ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the importance of culture in a number of common workplace activities. It considers how different cultures approach negotiation and then see how this can affect decision-making processes. These are both activities that people perform constantly in the workplace, often when working together as part of a team. The chapter discusses what the implications of cultural differences are for team development and performance. It focuses on specific instance of cultural dislocation, that of the new arrival in a foreign culture and the implications of cultural diversity on performance management systems. People from cultures that place importance on relationships are much more likely to see a partnership as a desirable outcome of a negotiation. Negotiators from a linear-active culture, who divide their lives up into parcels of time that can be bought and sold, can find extended negotiations very frustrating. In high power distance cultures decision-making is the preserve of the person highest in the hierarchy.
