Communicating with people who belong to different cultures can be quite challenging. To make sure you don’t end up offending them, cultural competence can be of great help!
What is Cultural Competence?
Man is a social animal and can’t live alone. He always needs the help of others. When different people get along with each other, they form communities. Each community has its traditions, values, and ways of living. It results in the evolution of cultures.
The world has become a global village. To interact with the global world, it is important to know different cultures. Each culture is distinct from the other. Sometimes it becomes very difficult to interact with people that have different values.
Cultural competence helps us to deal with each other properly without any differences and helps in creating a peaceful world. It is the ability to understand the different cultures well and deal with them accordingly.
For understanding the different cultures, you should know your culture first then you can easily understand other cultures.
By understanding the different cultures, you can treat people with empathy, compassion and can develop a sense of mutual respect and understanding between each other. It is a great skill to handle different people as per their values and norms.
Why Cultural Competence is Important In the Global World?
People from developing countries migrate to developed countries because they want better job opportunities and want to enhance their quality of life. When immigrants and migrants move to another country, they bring with them their cultural values, norms, and traditions creating another diverse culture.
The best example of diverse culture is the USA. It is also called a melting pot because people from different cultures are residing there. Americans are said to be culturally competent because they deal with distinct cultural values in the best way and develop a relationship with people without any misunderstandings and biases.
At Workplace
It is the capacity of a business or company to identify and utilize the benefits of cultural diversity by taking advantage of their skills and using them with a balanced approach.
Companies with strong cultural understanding can negotiate differences in beliefs and cultures and use these differences to learn new things and to adapt to sensitive cultures respectfully so that they can reach a wide customer base.
If as a businessman you want to reach a wide range of customers then familiarity with their culture will help you better understand the different types of customers and their distinct experiences. Thus, it improves the quality of the service that you want to provide to your business and customers.
Cultural Competence: How it Helps Your Business?
Boosts Creativity
Business studies have shown that businesses and companies that deal with cultural diversity well have a better financial performance than those who don’t practice cultural competence. It increases innovation and creativity.
People from different cultures bring different concepts and ideas to the business, and you can expose yourself to diversity in such a way that your thinking is widened and you can see future business perspectives.
Improves Reputation
Having a diverse workforce increases the reputation of your business and a company. With the help of a diverse workforce, you not only can gain higher profits, better customer services but you can also determine equal job opportunities and ethical employment practices.
All those professional organizations that practice these measures can attract socially responsible companies and businesses. This in return improves the reputation of your company and business.
Builds Positive Environment
When you make efforts to understand diverse cultures in the workplace then it creates a positive work environment creating workplace cohesion. Employees from different cultures and backgrounds interact and work together, share their ideas at different stages of work.
New employees are welcomed and they feel comfortable because they find people that recognize them despite their different experiences and background. It also helps to encourage communication, cooperation, and understanding the sensitive issues with the help of cohesive workgroups.
How to Develop Cultural Competence
Let’s have a look at ways that can help you to develop a better understanding of different cultures.
Being Attentive
Being attentive and slowing down to the present situation will help us to engage with the speaker. It allows us to listen to the words of the speaker attentively and analyze them thoroughly. It also shows that we value what another person is saying.
Don’t React
You should not react immediately after listening. Sometimes we get triggered by what we heard. We should take a second and take a deep breath to give our response. In this way, we can give such a response that will not trigger an attack or defensiveness.
Active Listening
Active listening is very important to research and encourage different points of view. You should ask probing questions that allow the other person to explain to you in a better way instead of making wrong assumptions.
Paraphrase and Summarize
You need to paraphrase in your words what you have heard and then summarize it. In this way, the speaker can identify his errors and comes up with easily understandable points.
Beware of Stereotypes
When we rely on our previous experiences then we make assumptions out of them. This makes us jump to wrong conclusions so don’t stereotype things.
Be Aware of the Body Language
Remember that the body language of every culture is different and they are interpreted differently. Understanding the body culture from a cultural point of view will not embarrass you.
Look for Common Things
Human beings despite different cultural backgrounds share some common things. You should look for ways of mutual interest that cultivate empathy and enhance the human relationship.
Wrapping Up
Distinct cultures speak distinct languages. To understand the respective culture, you need to know its language. You cannot learn all the languages so you need the services of a reliable translation company, and that’s where CCJK can help!
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