The Cultural Advantage - Book Report/Review Example

He is therefore a recognized authority in the field of cross culture. This paper seeks to review a section, chapter seven, and chapter eight, of Huijser’s book, ‘The cultural advantage, a new model to succeed with global teams.’ The author applies symbolic expressions in his chapter titles to possible captivate readers and absorb them in the chapter contents. He for example applies the term ‘gladiators’ to symbolically refer to experts with special differences. The author also succeeds in exploring his topic in an explicit and understandable way and is consistent in content illustration.

In exploring cultural differences with respect to meetings, Huijser explains that differences emanates from cultural diversity, and influence perception of people’s contributions in meetings and the ultimate influence of such contributions. He explains that culture is the fundamental basis of differences in meetings and the difference begins with definition of a meeting and applicable style across different cultures. Based on an illustrative example of a real life meeting, the author demonstrates four cultural categories and explains their characteristics that influence meetings.

He defines a meeting in “an action oriented culture” as an interaction in which communication is aimed at ‘decision-making’ (Huijser, p. 76). Members of this cultured meeting convey their ideas with the aim of influencing a way to be adopted. The decision in such a meeting that defines an action to be taken is the final task of members of the meeting. The author on the other hand defines a meeting in “a process oriented culture” as a forum for formalizing ideas (Huijser, p. 76). A task based cultured meeting aims at communicating with team members in order familiarize all parties with activities to be undertaken while a duty based culture focuses on the process of implementing a project and conveyed information to each party to the meeting may be different.

Huijser applies these ideas to demonstrate that Cultural differences establish grounds for misunderstandings and disappointments in meetings (Huijser, p. 79). The author’s gradually explorative presentation then explains how these cultural differences influence outcomes of meetings and recommends an understanding of other represented cultures in a meeting for a successful participation. Once other cultures are understood, changing “behavior and communication” is necessary for effective input (Huijser, p. 80). This is particularly because each of the cultures can incorporate another if a proper understanding is developed.

Leaders from a task driven perspective and those from ‘process-based’ cultures can for example easily develop an understanding in meetings. The same applies to action and role oriented categories. Huijser also applies established principles such as “golden rule” to support his arguments (Huijser, p. 82). Based on the rule, he argues that people from different cultures are able to overcome communication and cultural barriers for an effective understanding. The core idea, according to the author, for bridging cultural difference that hinders meetings is the “conscious approach” that identifies a person’s culture and those of other members in a meeting.

The approach can facilitate either change in