Faculty-Student Collaboration is Published Nationally
Dr. Faridah Awang and student Robert Combs share a common interest in cultural intelligence that led them to collaboration, research and, finally, publication in a national journal. Combs, a Global Supply-Chain Management senior from Lexington, has also been selected as this year's Outstanding Senior in General Business for the Department of Management, Marketing, and International Business.
According to Dr. Awang, Professor and Program Coordinator of Corporate Communication and Technology, the article was recently published in the National Business Education Forum. Titled “Developing Cultural Intelligence across Business Functions,” it describes how culture plays a large part in business in today’s international market.
MMIB faculty actively encourage faculty/student collaboration and research. This month's departmental WOW! Session, “Involving Students in Research,” was led by Dr. Weiling Zhuang and focused on best practices.
Excerpt from “Developing Cultural Intelligence across Business Functions”
“Culture matters. On the surface, this seems such an obvious and simplistic point that it is hardly worth mentioning. But in international business, cultural barriers do affect many businesses working across cultures. It is not enough to merely have cognitive intelligence when working; business managers also need cultural intelligence, also referred to as CQ.
The article describes a study to assess needed cultural intelligence skills and their effects on business operations and performance of international business divisions within multinational organizations. The study answered the following question: How can the enhancement of cultural intelligence skills affect the effectiveness of businesses’ international human resources (HR), sales and marketing, and accounting and finance divisions? The study found that HR professionals particularly need to focus on interpersonal communication skills and adapt them to specific cultures; marketing and sales professionals need to focus especially on language abilities and communication adaptability; and finance and accounting professionals need to focus on varying applications of regulations in different cultures.”
Reference:
Awang, F. & Combs, R. (2015). Developing cultural intelligence across business functions. Business Education Forum, 69(3), 38-40.
Published on March 11, 2015