As advances in information technology continue to develop, new markets are brought closer to your businesses doorstep than ever before.
In this developing world is your business ready to take on these new markets and integrate itself into the working culture of a new country/society?
Technology
Over the past two years technology has developed to the point where cloud computing and apps are the future of business. It’s these advances in technology that are closing the gap on the barriers to enter markets in places such as the far-east or west.
The advances in technology mean that you can download an app onto your computer, phone or tablet pc which enables you to communicate quickly with a person halfway around the world. It’s this quick access to responding twenty four hours a day which means the barrier of time is being removed, so to deal with China which is eight hours ahead of GMT or to deal with Mexico which is seven hours behind GMT is no problem.
Platforms such as Facebook, Linkedin, Google , Twitter and various others such as Blackberry BBM and Voxer mean that you can stay in touch and liaise with people in a professional, relaxed and disciplined manner over the preferred platform of your choice. Companies are going as far as coming up with their own platforms to enable ease of communication via the internet, and to increase speed of communication.
Training Apps
The advances in technology are so great that companies are now using IT to further enhance how they deal with the intercultural nature of the staff within the organisation by standardising the technology and training given to each individual. This is to try and put each employee working in a different culture in the same position with the same access to training and information.
Culture
The only thing technology cannot solve is some of the cultural barriers that different countries are accustomed too.
Using new technology means that you can communicate faster with staff and colleagues but this doesn’t mean that the understanding in the other country is there. To bolster the communication channels or platforms that we use there are professionals who can teach us the customs of other cultures and train us how to get the best out of the communication platforms that we now have at our disposal. It is possible to grow your business in these new markets, but it’s important that you fully understand the culture or market place you are trading with, as your deals and ultimately profit margin will rely on this.
