Effective Intercultural Workgroup Communication Theory

Key Concepts

The theory includes three broad inputs in culturally diverse workgroups: contextual factors, group composition, and cultural-individual factors. Contextual factors include the following: (a) a history of unresolved conflict among cultural or ethnic groups (e.g., the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians); (b) in-group-out-group balance (i.e., the number of group members from each cultural group); (c) cooperative versus competitive tasks (i.e., does the task require collaboration among members or encourage members to work for their own interests?); and (d) status differences among members (e.g., boss and employee). Essentially, each of these four factors is a condition that helps or hinders the creation of a common identity in a culturally diverse workgroup. Group composition is the degree of cultural diversity (or similarity) in the group and ranges from homogeneous to heterogeneous. Cultural-individual factors are the values and identities that individual group members have. The primary cultural value difference considered is variability of individualism and collectivism. Individualism is a social pattern that consists of loosely linked individuals who view themselves as independent of collectives and who give priority to their personal goals over the goals of others, while collectivism is a social pattern consisting of closely linked individuals who see themselves as part of one or more collectives (family, coworkers, tribe, nation) and are willing to give priority to the goals of these collectives over their own personal goals.

[Page 328]Processes refer to the communication among members of a workgroup. The theory distinguishes between effective and ineffective communication. Effective communication consists of four workgroup behaviors: equal participation, consensus decision making, cooperative conflict, and respectful communication. These four behaviors are culturally appropriate in that they relate to both task and relational aspects. Outcomes are the work output of the group and/or the relationships of the members and include such factors as decisions, solutions, creative ideas, satisfaction of members, and cohesion among members. Outcomes are categorized as either task (e.g., decision, solutions, and plans) or relational (e.g., satisfaction and cohesion).

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