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Does business know how? The role of corporate communication in the operations of globalized companies

The second major research project run by the International Business Communication unit at HSE started in 2006 and will continue until 2009. Its starting point is the idea of communication know-how as an integral component of business know-how in corporate activities. On a concrete level, we aim to characterize ‘successful communication’ in situations where BELF is used in multinational companies. One of the five subprojects (for more details, see http://www.hse.fi/EN/research/t/p_10/liike2/) comprises a questionnaire survey targeted at companies operating globally, and related interviews.

The ongoing project is a spin-off from the first one, since it inspired us to focus on BELF-related issues. Here I narrow my discussion to only three areas: the nature of English needed in international operations, the role of culture, and the persuasion strategies of BELF communication. At this point, I must emphasize the fact that we are still collecting data and our present data have not been systematically analyzed. So, the findings I will be briefly discussing next are preliminary and should be treated as such.

First, respondents with different cultural backgrounds working in internationally operating companies considered the English proficiency important and felt that BELF communication usually works well in situations where both parties are familiar with the topic. On the whole, communication with other non-native speakers was considered easier than that with native speakers.

This finding is in line with the suggestion by Charles & Marschan-Piekkari (2002), who argue that multinational corporations should invest in training their native English speaker employees to better understand and communicate with their non-native colleagues. Also, it could be argued that BELF speakers might well benefit from training in each other’s specific discourse practices.

Second, it seems that in BELF communication culture plays an important role. However, although it is important to know both the organizational and national culture of the communicator, they are not considered as relevant as the knowledge of the other party’s role in the organization. Comments supporting this finding were also obtained from email writers, who were not able to tell the nationality of some of their frequent communication partners (see Kankaanranta 2006). This finding is in agreement with Jameson’s (2007) conception of individual cultural identity, in which nationality is but one component of many. Other such components are, for example, profession, education, religion, gender, and language.

Third, the respondents strongly agreed with the claim that such persuasion strategies as directness, explicitness, and politeness are important in BELF interactions; in particular, clarity was emphasized. They also stressed the importance of stepping into the other party’s shoes and of making him/her feel good. Thus, successful BELF communication seems to remind us of Aristotle’s rhetorical appeals and their importance in international business communication as discussed by Campbell (1998).

In particular, logos appeals are considered crucial: facts must be presented clearly, explicitly, and directly. Pathos appeals, i.e. appealing to the emotions of the audience, on the other hand, can be exploited to ease the possible cultural hiccups, since the attempts to be polite and to make the other party feel good are bound to pave the way for successful communication. And as mentioned earlier, the fact that knowing the role of the communicator was regarded as essential can be interpreted as emphasizing the ethos appeal.

To sum up, these and other emerging findings will be subject to further analyses and will be complemented with interview data. Finally, we aim at characterizing the prerequisites of successful international communication.

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