Cross Cultural Awareness for the International Manager Essay - 1

Cross Cultural Awareness for the International Manager - Essay Example This report assesses the operations of Muffin King Ltd, an international chain of bakery outlets that is fast expanding in the global market. The key objective of the report is to propose business strategies based on a high level of awareness and close insight of cross cultural differences among different international markets, which will yield the business a competitive advantage. Achieving business competitiveness in today’s highly competitive globalised scenario is no longer possible through traditional success factors such as low production costs, high productivity and shorter lead-times, which have now become prerequisites to stay in business. Neither can global players in the market offer standardised product offers or implement standardised work processes and human resource management (HRM) practices across different nations in which they operate. Companies today have realised that to succeed in the global market place, a high level of awareness and a deep insight is required of the cross- cultural differences existing across the world (Broek 2005). These cross-cultural dimensions are a source of competitive advantage if understood and exploited to the company’s advantage. As global multinationals such as Ecare the Swedish furniture marketer, the MTV Broadcasting Company or MacDonald have realised, companies need to change and adopt their products and business practices to suit different cultural dimensions in order to stay competitive (Hill 2003). This report aims at evaluating the business operations of â€Å"Muffin King Ltd.† a UK based international chain of bakery outlets, and make recommendations which will exploit the sources of competitive advantages in the sphere of cross -cultural differences. â€Å"Muffin King Ltd.† is a UK based retail chain of bakery outlets, which has recently expanded to the