Cross-cultural communications

This page is designed for students taking MARK / IBUS 492 Cross-Cultural Communications at the John Molson School of Business (JMSB) at Concordia University. The “See also” section provides links to additional library resources and services. The “More books, articles (…)” section provides insight on searching the library’s collections to enrich your classroom experience. The “Tips for your final project” section provides insight on searching for project ideas and documenting your paper. The concluding section provides “Parting thoughts and references“.

See also

Quick access trio: remember to access the Library’s (1) Business Research Portal for the best business sources; use the (2) Ask-A-Librarian help desk; and the (3) citing business sources in APA format.

Country Statistics: If you are curious about finding the best places for data or market/industry reports to support claims about foreign markets, access this page: Researching foreign markets for Canadian business students.

More books, articles and resources about cross-cultural communications

Statistics Canada projects that the Canadian population could reach up to 70 million people by 2068, through a variety of means including immigration. The Conference Board of Canada provides further insight, pushing some to claim that our population needs to reach 100 million people by 2100 to provide for sustained economic growth. In light of this, cross-cultural communication is an essential piece in contemporary Canadian business environment.

Ebooks search: To discover more books and research articles about cross-cultural communication, please access the library website (https://library.concordia.ca/), Before July 12th 2020, use the library website to search CLUES, the library catalogue. After July 12th, the library will launch a new search system called “Sofia” (link not yet available) but you will find it on the main page of the library website.

Remember that an asterisk * allows for any ending in a word. Quotes “exact phrase” around a phrase provides results with that exact combination of characters. In Sofia, boolean operators (AND/OR/NOT) need to be capitalized to work.

In all cases, the following searches provide best results:

  • workplace AND diversit*
  • corporat* AND cultur* AND (minorit* OR margina* OR cross-cult*)
  • corporat* AND cultur* AND (internat* OR multicult* OR cross-cul*)
  • (Marketing OR Advertis*) AND (minorit* OR margina* OR cross-cult*)
  • business* AND (minorit* OR margina*)
  • business* AND etiquet* AND (interna* OR multicul* OR cross-cul* )
  • negoti* AND business* AND (internat* OR multicult* OR cross-cul*)
  • communica* AND business* AND (interna* OR multicul* OR cross-cul*)
  • business* cultur* communicat*

Combine and explore: Try to mix up the components of these strategies. Also, consider these search strategies as starting points. If you identify an ebook of interest, try searching again by shifting your search strategy by using the phrases listed in the subject headings on its record.

And, yes, you can also use these search strategies to locate articles from trade or research journals through ProQuest Business Databases.

Tips for your final project

Be smart, first use the library, then Google: Using Google may seem like a good idea. Unfortunately, Google’s sorting algorithm favors certain magazines or news websites based on the data it has accumulated about you (or, worse yet, what it infers will keep you searching). You should use more powerful tools acquired by your library and available at no cost to you. These tools will foster a more relevant set of articles to use in your paper, mainly articles from trade and academic journals. These do not tend to be freely distributed on the Internet, we subscribe to them at the library. Maybe you’ll discover you don’t even need to Google after having used the library…

Business blunders related to “corporate culture” or cross-cultural mishaps: the best method to identify such examples is to search for articles from trade journals on ProQuest Business Databases. Notice how the search statements were crafted in the section above: there are two main concepts; each concept is expressed in a variety of synonyms; synonyms are separated with OR; synonyms are grouped in parentheses; the two concepts in each of their parentheses are joined with AND.

The same structure applies for this search. First, you can brainstorm words around the concept of mishap or blunder:

  • blunder; mishap; backlash; fail; resign; bias; racism; boycott; discrimination; bias; negative…

Then, reflect about these words. Some of them are probably too generic or imprecise, such as fail or negative. Using them in a search would lead to too many results.

Also, consider synonymous or equivalent expressions for corporate culture or cross-cultural communication. For these concepts, look at your in-class assigned readings or the ebooks you’ve discovered by searching the library catalogue. Try a few combinations and iterations, it could take you a few tries to discover the best results.

For example, try these searches in ProQuest Business Databases:

  • “corporate culture” AND (blunder* OR mishap* OR backlash* or resign* OR boycott* OR discrimin*)
  • (marketing OR advert*) AND (blunder* OR mishap* OR backlash* or resign* OR boycott* OR discrimin*)

To filter your results, use the menu on the left-hand panel to select Source Type to be professional journals and Date to be the last 2 or 3 years. You should have enough results to work with.

Once you have picked the mishap or blunder to research, look for more articles in ProQuest Business Databases on that company. Again, remember to focus your search on articles from trade publications as well as academic journals. You can also look at brands, industry names or any other lead you encounter in your searches.

Business environment and consumer lifestyles in other countries: remember to use the resources, databases and search strategies listed on the Researching foreign markets for Canadian business students: https://www.outfind.ca/researching-foreign-markets-for-canadian-students/

Parting thoughts

Remember to access the Library’s (1) Business Research Portal for the best business sources; use the (2) Ask-A-Librarian help desk; and the (3) citing business sources in APA format.

Last updated June 23rd 2020 by Olivier Charbonneau.

Ce contenu a été mis à jour le 2020-06-23 à 1:38 pm.