The global exchange of goods has in recent years made cultural intelligence an important success factor conducting business over cross-cultural boundaries. Due to lack of cultural competence, several mistakes in international business have been made. Previously studies of cultural intelligence have been carried out in controlled settings and not in day-to-day life. Further, authors for these studies point out that more empirical studies need to be carried out in the subject and in an uncontrolled environment.The purpose of this study is to find out what criteria are important and successful for Swedish professional sellers and buyers when they are conducting international negotiations. If possible, these criteria will then relate to the relevant capabilities of CQ to add validity to the concept. Furthermore, the study also aims to answer if the criteria mentioned by the professionals are applicable with Hofstede's dimensions (Hofstede, 2011) as well as the Context Culture model by Hall (1976). The participants for the study are five individuals from different companies located in Sweden. The participants have previous experience from conducting international business ranging from six to 35 years.The result of this study shows that cultural intelligence is beneficial when it comes to conducting international negotiation. This is presented in the form of important criteria from the respondents, these criteria are explained through the respondent’s own words and then reinterpreted by the authors using theoretical concepts, an example of this is Preparation. Further, the findings present validity to some of the conceptual benefits that previously lacked empirical validity such as collaboration and decision making.

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This qualitative phenomenological study examined central Florida's nursing home administrators' knowledge and perception of cultural competence and how they perceive that their knowledge and perceptions impact residents, families, and healthcare. The theoretical framework for this study was explained through Campinha-Bacote's interdisciplinary model of The Process of Cultural Competence in the Delivery of Healthcare Services. The theoretical framework was used to guide research questions, and individual interview questions to obtain nursing home administrator's knowledge and perception of cultural competence. The study explored the level of cultural competence reported by nursing home administrators, their individual perception of cultural competence, their degree of confidence in cultural competence, and how nursing home administrators describe their proficiencies and skills in cultural competence. Interviews with six nursing home administrators included licensed nursing home administrators (NHA) and assistant nursing home administrators, and the director of nursing (DON). The findings identified and analyzed the diverse levels of nursing home administrator's knowledge and perception of cultural competence. Some participants demonstrated difficulty expressing their knowledge and perception of cultural competence. Findings indicate that various factors influenced participants' overall degree of confidence in their knowledge and perception of cultural competence. Nursing home administrators also had a difficult time articulating particular skills that demonstrate their ability to adapt to the diverse residents in their facilities, and how they promote cultural competence in their nursing home facilities. This study identified the need for additional research and continuing education about cultural competence in healthcare.

This thesis investigates the dynamics of knowledge transfer between cultures within multinational firms, with a particular emphasis on subsidiaries located in Sweden and Romania. This study investigates how subsidiaries adjust corporate knowledge to fit local cultural contexts through semi-structured interviews with participants from a range of sectors. It also looks at the wider effects of these changes on organizational knowledge transfer processes. The research methodology used is qualitative research.   The data indicates that local cultural and regulatory variations have an impact on knowledge transfer tactics. Different techniques to integrating and adjusting corporate knowledge are shown by companies in Sweden and Romania, which reflect different operational and cultural contexts. The results show how subsidiaries improve their strategic positioning and operational efficacy within the multinational framework by utilizing both local and global advantages.   The study's methodology involves using thematic analysis to analyze the gathered interview data in order to provide a deeper understanding of the mechanisms underlying cross-cultural knowledge transfer. The main results suggest that the effectiveness of knowledge transfer is heavily dependent upon the ability to navigate and incorporate local cultural characteristics alongside international standards.   By offering empirical insights into the difficulties and methods of knowledge transfer within Eastern European contexts, which are less studied than those in the West, this study adds to the body of literature already in existence. Additionally, it has useful ramifications for global firms looking to maximize knowledge management in various cultural contexts.

This study introduces cultural knowledge as a central element to conceptualizing and measuring Black consciousness beliefs. Through the development and initial validation of a new measure, the Scale of Black Consciousness (SBC), the structural nature of Black consciousness as a function of cultural knowledge was determined using exploratory factor analyses. Relations between Black consciousness, self-esteem, cultural socialization and knowledge, African cultural consciousness, group-based racial identity, and impression management were also assessed to determine validity evidence for the SBC. Further, known-groups validity was determined by examining SBC score means between participants who endorsed taking Black Studies courses as compared to participants who did not endorse taking such courses. This study also provided an analysis of sources of cultural knowledge among participants. Previous research provides support for the relationship between Black consciousness and cultural knowledge. The Africentric Theory of Black Personality theoretically highlights the value of culture-centered knowledge (Baldwin, 1981, 1984; Baldwin & Bell, 1985) and the group-based theory of stratum consciousness (Gurin & Epps, 1975; Gurin, Miller, & Gurin, 1980) provides a model for examining group consciousness among historically marginalized groups. Accordingly, cultural knowledge supports the development of Black consciousness through an awareness of and connection to African descent cultural history (King, 2004; Lewis et al., 2006; Shockley, 2007). Despite theory suggesting a conceptual link between cultural knowledge and Black consciousness (Adams, 2005; Banks, 2004; King, 2004), there is limited research examining cultural knowledge in relation to Black consciousness beliefs. Results revealed the SBC as a reliable and valid measure of Black consciousness. For construct and predictive validity, the SBC exhibited significant correlations in the expected directions with African cultural consciousness, group-based Black identity, self-esteem, cultural socialization, Black history knowledge, and impression management. A comparison of SBC score means demonstrated that participants taking Black Studies courses exhibited higher consciousness beliefs as measured by the SBC than participants not taking Black Studies courses, providing evidence for known-groups validity. Additionally, the results for sources of cultural learning, revealed parents and teachers/professors as the most frequently cited sources. These findings further the literature on cultural consciousness among African descent people. / text

This dissertation aims to explore the nature of early social preferences by testing attention to a cue that might have evolved as a reliable signal of shared group membership – shared cultural knowledge. Part 1 shows that children attend to this cue when making social choices: Children both prefer others who know songs they themselves know, and avoid others who know songs they do not know, while other cues such as shared preferences for songs are not as powerful drivers of social preferences. Part 2 shows that this cue affects how five-months-old infants allocate attention to human singers. After listening to two individuals singing different songs, infants look longer at singers of familiar songs than at singers of unfamiliar songs. When both songs are unfamiliar, infants do not show preferences for singers of songs that follow or violate Western melodic structure, although they are sensitive to these differences. In focusing on familiar songs but not musical styles, infants may selectively attend to information that might mark group membership later in life, namely shared knowledge of specific songs. Part 3 investigates whether children are selective in the properties they use to infer that two individuals belong to the same group, targeting two potentially important social cues: race and gender. Specifically, Part 3 asks if children attribute shared musical knowledge to individuals of the same race or gender. Four-year-olds attribute shared knowledge to individuals of the same gender, but not of the same race. Five-year-olds attribute shared knowledge to individuals of the same race, but not of the same gender. In contrast, a control unrelated to group-membership – attributions of shared musical preferences – do not yield any dissociation between attributions based on race or gender. Thus, as they gain experience, children seem to adaptively update the social cues they use to infer shared group-membership. Together these results begin to elucidate the mechanisms underlying early social preferences by showing that children might selectively attend to the most reliable cues to shared group-membership, which, in turn, might allow them later in life to participate in the complex social organization that is unique to human societies. / Psychology

Magistro baigiamojo darbo objektas – žinių vadybos procesų tarpkultūrinės sąveikos kontekste ypatumai Lietuvoje įsikūrusiose tarptautinėse kompanijose. Darbo tikslas – atskleisti kultūrinių skirtumų raišką žinių vadybos procesuose tarptautinėse organizacijose, įsikūrusiose Lietuvoje. Teorinėje darbo dalyje išskiriami pagrindiniai žinių vadybos aspektai bei pagrindiniai tarpkultūriniai skirtumai remiantis G. Hofstede (1997) kultūrinėmis dimensijomis, pasireiškiantys organizaciniame kontekste ir profesinėje veikloje. Remiantis išskirtais žinių vadybos aspektais ir tarpkultūriniais skirtumais yra atskleidžiami pagrindiniai žinių vadybos procesų savitumai, tarpkultūriniame kontekste. Atliekant Švedijos, Japonijos ir Didžiosios Britanijos įmonių atvejų analizę buvo nustatyta, kad įmonės nacionalinė kultūra atsispindi kompanijų žinių vadybos procesuose. Buvo atskleista, kad viena iš daugiausiai žinių vadybos procesams įtakos daranti yra individualizmo ir kolektyvizmo dimensija. Tyrimas taip pat atskleidė, kad ne tik nacionalinės kultūros bruožai turi įtakos žinių vadybos raiškai, kartais jie yra nustelbiami ir kompanijos atstovaujamo sektoriaus ir jo veiklos specifikos, kuri yra reglamentuojama įstatymų. Atvejo analizės tyrimas parodė, kad savitas istorinis, socialinis, institucinis Lietuvos žinių kontekstas turi įtakos žinių vadybos procesų, siūlomų įmonių centrinių būstinių, svarbos suvokimui ir atitinkam žinių panaudojimui. / The subject of the Master‘s thesis is the distinctiveness of the knowledge management processes in the context of cross-cultural interaction within Lithuania-based international enterprises. The aim of this work is to reveal the expression of cultural differences in the processes of knowledge management within Lithuania-based international enterprises. In the theoretical part of the thesis the basic aspects of knowledge management are distinguished and the basic cross-cultural differences are explained based on G.Hofstede’s (1997) cultural dimensions that occur in organizational context and are a part of professional activities. Based on these distinguished aspects of knowledge management and cross-cultural differences, the basic particularities of knowledge management processes within cross-cultural context were discovered. Analysis of cases of Swedish, Japanese and British enterprises revealed that national cultures were mirrored in the processes of knowledge management employed by these companies. It was disclosed that individualism and collectivism were the main dimensions determining the flow of knowledge management processes. The analysis also discovered that national cultural features were not the only factors that influenced knowledge management processes. Sometimes the specifics of a sector enterprise worked in or the enterprise’s own specifics that were being determined legally played a more crucial role than cultural uniqueness. Case analysis revealed that... [to full text]

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Communities of Practice have been utilized with great success by organisations in the business and manufacturing sectors to help in the management of their knowledge. Not much research have been done on their application in learning organisations such as academic libraries, however. The aim of this study was therefore to determine how knowledge can be managed through Communities of Practice in a learning organisation such as an academic library. The investigation was build around the concepts knowledge management, learning organisations and Communities of Practice and the interrelationship between these concepts. The role Communities of Practice play in the management of knowledge in a learning organisation is investigated as well as the development stages in the implementation of Communities of Practice to support knowledge management. This is followed by an investigation of the factors critical to the success of Communities of Practice in a learning organisation. The investigation consisted of a literature study to help define the key concepts and to lay a framework for the research design, and is followed by an empirical study where interviews were held with some of the staff members of the Academic Information Service (AIS) of the University of Pretoria, South Africa. In conclusion it was found that the AIS was considered a learning organisation and that the AIS was in the beginning stages of knowledge management. A number of Communities of Practice in the AIS were identified that existed internally and externally, and the small number of internal Communities of Practice in the AIS were linked to specific inhibiting factors. The study also showed that Communities of Practice can be found in learning organisations, and that learning organisations are characterised by knowledge management. Knowledge managed through Communities of Practice was also shown to help in the development of learning organisations. Communities of Practice in the AIS were shown to be in the beginning stages of development. The role of management, incentives and rewards for participation, information technology/tools, attention to newcomers, knowledge capturing/sharing techniques, trust and a proper knowledge management framework were shown to be essential for the success of Communities of Practice in the AIS. / Dissertation (MIS)--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Information Science / unrestricted