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In a study of 200 business executives in the US, global management company Accenture found that two thirds of respondents had experienced miscommunication issues within their outsourcing operations.
Among the companies in the US that offer cross-cultural training, however, this figure was marginally lower at 60 per cent.
Accenture questioned the executives on the main factors causing problems in the outsourcing relationship and the vast majority pointed to different communication styles between onshore and offshore workers.
Around half also cited different approaches to completing tasks while a significant number had encountered different attitudes towards conflict and decision-making.
Kris Wadia, a senior executive with Accenture, said: “The soft issues, particularly cross-cultural communication, will continue to present the main challenges to realising global sourcing’s full potential for the foreseeable future.”
While offshore outsourcing remains a popular strategy with large corporations, a growing number of small and medium-sized businesses are instead choosing to outsource IT support and other business processes to onshore providers.
2 Comments Add your own
1. Ian Ippolito | February 2nd, 2007 at 11:48 pm
One prominent cultural clash I’ve seen is when a buyer in the U.S. asks a coder in India, “how is it going”. The coder almost always says fine…because that is what is expected culturally. If the U.S. buyer doesn’t probe deeper, they’ll never discover if something is wrong. It’s important to be educated on such differences.
Sincerely,
Ian Ippolito
2. AV | February 24th, 2007 at 5:19 am
Every large culture has sub-cultures and it breaks down to the level of family culture. It is useless to believe that people around the world will change their beliefs and values because some work is outsourced to them. It is unfair to expect it. Our western partners in offshoring business are looking only advantages without a desire to make an adjustment to the needs of another partner. Why don’t they understand that world is different. I wonder if someone did any research to identify cultural or communication issues between south and north states of America; or within Europe. If a french man can be different from German man culturally then why it is expected that an Indian should not be different from an American.
If one wants to reap the benefits of offshoring then better one should learn to be flexible, and adaptable to other cultures. It is for both partners. Changes has to come from both side.
Sincerely,
AV
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