This chapter provides the reader an overview of the study, including the background of the study, the purposes of the study, the research questions, the significance of the study, the delimitations and limitations, and the definition of terms.
Background of the Study
In an increasing global environment, there are more and more business involved in international activities which requires the ability to communicate across cultures. How to communicate effectively in intercultural situations and to behavior appropriately in a variety of cultural contexts became a pivotal issue (Chaney & Martin, 2003). In Taiwan, one can also see this trend. Owing to the rapid change of technology, global communication and
transportation break the boundaries. Taiwanese market is facing the global challenges now.
There are many international corporations dispatching their employees overseas to implement global strategies and manage subsidiaries. Also, Taiwanese workers have more chance to communicate with international workers. Hence, intercultural competence became important to management in Taiwan.
Besides, the increasing numbers of intercultural contents shows the importance. In 1976, close to 25 articles were written on this topic in PsychINFO. But in 2008, more than 15,000 articles were written to discuss this topic (Joseph, Paul & Eduardo, 2009). Whether in business or research fields, intercultural communications and developing intercultural competences have become an important issue for the whole world (Jokinen, 2005).
Background of Taiwan Financial Sector
Taiwanese economic growth depends heavily on international trade and manufacturing.
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In 1985, industry sector (including manufacturing industry) accounted for 44.6% of Gross Domestic Product. However it downed to 31.2% in 2003. Accompanied with this trend, services industry raised to 67.1% from 49.7% during 1985 to 2003. Service-providing industry took off in recent year, and has become the main contribution to GDP (Council for Economic Planning and Development, 2011).
Among service-providing industry, financial sector is an important sector. According to Taiwan Coalition of Service Industry, financial sector accounted for 10% of total output in 2005, the third largest follows after wholesales sector of 20% and government service of 13%
(Taiwan Coalition of Service Industry, 2011). Besides, financial sector accounted for 11.5%
of GDP in 2003, and the total value of output was NT$ 1,148 billion dollars in 2009 (The Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, 2011). Financial sector is also important to a nation’s economic and development. It provides funds for industries and enterprises and support their expenditure and growth.
Taiwanese financial sector is going globalization. There are many foreign financial institutions setting up their branches and dispatched managers to implement global strategies in Taiwan. According to Financial Supervisory Commission (2011), there are 31 branches of foreign banks, which are 45.6% of total branches of banks. Also, the total accumulated net inward remittance was US$ 1,669 billion dollar till 2011. The percentage of market value held by foreign investors was 31.59% (Financial Supervisory Commission Executive Yuan, 2011). Taiwanese financial industry has more and more business with foreign investments.
These involve in intercultural communications. Therefore, having intercultural competences can let financial professionals communicate effectively in intercultural situations and
behavior appropriately in a variety of cultural contexts.
Purposes of the Study
The ecosystem of the workforce nowadays is that workers from many different cultures
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interact and work together. Thus, intercultural competence is needed in a variety of fields, such as education, business, social work, and etc. What intercultural competences do intercultural competent workers need in a particular field? The specific intercultural
competences needed for globally competent businessmen are somewhat different than those needed for intercultural competent engineers (Darla, 2009). Each field may have its own suitable intercultural competences, thus, the purpose of this paper was to explore intercultural competence needed for professional financial workers. Furthermore, the study aimed to explore communication barriers these professionals met in intercultural context, and to investigate the developmental approaches of intercultural competence for them. The researcher listed research purposes as below.
1. To explore intercultural competence for professional financial workers.
2. To explore barriers which the professional financial workers have met in intercultural communication.
3. To investigate the developmental approaches of intercultural competence for professional financial workers.
Questions of the Study
1. What intercultural competences do professional financial workers need?
2. What are the barriers which professional financial workers have met in intercultural communications?
3. What are the approaches to develop intercultural competences for professional financial workers?
Significance of the Study
Over the past 30 years, numerous scholars have focused on a variety of aspects of
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intercultural content, such as selecting expatriates, cross-cultural adaptation and adjustment, intercultural communication, intercultural training development and global competence (Kim, 2001). Although it has been a bloom field, study related to intercultural content is still limited in Taiwan.
Most of the scope of research related to financial industry are limited to trading strategies or work competence in Taiwan (Hwang, 2002). Therefore, the study served as a pioneer of exploring intercultural content for financial professionals. This study provided practitioners’ perspective and a detailed reference for understanding the job contents and working environment of financial professionals.
There are a variety of intercultural content, but most of research were having perspectives from western cultures. Non-western cultural perspective, such as perspective from Latin America, Korea, and China, is booming (Darla, 2009). However, still limited research is taking a perspective from Taiwan. The study provided a Taiwanese perspective and explored intercultural competences which are suitable for the applications in Taiwanese financial industry.
Delimitations and Limitations
The study focused on professionals of financial industry in Taiwan. Therefore, the research delimitations and limitations were as below.
Firstly, this study was delimited to financial industry in Taiwan, thus research findings may have potential limitation to apply to other industries
Secondly, the study is a culture-specific approach. The research findings may be limited to Taiwanese experience. Thus, further researchers who want to use the findings to generalize principle that applied to other cultures may not be suitable.
Definition of Key Terms
In order to have deeper understanding of the terms used in this study, key terms are
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being clarified as followings.
Intercultural Communication
Intercultural communication is generally conceptualized as communication between people from different cultures (Gudykunst, 2002).
Intercultural Competence
Intercultural competence is the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes (Darla, 2004, p. 184).”
Barriers of Intercultural Communication
The barriers in intercultural communication are those obstacles to effective
communication, including anxiety, assuming similarity instead of difference, language, nonverbal language ethnocentrism, stereotype and prejudice, communication style, and etc (Bennett, 1998; Chaney and Martin, 2003; Jandt, 2010).
Financial Industry
Financial industry includes banking enterprises, securities enterprises, futures enterprises, insurance enterprises, electronic stored value card enterprises, and enterprises in other
financial services (Financial Consumer Protection Act, 2011).
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