Cultural differences in business and comparison between the American, English and French management style

Résumé du document

Progress in telecommunication and transportation technologies has resulted in unprecedented growth in international trade in general and transatlantic trade (between the European Union and North America) in particular. As a result, Europeans and North Americans often interact to negotiate and implement business agreements. Doing business abroad leads to deal with lots of cross-cultural challenges. Prior to travelling to another country, factors such as differences in etiquette, business practices, negotiation techniques and business protocol must be considered.

And it's compulsory to take these elements into account very seriously to be able to work effectively. I will first present the American, English and French specificities and try to underline the similitarities and the differences. I will then speak about my own little experience about this subject. For North Americans and Europeans, doing business with one another was not that hard. Indeed, European Union and North American countries share common historical and religious roots, and lots of other elements and traits. Unfortunately, the apparent similarities between countries of the European Union and North America mask significant cultural differences.

Extraits

[...] What I could also notice is that. England is a country where equal opportunities at work are a reality. I could see it as people coming from different countries and cultural backgrounds were totally integrated and free to express their religious belongings. The most significant sign is the recruitment process, which is fair and objective, and where legislation is strong against discriminatory criteria of any kind (race, religion, sexuality . ) I believe that the mentality evolved faster than in France on this aspect. [...]

[...] And UK and France both invest a lot to enter the huge American Market, that's why they must understand each other more than never. Second part Now I'll talk about my personal experience. Actually, I achieved my bachelor internship in London last year, in an American company (Cerner). This experience was thus totally different from my previous French professional experiences. I could notice a gap between a big American group and a middle-size French structure where I had been intern few years ago (Micropole-Univers) ; even if they work in a very comparable universe, the computer services industry. [...]

[...] Power Distance, the psychological distance between a manager and his subordinates. The USA fall in the middle of the range while France gets a high position. Certainty, which measures the tolerance that a culture has of risk. It's in the middle once again for the USA, when uncertainty avoidance is high in France. Achievement, which corresponds to the extent to which people focus on tasks or relationships to achieve their professional objectives. Note the difference between the USA and France, in this dimension: which is more relationship-oriented than the USA? [...]

[...] Conclusion We presented and compared three major systems, the American, English and French ones, showing their common and divergent aspects. Among others, we observed that as compared to the USA and the United Kingdom, what we could notice is that France is a much more hierarchical culture with, a strong emphasis on the relationship, valuing long term. In the current context, lots of firms have teams composed of people from different backgrounds, who must collaborate to achieve projects together, like in the Raji case we studied. [...]

[...] The first has been written by Edward T.Hall, famous researcher on this subject, intercultural differences in communication are based on the context, on time and on space: “Understanding between people results from the combination of information and its context. Some cultures have a rich context: these cultures are highly " implicit " ; other cultures valuing communication only when it is very clear in itself are said to be " explicit” or it is said that they have a context” (taken from a web article, First reference). USA is said to be a context culture”, whereas France is known for its “high context” culture. One approach to cultural differences was devised by Dr. [...]