Cultural Competence and Human Resource Management Essay

Cultural Competence in Organizations

Cultural competence is the interaction of different individuals of different cultures, social and economic backgrounds, in business organizations, government agencies, non-profit organizations and human resource departments. It incorporates four essential and fundamental concepts: consciousness of perception on culture, differences attitude regarding culture, information on cultural practices and perception and skills regarding cross-culture.

Cultural competence is the interaction of different individuals of different cultures, social and economic backgrounds, in business organizations, government agencies, non-profit organizations and human resource departments. It incorporates four essential and fundamental concepts: consciousness of perception on culture, differences attitude regarding culture, information on cultural practices and perception and skills regarding cross-culture. The development of cultural competence can assist in ensuring that people of different culture can effectively interact, understand and communicate with one another.

Background

In order to understand the concept of cultural competence, it is essential to understand the word culture. Culture is defined as the traditions, customs, language, values and norms that group of individuals share and live together in one community in order to interact with one another. In simple terms, it is considered to be the pattern of behavior of individuals, which incorporates communication, interaction, interpersonal relationships, beliefs and values. Cultural competence is associated with diversity as well as the communication and interaction within the organization (Goodman, 2012). The Hainan Incident is an important incident that occurred between China and United States and it is essential in understanding the significance of cross-culture and cultural competence in resolving conflicts. The incident started with in 2001, when a U.S. surveillance plane entered Chinese land and two Chinese jetfighters had been sent.

The U.S. plane was damaged and had to make an emergency landing and 24 American crews were detained. Negotiations between the Chinese and Americans sides were successful as the 24 members of U.S. crew were freed. Both of the sides had their "diplomatic victories" (Huang & Bedford, 2009). According to Huang & Beford (2009), "The effective image (or face) restoration (Benoit, 1995) and crisis communication strategies that were employed took into consideration the Chinese rhetorical characteristics that allowed a face-saving mechanism and led to the eventual resolution of the diplomatic crisis.Cultural factors indeed play a significant role in crisis management and should be considered integral components of crisis communicative strategy" (574). In terms of organizations and academic settings, cultural competence can assist in resolving conflicts.

Role of Cultural Competence in Organizations

The role of cultural competence in terms of organizations and academic settings is to understand the diverse culture. Cultural competence can assist in forming congruent policies that can be applied in cross cultural settings in order to allow professionals to work together as global teams and to resolve conflicts through understanding one another's culture (Xue&Zhong, 2012). The goal of cultural competence is to ensure that business organizations formulate and establish such values and principles that are integrated to form a unique organizational cultural and where people of different cultures work together in order to create a positive organizational culture.

Cultural competence allows organizations to apply skills based on knowledge in order to ensure that global team building is incorporated. Furthermore, it requires to create an awareness on personal perception of the culture. This can only be achieved through the development of global mindset. The first essential aspect of cultural competence is virtual communication. Virtual communication can be done through emails, chats and social media and can easily be understood. Therefore, it is essential that communication is strong between global teams (Goodman, 2012). Cultural competence also promotes team building, global leadership development, new business opportunities and profitability and applying knowledge.

Cultural Competence and Future Policy

Cultural competence can have a significant on influencing and devising future policies of the organization. It allows the organization to devise a conflict management resolution through which conflicts can be easily resolved. Furthermore, it can allow the organization to formulate strong business policies and strategies, which can allow it to expand its….....