the Summary of Intercultural Communication (4)

Intercultural communication skills

Q: What abilities do employers look for from employees about intercultural skills?
A: Understand people from different cultural backgrounds, build trust, demonstrate respect, and speak other languages.

What do employers understand by intercultural skills ?

Descriptor

1. contexts and viewpoints
2. respect
3. settings
4. differences
5. languages
6. ideas and ways of thinking

Why do employers think that intercultural skills are important ?

Benefits:

• earnings
• new clients
• diverse teams
• brand and reputation

Risks:

• loss of clients
• damage to reputation
• team conflict

How do employers evaluate job candidates for intercultural skills ?

• Strong communication (interview and selection)
• Foreign language
• Cultural sensitivity (interview)
• Studying overseas
• Working overseas

The Ritual of Conversation across Cultures

Key Terms Preview

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• absent presence
• conversational initiation
• phatic communion
• conversational preview
• conversational talking points
• conversational feedback
• conversational closing

Introduction

Q: What is absent presence ?
A: A behavior that someone can be here, but also be there, in another world, separate from his or her surroundings, including people.

Q: What should a skilled intercultural communicator know ?
A: When to speak, when to remain silent, and to always stop speaking before the listener stops listening.

Q: What is an important first step when engaging in a conversation ?
A: Being open to others and their differences.

Q: Why discuss the ritual of conversation ?
A: Because it is one of the main ways we interact across cultures and it is ripe for misunderstandings.

Q: What dose the ritual of conversation will allow you to do when examining it ?
A: Consider its components, predict the next turn, anticipate an opening or closing, and beconme a better conversationalist.

Initiation (1st stage)

Q: What does conversational initiation require ?
A: It requires you to be open to interaction.

Q: What does ‘small talk phatic communion’ reinforced ?
A: A idea that there is a degree of ritual across cultures on how we initiate, engage, and conclude conversations.

Preview (2nd stage)

Q: What is conversational preview ?
A: An indication, verbal or nonverbal, of what the conversation is about, both in terms of content and in terms of the relationship.

Talking Points (3rd stage)

Q: What is talking points ?
A: It represents the essential meanings shared in the interaction.

Feedback (4th stage)

Q: What is conversational feedback ?
A: It allows the conversational partners to clarify, restate, or discuss the points of the conversation to arrive a sense of mutual understanding.

Closing (5th stage)

Q: What is conversational closing ?
A: It is a verbal and/or nonverbal exchange where the conversational partners agree to end the interaction.

Q: What are the factors that influence what you say and hou you close a conversation ?
A: Include your relationship and level of familiarity with the person or group. But it is often best to signal your attention to close the conversation clearly to avoid misunderstanding.

Course Notes

Q: Four elements of intercultural communication.(C-VPN)
A:

• Perception
• Verbal Process
• Nonverbal Process
• Contextual Elements

Q: Why do we need to learn intercultural communication ?
A:

1. self-awareness
2. demographic changes
3. ethnocentrism
4. creative problem solving
5. workplace economic globalization
6. global and interpersonal peace respect

Q: What is ethnocentrism ?
A: Tendency to think that our culture is more superior to other.

Q: What is perception ?
A:

• beliefs
• values
• attitudes
• world views
• social organization

Q: What is verbal process ?
A: The ways in which cultures employ symbols to portray things and experiences.

Q: What is nonverbal process ?
A: Shared thoughts and feelings of bodily behavior, time and space.

Q: What is contextual elements ?
A:

• business
• education and health care
• tourism
• personal relationships

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