There are different facets to American culture. For the purpose of discussion, five key aspects that are priorities in my life are career, individuality, expression, success and fame. Evaluating using Hofstede’s model of culture, these five priorities are in line with the model’s dimensions of masculinity. Americans aspire to be successful in their career, gain fame and emerge winners. These aspects add to organisation culture as individual employee’s drive for success will in turn result in highly motivated employees who actively contribute towards the organisational success. The Score for individuality dimension is very high in the Americans (The Hofstede Centre, n.d.). This indicates equal rights, liberty, and expression. Liberty and justice for all has been a strong requirement in American societies. Equal rights have been the focus of the government as the communities and societies have a strong preference for it. This cultural dimension has driven the government to develop laws and regulations to ensure employee rights to equality and expression. The organisations also offer the employees equal rights and right for expression based on the related laws and regulations.
Culture is important in communication as it strongly influences how people belonging to a culture interpret a communication. For instance, the way in which nonverbal communication is understood by people varies with the culture they belong to. Culture also influence interpretation of external environment, use of the physical link for communication, defines frame of reference that forms the basis of interpreting a communication message and also the time and space for communication (Gerritsen, n.d.). Assimilation through globalisation has been increasingly leading towards better understanding of others culture and in turn, their communication.
The American culture is inclined towards preference for open communication. This translates to the organisation culture as employees and managers are expected to share information with each other. Level of informal communication is high and people prefer participative leadership style (The Hofstede Centre, n.d.).
Mediated communication is increasingly being used in communications through social media (e.g., email, blogs, Facebook, Skype, and Twitter). This has largely transformed the traditional ways of organisational communication that has been used by companies for ages. Researchers have indicated that mediated communication improves responsiveness and resourcefulness of a communication. It improves speed, convenience, accessibility and cost effectiveness of communication. There are some disadvantages of mediated communication also. Mediated communication can be used by people to hide their identity, impersonate someone else, and avoid face to face interaction.
Mediated communication has made communication easier and faster. With globalisation, organisations have expanded worldwide; the workforce is spread across the globe. Effective communication becomes crucial for better management of the organisation, improve productivity and increase employee engagement. It has helped the companies reduce their cost of communications across the globe, thus making the company’s communication cost effective (Sorenson, et.al., 2000).
Increased use of technology often tends to make the employees overwhelmed. Presently with advancement of technology and improved communication infrastructure has made employees wired in devices and the virtual world of internet. This often tends to increase the stress level of the employees by constantly keeping the employee in tough with the organisational communication; even after the office hours (Sorenson, et.al. 2000). Mediated communication in this way may become intrusive in the employee’s life and affect his work-life balance. Also, the nature of group interaction and grapevine communications have changed considerably by use of mediated communication. Management often finds it difficult to manage such informal communications. Moreover constantly using technological devices can impact the individual’s health. For instance, researchers have found ill effects of constant use of smartphones for more than certain number of hours in a day (Sorenson, et.al., 2000).
References
Gerritsen, M. (n.d.). The role of culture in communication: How knowledge of differences in communication between cultures may be the key to successful intercultural communication. University of Nijmegen, Department of Business Communication Studies.
Sorenson, R, DeBord, G, & Ramirez, I. (2000). Business and Management Communication: A Guide Book. 4th Ed. Prentice Hall.
The Hofstede Centre. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://geert-hofstede.com/united-states.html
