Lauren Faust

Blog 5- Cultural Skills Can Make the Difference
Today’s Global Marketplace
by SHEIDA HODGE, Managing Director

http://www.globalhrnews.com/story.asp?sid=70

This article discusses the human’s natural reaction upon introduction to a new culture. This article relates to the chapter we discussed on Global HR and is called, “I found this article very interesting because it reinforced the importance of knowledge of culture before traveling to a foreign country and the acceptance of culture shock, two things that were discussed in class. It gave me a perspective on the Global HR world and how to better deal with the new environment. This article starts off by talking about how a lot of people don’t realize the culture they are currently in, like a fish doesn’t realize it needs water, until it is placed on sand. Following the fish analogy Hodge discusses the stages of doing business internationally and discusses culture shock. Hodge suggests knowledge as a cure to this shock. “The best defense against culture shock is knowledge. Culture shock is not a psychological disorder but a lack of social skills and knowledge needed to deal with a new environment” (SHEIDA HODGE). She always discusses the how certain people are not meant to work internationally and it is based on training, knowledge and skill sets. “Learning the proper skills for dealing with other cultures can reduce or eliminate the negative impact of culture shock” (Sheida Hodge). After the culture shock stage the applicant finally hits a stage in which they feel content. After they reach this stage they must return home a short time after. It is very important that the applicant has a successful return home because it can be costly to lose an employee due to return culture shock, or lose of job. This process of employee abroad is very important for companies to grow but can be costly to the employee.
I think this article was very interesting and really outlined the stages of employees who are working internationally. I thought that the discussion on how to prevent culture shock is accurate. I am planning to study abroad in fall and I found the tips on culture shock useful. I also liked how the article discussed the importance of the employees who return to their parent land and the challenges they face upon arrival. Hodge says, “Companies make an enormous investment in sending executives abroad, and they should think carefully about how to utilize the expertise they have gained” (Hodge). I believe that some companies forget the importance of the new culture skill sets that are learned while working abroad by the assigned employees and how those skills can be related to the work of the parent land. This article was very helpful in understand Global HR and the realization of the experience.

Blog 6- Is the Purpose of Incentives to Motivate Your Employees?

http://www.tlnt.com/2012/03/12/is-the-purpose-of-incentives-to-motivate-your-employees/

The article I read was called “Is the Purpose of Incentives to Motivate Your Employees” by Ann Bares. This article really touches upon the topic of motivation and its relation to incentives in the work place. I thought the beginning of the article was very interesting because it discussed how incentives like money are not really motivating a person to do better, they are only convincing a person to do a task they normally wouldn’t do for money. It almost makes incentives sound wrong and similar to bribery. “Truth is, you have to create the conditions for motivation – trust, transparency, a sense of shared interest, good work systems, etc. – as a baseline before any reward is going to be worth the investment” (Bares). Bares talks about how although there are bad apples in the bunch, most employees actually want to better the company and just need a positive work place and employee relations to make this happen. If a company wants lasting effects on an employee they need to have a motivational environment not just an incentive of profit. Bare’s suggests only using incentives for employees with a baseline of motivation already in place. This way the employee will only be bettering their skills and values as appose to forcing the employee to fake skills and values. She ends the article telling the reader that bribes will be used to force employees to do their job well in today’s world and suggests that we step above these bribes and use motivation instead.
I thought this article was very interesting because of the relationship Bare’s addressed between motivation and incentives. I never really thought of incentives as bribes but it makes sense in an unethical type of way. Sadly, the world has come to the point where employers have to convince an employee that they should be motivated and be doing their job efficiently and affectively. This article attacks this issue and concludes that almost every employee has drive and enthusiasm inside of them, it just needs to be brought about by motivation. I related this article to the movie clip we watched in class and discovered that the movie clip was correct. Money isn’t going to be an incentive for tasks that involve critical thinking because you cannot bribe a person to think harder or at a faster pace. Truth is, the only driving force for any employee is motivation. This article made the fact very clear that employees with little motivation are existent but every other employee is just waiting for an assignment in which they can shine.