‘Discuss the role of market culture and language in developing and maintaining cross cultural business relationships’.

Order Description

Background to Assignment

You are the New Business Development Manager for a large UK – based upmarket shirt distributor that specialises in high end quality shirts and ties. These are sold through its numerous retail outlets.

This is an INDIVIDUAL assignment and should be presented in a REPORT style format with a word count of 3000 words (excluding appendices and references).

The editorial requirements for the assignment are:

Some months ago it was decided that your current supplier in India would have to be changed as there were a variety of problems that had led to an irretrievable break – down of the relationship. A review of the partnership concluded that your personnel had insufficient knowledge of the linguistic and cultural aspects of dealing with the Indian supplier, and this had resulted in a variety of problems, contributing significantly to a lack of trust, and ultimately to the break- down of the relationship.

Consequently, the MD has sought a new supplier for your current range of products – the basic requirements will not change, and have already been agreed with a supplier in Egypt. You are due to go to Egypt next month to visit this supplier, and look at their operations, and premises. However, in view of the breakdown of the previous relationship, the MD has asked you to prepare a report in which you detail the cultural and linguistic requirements of working with an Egyptian company. This report will then be passed to your HR department, so that they may devise an appropriate training schedule for those who are likely to be involved in the development of this relationship.

INDIVIDUAL Written Report

Your task is to:

‘Discuss the role of market culture and language in developing and maintaining cross cultural business relationships’.

You must prepare an individual report, of no more than 3000 words (excluding references and appendices). This report must cover the following areas:

1. An analysis of culture and how it influences business (25%).

2. An analysis of foreign language competence and how it is useful in business (25%).

3. In the context of the task outlined above, how would you use your knowledge of Egyptian language and culture in developing business relationships with the Egyptian company? (40%)

4. Referencing and presentation (10%).