Impact of western culture on Big Box Business Essay

Impact of western culture on Big Box Business - Essay Example The research also analyzes these various situations and proposes recommendations regarding what is and what is not effective, in international expansion, relative to a respect for multicultural values and a sense of being open to new cultures. As shown in the case, a company like Wal-Mart which is expanding overseas must beware of perpetrating a situation which has the capability to be more divisive than unitary, and managers and leaders need to highlight issues of how important it is to examine intercultural communication and its effects on international negotiations. These are significant problems. Differences in language and culture can significantly impact movement towards global expansion of a company, be it Wal-Mart or some other entity. â€Å"Culture-centered approaches use qualitative anthropological approaches to describe a single culture in terms of its ethnology, religion, customs, etc. This approach is suitable when studying a single culture† (Hoffman, 2007). Cultural differences also highlight the need for global research into international markets, as a company like Wal-Mart that enters a foreign market unprepared and unversed in its language, regulations, union procedures, common reimbursement plans, and culture faces many potential difficulties and obstacles. For example, as Hoffman (2007) points out, Chevrolet introduced the Chevy Nova in Latin America without considering that â€Å"no va† means â€Å"does not go† in Spanish, and suffered some amount of embarrassment. Therefore, it is very important for a organization like Wal-Mart to consider differences in language and culture in its global research. The example of the miscommunications in the Wal-Mart case is a good illustration of how U.S. businesses have traditionally run into problems by relying too much on a centralized domestic command structure that does not give sufficient local autonomy for marketing and other operations. This is the same problem that the case mentions