Topic The concept of time varies across cultures and is an aspect of international marketing and negotiations that is often not appreciated. This, in turn, leads to significant frustration. Discuss...

Title
The student’s name
The professor’s name
The course title
The date
Contents
Executive Summary ........................................................................................................................ 3
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 3
Literature Review............................................................................................................................ 4
Management Implications ............................................................................................................... 6
Conclusions ..................................................................................................................................... 7
Recommendations ........................................................................................................................... 8
Executive Summary
This paper is focused on the time concept of different culture. Though time is a basic
element and every action is related to time, yet time plays a very vital role in international
business. It often becomes the reason of failure of most promising venture. The time concept is
studied on the basis of Edward T. Hall’s concept of Monochronic and Polychronic cultures. An
Australian company Coles Group Limited has been taken as an example to understand the
concept. The study focus on the challenges the company might face while expanding overseas in
the polychromic culture. Finally the paper suggests few recommendations regarding the same.
Introduction
The primary motto of every organisation is to earn profit and provide value to its
stakeholders. However, this is only possible when the organisation is able to do the right things
at the right time. Thus, Time is an important component of every business which plays an
immensely vital role throughout its journey. This paper studies the importance of time in the
international business scenario and analyses the challenges of the Australian company, Coles
Group Limited, with respect to time. It is a successful retail chain in Australia over more than
ninety years (Official website of Coles, n.d.). With the increasing global trade, Coles may soon
go for overseas operations. Further, a complete study on the company with respect to time
concept is done to find out the challenges and the solution for the organisation.
Literature Review
Corporate culture of all the organizations can be defined as a term that refers to the
collective behavior of humans who are part of the organization and include the values, norms,
visions, system, symbols, beliefs and their behavior (Guthrie, 2007). It can be said that collective
behavior and assumptions that are taught to all the organizational members and this particular
culture has an effect on the people and groups, stakeholders etc. Culture controls the behavior
within a society, encourages stability and provides a source of identity for the country. Culture
comprises of implicit and explicit pattern of and for behavior within a social setting. It is the
traditional ideas and their attached values that form the core of culture. Culture takes a long time
to evolve and is sustained over a longer period of time. The culture may reflect in its
infrastructure, behaviour, communication, observance, gender equality, compensation patterns,
values like quality, efficiency and so on. Culture comprises of three levels- the behavioral pattern
and artifacts, the values, the assumptions and beliefs. Understanding the culture requires an
understanding of all these three levels.
It is important for all companies to develop a corporate culture to bind the organization,
its philosophy and the employees together. Coles is no exception. The concept of time is
fundamental to all cultures. However, how the time is handled is different in different cultures
(Samovar, et.al., 2010). According to Edward T. Hall, there are two ways how the culture
structure time. The two ways are Monochronic and Polychronic cultures (Hofstede & Hall,
2007).
The monochronic time concept follows the notion of “one thing at a time”, while the
Polychronic concept focuses on multiple tasks being handled at one time, and time is subordinate
to interpersonal relations. The organization's perception of the monochronic time culture is
making the activities isolated from the organization and tasks are measured by output at a
specified time. In this type of culture it is preferred to plan in detail, make lists, keep track of
activities, and organize them into a daily routine. On the other hand in Polychronic culture, all
activities are integrated into the organization and tasks are measured as a part of overall
organization's goal (Hofstede & Hall, 2007)....