The value of communication, the most important skill in business

Business environment and culture is different from country to country because of the national culture. Country culture reflect the behaviour and attitude of the people, there are plenty of ways to understand the underlying values, beliefs and assumptions which help to become a successful businessman at everywhere. India is a diverse country where building strong business relationships affectively can be paramount step to conduct business smoothly. Therefore, Mary an Australian woman, highly persuasive to exaggerate her business in India but before going to start business, she need to be carefully examine and refine the business etiquette about Indian business.

Mary, who has an extremely valuable skill to making delicious and spicy food stuff which contain only organic ingredients, her dream to proceed successfully in food business would be possible if she putt effort to makes mutual understanding with business partners and be aware to business structure. It is worth noting that knowledge of business culture can bring golden opportunities for Mary to capture greater area of food market, however miscommunication and misunderstanding occur when the knowledge of business code of conduct do not gain at initial stage.

Due to the increased in globalisation, it is necessary to maintain cross cultural communication Mary has a numerous expectations to expand her business in different culture, although it is not much difficult to put her in the framework of a specific culture. Indian considered that building business relationships play a dominant role to get success. Knowledge of particular business environment and culture is essential to conduct business in better manners. India has been a hierarchical culture for a very long period of time, caste system most popular in different areas in India which make it hard for people to interact with members of caste. Mary should have information how Indian people behave and what are the values, norms they follow.

Indians have huge belief in religion that reflect how people think and act according their norms, there is vast diversity in linguistic system in India as Hindi, Punjabi, Guajarati, Marathi, Bengali and so on. Although, when Mary will meet first time to Mr. Sharma, she should not directly hand shake to him because initially hand shake could be rude for him. While talking with Indian people always avoid violent posture like folding your arms and putting feet on furniture. Another useful tip to communicate effectively that does not use the full name of person, just use the title Mr and surname and it considered polite way to address.

Business culture must need the professional attire such as Indian business people always follow the formal dressing sense, clothing depend on the season such as generally males should have to wear a suit and females do not allowed to wear too short dresses but they can wear business dress. Although, outfit reflects the personality of cultural and sensible nature of the person, Mary has from different culture so she will have to modify herself according to the demand of the situation. Apart from it, the gap between senior to junior can be seen easily, each and every organisation/ business the decision made by top management, even though not junior level employees have a right to being a part of decision making process.

Between members of particular business. There are two ways to communicate within organisation as verbal and non verbal. There are a lot of people in India using the non verbal way to communicate as everybody knows that Indian always uses nods for giving response which do not considered as no or yes . Communicating in different languages create bigger issue while communicating serious problem. Barriers in communication occurs when unable to understand what other saying because of different languages, sometimes one word meaning in different languages is unique to other that change the whole meaning.

First and foremost, it needs to be examining the Hofstede cultural model that proposed the specific theory of business scenario which would be helpful to Mary to look in depth of the cultural and attitude of people regard to overseas businessman.

POWER DISTENCE: It has been stated that India scored 77% in power distance dimension (Hofstede, 2010). This concept is organised based on the hierarchy, the root cause of hierarchy is caste system which prevailing from our elders. For instance, the each and every decision always made by senior members, while junior level members have obligation to respect their decisions and do not put any argue/ question against them. However, the unequal distribution of power has to accept by all the lower level people.

INDIVIDUALISM V/S COLLECTIVISM: According to Hofstede (2010), 48% Indian are emphasis on collectivism, where the group have formed and their interest prevails over the interest of individual and they also stay in that group for whole life. Moreover, kulkarni (2010) stated that the collectivism has a more focus on mutual goals, rights, cooperation and harmony. In this case, Mary should gain the information about how people do work in group effectively.

MASCULINITY V/S FEMININITY: This dimension refer to the distribution of emotional roles in between male /female, femininity refers to equal treatment to both genders such as modest, caring, concerned to quality of life, conflict solve through mutual understanding. While, India gives huge preference to masculine as 56%, it has a male dominant society which pays huge attention to male gender. In some specific traditional areas the female do not have right to go outside and do work. The feminine cultures tend to have democratic but masculine culture prefer to characteristics like authority, assertiveness and success (Jones, 2007: 4).

UNCERTAINTY AVOIDENCE: This situation reflects the tolerance ability of the people, high/low uncertainty avoidance expresses that on what extent society have a patience to be brave and cope up with trouble situation. While, India is considered at low level regards to uncertainty avoidance that 40%, Indian people are free from stress and also having flexible rules and regulation which makes their life enjoyable. Therefore, low uncertainty avoidance societies do not have any stress relates to making laws to minimise the unpredictable worse situation (Hofstede, 2011: 10, Hofmann, 1999).

LONG AND SHORT TERM ORIENTATION: The Indian societies give huge preference to seek long run orientation and also score 51%, moreover they need to be considered to maintain the business at high level and it is required to stability in relationships, mutual understanding and commitment for future expectations (Hofmann, 1999: 24). The societies that are highly persuade the long term orientation might have great economic success which assists to nation to enhance the economic scale upward.

To some up, the whole review reveals that Hofstede model has a big contribution to shows the Indian business culture dimensions effectively as power distances, individualism v/s collectivism and masculinity v/s femininity, uncertainty avoidance, long and short term orientation. Mary has a strongly advise that she should carefully understand the norms and values to get a easy success, therefore she needs to be gained the information how people conduct business in tricky way, she also needs to understand liking or disliking and know the preferences of Indian people. Business etiquettes highly valuable to do business in Indian manners. Indians are very kind hearted to assist or guide you if you having putting efforts to become perfect in Indian business world.

It is highly recommended that Indian culture and business world might be frustrating until we take step toward them. Talented people never lose hope until they get success, Mary has a curiosity to fly over to different business culture but she should make sure that her dream will be fulfil if she is ready to take initial risk at early stage of life over there.