iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Declaration …………………………………………………………………………. iii Table of contents……………………………………………………………………. iv CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1. Aims of the study……………………………………………………….
Scope of the study…………………………………………………………………. Methods of the study ……………………………………………………………… 2 5. Significance of the study …………………………………………………………. Organization of the study………………………………………………………… 2 CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.
What is culture?. Components of culture. Vietnamese cultural values …………………………………………. Duty and honor……………………………………………………………….
American cultural values……………………………………………………… 9 1. Materialism and hard work…………………………………………………. What is communication?. Cross – cultural communication………………………………………………… 13 2.
Potential problems in cross – cultural communication ………………………. What is negotiation?. Negotiation as a form of communication………………………………………. Elements of negotiation………………………………………………………….
Characteristics of business negotiation………………………………………… 18 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Cross - cultural business negotiation…………………………………………… 19 3. Potential problems in cross cultural business negotiation……………………. Data collection instrument ……………………………………………………….
Data collection procedure…………………………………………………………. 23 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 1. Presentation and analysis of the data……………………………………………. The negotiators – the actors of a negotiation…………………………………… 25 1.
The size of negotiation team……………………………………………………. Goal of negotiating ………………………………………………………………. The role of attorneys in the negotiation…………………………………………. Activities accompanying the negotiation ……………………………………….
Similarities and differences between Vietnamese and American in business negotiation and the cultural explanation…. Potential problems in Vietnamese – American business negotiation and some 39 suggested solutions…………………………………………………………………… 3. Some suggested solutions………………………………………………………. Limitation of the study…………………………………………………………….
Suggestions for further study……………………………………………………… 42 REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………. 43 APPENDIX 1 I APPENDIX 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 1 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study During the last few decades, the increasing globalization of the economy has resulted in the tremendous growth in international market. As international business opportunities open, negotiations also increase.
There have been so many studies about negotiation skills across cultures, but they only focused mainly on developed countries. Just few studies have been conducted in the Vietnamese market. Located in the Southeast Asian region, the developing country Vietnam attracts a lot of foreign direct investments, especially after becoming a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2007. Among various foreign investors are those who come from the United States.-Vietnam Trade Agreement signed in July 2000 has created opportunities for US investors in Vietnam and also given Vietnamese businesses access to the U.
market on the same terms as other nations. With the increasing development in US – Vietnam trade relation, the negotiations between Vietnamese and U. partners grow to be a norm. This shows the importance of understanding how differences in cultures, sexes, experience, and characteristics could affect Vietnamese – American business negotiation.
However, to cover all those differences in a study of this size seems to be overloaded. This study, therefore, attempts to explore only one side of cultural differences - Vietnamese and American cultural values and to find out how they influence on Vietnamese – American business negotiation. Aims of the study This study aims to investigate the potential problems in Vietnamese – American business negotiation and the Vietnamese and American cultural values that cause those problems. To be more specific, the objectives of the study are: - to find out typical Vietnamese and American cultural values.
- to understand the nature of a cross cultural business negotiation. - to examine the potential problems in Vietnamese – American business negotiation. - to analyze how cultural values influence the negotiation process and outcomes. These aims are formulated into 3 following research questions: LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 2 1) What are the similarities and differences between Vietnamese and American business negotiation? 2) How are Vietnamese and American cultural values reflected in Vietnamese – American business negotiation? 3) What are potential problems in Vietnamese – American business negotiation? 3.
Scope of the study Dealing with all cultural factors affecting negotiation is too broad for a study of this type. Therefore, the focus of this study is to investigate only some typical cultural values of the two target countries: Vietnam and the United States; and to find out how they are reflected in Vietnamese-American business negotiation. Methods of the study The study used mixed methods to find answers to the three research questions. The instrument for data collection in this study was the questionnaire.
The data collected from questionnaires were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively for descriptive statistics. Considerations and comments will be made inductively. Significance of the study This study points out the cultural values of the two countries that have influence on Vietnamese – American business negotiation and tries to find out some potential problems in that case. The results of the study will be of some contribution to the literature of international business negotiation from cross-cultural perspective.
Moreover, the findings and comments of the study are believed to be useful for raising the cultural awareness of Vietnamese and American businessmen when they meet up in a negotiation so that they can achieve success when they do business in the United States or Vietnam. Organization of the study: This minor thesis consists of 5 chapters: The first chapter is the introduction which reveals the rationale, significance, aims, methods, scope and organization of the study. LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 3 Chapter 2 is the theoretical background centering on some typical cultural values of Vietnam and the United States, the cross cultural business negotiation with potential problems. Chapter 3 discusses the methodology of the study.
Chapter 4 deals with findings and discussion, and implications of the study given by the findings. The last chapter is the conclusion, limitations and suggestions for further study. CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1. Culture LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.
What is culture? Culture is an abstract term which is very hard to define. The meaning of the word ―culture‖ causes a lot of debates by anthropologists as well as many other social scientists. There are up to now hundreds of definitions of ‗culture‘ and different people define it in dissimilar ways. But the most general understanding of culture is that it is learnt, not inherent.
Culture may be understood in the sense of ―high culture‖ as the appreciation of art, music, literature and so on, or ―low culture‖ as normal life with daily activities of human beings. According to UNESCO, culture is an "aggregate of distinctive, spiritual, material, intellectual, and emotional traits, which characterizes a society or a social group. It includes, alongside with arts and literature, ways of life, basic human rights, systems of values, customs and traditions, and faiths". This is the definition that helps to articulate the concept of cultural dimension of development.
Geert Hofstede (1984:22) describes culture as the ―collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another.‖ Therefore, the behavior of a person can only be understood from the knowledge of the culture that he belongs to. Due to the fact that all negotiations take place in a socio-cultural environment, the culture of such a place will greatly influence the way the negotiators act, behave or perceive communications, both verbal and non verbal during negotiations. Therefore, the definition ―Culture is a shared background (for example, national, ethnic, religious) resulting from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, attitudes, and values‖ by Levine and Adelman (1993:xvi) is the most suitable one for the scope of this study. Components of culture Being passed down from generation to generation, the components of culture are extremely important to all aspects of a society.
They are necessary for members of society to competently participate in social life and interactions. The actions of people can provide information on the culture they come from. Sometimes, being submerged into another culture can lead to culture shock. According to Stephen Moore (1985:4), cultures are composed of six elements: beliefs, values, norms, roles, role conflict and status.
- Beliefs: these are general, vague opinions held about the world and about the nature of society. They vary by society and sometimes by subcultures, e. the ancient LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 5 people were encouraged to think that the Earth was the centre of the universe and all other planets moved around us. - Values: these are vague beliefs about what is right and correct in the world.
They imply that there are certain appropriate forms of action which ought to be taken, e. life is precious therefore, it is wrong to kill anybody. - Norms: these are socially expected patterns of behavior. (Actions that are regarded as normal) A norm of the British society is to say ―Hello!‖ on meeting someone, or to stand in a queue without trying to push in front.
- Roles: Social roles are patterns of behavior expected of certain people according to the occupation or position they hold in society. - Role conflict: There are innumerable social roles – father, mother, child, shopkeeper etc. All of us occupy a number of roles, which are generally complementary, but sometimes they may conflict. - Status: This refers to the position of a person or social role in society according to the amount of prestige received from others.
In different societies/cultures, status varies. Lustig and Jolene Koeste (2006, 86) have the opinion that culture involves four components: beliefs, values, norms and social practices. - Beliefs: A belief is an idea that people assume to be true about the world. Beliefs, therefore, are a set of learned interpretations that form the basis for cultural members to decide what is and what is not logical and correct.
- Values: Values involve what a culture regards as good or bad, right or wrong, fair or unfair, just or unjust, beautiful or ugly, clean or dirty, valuable or worthless, appropriate or inappropriate, and kind of cruel. Because values are the desired characteristics or goals of a culture, a culture‘s values do not necessary describe its actual behaviors and characteristics. - Norms: Norms are the socially shared expectations of appropriate behaviors. When a person‘s behaviors violate the culture‘s norms, social sanctions are usually imposed.
Like values, norms can vary within a culture in terms of their importance and intensity. Unlike values, however, norms may change over a period of time, whereas beliefs and values tend to be much more enduring. LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 6 - Social practices: Social practices are the predictable behaviors‘ patterns that members of a culture typically follow. Thus, social practices are the outward manifestations of beliefs, values and norms.
Cultural values In the scope of this study, only the component ‗values‘ is focused among the components of culture mentioned above. In the view of philosophers, value is a very common concept. It relates to economy, politics, morality, art, religion, science, culture and even the common connotation and essence of gains and losses, kindness and evil, beauty and ugliness, pros and cons in every field of daily life. Values are related to the norms of a culture, but they are more global and abstract than norms.
Norms are rules for behavior in specific situations, while values identify what should be judged as good or evil. Different cultures reflect different values. At the simplest level, cultural values are commonly shared concepts about what is right or wrong, possible or impossible, true or false and so on. In other words, they may be seen as the commonly held standards of what is acceptable or unacceptable, important or unimportant, right or wrong, workable or unworkable, etc., in a community or society.
Values determine thought patterns, standards of morality and behaviors. Each culture has its own value system which may be very different from that of another culture. Vietnamese cultural values Known as a once war-torn nation, Vietnam has a complex culture influenced by many foreign invaders over the centuries. However, it can be said on the positive side that, this history of war has contributed to shape the Vietnamese character.
Long years of fighting against foreign intruders have served to unify the country, fostering a sense of nationalism and pride. In the early history, the country was dominated by Chinese for almost 1000 years.