Free «Intercultural Business Week One» Essay Sample

Activity 1: The Economic System of Dubai

Dubai is one of the seven emirates of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The country has benefited from oil revenues from emirates such as Abu Dhabi, and it is constantly working to diversify its economy and thus become less dependent on oil and gas. While most of infrastructure was built on debt, Dubai is fast rising to position itself as the Middle East financial center. Currently, Dubai economy is supported by the contributions from a number of economic activities including construction and property (22.6%), trade (16%), entrepôt activities (15%), tourism (11.6%), financial services (11%), and natural gas and oil (6%) (Dubai.com, 2014).

Further, the government has set up specific industrial free zones that have done a great deal in attracting foreign direct investments. The progress has seen the development of zones such as the Media City and Dubai Internet City leading to global giants such as Microsoft and CNN (Torchia, 2013). The government focuses on changing the economy from mainly trading to a service and knowledge-based economy by 2015. Again, it intends to sustain 11% growth rate per annum to reach a target GDP of 108 billion dollars (Dubai.com, 2014).

Activity 2: Types of Cultural Shocks in Egypt

Despite the fact that Egypt has a fascinating culture and friendly society, there will be common challenges that could be experienced starting to work there as a manager. First, the country uses Arabic as a language of communication. Arabic has different versions, and Egyptian may be one of them. As a new individual in the Egyptian environment there will be challenges of language barrier. Another culture shock relates to religion. Egypt is predominantly a Muslim country with minority of other faiths such as Christianity. Although the country has not been seen to target religious minorities, there is a general feeling of fear from Christians seeking to work in Muslim-dominated areas (Peter, 2014).

Thirdly, there is government bureaucracy. In every nation, there are difficulties while doing business. Different countries approach economic matters differently; thus, one will need time to adapt to the new system while taking caution not to break the government’s requirements for business activities. Finally, there are the various cultural practices in Egypt that are different from one’s home country. For example, while shaking hands in Egypt is ubiquitous among men, it is not necessary to shake every person’s hand in my country of origin. Again, in other country, hands shaking may occur between a man and a woman (Peter, 2014).

Case 1

As more and more companies offer grants to American universities, these universities will have more resources to continue the expansion of their activities such as research. Further, the universities will emerge as shapers of the global culture based on the fact that students from all over the world are flocking in for further studies. Thus, the behavior of most professionals will be a replica of what is learnt in these institutions.

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There is a need to pay a close attention to the 25% of the population that do not make it beyond high school (Dynarski, 2008) as far as a nation’s prosperity is based on the level of education (Dynarski, 2008). It is a high figure as it equates to a quarter of the society not gainig basic education. Other nations facing similar problems have seen their uneducated populations being politically venerable as well as unemployed (Moretti, 2005). Further, these individuals are prone to joining illegal groupings, thus raising insecurity.

The advantages of foreign students attending American universities far much outweigh disadvantages. As the world seeks to find common solutions to global problems, people learning common means of solving crisis will help reduce bureaucracy especially in field of business and trade (Sloan, 2010).

Case 2

The approach given to the hosts may not have been necessarily wrong but could have made it uncomfortable for them to accommodate Larry. Larry ought to learn some of the Japanese manners of doing things. Again, other than trying to attract the attention, he should handle the situation in a normal business practice that is globally acceptable in most organizations.