Multicultural Team Management in the Context of a Development Work

Molla Mekonnen Alemu

doi:10.5539/jsd.v9n1p8

Abstract

Diverse teams have become common practice in today’s world. The current trend of globalization is making managers to work in a diverse multicultural team set up whereby the diversified team members will come up with a new set of skills, ideas, approaches, etc. to the team. It has however, its own challenges in harmonizing the contribution of the culturally diverse team members. Cross-cultural differences in a development work context also entail a range of issues varying from individuals cultural background, characteristics on work places, to their own values and ways of doing things which will have a its own influence on their working style, interactions and relationships at work places. Communication styles, language, a person's cultural background, and perceptions on conflict, styles and methods of doing the work as well as the style of decision making will have an impact how individuals will act and behave in work places. Therefore, the question will be how a manager can successfully lead and work in a culturally diverse team. This study was conducted in Sierra Leone which was aimed at identifying the major bottlenecks of multicultural team management and come up with workable tips for working within a multicultural setting development work.

Highlights

The present day work environments have moved away from the monochromic office set-ups to the one that is decorated by members of a team gathered from different parts of the globe
The current trend of globalization is making managers to work in a diverse multicultural team set up whereby the diversified team members will come up with a new set of skills, ideas, approaches, etc. to the team
This study was conducted in Sierra Leone which was aimed at identifying the major bottlenecks of multicultural team management and come up with workable tips for working within a multicultural setting development work

Summary

Introduction

The present day work environments have moved away from the monochromic office set-ups to the one that is decorated by members of a team gathered from different parts of the globe. The widely used characterization of cultural diversity include racial, sexual, organizational, professional, and national heterogeneity. Cultural diversity is here defined as heterogeneity of national cultures of team members; whereby an individual’s national culture is considered to be that of his or her country of residence. Two important frameworks of cultural dimensions are those of Hall and Hofstede These define culture according to a small number of dimensions, in which each culture varies, but neither of the frameworks seems sufficient to capture the complexity of culture (Hall, 1983; Hofstede, 1991; Pnina, 2008). According to Guirdham (1999), diversity denotes to people from various groups such as gender, religious groups, younger and older groups of people, ethnicity and nationality etc

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