intercultural competence by first nurturing my emotional intelligence skills to allow me to acknowledge, understand, and respect other cultures even when they differ from the American culture. This is in addition to embracing empathetic skills and tolerance of ambiguity marked willingness to accommodate unfamiliar behaviors. This will be enabled by behavioral flexibility, adaptability, and openness to new learning opportunities. Most importantly, I will develop and nurture intercultural competence by embracing rationality and objectivity as opposed to subjectivity, prejudicial thinking, and assumptions. I will achieve this by suspending all biases, being nonjudgment, and treating all communities fairly, notwithstanding the long-standing stereotypes.

The first step in monitoring my ethnocentrisms with the Chinese culture is embracing emotional intelligence and cultural awareness. As aforementioned emotional intelligence is based on the realization that one may not always be accurate and acknowledge others' points of view, cultures, and ideologies, even when one does not necessarily subscribe to them. In this regard, I intend to counter my ethnocentrism with the Chinese by acknowledging and respecting their uniqueness. This also includes the realization that my perception of reality may not always be

4 accurate, and hence being open to their culture and ideologies. I will also counter ethnocentrism relative to the Chinese by practicing empathy to allow me to tolerate and accommodate Chinese in my network without being judgmental. In the context of countering ethnocentrism, empathy and cultural awareness are intertwined. The latter implies being sensitive to the differences between the American ad Chinese cultures. For example, in realizing that Chinese workers value harmony, I will promote a culture of teamwork and collaboration at the workplace to acknowledge Chinese workers' love for harmony.

Embracing cultural relativism is of more importance in monitoring ethnocentrism with the Chinese. Lynch (2019) explains cultural relativism as the idea that a person’s behavior should be interpreted and understood in the context of their culture. Therefore, I will strive to understand Chinese workers' behaviors and practices at the workplace in the context of their culture and avoid attempting to assimilate them. For example, when the Chinese workers request to work with team members from the same culture, I will perceive this as a conservation of their communist culture instead of perceiving such behavior as a compromise of independent thinking that marks the American culture.

My commitment to nurturing cultural competence skills and counter ethnocentrism with Chinese workers will be centered on practicing empathy and upholding the principles of social justice, including integrity, fairness, ad respect for human dignity. Henceforth, similar terms and conditions, including wages, will apply to all workers, notwithstanding their social and cultural orientations. Besides, I am committed to learning about the Chinese culture to foster my cultural awareness, avoid being judgmental and biased and embrace objectivity and inclusivity when interacting with not only Chinese by other diverse societies. This will lay the basis for me to

5 overcome cultural barriers, create and sustain international relationships, and promote globalization and inclusivity.

References Chen, G. M., & Starosta, W. J. (2012). Intercultural communication competence: A synthesis.

In Communication yearbook 19 (pp. 353-383). Routledge.

6 Lynch, W. T. (2019). Between kin selection and cultural relativism: Cultural evolution and the origin of inequality. Perspectives on Science, 27(2), 278-315.