Doing Business in Saudi Arabia Essay

Why is partnering described as the highest-quality selling relationship? Why has the building of partnerships become more important today?

     In business, successful communication is the key to success, and being able to relate to a customer is the best form of communication. This is why cross-cultural communication is so important as the business world continues to globalize itself. Unfortunately, “A lack of awareness about the culturally prescribed rules and norms of communication behaviors can cause public relations projects to fail, or worse, backfire.” (Zaharna, 2001, p.135).

The case study “Let’s Make a Deal: Middle East Mosaic” by Charles Rarick is a primary example of the struggles a businessman might encounter when conducting business cross-culturally. The case study opens with describing how the country of Jordan recently acquired trading rights with the United States and Europe because King Abdullah wished to reform to a democratic society and gain rights for its women. Thus the business ExportJordan was created so the women of Jordan could manufacture and export their products and utilize this new trade agreement. ExportJordan hired an American women named Anne Burns who would assist the Jordan women who wished to produce and export their products utilizing this new trade agreement. However, Anne begins to encounter multiple unexpected cross-culture issues

In a business perspective, the oriental and western cultures remain a huge difference. Low-context societies such as American egalitarian culture, they emphasize on logic and facts, verbal messages are more direct and concise, individualism and extremely tolerant to changes. However, high-context societies such as Chinese hierarchy culture, they prefer non-verbal methods to express meaningful communications, group-oriented, and pay more attention to interpersonal relationships during business interactions. For example, a successful business interaction will count on interpersonal relationships among businesses and government. On the other hand, business dealings can be completely transactional with Americans, without building relationships to do so.

1 In Relationship era, business gets a different method which includes long time relation with their customers and how they buy that products by just knowing about their customer’s desires and needs. They interact with their customers and it takes a lot of time to know about each person personally. The companies who have long term customers, they don’t have to give discounts to make new customers because their regular customers help them by just referring that product or company. The companies get a lot of benefits from their existing customers as the relationships between the customers reduce their overall costs. During this era, business did not confine to one nation only but it grows beyond boundaries.

A third way to build a positive and successful intercultural relationship is to become educated on common business practices and cultural norms of the country of the prospective business partner. “Business people should learn how the other side approaches business and what the principles of hospitality are” (MacEwan, 2015, p. 156).” This quote demonstrates the importance of education in regards to other cultures business norms, because without a prior education a person could be doing something that the other country or culture finds offensive without realizing it. It could be the smallest of issues that ruins the business relationship and makes it unsuccessful.

North America’s culture certainly affect international business activities, the same happen among all countries and continents in the world. Culture and tradition have a particular role in person’s critical thinking, communication barriers and behavior. In the business environment negotiation is an important skill in where all parties needs to be pleased, at the end you have to give for you to be able to receive, either is entering into a contract or building a

Communication – verbal and otherwise – remains an important dimension of international management, and there are different communication styles, how communication is processed and interpreted, and how culture and language influence communication and miscommunication (Luthans & Doh, 2012).

In Saudi Arabia, familial ties are an immensely important part of most businesses, and end up dominating most domestic business partnerships in the world of finance and medium- to large-scale corporate enterprises (Long, 2005). What might be considered unfair or inappropriate in terms of family ties between different businesses and in making deals is considered natural and commonplace in Saudi culture, and

INTERNATIONAL MANAGEMENT: CULTURE, STRATEGY, AND BEHAVIOR, EIGHTH EDITION Published by McGraw-Hill, a business unit of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 1221 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. Copyright © 2012 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Previous editions © 2009, 2006, and 2003. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written consent of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., including, but not limited

Obama’s victory started a new era in dealing with the Middle East, despite the fact that U.S foreign policy remains tied to its interests in internal security, the economy, and welfare. The U.S policy is being dictated by its personal interests and political parties that stick to the same lines, but differ in some minor ways of implementation. The implementation of this policy serves pubic interest and employs strategy that ensures the best results for the ruling party. As a result of the Democratic Party holding the majority in the U.S government, Obama’s foreign policy is considered to be backed by a majority of Americans.

According to the works of Chaney & Martin (2011) and Harris & Moran (2000), they agree that international management skills are in need for the increasing scope of international trades and investments. A large number of multinational companies have expanded their businesses through both developed and developing countries. Some of the business invest directly and others are partnership arrangements and strategic alliances with domestic operations. Their studies show that independent entrepreneurs and small businesses have started investing and competing in the world marketplace. Thus, to acquire corporations’ objectives, there is exceedingly a necessity for the development of strategic framework for cross-cultural management and communication in the current competitive global market. Chaney & Martin (2011) also noted that, cultural awareness and cultural differences are strongly important to the multinational corporations’ success. A good understanding of the culture where business is implemented can make international managers productive and effective.

When dealing with businesses there are always going to be cultural barriers and obstacles. This is because no two countries are the same and each person is different. Cross cultural communication looks at how people from various backgrounds interact and communicate and this is what this report will cover. It will look at how people from different backgrounds pass information and make negotiations despite the barriers of culture between them. The case study ‘Journey to Sharahad’ displays the cross cultural exchange between the Americans who have just arrived in Sharahad are completely oblivious to the culture and people of Sharahad and what

The Saudi Arabia Ministry of Foreign Affairs has a five year applied strategic plan (ASP) to develop the performance of its human resources. This ASP is put in place to help senior leaders establish a better outcome form new hired employees at the ministry. The purpose of this ASP is to draft a roadmap for new employees to enroll in training and gain techniques. The foundation of this plan is training for employees on learning new techniques. That the human resources (HR) applied strategic plan is in place, but not very efficient to accomplish their goals. A re-examination is needed.

Executive summary: With the globalization of world business, Saudi Arabia has become an appealing market for foreign investors. But there has long been belief that the market of Saudi Arabia is difficult to develop and the culture there is inconsistent with the world. The problem of cross-cultural management arises as the cooperation between Saudi Arabia and its world partners continue to increase at an unprecedented rate. This paper analyses commercial and cultural feature of Saudi Arabia, presenting an understanding on the general cultural differences between Saudi Arabia and Singapore by applying different cultural dimensions. And it explains the influence of Arabia commercial culture on