Cultural Differences and People Management - the Ebola Crisis

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1. Table of contents
2. Introduction
3. A module providing a greater understanding of culture self-awareness, through the process of cultural pluralism
4. Reflecting on the political rights of women in France and Saudi Arabia across the concept of masculine societies
5. Cultural Shock: a concept perceived as a disease, or a learning process of cultural differences?
6. Difficulties to demonstrate high and low context from you culture, but a strong relation with other cultural patterns to help.
7. The importance of rituals, symbols, beliefs when negotiating with the Chinese culture, as example: the meaning of a gift
8. Cross cultural management: the relationship between managers and employees in France compare to Australia.
9. Conclusion
10. References

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According to Schön (1983), reflective practice enables people to involve in a process of continuous learning, by learning from experiences. This reflective report is important for personal development and improvement, by choosing six topics, I will bring together theories/concepts and practice within cultural differences and people management (McBrien, 2007). The main goal was to reflect on the theories/concepts that we have covered during the module, and apply them to personal experiences/thinking, to show what we learned about culture and cultural differences (implying our self and others on the assessment of values, beliefs, customs, and behaviours). Being aware of those cultural differences will help us to communicate effectively, develop cultural knowledge and skills, and be able to manage efficiently to success when working in multicultural environment (Meyer, 1996).

        Firstly, I decided to focus on the overall learning of the module, what he brought me, more especially on the fact that it helped us to be aware of our own culture, and I will develop the concept of cultural pluralism or “mosaic of culture. Secondly, I compared on the position of women in France (my own country) and Saudi Arabia, with a political approach, by demonstrating the evolution of the society, and liaised with the theory of masculine societies. Indeed, I feel concerned by the rights of women, so it was relevant and important for me, to address the issue. Thirdly, reflecting on cultural shock was interesting, because of the complexity of the concept, and I challenged myself by asking me “Is cultural shock a disease model or a learning process?” The topic four is about high and low context, and the difficulty I had to characterized France, and give examples. In addition, I developed a topic about the Chinese Culture, more especially how it was difficult to negotiate with Chinese, because of the importance of rituals, beliefs, and values of their culture. After that, I took an example of my own experience, which is the meaning of a gift in China. And finally, I reflect on the concept of cross cultural management, and more precisely on the relationship of managers and employees in France and Australia, where I had the opportunity to develop the concept of power distance.