The effectiveness of guideline to improve intercultural sensitivity in cross-cultural management

Abstract

This study employed Kolb’s experiential learning cycle to investigate whether experiential learning could gain effective results via cross-cultural management theories in teaching and learning. Data from experts was collected to design a teaching program, which was then implemented with the Intercultural Senility Scale to compare between the experimental and control groups using a quasi-experiment research design. Finally, using a focus group discussion, the experts’ opinions were collected for an effective guideline development. The results revealed in the proposed teaching program that elements of the experiential learning such as curricular, teaching environments, and teaching pedagogies should be taken into account by educational stakeholders. The implementation of the teaching program found to have made a positive effect and suggested that a recommended guideline for various stakeholders should make full use of formal, non-formal, and informal learning. Formal education is effective in conceptualizing abstract values and assumptions for explicit culture, while non-formal and informal education are effective in gaining experiences for implicit culture, which then becomes a base for forming abstract values and assumptions.