6.1 Cultures, Subcultures, and Organizational Socialization

On page 75 of the textbook the author claims that "when we visit other countries for the first time, however, we notice details of the environment and behavior because they are not familiar or customary. We are strangers and suddenly aware of differences and similarities."
I directly relate this passage to my own life. Before moving to America, I visited it twice. I got to know the most famous tourist places in California, and I went back home assured that my life would completely change, given that everything was unfamiliar to me.

All of a sudden I realized that I would not be single anymore, and I would not be physically close to my family & relatives. In addition to that, I would need to get used to a new language, culture, food, friends, job, and so forth. Gee, my whole life would change! I finally moved to the U.S., and I do not have regrets. I would do all over again if necessary. It is amazing how much I grew with so many changes.

Moving to a foreign country is very exciting, but people always have lots of unanswered questions in their minds prior, during, and after the fact, due to everything they gain and lose along the process. At some point new circumstances create awareness and confirmation that human beings always take things for granted. "We suddenly see what we took for granted in a new light."

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5.5 Research Project – part II

After thinking carefully about the direction that my partner and I will give to our Research Project, I realized how huge our theme (Global Business Communication) is. We will rely on good peer-reviewed journal articles and some books to substantiate our work.

The most important part of this project appears to be the preliminaries. While doing the readings, we will need to restrict it to how Business Communication is in determined countries. I like the idea of focusing it on Brazil, China, and United States.

Additional aspects, such as how power is perceived between managers and subordinates, how technologies connect people cross-cultures, how English appears to be predominant to other languages, are very appealing. Although we feel tempted to include these additional aspects in our project, we need to keep our area of interest very clear in our minds. Doing so, we will be able to clearly convey Global Business Communication in our website.

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5.4 Research Project – part I

My initial idea for this Research Project was to focus on Business Ethics; my project partner, on the other hand, came up with the topic Global Business Communication. After discussing about both themes, most likely we will focus our project on Global Business Communication – reinforcing diversity as key element on this process.

In addition to verbal and nonverbal communication, appropriate business conduct, how diversity impacts Global Business Communication, we might illustrate how this dynamic process called Global Communication is performed in other countries. By contrasting how this dynamic occurs in the United States, and in other countries, we believe we will provide an accurate view of this reality.

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5.3 Language & Power

On page 462 of the textbook the author states that “the passive voice masks the decision makers and suggests a neutral air of authority.” On Goldberg, A. et al.’s article, The Meaning of Power, “one obstacle to the study of power and communication has been the elusive nature of power as a concept.”

The following real-life episode is perfect to explain the relationship language & power. Not even a month ago my manager decided to make some arrangements in our group. She sent out an email to the team, informing that everybody on the 4th floor would move to different cubicles. The interesting thing here is that no reasons were provided to justify such change. However, there was no room for inquiries, because she reinforced that we could ask any question we had, except why those changes were happening.

This neutral air of authority employed by my manager has everything to do with power as control. Her warning shut some people up, and frustrated others. Clearly, the decision was made, we were “informed” afterwards, but we still do not know the reason for such unexpected change. And we will probably never know.

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5.2 Label & its implications down the road

On page 444 of the textbook the author explains how we make sense of determined events and how we respond to them makes a big difference. I indeed can illustrate a situation where a label had serious implication down the road.

After getting married I decided to use my husband’s last name (Hasan), and do not use my Brazilian surname (Ribeiro) anymore. One day I was going to Southern California and for some unknown reason, I neither could check-in online, nor I could print my boarding pass in one of those self-service machines at the airport. Then I was informed that my name was in the “Transportation Security Administration’s watch list”, due to its Arabic origin. I can not describe with words my level of frustration with this ridiculous situation. If I am unable to kill even one insect, there is no way I could be considered a threat to anyone.

But anyway, I have been emailing TSA in order to have my name out of this watch list, but so far no response at all. Every time I travel I need to plan to be at the airport much ahead of the time to check-in and print my boarding pass with the attendant’s help. Hence, because someone decided to put the in this category (list) I will suffer the implications of this choice until any wise decision is made.

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5.1 Dimensions of Organizational Messages

The question “When does a message have almost material force?” is indeed meaningful to me. Having lived abroad for almost three years makes me miss my country so much! So every time I visit my family in Brazil I make sure I bring lots of objects that bring me memories from home. For instance, I have some Brazilian flags, flip-flops, T-shirts, CD's, and lots of other little things that I am very proud of showing to other people.

Few months ago I was taken by surprise when I saw a big Brazilian flag outside a store by my house. When I entered the store I found out that they had lots of Brazilian products that I simply adore. The time I spent there was as of I was shopping in Brazil. Seeing so many familiar products – most of them stamped with a little Brazilian flag brought so much happiness to my heart. Hence, seeing my nation’s flag in the United States has always an incredible material force to me.

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4.5 Group decision making and communication

“Look at the checklist!” This is one of the phrases I hear on a daily base where I work at. My job consists of analyzing and imputing data in SAP – HR environment. For every single transaction I process, I need to make sure I am following the checklist. Whenever I need to process an unknown transaction I feel tempted to discuss it with a co-worker, because it is faster. So it frustrates me to hear someone saying “look at the checklist”. It is easier to talk to a co-worker and clarify my questions. But at the end, I know that relying on the checklists is the safest way to go on my job.
I believe that human beings and organizations rely on patterns in order to make decisions. On chapter 3 of textbook Karl Weick suggests that “…what we remember worked for us in previous decisions becomes the frame for viewing the next decision.” Then he adds that organizations perform on the same way: “they use maps from earlier situations in a new situation because that’s the best they can do.” Hence, past experiences provide guidance on the decision making process.

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