© 2017 Dr. Xiaoran SongThis project explores Chinese-Western business communication strategies. It is based in qualitative research, combining participant observations of business meetings and semi-structured interviews with senior managers and executives who participated in the meetings. Broadly a case study of a British organisation’s subsidiary companies in China and Australia, as an ethnographic researcher, I seek to understand the meaningfulness of Chinese-Western business environments. I am particularly interested in why Chinese and Westerners communicate in particular ways, what are some implicit reasons governing their communicative behaviour and what the strategies are involved in successful business communication and management. I achieved this by observing and analysing the actual communication of Chinese and Western participants in business meetings, and follow up reflections, initially explored through analysis using Hofstede’s (1980, 1988) dimensions of national cultural value differences, to see if any evidence could be found for these. Then, interview data was screened to consolidate explanations for communication in the meetings and to consolidate participants’ experiences and reflections on cross-cultural and international business communication and management, to identify other differences.

The findings show, first, that Hofstede’s dimensions of national cultural value differences do not provide effective guidance for understanding cross-cultural business communication, particularly Hofstede’s dimensions of cultural value differences in Chinese culture. Instead it is the sameness that provides the conceptual bridge and the common ground for communicability and manageability. The second significant finding is that the dynamism and fluidity of the concept of ‘culture’, especially the difference at the individual level that creates difficulty and confusion for cross-cultural management, but this challenge can be controlled by managing expectations before and during business communication, and by enhancing understanding and management of people (both insiders and outsiders) in the same business context. 

Based on these two findings I propose a pedagogical framework for business communication within management training and workplace learning. The central concept of this framework is that the sameness in intercultural business communication and management can be explicitly identified, elicited, encouraged and further developed; and that difference and expectations can be negotiated.Open Acces