Dilemmas in Working Across Cultures: Arun in a Conundrum

Arun Gupta was born in Northern India and trained in the United Kingdom as a professional accountant. He enjoyed his life in the United Kingdom and opted to remain there to further his career after he had finished his studies. While the United Kingdom was different from India in many ways, he felt he had adjusted well to his host country. He attributed part of his success in cross-cultural adaptation to his background, as he had had been exposed to an essentially British system of education in India.

After many years of experience in his field in the United Kingdom, he decided he was ready to venture further abroad and seek work opportunities in an accounting company in another country. With the increased globalisation of business, accountants with significant international experience are highly valued, and can often command higher salaries within their organisations. Arun began considering worldwide options for a location in which he could continue to develop his professional skills while enhancing his CV with international experience. After talking to friends and colleagues, he began to focus his search on South Korea. Arun had a personal interest in Korean culture: his girlfriend was of Korean ancestry, having immigrated to the United Kingdom with her parents when she was a young child, and her family had introduced him to some of the highlights of Korean culture - including Korean food, which he had come to enjoy. He had even taken a Korean cooking class in London to learn how to make his favourite dish, bibimbap (a signature dish in the Korean cuisine). His girlfriend was keen to move to Korea with him, both to reconnect with her culture and to seek further career opportunities. There were good employment prospects for a fully bilingual English/Korean businessperson in Asia, and the financial crisis in Europe was limiting career advancement opportunities for both of them in the United Kingdom. A move to Korea seemed like a great idea for both, personally as well as professionally.

With Arun and his girlfriend convinced that a move to Korea would be a good opportunity for both of them, he began to look more seriously at job opportunities. Finally, he identified a suitable professional accounting position with a seemingly attractive compensation package that was advertised by a large Korean company in Busan, South Korea. Busan, South Korea's second largest city, offered a lifestyle that both Arun and his girlfriend thought would suit them perfectly. Arun liked nature and outdoor activities, while his girlfriend loved museums and shopping in big cities. Busan, with its beaches, mountain hikes and hot springs, combined with its museums and the world's largest department store, Shinsegae, was an ideal location for them.

He contacted the company, and after a few exploratory conversations formally expressed his interest and submitted an application online. He had a few more discussions with the Korean company and was pleasantly surprised when he was offered the position of an accountant with the company. Negotiations for salary, work conditions and other benefits ensued. These negotiations were conducted entirely via email between Arun and Mr Kim, the director of the department. Arun was impressed by the smoothness of the initial stages of the job application process. However, this soon changed when, after several months of emailing back and forth, there was little success in reaching a resolution to the negotiations. Arun was keen to commence working in Korea, and thought it was time to act. He bought an air ticket and flew to Busan to settle the matter in a more expedient fashion.

On his flight to Busan, Arun reflected on his discussions with the company and the negotiations in which he had engaged thus far. He was basically happy with the offer of the conditions of employment and future prospects with the company. The position with a prestigious Korean multinational company, with a great deal of room for career advancement, was just what he was looking for. The starting salary was acceptable, and some of the benefits that went with the job were very attractive. However, there were aspects of the position and work conditions that Arun wanted clarified before he formally accepted the job. These areas include official work responsibilities associated with the role, expectations in relation to working hours, progressive salary rises and incentives, and a performance bonus structure. Arun wanted to have these issues clarified in writing before he officially accepted the position. All of the issues seemed fairly minor, but he had heard stories from friends about cultural differences in work expectations between the United Kingdom and Korea, and he thought it best to make sure that everyone was in agreement on these issues before he took the job. Past experience had made him cautious, and had taught him to get everything specified in writing to avoid problems or misunderstandings in the future. At times, he did wonder whether he was being too cautious, and should instead just 'let things unfold' and deal with them later, but decided against this approach, based on his limited understanding of potential cultural differences.

When Arun arrived in Busan, he headed straight for the office of the Korean company that was hiring him. He was surprised to find that the position being offered was different from what he had come to expect as the industry norm. There seemed to be significant differences between his expectations and those of Mr Kim, and Mr Kim's boss, Mr Lee. They had not taken into consideration the requests and revisions he had included in his negotiation emails, and there were differences in what they envisaged the job would involve in relation to specific matters including the job title, level of seniority and job responsibilities. Furthermore - and much to his disappointment - there was no contract for him to sign.

Arun was quite confused and wondered what he should do. The job he was now apparently being offered was significantly lower in status and included duties that he felt were more appropriate for a junior-level employee, rather than an employee with multiple degrees and over ten years of experience in the industry. He asked about the differences and expressed his dismay at the change from what had been discussed in the emails to what was actually being offered. He was annoyed, too, at having travelled all the way to Busan to find such a disappointing situation.

When Arun insisted to both Mr Kim and Mr Lee that his professional record outline in his CV was certainly not fabricated, and that his age had nothing to do with his skills and abilities, Mr Lee intervened and began speaking to Arun in English. He made it very clear that he did not approve of Arun's attitude and line of response, even to the point of raising his voice and informing Arun that he did not believe that he would fit in with this organisation if there was no trust and respect between them. When Arun questioned why Mr Lee did not think he would fit into the organisation, Mr Lee began telling a story about a Korean folk tale involving an aggressive tiger who was ungrateful to the man who had saved his life.

At this point, Arun - despite being angry - paused and thought for a moment. When he was a little boy in India, his grandmother had often scolded him in the form of a (seemingly unrelated) story. Arun had hated listening to long stories that had nothing to do with him, but as he grew up he had come to understand that his grandmother was using the stories to indirectly teach him about appropriate behaviour. What was the point of Mr Lee's story about the tiger? It seemed that Mr Lee was suggesting that he had been too forward, too aggressive, and had not shown proper gratitude to the company for considering his application. Arun realised that he had to demonstrate that he was fit for the job, that he would be able to show respect for his employers and that he was able to adapt to both the local and organisational culture. He immediately apologised for sounding ungrateful, and again expressed his eagerness to join the company. He explained that he accepted that there could have been some misunderstanding and that he would like to discuss the matter of his position more. Mr Kim agreed that there seemed to be some misunderstanding but noted that in his opinion the misunderstanding had been on the part of Arun. While Arun would have liked to have protested and stated that the misunderstanding was the responsibility of both parties, he decided not to do so as it might be seen as an angry or ungrateful response. Perhaps it was safer not to challenge the position of the boss in Korea.

Trying to salvage the meeting, Arun decided to be less confrontational and focus on establishing a positive relationship and building trust. He agreed that they needed to establish a basis of trust in order to successfully move forward. He began to explain his other reasons for wanting the position. He told them of his strong interest in Korean culture and in Busan in particular. He told them about his Korean girlfriend and of his close relationship with her family, his love of Korean food and the similarities between Korean food and the traditional food that his grandmother in India used to make at home. His Korean connection helped ease the tension, and conversation appeared to improve, as did the overall atmosphere.

He went on to say that he would love to take the position and suggested that they may be able to approach the situation from a win-win perspective. He subtly pointed out that he had the professional skills that they were seeking and from which the company would benefit. Mr Lee and Mr Kim both nodded, and Mr Kim then proceeded to the usual interview-style questions. He asked Arun when he would be able to begin his work there. Arun replied that he had not yet quit his job back in the United Kingdom, as he could not quit his current job without a signed contract for the new job. Mr Lee and Mr Kim were both shocked that he had not already submitted his resignation at his current job and were further dismayed to find that it would be a minimum of three months before Arun would be available to begin working in Busan. To Arun, it seemed only logical that he should not quit his current job before being guaranteed another job. To Mr Lee and Mr Kim, the matter of an unsigned contract was an inconsequential detail, a mere 'loose end' to be tied up at the last minute.

The atmosphere of the meeting once again took a turn for the worse, as Mr Kim suggested that Arun had not trusted them in their offer. Arun refrained from pointing out that they had not had any contract for him to sign when he arrived, so from his perspective there had been nothing to trust or to distrust. Knowing that an outburst like that would ruin the meeting, he instead took a deep breath and drank a large gulp of the tea that a secretary had brought them in the meeting room. He decided to change topics, saying that he was really looking forward to meeting his new colleagues.

At the mention of the colleagues, Mr Lee and Mr Kim told Arun that he would have to really work hard to 'repair his relationship with the department staff'. Arun was confused and asked what they meant. Mr Kim explained that many members of the department staff were unhappy with the tone of his emails in the negotiations. Arun had expected those exchanges to be confidential - he had no idea that his emails were made public to everyone in the organisation. Not only did his soon-to-be colleagues know the details of the contract negotiations, they also knew what salary level Arun had been offered and other details of the job offer. Arun noted his displeasure at having had his emails shared with the entire company and said that the company would be hiring him for his skills, not for his ability to focus on unnecessary politicking. Mr Kim and Mr Lee again spoke to each other in Korean, and Mr Kim turned to Arun and told him that all great accomplishments in the company - in fact, in the society - had been group efforts. At that point, Arun decided that it was best that he keep his job in the United Kingdom and continue to look for international positions elsewhere. He did not know whether this lack of basic respect for confidentiality was an organisational situation or a cultural expectation, but he had had enough. Mr Lee and Mr Kim were right - Arun would not fit very well into this company if the norm was to indirectly accuse job applicants of fabricating the experience on their CVs and violating expectations of confidentiality, and his individual skills meant far less than his ability to effectively join a clique. He felt he had narrowly escaped a bad situation and was grateful that he still had his job in the United Kingdom to which to return.

As the meeting ended, Arun said that he regretted the miscommunications, but was happy to have had the chance to talk face to face. Mr Lee expressed remorse and noted that Arun 'should have communicated more with him' in order to avoid having to have come all the way to Busan. Arun forced a smile and suggested that, in the future, perhaps they would meet again at an international industry conference. The men shook hands and Arun left. Mr Kim commented to Mr Lee that Arun had not seemed like a very good fit with the organisation. He did not seem like a team player, based upon his email communications and the interview. He had not asked about the team with which he would be working in any of his negotiation communications. He had not bothered to contact any of the other staff with whom he would have been working in the department. The employees who would have been Arun's colleagues (whom he had not met, but who knew about him from reading the negotiation email exchange) suspected that he was an overly direct, demanding foreigner, and were offended that he had not communicated with each of them in a personal, friendlier manner. He had not studied the hierarchy of the company. He did not seem to know who was in which position, and where he would have stood in the company hierarchy.

To Mr Lee and Mr Kim, Arun seemed to display an overly individualistic personality style, evidenced first by his arriving in Busan uninvited, when they had not expected him, and second by his expectation that he should not have to work his way up in seniority and rank, the way other employees had to. His tone in addressing both of them indicated that he believed they were equals, when in fact they outranked Arun by several levels. Mr Kim had been in the position for which they were interviewing Arun 20 years earlier and believed that he knew better than Arun what the position required and how best to approach it. Mr Lee was a close family friend of the company's president and had been with the company since shortly after the company's founding 40 years earlier. The men agreed that there was no place in the company for a young man who did not know how to properly respect authority or how to work within a team.

The night after the disastrous meeting, as Arun prepared to depart on his flight back to the United Kingdom, he reflected on his experience. He tried to figure out just what had gone wrong. Clearly, there were cultural differences between the Koreans he had met and himself. But he had managed cultural differences before when he settled in the United Kingdom and travelled to different parts of the world, and his girlfriend was Korean. So, what went wrong in this experience? What did he not understand? Also, what did Mr Kim and Mr Lee fail to understand about him, his expectations and his behaviour? He thought he had been very reasonable in his demands and wondered whether he would ever make the effort to seek employment with a Korean company again, given the differences he had experienced.

Case Questions

1. How could Arun have avoided the culture clash that resulted in the failure of his negotiation and his not getting the job? What advice would you have given to Arun to conduct a successful negotiation?

2. Could Mr Kim and Mr Lee have managed the situation differently, and if so, how? What advice would you have given to Mr Lee and Mr Kim to consider, before they began their negotiation process with Arun?

3. Discuss the importance of 'cultural intelligence' (CQ) in such cross-cultural contexts, the impact when cultural intelligence is lacking and the implication for the interactions in this case study