international marketing Home Assignment 2 - discussion of Outsourced Movie PDF

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summary and discussion of the movie Outsourced, specifically touching on cross-cultural business practices...

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Gabrielle Schmidt Kurpis MKTG 417 09/23/2021

Home Assignment 2 — Reflection on “Outsourced” the movie

Outsourced is an inspiring movie about a Seattle businessman who travels to India to train his replacement, as his company outsourced their entire customer service division there. He was tasked with a specific goal by his manager to accomplish in the Indian office, until then, he wasn’t to return home. During his time abroad, he had quite the culture shock from not only the local community but how his office and employees handled business. His initial focus was to teach the new employees about United States culture, quirks, and language slangs. After realizing the importance of cultural integration on both sides, he began to let his guard down and allow those around him to bring him into their world. In the end, he was not only successful in completing his goal and creating a well-fueled office machine, he saw that there was more to life than being a corporate slave. Overall, I would definitely recommend this movie to those interested in differences between business practices around the globe, because it was very applicable in that aspect. Cultural values differ from place to place, especially within the business world and the relationships that are within. Two extreme opposites are individualist and collectivist cultures, which were both simnifically prevalent in the movie. Individualist cultures are those who revolve around personal goals, each individual has a focus on their own goals and rights. Within the

workplace, seen in the US for example, is comfortable in autonomy and prioritizes the self over the group. Whereas collectivists, seen in India, are motivated by group goals, with a focus on personal relationships and team success. In the movie, Todd takes awhile to realize the different in business culture between the United States and India. Back home, he lives in an environment where everyone is out for themselves, lives alone, and does not sacrifice personal efforts for the whole team. When being submerged in Indian culture from all directions, he sees that personal relationships are one of the highest priorities in the home, and in the office. For instance, he finds that Indian households are shared with all members of the family, oldest generation to youngest. Whereas he lives alone in Seattle, seeing his family barely once a year if he’s lucky. Another situation seen in the movie, differentiating these two cultures, was the close relationships seen between employees. Towards the end, when the Indian office building flooded, the employees worked together, bringing in friends even, to help them move up to the roof. They worked as a collective, as a team, to accomplish a goal. Whereas in Seattle, Todd’s managers looked out for themselves only, moving around the outsourcing to India and then to China, without considering how that would impact their employees. With cultural differences in the workplace, being ignorant and blind to another’s way of business leads to isolation and failure in cooperation. High-context and low-context cultures are two other large characteristics in differentiating business cultures among different countries, seen also in the movie Outsourced. High-context cultures are collectivist, prioritizing a close-knit community within the workplace. Whereas low-context cultures, similar to individualist, have fewer relational cues when interpreting communication within the work place, individuals are not expected to have knowledge of their peers backgrounds and histories. The movie demonstrates India as having a High-context business culture, as compared to the low-context culture of the United States. For

instance, in Outsourced, Todd has a very direct-talking style, which is a prime example of lowcontext culture. As opposed to how Todd’s counterpart, Puro, uses a high-context communication style when he’s asked if he can pick up the shipment from the wrong location it was delivered to. He avoids saying a direct no, in order to maintain social harmony, but rather emphasizes the impact it would make on his life. Understanding these differences in context culture is very important because you are able to understand how different businesses communicate and thus be able to maintain relations. Ethnocentrism is very prevalent in ignorant countries, it is apparent when an individual perceives their own culture as being superior in comparison to others. The United States is a prime example of this, especially seen in Todd’s behavior when he first arrives to India. Upon arriving, he hunted down “Mac Donalds”, in search for a cheeseburger. He was disappointed to find that India doesn’t serve beef there, due to their religious beliefs of cows. Todd then met an older gentleman in the same boat as him, and they discussed the differences in business culture, with an obvious favor towards the US. His entire attitude for most of the movie was negative towards Indian culture, he found the way they ate with their hands to be odd, their religious figures to be unsettling, their arranged marriage tradition to be outdated, and he especially found the informal relations within the workplace to be unprofessional. Luckily as time went on, he gave in and found appreciation for the new home he found, joining in on the cultural practices and flipping his way of thought. Cross-cultural management is a challenging task if one does not have the proper knowledge of the other culture that they are managing. Todd for instance had little to no idea how India ran things, he did not do an efficient job at bringing success into the work environment upon arrival. Mentioned previously, he focused solely on educating his Indian

employees on exclusively American culture and social norms. Because he did not think to learn about the differences India has compared to what he is used to, he ultimately offended the staff when disrespecting their sacred cow. His low-context, individualistic way of business relations set him up for failure, and the goal of a 6.0 score was no where in site if he kept his management strategy going. After immersing in the culture, and dissolving his ethnocentric ignorance, he was able to use the strengths of India’s high-context and collectivist business culture to work in his favor. A huge influence was gaining the friendship of his counterpart Puro and the assistance of his love interest, the two gave him a personal outlook on Indian culture and practices. By the end of the movie, Todd’s ability to handle intercultural situations was very successful solely because he put effort into learned cultural differences and shedding his biased point of view....