International Journal of Cross Cultural Management › 2013 › 03 › 2-a-cross-cultura… · 02.03.2013 · Extensive research has been done in business relationship building,

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Management International Journal of Cross Cultural

DOI: 10.1177/1470595806070638 2006; 6; 319 International Journal of Cross Cultural Management

Yunxia Zhu, Pieter Nel and Ravi Bhat Relationships

A Cross Cultural Study of Communication Strategies for Building Business

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A Cross Cultural Study ofCommunication Strategies forBuilding Business Relationships

Yunxia ZhuUniversity of Queensland, Australia

Pieter NelUnitec New Zealand

Ravi BhatUnitec New Zealand

ABSTRACT This study aims to explore communication strategies for relationship buildingacross cultures from a linguistic as well as a culture-specific perspective. Specifically, it seesbusiness relationships as part of social capital and compares communication strategies usedto build relationships in sales firms. The research method is based on a discourse analysis ofinterviews with business managers, which also incorporates their success stories. In theanalysis, relationship building is divided into two stages: the initiating stage and themaintaining stage. It has been found that more interpersonal strategies have been employedby Chinese and Indian business managers when initiating a business relationship. Incontrast, the New Zealand and South African managers tend to use more impersonalcommunication strategies to promote public relations. Similar interpersonal communicationstrategies are employed in all the target cultures for maintaining relationships. However, astronger orientation for long-term relationships in the Chinese and Indian cultures has beenidentified. Furthermore, the communication strategies are dynamic in all the countriesinvestigated since they are becoming more and more multicultural and increasinglyglobalized in international business and management.

KEY WORDS • communication strategies • cultural dynamics • impersonal • interpersonal •social capital • success stories

Copyright © 2006 SAGE Publicationswww.sagepublications.com

DOI: 10.1177/1470595806070638

CCM International Journal of

Cross CulturalManagement2006 Vol 6(3): 319–341



Extensive research has been done in businessrelationship building, in particular in thearea of marketing relationship (e.g. Arias,1998; Dwyer et al., 1987). The marketingrelationship is often used as a universal con-cept in the study of business relationship-building, such as with guanxi (connections)(Arias, 1998). In today’s world of globaliza-tion and internationalization of businesses,the marketing relationship is becomingincreasingly important as a means to meetthe marketing needs of sales firms. However,when it comes to establishing specific busi-ness relationships in a particular culture,business people can resort to their own cul-tural values and communication strategies,which may go beyond the area of marketingto include broader social dimensions. Socialcapital theory (e.g. Lin, 2001) can be of rele-vance for exploring these social dimensionsand relevant communication strategies.Existing literature, however, has given littleattention to exploring specific communica-tion strategies for establishing business rela-tionships, and even less has been done from a culture-specific perspective. Interculturaldimensions such as proposed by Hofstede(1991) and Hall (1976) may shed light on theunderstanding of different communicationstrategies used to establish business relation-ships. For example, Grosse (2002) made anattempt to explore relationship building inrelation to communication strategies. Shemainly used intercultural dimensions to com-pare American and Latin American cultures,but these cultural dimensions tend to havethe presumption that all cultures can be categorized by these kinds of polarized differ-ences, thus ignoring the specific communica-tion strategies each culture employs.

This study attempts to go beyond theselimits and employ both intercultural dimen-sions and culture-specific perspectives tocompare communication strategies for build-ing business relationships across New Zealand,Chinese, Indian and South African cultures.These four cultures are chosen for analysis

for the following reasons. First, New Zealandis located in the Asian Pacific region, alongwith China and India, and is also developingclose international trade ties with countries inthis region and this kind of frequent contactrequires further understanding of eachother’s culture. Second, New Zealand has asignificant proportion of immigrants fromChina, India and South Africa, and com-paring and understanding these cultures willshed light on a better understanding betweenthese cultures. Third, South African cultureis included here since it may share some similarities with the New Zealand culture asa multicultural society and it would beinsightful to explore the dynamics and impli-cations for relationship building in a rapidlychanging world. Last but not least, there is apersonal reason to compare these cultures:each of the authors comes from one of thesecultures and all have lived in New Zealandfor at least five years.

Specifically these research questions areproposed:

• What does ‘business relationship’ meanacross cultures?

• What specific communication strategiesdoes each of the target cultures employto initiate business relationships?

• What specific communication strategiesdoes each of the target cultures employto further develop and maintain businessrelationships?

In order to answer these questions, the articlefirst provides some background informationabout each of the target cultures. Second, itdevelops a conceptual framework based onsocial capital and intercultural communica-tion. A particular culture-specific dimensionof exploring the semantics of relationshipbuilding is recommended to complementthese dimensions. The research method isbased on both interviews with business managers and genre analysis of their successstories. The research method section detailsthe data of success stories collected from busi-

International Journal of Cross Cultural Management 6(3)320



ness executives. The fourth section discussesfindings on how these managers, who are alsothe main characters of the success stories,have specifically applied the communicationstrategies to initiate and maintain relation-ships. The article concludes with findings onthe differences between New Zealand andChina, and the implications for understand-ing the dynamics of relationship building.

Conceptual Framework

This section develops a conceptual frame-work for studying communication strategiesof business-relationship building. The dis-cussion also incorporates a culture-specificdimension. According to Bond et al. (2001), itis imperative to have a dual perspective forcomparing cultures.

Relationship Marketing

Relationship marketing (Buchanan andGilles, 1990; Gordon, 1999; Levitt, 1983) is aform of marketing with a strong emphasis onbuilding business relationships with cus-tomers, and it is also a further developmentof marketing, which mainly concentrated onindividual transactions previously. It also seesmarketing as a pervasive approach for doingbusiness and has the potential to form a synthesis between quality management, cus-tomer service management and marketing.Business relationships are often interpretedas a business construct in the light of market-ing relationships (e.g. Arias, 1998; Li andWright, 2000; Yau et al., 2000), which may well reflect the importance of businessorientation in the global economy. Otherresearchers also have made attempts to applyrelationship marketing as a universalapproach for studying guanxi – a controversialissue we will come back to later. In spite of itspopularity and its broader focus than tradi-tional marketing, relationship marketing stillfunctions in the marketing domain and hasmarketing as its core orientation. This limita-tion indicates that relationship marketing

may not be an appropriate approach forstudying customer or business relationshipsthat go beyond the domain of marketing.Thus it is essential to examine business rela-tionship from an even broader perspective,hence the introduction of the concept ofsocial capital.

Social Capital: RelationshipBuilding as a Social Construct

According to Lin (2001: 19), social capital is‘investment in social relations with expectedreturns in the marketplace’. Social capital isinterpreted here as a social asset by virtue ofpeople’s connections in the group of whichthey are a member.

Nahapiet and Ghoshal (1998) definesocial capital as the sum of the actual andpotential resources embedded within, avail-able through, and derived from the networkof relationships possessed by an individual orsocial unit. Putnam (1995: 67) states thatsocial capital represents a social organiza-tion’s ‘networks, norms, and social trust thatfacilitate coordination and cooperation formutual benefit’. Furthermore, Bourdieu(1986) points out that social capital is com-posed of social obligations and connectionsand is linked to possession of a durable network of institutionalized relationships. Allthese definitions incorporate the concept of‘network’. A network can be understood asfirms involved in a long-term relationship,and network relations are also closer andlonger term than market relations (Thorelli,1986: 37), and are likely to facilitate greaterinformation density and a more reliableinformation exchange than markets do(Easton, 1992).

Another relevant concept to networkrelations is relational capital (Bontis, 1998,1999; Bontis and Choo, 2002; Ordóñez dePablos, 2002, 2005), which is also a subset ofsocial capital. Relational capital extends thedefinition of relationship marketing or cus-tomer capital by including both sides of thevalue chain (Ordóñez de Pablos, 2005).

Zhu et al.: A Cross Cultural Study of Communication Strategies 321



Relational capital is thus a broader term thatencompasses these two types of values: thevalue of customer relationships and the valueof relationships with shareholders, govern-ments, and partners of strategic alliances. Inthis way, human capital provides a matrix ofrelationship-building networks. This can beanother valid reason to show why the mar-keting relationship alone cannot explain allthe business network relationships.

In light of the social capital theory, busi-ness relationships should be seen as a socialconstruct since they contribute to the forma-tion of networks or group of memberships. Inaddition, social capital also offers a potentiallink to communication strategies in the arearegarding the way business network relation-ships are specifically established and main-tained in each culture, hence the need tointroduce communication strategies andintercultural dimensions.

Communication Strategies andCulture

This section reviews literature in the area ofinterpersonal communication strategies sincenetworks and business relationships are builtthrough appropriate use of these strategies(Adler et al., 2005; Bolton, 1986; Carlopio etal., 2005). According to Adler et al. (2005),interpersonal communication is character-ized by a high level of personal commitment,while impersonal communication representsa clear detachment from personal feelingsand involvement. The important dimensionsto differentiate interpersonal from imper-sonal communication include uniqueness,replaceability, interdependence, self-disclo-sure and intrinsic rewards. In interpersonalcommunication, one tends to use strategiesthat are unique and irreplaceable to theinteractant. A high level of self-disclosure,such as personal feelings, is also frequentlyinvolved in interpersonal communication.An additional feature of interpersonal com-munication is that it tends to target intrinsicrewards and long-term relationships. The

opposite is true of impersonal communica-tion in all the dimensions just mentioned.

These communication strategies can alsobe seen as related to the intercultural dimen-sions, and people in different cultures resortto different types of communication strate-gies for building business relationships anddeveloping social and relational capital.Specifically these intercultural taxonomiesare seen as relevant: Hofstede’s (1991) powerdistance and individualism/collectivism, andHall’s (1976) high context and low context.These dimensions are chosen because theycan reflect the networking patterns as shownin their definitions. According to Hofstede,power distance (1991) reflects a culture’s attitude towards human inequality. Culturesdiffer in the extent to which they view socialstatus inequality and prefer particular valueorientations regarding the importance of status difference and social hierarchies.Hofstede also divides cultures into a continu-um of individualism and collectivism, andthis dimension reflects the extent to which aculture relies on and has allegiance to the selfor the group. Typical examples of individual-istic cultures are the USA, Australia, NewZealand, South Africa, Scandinavia, Britainand Germany. Typical examples of collec-tivistic cultures are China, India, Japan,Korea, Brazil and Egypt (Gudykunst, 1994;Singer, 1998).

Hall’s (1976) low- and high-context cul-tures are a very important dimension forstudying communication strategies. Low-context cultures tend to communicate in adirect fashion, whereas high-context culturestend to function in an indirect fashion(Gudykunst and Kim, 1997; Samovar andPorter, 1991). In addition, Hall also points to the polychronic nature of high-contextcommunication, which is easily interrupted,whereas low-context communication is characterized by monochronic styles.

It can be inferred that there is a close linkbetween the use of communication strategiesand intercultural dimensions. For example,




in more power-oriented cultures such asIndia and China, people need to applyunique and irreplaceable communicationstrategies to deal with specific relationshipsrelating to power influence when buildingbusiness relationships. Cultures that exhibitless power distance and strong egalitarian-ism, such as New Zealand and South Africa,tend to apply more egalitarian and replace-able communication strategies since theytend to treat everyone as of equal status.

Furthermore, similar inference extends toother cultural dimensions. In collectivisticcultures people tend to exhibit more self-disclosure and use interdependent communi-cation strategies, since group members tendto share their feelings and thoughts with eachother. People from individualistic culturestend to have a lower level of self-disclosureand to view themselves as an independententity for promoting business relationships,such as those shown in marketing relation-ships. Accordingly, these two types of culturealso tend to stress different goals in theircommunication behaviours. Collectivistic cul-tures may target both tangible and intrinsicgoals for business-relationship building. In

contrast, individualistic cultures target main-ly tangible goals such as business transactionsand product promotion in relationship mar-keting. This tendency is also in congruencewith Hall’s (1983) concepts of monochronicand polychronic dimensions. If cultures tendto achieve intrinsic goals in addition to busi-ness transactions in the process of buildingbusiness relationships, they are likely to bepolychronic, which means they focus onachieving multiple goals and performingmore than one task at a time. This discussionis summarized in Table 1.

Table 1 represents a comparison acrossthe four target cultures of possible ways ofdeveloping business networks and relation-ships. However, it is only a static representa-tion of the interrelatedness of communicationstrategies and culture and at least two dimen-sions are missing: culture-specific semanticsand the dynamics of relationship develop-ment. Only relational and social capital theorycan help develop these two dimensions.

On the one hand, it is essential to explorethe meanings of relationship building sharedamong the members of the professional cul-ture – the business managers as in this study.


Table 1 Communication strategies for building business relationships

Cultures

Strategies New Zealand China India South Africa

Uniqueness Social Unique Unique Social

Replaceability Replaceable Irreplaceable Irreplaceable Replaceable

Interdependence Independent Interdependent Interdependent Independent

Disclosure Little Frequent Frequent Little self-disclosure self-disclosure self-disclosure self-disclosure

Intrinsic rewards Tangible goals Both tangible Both tangible Tangible goalsand intrinsic and intrinsic

Monochronic vs. Monochronic Polychronic Polychronic Monochronicpolychronic



In fact, the culture-specific ‘semantics’ refersto the particular definitions each culturetends to offer. Take guanxi as an example.Guanxi can be interpreted in more depth inthe light of Fei’s (1985) work on the Chinesenetworking system as part of social capital.According to Fei, Chinese culture is com-posed of a series of concentric circles with ‘I’and ‘family’ placed at the centre. Subsequentcircles that surround this core circle are com-posed of siblings, classmates and friends.Therefore group membership is the key torelationship building and in order to achievethis, one has to locate oneself somewhereinside the circles.

On the other hand, social capital theoryalso stresses the long-term investment in rela-tional networking as a kind of resource formembers to have access to. An investigationinto communication patterns in each of thedevelopment stages will help in understand-ing the dynamics of networking patterns.Communication strategies should not beseen as something static, even within a par-ticular culture. Instead they should be seen ascontext-related and stage-based in the inter-personal communication processes.

The ‘dynamics of relationships’ thereforespecifically alludes to the stages of a particu-lar business relationship, including the initi-ating stage and the maintaining stage.According to social capital theory, social networks can be maintained for long-termpurposes. Therefore, it is essential to examinethe use of communication strategies for eachstage across cultures. In light of social capitaltheory, this article proposes the followingdimensions to complement the study of com-munication strategies:

• Defining business-relationship buildingfrom a culture-specific perspective

• Exploring the communication strategiesin two stages: the initiating stage and themaintaining stage.

Methodology

The data are drawn and updated from open-ended interviews with business execu-tives of all the target cultures. Fifteen businessmanagers from each culture were inter-viewed, making a total of 60 across the fourcultures. For each country, the interviewswere conducted in between two and threemajor cities. Only European New Zealandersand European South African cultures wereincluded in the discussion. However, we were very much aware of the changing faceof the countries, which probably deservesanother topic of discussion. The interviewresults and the managers’ success stories were transcribed. The interview questionswere composed of three sections in light ofthe dimensions proposed in the conceptualframework. The managers were first asked todefine relationship building in their own language, and then their views on the com-munication strategies in each of the relation-ship-building processes were solicited. As athird task, the managers were invited to pro-vide a success story about how they initiatedand maintained a successful business rela-tionship. Altogether 15 success stories werecollected from each culture, which againmakes the total of 60.

Both interview results and success storiesare analysed using the proposed conceptualframework. The units for analysing the stories were based on social interactionsembedded in the story and the genreapproach is used to identify the interactions.According to Orlikowski and Yates (1994),genre is characterized by its purpose, formand content, which are often used as criteriafor identifying organizational genres such asstories and business documents (Louhiala-Salminen, 1997; Zhu, 2005). Both purposeand content are seen as the major areas forunderstanding the success stories. Contentcan be analysed in the idea unit of moves. Amove is a communicative event which alsorefers to the strategies used in a text, and




form refers to the linguistic features of realiz-ing the moves and purposes (Zhu, 2005).Specifically, the following purposes andmoves are seen as essential for analysis:

• Purposes: Promoting business initiativesvs. establishing other types of relation-ships such as friendship.

• Initiating moves: Communicationstrategies for initiating relationships.

• Maintaining moves: Communicationstrategies to further develop andmaintain relationships.

• End-result moves: Long-term vs. short-term relationships.

In this way, the focus of analysis is placed onthe purposes and content. This focus is alsocongruent with the proposed aim of identi-fying communication strategies as shown earlier in this article.

Introducing Target Cultures

This section introduces the target cultures incomparison. One cannot really comparethem without an adequate understanding ofthe target countries, hence a brief intro-duction to the socioeconomic contexts ofNew Zealand, China, India and South Africafollows. The focus here is on the mainstreambusiness national culture within each coun-try. However, we are also aware of the multicultural contexts in New Zealand andSouth Africa and the paradoxical westernand eastern business influences in China andIndia. Furthermore, other levels of contextssuch as professional and interpersonal cul-tural contexts may also play an importantrole. Detailed attention is given to the differ-ent levels of culture where relevant.

The European New ZealandCulture

New Zealand has witnessed a remarkabletransformation in the last 20 years, both eco-nomically and socially. Muldoon’s Nationalgovernment until 1984 involved itself heavily

in the economy through big spending andinterventionism (King, 2003). After the 1984elections, the Labour government and itsfinance minister Roger Douglas, initiatedmajor economic reforms that brought inderegulation and free competition in manysectors. The business culture was mainly oneof managing and control over monopoliesand an antagonistic attitude towards theworkers. With deregulation and a more openeconomy, managers have evolved towards anupgrading of competitive advantage for NZbusinesses (Enderwick and Akoorie, 1996).On the other hand, New Zealand is a smallcountry and people tend to form friendshipcircles based on cronyism and the ‘old boys’network’ in business dealings.

It needs to be noted that New Zealand isalso known as a bicultural country, where theEuropean New Zealand culture coexists withthe traditional Maori culture. More recentlyimmigrants from various countries, in par-ticular from China, are adding richness tothe existing bicultural context. The multicul-tural context may indicate the potential forthe dynamics of relationship building in NewZealand.

The Chinese Culture

China is an emerging key player in the international market. Since it started itsopen-door policy in 1978, it has witnessedtremendous changes in terms of economicgrowth and international business develop-ment. Western influence, in particular that ofthe market economy, has become a drivingforce for business undertakings. China hasalso gone through a series of reforms in orga-nizational structure. As a result, various typesof business are in practice, including foreign-owned, government-owned, joint venturesand private companies.

In other words, China is caught betweenits age-old cultural tradition and the westerninfluence, and the market economy and traditional family values compromise eachother and exist alongside each other. On the




one hand, marketing practices and businessvalues have been well accepted and havebecome a major trend in Chinese society. On the other hand, Confucian heritage andfamily values are also maintained and re-flected in business practices, although there isnoticeable conflict between these two sets ofvalues. Confucian capitalism may helpdescribe the context. The idea of ‘Confuciancapitalism’ (such as in Yao, 2003) becamewell accepted in the past two decades as aconcept to explain the capitalist developmentin East Asia. This term may not fully capturethe nature of business practice in China, but it more or less reflects the business-relationship building under both westerninfluence and Confucian principles. Both arealso crucial for interpreting and understand-ing the Chinese guanxi.

The Indian Culture

Historically after independence in 1947, Indiahad a command economy with socialisticprinciples. This led to the license raj period inwhich a few politically connected businessesdominated the economy and were virtualmonopolies in their sectors. The Indian econ-omy was closed and even the governmentplayed a major role in the economy via itspublic sector undertakings (PSUs), whichwere controlled by politicians and bureau-crats. In this era, considerable time was spentby senior management on cultivating ‘con-tacts’ within the bureaucracy and political circles.

However in 1991, there was a change indirection with the first tentative steps to eco-nomic liberalization (Ghoshal et al., 2000). In the last decade, new competitive and tech-nologically advanced forces have evolved,forcing senior managers to restructure andface the onslaught of foreign competition.According to Ghoshal et al. (2000), manyIndian managers aspire to internationalizetheir companies. Pearson and Chaterjee(2001) write that this new competitive envi-ronment has inevitably reshaped managers’

expectations and priorities, and in particularthe societal value orientations held by them.

The European South AfricanCulture

South Africa is currently a complex amalgamof several cultures and sub-cultures, but thedominant management practices are, for historical reasons, currently still mainlyEurocentric (Booysen, 2000; Jackson, 1999;Manning, 1997; Nel et al., 2004; Prime,1999). However, after full South Africandemocracy was established in 1994 andNelson Mandela became President, movestoward Afrocentric management gainedmomentum. The cultural constellation of theAfrocentric South African management isdifferent from that of Eurocentric manage-ment in that it reflects high levels of collec-tivism and humane orientation, concern forpeople as well as working for the commongood and respect (Booysen, 2001).

Khoza (2002: 22) proposes the redirectionof business culture in order for the communi-ty concept of business to be pursued. Booysen(2000: 1) states that the face of South Africanmanagement is becoming more diverse andinclusive of all race groups, which poses achallenge to the dominant Eurocentricapproach. This view also echoes otherresearchers’ findings (e.g. Booysen, 2000;Khoza, 2002). For example, in summarizingthe current business management culture inSouth Africa, Dadoo et al. (2001: 130) state:‘Up to now, business has been done accordingto Western styles of management. Presently,even Africans in senior management posi-tions tend to adopt them. But in future, SouthAfrica could develop its own style of businessdue to the meaningful interaction occurringamong different people.’

Defining BusinessRelationship Building

This section provides a culture-specific per-spective, and relationship building is defined




by managers in the respective languages ofthe target cultures.

To New Zealand business managers, rela-tionship building was a critical exercise inorder to achieve business goals. The termsthat emerged in the interviews for relation-ship building were ‘competition’, ‘marketingrelationships’, and ‘business mates’. There isa clear focus on the business orientation.However, the small size of the economy andpopulation may account for the tradition ofconducting business via referrals or ‘mates’,even though New Zealand is predominantlyan individualistic society of Anglo-Saxonheritage (Enderwick and Akoorie, 1996). Thisseemingly contradictory approach could bedue to the history of earlier pioneering farm-ing settlers who helped and were dependenton each other; it is, thereby, a clear focus oncommunity.

The community focus could also be related to the influence from the biculturaland multicultural environment in New Zealand.The managers were aware of the influencefrom the Maori culture, as Maoris wereknown to be the earliest settlers in NewZealand. For example, whanau or family is arelevant term defining relationships in theMaori language. In the Maori culture, rela-tionships, which also include business rela-tionships, are built around the concept ofwhauau with an emphasis on community support for individuals. In the past 20 years,immigrants from all parts of the world, in particular from China and India, also beganto settle in New Zealand, which may also contribute to an increasing emphasis on community-based networks.

In mainland China, guanxi is the Chineseword for relationship. Literally it means apersonal bond or connection. According tothe Chinese business managers, it had amuch broader social and cultural constructthan the utilitarian concept. Specifically, theyemphasized these terms for relationshipbuilding: jiao pengyou (making friends), jianli

ganqing (developing connection of feeling

between people), and yanxuxing touzi xingwei

(continual investment behaviour). They alsoindicated that the action word for developingguanxi should be ‘jianli’ (establish) guanxi, andshould not be ‘la’ (forcing or using dishonestmeans) whanau as sometimes people misinter-pret it. The former is to develop relationshipsbased on reciprocal respect, friendship, effortand continued contribution. The latter isoften to do with bribery, doing favours orusing power to influence in dishonest ways.However, the Chinese managers also stressedthe importance of achieving business objec-tives in the process of developing guanxi, andthey believed that guanxi can help realizethese objectives if it is developed and main-tained healthily.

Their views validate the business values,Confucian relationship principles and Fei’s(1985) interpretation of guanxi discussed earlier. The business managers’ comments,however, seemed to go beyond Fei’s theoryto include more dimensions. A clear empha-sis was placed on friendship, trust, honesty,reciprocity and care, without which guanxi

could not be achieved successfully.In addition, Chinese managers’ definition

of guanxi seems to have a broader perspectivethan some of the existing research findings,which tend to focus on a pejorative and utili-tarian connotation to mean using someone’sinfluence and authority to obtain favours andpolitical and economic benefits (e.g. Hwang,1987; Luo, 1997; Yang, 1994).

Indian interviewees used two key words,jan pehchan and sambandh, to define the con-cept of business-relationship building inNorthern India. The Hindi term jan pehchan

essentially means ‘who you know’ and re-inforces the criticality of ‘familiarity’ and‘right connections’ as a means of furtheringone’s business interests. Sambandh means afirm bond developed from the right connec-tions and also has the emotional connotationof a long-term tie, which indicates a simi-larity with the Chinese guanxi. This kind ofinterpersonal bond was particularly true in




the old closed economy. On the other hand,the interviewees also stressed the inter-relatedness of jan pehchan and ‘professional-ism’, which is indicative of the current opencompetitive business environment sweepingIndia.

The South African interviewees indicatedthat relationship building in South Africa was attained by mutual understanding ofwhat was important to a business and to thebenefit of all stakeholders. One intervieweeexpressed it as ‘a concerted effort by differentparties to establish a foundation whereuponthey can all co-exist in peace and harmony’.As noted earlier, alongside the dominantEurocentric business orientation, coexists theAfrocentric South African culture. The wordthat can be used to summarize building rela-tionships for the latter is ubuntu, meaning ‘aperson is a person through other humanbeings’, according to Khoza (2002: 22). Withthis concept, it is suggested that the com-munity concept of management cultureshould be enhanced by the concept of ubuntu.According to Mbigi (1997), ubuntu also meansthat there should be supportiveness, cooper-ation and solidarity; that is, communalism.The interviewees were also quite aware of theinfluence of this concept when emphasizingthe importance of business orientations.

These business managers’ definitions maywell underpin their strategies for buildingrelationships and are used as an underlyingguideline for analysing and understandingbusiness relationships.

Communication Strategiesfor Relationship Building

This section discusses findings from the inter-views with the business managers in light of the conceptual framework. Specifically,relationship building is discussed in both the initiating stage and the developmentstage. Relevant intercultural dimensions arealluded to in these stages as well.

Communication Strategies:European New Zealand Culture

The New Zealand managers to a large extentindicated that the marketing relationshipcaptured the nature of business relationshipsthroughout the relationship-building pro-cesses.

Stage 1: Initiating business relationshipsNew Zealand is one of the individualistic cultures, and many of the features describedin Table 1, such as a tendency to use imper-sonal strategies for initiating relationships,apply here. The business managers inter-viewed noted that they frequently used semi-nars and public meetings to solicit initialinterest in their business proposals. They further noted that these seminars were no-obligation meetings that focused on the market needs. As one manager commented,‘It is a matter of finding the potential partnerwho may share common interest with us.’ Itcan be seen from this that independence isemphasized in the communication processesof initiating relationships.

New Zealand is also characterized by theegalitarian approach and a low power dis-tance is paramount (Enderwick and Akoorie,1996). This view is further illustrated by the‘tall poppy syndrome’, which discouragesindividuals from standing out as achievers.Accordingly most of the managers inter-viewed talked about using an informal‘mates’ approach to communicating with alllevels of the social hierarchy. To them, whatwas more important was an understandingthat the potential business partner would bereliable and trustworthy – a social approachto apply to all they interact with.

Stage 2: Maintaining business relation-ships Once the potential customer wasidentified, they would follow up and main-tain it on a one-to-one ‘mate’ basis andachieve their business objectives. Note thattheir communication strategies shifted from




impersonal to a more interpersonal styleonce their relationships became more spe-cific. The managers’ orientation towardsbusiness meetings and time usage was mono-chronic as would be expected from Hall’s(1976) definition of low-context cultures. Therelationships, according to the interviewees,could be either long term or short term,depending on how the objectives wereachieved. For example, the interviewees indicated that they could keep in contactwith clients over the long term because mostpeople knew each other in the same industry.However, if an opportunistic situation offereditself, they could also develop a short-termrelationship. Their attitudes towards rela-tionship development with clients seem to bequite flexible and they are ready to acceptand adapt to the relationship pattern.

The interviewees, in general, pointed outthat they preferred direct and clear com-munication in order to reach a ‘win–win’business proposition. However, one inter-viewee mentioned that communication couldalso be indirect and subtle if the relationshipwas likely to evolve and be advantageous inthe long term. This manager’s commentindicates that their communication strategieschange when the business relationshipbecomes more interpersonal.

Communication Strategies: TheChinese Culture

As discussed earlier, China is one of the collectivistic societies (Hofstede, 1991) andthe managers’ views tend to substantiate this tendency. Communication strategies werealso used to achieve social capital of a collec-tive nature. The managers’ views regardingthis are summarized below.

Stage 1: Initiating business relationshipsThe Chinese managers indicated that it wastheir own understanding of guanxi as shownin their definition earlier that underlinedtheir strategies for initiating a business rela-tionship. As one manager commented, guanxi

is about connections and ‘The more you helpothers, the more you’ll get connected withpeople.’ This view further reflects FeiXiaotong’s (1985) view about China being aguanxi-oriented society based on its ownpeculiar social structure, and it also points to a unique way of establishing guanxi inChina, which involves connection of feelingsand reciprocal care, and also contributes tothe development of relationship and socialcapital.

Specific strategies for establishing guanxi

at the initiating stage tend to be indirect andoften through a third person’s introduction.For example, one manager indicated that ifhe wanted to initiate a relationship with apotential client or business partner, he wouldlike to be introduced to that party through afriend who had existing guanxi to both parties.He admitted, however, direct communica-tion to approach the potential client couldalso be a possibility if he did not have anyexisting guanxi. The relationship was built ona one-to-one basis and was special and alsointerdependent as it was regarded as part ofthe guanxi network.

Stage 2: Maintaining business relation-ships With regard to how to maintainrelationships, the Chinese managers admit-ted that they would use different styles basedon how the relationship had developed. Forexample, they tended to be more direct withlong-established guanxi relationships. Theircomments can be interpreted in relation tosocial proximity again. When guanxi wasturned into friendship, the social distanceactually would decrease accordingly and theywould use more direct styles. In other words,their communication style is underpinned byspecific guanxi with the people with whomthey interact, which fits in well with Confu-cian theory and philosophy about relation-ship building (Fei, 1985).

In addition, the Chinese business man-agers preferred a polychronic communica-tion style, which confirmed Hall’s (1983)




claim. The reason for their preference couldbe that they tend to develop a one-to-oneguanxi, and building guanxi with more thanone person sometimes happens simultane-ously.

Chinese business managers agreed thatpower relations play an important role forinitiating guanxi in the Chinese context. In themeantime, they also believed that it wasimportant to understand these power rela-tions in order to use communication strate-gies appropriately. For example, one businessexecutive pointed out that ‘showing an ade-quate level of respect to senior people’ was animportant strategy.

In addition, they also mentioned that itwas important to reduce the power distanceand reach a certain level of proximity as thebusiness relationship developed, which is thesecond stage in relationship building. Soinformal communication styles were seen tobe useful for developing friendships. Onemanager, based on her experience of devel-oping guanxi, even developed a model of turning ‘power or social distance to friend-ship’ as a fundamental principle.

So far the Chinese managers’ views werefound not to be very supportive of Hall’sclaims since most of the managers agreedthat their communication styles were directand they often spoke to the point, and thispreference was particularly true with the typeof guanxi closely intertwined with friendshipin the second stage.

Communication Strategies: TheIndian Culture

Stage 1: Initiating relationships TheIndian business executives preferred high-context communication styles that required asubtle or indirect approach to develop jan

pehchan or knowing the right people for doingbusiness. One way of initiating business rela-tionship was through the ‘old boys’ network’,which relates to well-known colleges and universities. Another facilitator towards rela-tionship building was managers or businesses

coming from common linguistic or regionalbackgrounds. One manager commented thatif one belonged to a certain caste that toogave them access to a network system withsubstantial resources. However, getting con-nected to and accepted by the target castecan be very time consuming and also involverespect for hierarchy and seniority, whichleads to the next cultural dimension of powerdistance (Hofstede, 1991).

During the interview, the Indian man-agers mentioned that the various levels ofhierarchy had to be respected and were animportant consideration in relationship build-ing. The managers usually formed connec-tions horizontally to appropriately match thelevel of hierarchy. For example, a managingdirector ‘connected’ with another CEO orpresident, depending on the title used.

More derivative types of goals wereachieved by the Indian managers, who saythey can continue with their existing businesspartners even after a certain interval of time,and that the ties they had established beforecould be easily renewed and continued witha similar level of trust and intensity.

Stage 2: Maintaining business relation-ships Communication strategies becamemore direct as the relationship developed.The key issue that emerged as underpinningrelationship building in the Indian businessenvironment was trust in light of sambandh orthe firm bond. Accordingly long-term rela-tionships were seen as an essential part ofsocial obligations, which could be extendedto the families of the business contacts. Note the difference from the individualisticcultures such as European New Zealanderswho are flexible with either short- or long-term goals. For example, a few intervieweessaid that attending weddings or other suchpersonal functions was expected of them.

Because of the various obligations involvedin developing relationships, Indian businessexecutives usually exhibit a polychronic orientation (Hall, 1983), with many distrac-




tions and interruptions during meetings, andthis is especially true of the large family-run traditional businesses. However, seniorexecutives working for multinational firmsexpressed a more professional attitude, simi-lar to the low-context communication style ofbeing direct and forthright, which is anotherinstance to indicate the dynamics of relation-ship building in a multicultural or interna-tional context.

Communication Strategies: TheEuropean South African Culture

Stage 1: Initiating business relationshipsThe South African managers pointed outthat the major motivation to establish busi-ness relationships is the need to fulfil a par-ticular business requirement. This responsealso lends support to the individualismdimension. The South African managersvouched for long-term relationships. This isin line with the research of Booysen (2000)who states that future orientation, such as inthe areas of goal setting, planning and alloca-tion of resources, are important for SouthAfrican managers. However, the communi-cation strategies of using direct and clearstyles were seen as part of their long-termrelationships. Note that their long-termstrategies are different from those preferredby the Chinese or Indian business executives.The South African interviewees placed greatemphasis on the importance of building trustto achieve organizational objectives. Theyalso mentioned that if quick payoffs and aone-off situation arose, the relationshipwould be short term only. In-depth relation-ships were, however, less common in build-ing business relations. As one intervieweementioned: ‘The main goal is to achieve thebusiness’ set objectives.’ This comment isonce again characteristic of the Eurocentricmanagement style.

Stage 2: Maintaining business relation-ships Generally speaking, the SouthAfrican business managers preferred direct

and low-context communication, which indi-cates a similarity to the New ZealandEuropean culture. However, when a rela-tionship was developed that was envisaged tobe longer-term, the communication was subtler and less direct. Note the differencefrom the Chinese close proximity for main-taining long-term relationships. In the con-text of E.T. Hall’s style of communication,Prime (1999: 6) states that the Eurocentrictop management uses an explicit style ofcommunication with little reference to thecontextual aspects of communication. Writtencommitments are the only indicators of trustand there is a tendency to depersonalize rela-tionships and focus on the tasks to be done.

Interviewees also claimed that the approachto establish a relationship could vary, mainlyaccording to the business need. Power dis-tance is therefore a less important variable inapplication, which shows a certain level ofdiscrepancy with Hofstede’s power index.This is an indication that the traditionaldimension of power distance being high inbusiness relationships is starting to shift in top management in South Africa. Managers are becoming less focused on maintainingquality and status stratifications, as had pre-viously been the case (Booysen, 2000; Prime,1999). It may be deduced that more partici-pative communication is starting to evolvewhen business contexts are established, suchas those involving multicultural interaction.

As shown in the interview results, signifi-cant differences across the cultures exist inboth stages of relationship building, withmore interpersonal strategies being preferredby the Chinese and Indian cultures, and theopposite is true with the New Zealand andSouth African cultures. Differences are alsoapparent between the two pairs, which canonly be interpreted in more depth from theculture-specific dimension. In addition, theinterview results can only be explained further in light of the semantics of relation-ship building provided by each of the targetcultures, since the cultural dimensions can-




not explain fully the dynamics of business-relationship building, nor can they offer theinsider’s perspective about cultures.

Analysing Success Stories asa Genre

This section analyses the success stories col-lected from the business executives using theproposed conceptual framework, and bothstages of relationships building are examinedhere. First, a breakdown of general findingsfrom the data is summed up in Table 2.

The Purposes

In general, both tangible and intrinsic purposes are identified in the success storiescollected. As shown in Table 2, marketingrelationships with clients are the most impor-

tant purpose for the New Zealand and SouthAfrican cultures, while both interpersonalgoals and business objectives are found in theChinese and Indian cultures. This finding iscongruent with Hofstede’s collective andindividual cultural dimension, and more col-lective goals are in existence in the collectivecultures of China and India.

However, the strategies of achieving similar goals may vary as shown in the dis-cussion of the next section on strategic movesemployed by each culture.

The Initiating Moves

The strategic moves (see Table 2) concurwith those preferred strategies discussed inthe earlier sections of this article: the NewZealanders and South Africans resorted topublic-relation strategies, while the Chinese


Table 2 Breakdown of findings from the success stories

Culture

European European Story genre New Zealand Chinese Indian South African

Purposes Relationship Guanxi and Interpersonal Relationshipmarketing business goals relations and marketing

business goalsInitiating Public seminars One-to-one One-to-one Public seminarsmoves and direct meeting via meeting in a and direct meeting

meetings 3rd person group or directintroduction or meetings (rare)direct meetings (rare)

Maintaining Follow-up Meetings, Meetings, Follow-up meetingsmoves meetings and luncheons, luncheons, and lunches with

social functions family and family and cast- individualswith individuals friends’ activities related activities

End-result Long- and More long-term Long-term Long- and moves short-term than short-term; preferred; short-terms

relationship Guanxi established Relationship relationships andestablished and reinforced established bonds formed

and reinforced



and Indian managers mainly approachedindividuals with irreplaceable interpersonalrelationships. These strategic moves are alsoa further substantiation of the interviewresults with the business executives.

As shown in Table 2, the Chinese managers sometimes also approached thepotential customer or partner directly at thisstage. This direct communication strategycan be related to the cultural dynamics dis-cussed earlier. Under the western influenceof marketing relationships, the Chinese andIndian managers can also resort to a moredirect and open communication style. How-ever, they still prefer a one-to-one interper-sonal relationship.

The Maintaining Moves

Maintaining moves are used to further develop and maintain the relationship. Atthis stage (see Table 2), interpersonal com-munication using self-disclosure is quite common in all the stories collected across thefour cultures. The New Zealand and SouthAfrican managers also switched to inter-personal communication strategies at thisstage. For example, all four cultures tend to have individual meetings and workinglunches to follow up their business goals.However, the Indian and Chinese managerswere found to use even more interpersonalstrategies to further develop their ties withthe clients or partners. This kind of relation-ship also includes further connections withinthe group or cluster they belonged to. Bothcultures tended to be polychronic in commu-nication styles. At this point only the culture-specific perspective can offer a more detailedinterpretation. The Chinese managers inter-act within the guanxi networks, taking care oftheir partners, their family members and theother members connected with the networksystem, which reflects the continuum ofguanxi. The Indian managers functioned alsobeyond the business goals and interactedwith the partners’ family members withintheir network system.

End-result Moves

As a consequence of the different communi-cation strategies employed, the end resultsalso indicated significant differences acrossall four cultures (see Table 2). Most of the stories collected from the New Zealand andSouth African managers tended to focus onone major goal of promoting businesses.More derivative types of relationship such asfriendship were achieved by the Chinese andIndian managers.

However, similarities also exist and eachculture may develop both long- and short-term business relationships. What is moreinteresting is that each culture may have its own preference about this. Business managers in Chinese and Indian culturesappeared to prefer a long-term goal, whilethis was not as strong in the New Zealandand South African cultures. In addition, thecommunication styles in both Chinese andIndian culture in fact became more poly-chromic at this stage as the relationshipspread to the related networks that gobeyond the business relationship between themanager and the partner or customer.

Examples of Success Stories

Among the 15 success stories collected fromeach of the four cultures, one from each cul-ture (see Appendix) is discussed in detail inthis section, with reference being made to thecorpus where relevant. The following fourstories were randomly chosen for illustrationpurposes.

New Zealand Story

As noted earlier, organizing public relationsis an important way of communicating business relationships for the initiating stagein New Zealand. As shown in Mr Frazier’scase, sound relationships have developedfrom these activities, including attendingpublic seminars and approaching potentialclients directly, which is also true of the initi-




ating move in other success stories collectedfrom the interviews. This scenario has con-firmed some of the findings discussed earlier.As already mentioned, the New Zealandinterviewees defined relationship building as building trust and dependability withanother business ‘contact’.

The maintaining move can be analysedin light of the New Zealand manager’s definition relating to ‘business mates’ andkeeping ‘faith’ and the continuity of the rela-tionship. Accordingly, Mr Frazier involveshis client in social activities such as golf tournaments. However, a surprising themeto emerge was that relationship building waslooked at as a long-term exercise (see theend-result move) and not a short-term one as would be expected in an individualisticsociety. This could be related to the commu-nity focus in a small country characterized byboth biculturalism and multiculturalism.

The Chinese Story

This story can be interpreted in light of thecollectivistic dimension, power distance, andthe culture-specific ways of building trust. Aspart of the background of the story, MrChang, the CEO of the telecommunicationssales company, first identifies a need forbuilding a relationship with a brand namecorporation in the electronics industry. Asshown in the initiating move, his way of initi-ating a possible relationship was via a thirdperson who is directly connected to the targetcorporation. In the maintaining moves, their interpersonal relations are also furtherdeveloped, involving both partnership andfriendship. However, each party involvedalso tried to make sure that they had theirown integrity and all the criteria for the collaboration were appropriately met, whichled to an ideal win–win outcome, as shown inthe end-result move. This story demonstratesthat successful relationship building is aprocess intertwining friendship, integrity,trust and long-term relationships.

The Indian Success Story

The Indian success story can be viewed inlight of India being a collectivist society,where the caste-related type of relationship isimportant in creating trust and loyalty.According to Mun, the senior manager, theconcept of the jan pehchan (who you know)aspect of ‘connections’ was critical for bothinitiating and maintaining relationships withdistributors and clients. Mun implies that heinitiated relationships through his old schoolmates, a practice quite similar to guanxi.However, different from guanxi, it stresses theinteraction at the same social status, as shownin this story. The maintaining stage showseven more intensive effort in dealing with hisclients since Mun often emphasizes theimportance of investing in ‘relationship forsuccess’ – a communication strategy thateffectively encapsulates the concept of socialcapital. The extensive maintaining effortshave naturally led to growing trust and loyalty from his clients. This scenario is further substantiation of our findings regard-ing the nature of the Indian economy andbusiness practices. For example, the inter-viewees defined it as being an exercise tobuild the ‘right connections’ for businessdevelopment, and this focus was also preva-lent in other success stories collected from theIndian business executives.

The South African Story

This story is strikingly similar to the Chinesestory in terms of finding an appropriate busi-ness partner in the telecommunicationsindustry. However, the success of an applica-tion is gained through very different commu-nication strategies. In the initiating move, MrOlivia started with clear communication anddirectly approached the marketing managersof Nokia and Motorola without any referralfrom a third person as used in the Chinesecase. Mr Olivia switched to interpersonalcommunication strategies to maintain theserelationships. As shown in the maintaining




move, frequent meetings and social activitiestook place for both parties to communicatein business and also to develop interpersonalties. A great level of harmony and mutualunderstanding is stressed throughout theirrelationship-building process, which can beexplained in the South African managers’definition of relationship building focusingon both business goals and the ubuntu contextas well. As a result they both benefited fromtheir interactions, as shown in the end-resultmove. This is also a significant example toshow how different strategies are used tobuild a long-term business relationshipbetween the Chinese and South African cul-tures.

These four stories offer further substantiationof the interview findings. There is an over-arching theme across all the target cultures:all business managers regarded relationshipbuilding as a process of building trust andreciprocal behaviour. This finding furthersupports our claim that relationship buildingis a social construct rather than simply part ofbusiness or marketing capital. The major difference lies in the initiating stage. Asshown in the New Zealand and SouthAfrican stories, both cultures employed simi-lar strategies relating to public relations topromote business opportunities. In contrast,the Chinese and Indian cultures vouched for the interpersonal relationships to developbusiness relationships.

Significant cultural dynamics can also beidentified throughout the stories. For exam-ple, the New Zealander manager takes anactive part in the ‘old-mate’ networking sys-tem to develop his client base. The Chinesemanager identifies the need for buildingguanxi first in order to achieve business goals.The South African story, using a similarapproach of public relations as in the NewZealand story, offers a glimpse into directand clear communication styles, but at thesame time with the intention of achieving along-term business outcome.

Conclusion

This article developed a feasible conceptualframework for comparing communicationstrategies of building business relationshipsacross cultures from both linguistic and inter-cultural perspectives. Compared to market-ing relationships, social capital theory offers abroader perspective to view business relation-ships as a social construct intertwined withsocial networking activities. Specific defini-tions were used to complement the study ofcommunication strategies, and offered furtherexplanation about why certain communica-tion strategies were employed to build rela-tionships. As shown in the managers’ owndefinitions, relationship building was definedin close relation with the sociocultural andeconomic contexts of each culture. Each ofthe four target cultures also clearly showedcultural dynamics in a changing business and multicultural context, which indicatesthe need to study this topic in a broadersocial dimension.

It has been found that different culturestended to emphasize different values – suchas marketing relationships and ‘old mates’ forthe New Zealand culture, guanxi or friendshipfor the Chinese, jan pehchan or right con-nections for the Indians, and a mixture ofbusiness relationships and utbuntu for SouthAfricans. This further indicates that even ifbusiness managers share similar goals, asshown in the business managers’ views, theystill resort to different communication strate-gies for building and maintaining businessrelationships.

For example, different communicationstrategies were employed for initiating busi-ness relationships: both Chinese and Indianmanagers resorted to interpersonal com-munication strategies such as one-to-onemeetings, while impersonal strategies such asseminars and public meetings were found tobe more frequently used by the New Zealandand South African managers. More similari-ties in communication strategies were identi-




fied across the target cultures in the stage ofmaintaining relationships, and all tended to use more interpersonal communicationstrategies that involved specific communica-tion strategies tailored for the continuation ofthe existing relationship. However, signifi-cant differences were also identified in termsof goal orientations, and more intrinsic goals were found in the Chinese and Indiancultures, which can be seen as the continua-tion of the long-term tendency already inexistence in the initiating stage.

Further differences were also in existencebetween the Chinese and Indian cultures,which can only be explained from the culture-specific perspective. Guanxi and casteare both collectivisitic-based networking systems but they differ in the way people areconnected. In addition, there is no lack of differences in the individualistic cultures.New Zealand managers stressed ‘mates’ aspart of the egalitarian approach, while South African managers placed much moreemphasis on harmony and collaboration.These nuances of differences are crucial forunderstanding what communication strate-gies may be appropriate for each stage of therelationship development.

All these findings have been further sup-ported by the success stories incorporated inthe analysis, which offered an insider’s per-spective into what the business executivesactually did to develop business relationships.In addition, the dynamics of communicationstrategies for relationship building in theglobal and multicultural contexts have alsobeen identified, as summarized in the sectionon success stories. Cultures are dynamic anddeveloping and, in particular, individualisticcultures including New Zealand and SouthAfrica have also applied interpersonal com-munication strategies in order to maintainlonger-term relationships. In India andChina, the dynamics also exist. Changes arealso beginning to take place in China, andboth traditional and modern marketing rela-tionships already exist in India. These

dynamics will continue as the world becomesmore and more globalized. However, the traditional guanxi or jan pehchan won’t go awayovernight since they were deeply rooted inthe respective cultures long before the con-cept of business was ever in practice. Theyare essential for initiating business relation-ships for these cultures. It will be interestingto see how the dynamics develop and whatnew forms of relationship building take placeunder the influence of both traditional andmodern marketing relationships.

The research findings have implicationsfor conducting international business anddoing business across cultures, and also fordeveloping social networking relations ingeneral. In particular, an understanding ofthe differences in the preference of interper-sonal and impersonal communication strate-gies at the initiating stage can help preventpotential intercultural barriers. According toZhu and Sun (2004), intercultural businesscollaborations tend to collapse at the initiat-ing stage. The nuances of differences betweenChinese and Indian cultures and thosebetween New Zealand and South Africancultures also have implications for maintain-ing business relationships. Further research,however, needs to be conducted to see if similar types of preferences also exist in othercultures, more importantly to identify whetherthe cultural dynamics explored in this articlealso apply to other cultures.

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Appendix

New Zealand Success StoryMr Frazier is senior manager for one of the largest law firms in Auckland, which has practising partnersin all the fields of law such as commercial, family, property, and immigration. He felt that there hadbeen a change in business practice from a stage where clients just walked in to the firm to a stage wherethey are actively marketing the firm. One of the key strategies he used was building the client basethrough marketing relationships, and here is his story.

Initiating I regularly organize seminars for our clients to update them on the latest law changes,and mail out newsletters with the goal of keeping the clients informed and the firm’sname at the ‘top of the mind’ for brand recall. In addition, I pay attention to theclient base and organize business and social activities that will enhance business

Maintaining relationships, such as golf tournaments and barbecue evenings. At one such barbequeevening I developed a relationship with a large firm providing family services inAuckland including counselling, property settlements, and arbitration. I made it apoint to lunch with them regularly and even became ‘mates’ with some of the man-agers and attended their family functions.

End-result This in turn generated a lot of business referrals to my law firm, which I feel was awin–win situation for all concerned.



The Chinese StoryMr Chang Mingde is CEO of a Chinese telecommunications firm selling mobile phones and othertelecommunications products. His firm has recently experienced a downturn in sales. The major prob-lem, he believes, is that they do not sell brand-name products. As China is going through westerniza-tion, customers would like to buy products of known brands. In addition, the markets are full of prod-ucts manufactured by small family businesses. He decided to develop a business relationship with abrand company, as shown in his story below.

Initiating I approached some of my senior management members to find out who knew anyonefrom a company that produces brand-name products. One of the managers, Li Lan,responded that his friend Ms Wang is a senior manager for the Five Star Tele-communications Corporation, which is well known in China for its quality telecom-munications products. With the introduction of Li Lan, I got to know Ms Wang.

Maintaining Subsequent informal meetings with Ms Wang took place to explore the possibility ofhaving our company as a wholesaler. I also offered help to her and her family when-ever needed. Ms Wang recommended us as a wholesale company. After appropriateprocedures of assessment on our company site, Five Star Telecommunications

End-result Corporation agreed we had met all the criteria. Finally Yada has succeeded in becom-ing a wholesaler for the brand company and our relationship continues up to today.

The Indian StoryThis success story is provided by Mun Bhatia, a senior manager of FMCG firms, which sell a range ofproducts including tea and other grocery items, a line of liquor products and durables such as whitegoods.

Initiating I always view maintaining relationships with distributors as a critical strategy toachieve business goals. Some of my customers are large firms that in turn are man-aged by graduates from the same elite institution that I graduated from, which allowsfor strong networking opportunities. After a connection – jan pehchan – is made, it is

Maintaining important to invest in the relationship for success. I always encourage my subordinatesin this regard. For example, one of them is particularly good at maintaining his rela-tionship with major clients. He managed our client relationship very well, even goingunannounced to the airport or railway station to meet them, sometimes at 5 am! Thiseffort pleases the clients since it shows his sincerity to them and the extent to which heis willing to go in order to maintain the relationship.

End-result This sort of personalized service adds to our commitment to nurturing a long-termrelationship.

The South African StoryThis story is narrated by Alex Olivia, who is a senior manager at Vodacom South Africa, a telecom-munications corporation in South Africa. Vodacom South Africa as a market leader in handsets hasover the past years established relationships with various manufacturers. This led to the seeking ofopportunities to build relationships in order to market products and to improve business. Alex’s storyunfolds part of the process of establishing a relationship with manufacturers.

Initiating I did quite a bit of research on telecommunications manufacturers and decided thatNokia and Motorola should be my target since they produce high quality products. Iinvited their marketing managers to attend some of our seminars, which they did. Weexplored our overlapping interest in the market after the seminar. Our relationshipwas established by means of various intensive negotiations between senior managers ofthese two organizations to establish mutually beneficial advantages in the communica-tions market. Currently Vodacom South Africa provides a market for these




Maintaining manufacturers to distribute their products. As part of the agreement reached betweenthe parties, Vodacom undertook to supply these particular products at the lowest

End-result possible price in exchange for a constant supply of products and parts, as well as anexcellent service from the manufacturers which is going to benefit both parties overthe long run.


YUNXIA ZHU is at the University ofQueensland Business School, University ofQueensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia.[email: [email protected]]

PIETER NEL is at Unitec, New Zealand.[email: [email protected]]

RAVI BHAT is at Unitec, New Zealand. [email: [email protected]]

Please contact Yunxia Zhu.

Résumé

Une étude interculturelle des stratégies de communication dans l’établisse-ment des relations professionnelles (Yunxia Zhu, Pieter Nel et Ravi Bhat)Cette étude tente d’explorer les stratégies de communication visant à établir des relationsentre cultures d’un point de vue à la fois linguistique et culturellement spécifique.Notamment, elle perçoit les relations professionnelles comme partie intégrante du capitalsocial et compare entre elles les stratégies de communication employées pour construire lesrelations au sein des entreprises de vente. Cette méthode de recherche s’appuie sur uneanalyse du discours issu d’entretiens avec des cadres dirigeants, en intégrant également à cetteanalyse leur réussite personnelle. Cette analyse distingue deux stades dans l’établissement desrelations: un stade d’amorce et un stade d’entretien. D’après les résultats, les cadres dirigeantschinois et indiens ont eu davantage recours aux stratégies interpersonnelles pour amorcer unerelation professionnelle. A l’opposé, les cadres dirigeants néo-zélandais et sud-africains onttendance à recourir davantage aux stratégies impersonnelles de communication dans lapromotion des relations publiques. Des stratégies interpersonnelles de communicationsemblables sont employées pour entretenir les relations. Néanmoins, on a pu noter uneorientation plus forte en faveur de relations à long terme dans les cultures chinoise etindienne. En outre, les stratégies de communication sont dynamiques dans tous les pays del’étude, car ces pays sont en train de devenir de plus en plus multiculturels et de plus en plusmondialisés en matière d’affaires internationales et de management.




Yunxia Zhu, Pieter Nel and Ravi Bhat



International Journal of Cross Cultural Management › 2013 › 03 › 2-a-cross-cultura… · 02.03.2013 · Extensive research has been done in business relationship building,

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