Free «Preparing for Global Leadership» Essay Paper

It may be very difficult to work in a diverse teamdue to differences among team members. They may share different cultural values which are likely to influence their vision, performance, and working style. That is why it is extremely important to be able to develop effective communication strategies which would work well with diverse people as well as understand and use cultural assessment tools in order to make the workers perform in the best way possible. The purpose of this paper is to determine the behaviour of a global leader in a diverse team in order to suggest an effective leadership and work organization.

In a situation when the consultant has to lead and organize an international team, he or she has to take many cultural characteristics of team members into consideration. Cultural assessment tools such as surveys, discussions, and events in this case are very important, because they enable a consultant to use information about cultural background for the team’s advantage. When leading a team consisting of German, Greek, Iran, and Singapore workers, it is important to evaluate their cultural characteristics. Cultural assessment tools in this case are surveys (such as The Denison Organizational Culture Survey which calculates the culture score of the organization), communication, and the GLOBE data provided. The company can also use various questionaries such as Human Factors Organization Culture Questionnaire in order to understand its employees better. Nevertheless, with the GLOBE data, it is possible to see the differences between the employees. A consultant at first could be easily mistaken if he or she thought that Greek and German employees would have more in common with each other than with the employees from Iran or Singapore, because they come from Europe. Nevertheless, the data provided show that despite geographic closeness or far distance, the differences between employees are very unique and refer to their own cultures. That is why it is important to recognize the differences and speak about them.

The analysis of the group of international workers shows the cultural gaps which exist in the group. For instance, it is clear that an employee from Singapore has the greatest level of future orientation. It means that he or she will be looking from a bigger perspective and be eager to see the future development or possibilities coming from the project he or she is completing. Greeks, on the other hand, will not be as future-oriented as their international colleagues; thus, their vision will be very different which may affect their working relations with employees from Singapore. It is also important to note that Americans who will be working with the people from different countries will have their unique characteristics and approaches which will have to be taken into consideration. It is very important to be able to integrate people from different cultures into one working place effectively so that they will be able to share the same vision despite the initial differences among them (Groves, & Feyerherm, 2011).

It is very important to speak about global leadership in the multi-cultural environment. Global leadership means the ability to lead people with different backgrounds. Thus, the leader has to adapt his or her style in such a way that it meets cultural and social expectations of the members of the team. In this case, the main focus will be on communication. It is essential to communicate with various people representing the US, Germany, Greece, Iran, and Singapore. These people have many differences; however, despite that, there are more things in common that are seen from the first glance. As a result, it is essential to establish healthy communication among workers so that they are able to exchange ideas and expectations as well as share their own cultural characteristics (Story, & Barbuto, 2011). This will make all of the employees more aware of the backgrounds of their colleagues, so they will be more understanding and cooperative.

The fact that the team will consist of so many different people will influence one’s leadership, because a person will greatly care about cultural recognition. It means that the employees will be able to speak up about their cultures, organize holidays for the company in order to raise awareness, and there may be a possibility of culture exchange days as long as a leader establishes a culture where diversity is respected and appreciated. Nevertheless, despite such cultural tolerance, the company will also develop a set of rules which everybody will have to follow. These rules will not be connected to the culture, but the performance and the working process. With making the rules mandatory for everyone, workers will see that every employee is equal, but the company still recognizes cultural diversity.

Another technique in the global leadership process within a team will concern team building (Muethei, & Hoegl, 2010). Employees will be encouraged to speak up about their cultures, but that will take place in informal situations organized by the company’s leaders/officials. It means that the company will demonstrate its interest in the workers by showing them that it is willing to spend time and money as well as put a significant effort in order to get to know its employees better (Chin, 2010).

Also, taking into consideration the special characteristics of each nation represented, there will be special accommodations. For instance, with collectivism being the highest in Singapore, employees from Singapore will be given tasks which require more cooperation while Greek employees with the least level of collectivism will be working on the tasks which are more individual and independent. Greeks, being the most assertive, will be given the challenging assignments while employees from Iran will be working on tasks which require communication with many people such as customers because of their human orientation.