Subsequently, G. Hofstede developed his theory with the other two dimensions: Long-term orientation vs short-term orientation and indulgence vs restraint (IVR). Long-term orientation involves planning for the future and perseverance values. At the same time, short-term is oriented at the past and the present. Indulgence allows the gratification of basic impulses and having fun while restraint is regulating everything through strict social norms.

Having learned the given model of cultural dimensions, you may have a question “How can we determine whether a culture/organization belongs to a particular dimension?” If a culture or organization belongs to a particular dimension, it will have a set of specific features that are presented in the table where you can also find tips for determining (and behaving with) each of dimension's representatives:

PDI	Characteristics	Tips
High PDI	- Centralized organization - Complicated hierarchies - Significant gaps in compensation, respect and authority	- Confirm the status of a leader - One may need to go to the top to get the required answers
Low PDI	- Flat organizations - Employers and employees are almost equal	- Delegate what is possible - Try to involve in the decision-making session those who will be affected
High IDV	- People's time, privacy and freedom are highly valued - Challenging, enjoy being rewarded for work	- Acknowledge the individual's achievements - Do not confuse work life and social life - Stimulate discussions and expression of people's ideas
Low IDV	- Priority on building skills and becoming professional - Work for inherent rewards - Harmony among groups members is prioritized	- Intelligence is significant - Conceal feelings and emotions that threaten the harmony - Beware giving negative feedback publicly - Answering “No” may cause further problems except that it is a sign of politeness
High MAS	- Strong egos - feelings of importance and pride belong - Finances and success are essential	- Bear in mind the possibility of differentiated gender roles - People are driven by specific tasks
Low MAS	- Orientation on relationships - Orientation on reaching a consensus - Concentration on quality of life	- Negotiation and collaboration are the keys to success - Workplace flexibility and maintaining work-life balance are important
High UAI	- Conservative, strict and organized - Many societal conventions - Expressive, showing emotions if required - Society of increased energy	- Clearance and concision about anticipations and objectives - Acknowledge the existence of “unspoken” rules - The use of gestures to express emotion may be part of the conversation
Low UAI	- Readiness for changes and innovations - Inclined to endless learning - Less feeling of emergency	- Make sure that people are concentrated but avoid making it too structured - Demonstrating your knowledge in front of others is not always a good idea, being able to manage under all circumstances is more valuable
Long-term Orientation	- People are puzzled by the question of what is right and what is not - Frugality and education are valued - Modesty - Advantages and duties are highlighted - “What?”/“How?” > “Why?”	- Act in a shy manner - Avoid being selfish - People tend to compromise which is not always seen for others
Short-term Orientation	- “Why?” > “What?”/“How?” - Firm convictions - People overrate themselves - Others tend to evaluate their statements critically - Values and rights are highlighted	- “Selling” yourself is accepted seriously - Compromising is equal to weakness - Adulation empowers
High Indulgence	- Optimistic - Significance of freedom of speech - Concentration on personal prosperity	- Do not assume life being that serious - Promote debates and discussions in conferences and decision making - Pay attention to feedback, coaching and mentoring - Accentuate flexible work-life balance
High Restraint	- Pessimistic - More regulated and strict behaviour	- Prevent joking during formal meetings - Express negativity about the life and the world during informal meetings

After reviewing the dimensions' characteristics and tips, you may easily substitute the needed culture or company and analyze it through Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions. During this week, you have learned about a model of cultural dimensions that you may further apply for avoiding conflicts in the organizations or indicating its premises from the cross-cultural point of view. Moreover, you may find case studies as examples in the “readings” section. Next week you will learn other factors that might be sources of conflict and what background information of participants we should consider. Thank you!



Readings

1. Hofstede, G. (2001). Culture's Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviors, Institutions, and Organizations Across Nations, 2nd ed. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA.

2. Hofstede, G., Neuijen, B., Ohayy D. & Sanders G. (1990). Measuring Organizational Cultures: A Qualitative and Quantitative Study Across Twenty Cases. Administrative Science Quarterly, ¹35. (Case studies at pp. 292-294)

3. Hofstede, G. (2009). Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model in Context. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, Unit 2.

4. Jackson, J. (2012). The Routledge handbook of language and intercultural communication. Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, London.

5. Samovar, Larry A., Porter, Richard E., McDaniel, Edwin R. & Roy, Carolyn Sexton (2013). Intercultural Communication. A reader (14th ed.). Cengage Learning, New York, NY.

6. A website dedicated to the life and work of Geert Hofstede: www.geerthofstede.com/landing-page/

7. A tool to compare countries by their dimensions: www.hofstede-insights.com/product/compare-countries/

1 practice exercise (5 questions)

Q1: What is one of the characteristics of High PDI cultures? (only one option is correct)

(a) Flat organizations

(b) People delegate what is possible

(c) Centralized organizations (correct)

(d) Employers and employees are equal

Q2: What cultural dimension can be characterized as “challenging”?

(a) High PDI

(b) High IDV (correct)

(c) Low PDI

(d) Low IDV

Q3: “Conservative, strict and organized” are the characteristics of … culture (fill in the gaps) (High UAI)

Q4: What is the difference between masculine and feminine cultures? (open question)

Q5: How do you understand that the culture is long-term oriented?

(a) People have firm convictions.

(b) People are puzzled by the question of what is right and what is not. (correct)

(c) People tend to overrate themselves.

(d) Others tend to evaluate their statements critically.

Discussion prompt

Analyze your own culture through Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions. How can you describe its specific features?

Week 2. The premises of a conflict

Lecture I: the premises of organizational conflicts

To know how to handle conflict, first of all, you need to know what can lead to this conflict, what are the premises of the situation. During the first week, you have learned the differences among cultures that can be the reasons for conflict situations in the organizations due to miscommunication and misunderstanding from the cultural point of view. In this lecture, you will learn other premises that might lead to confrontations in workplaces.

There are quite a lot of reasons for conflict situations in a company. For example:

- Difficulties in the working process, adverse working environment, inadequate forms of working encouraging

- Incorrect actions of the manager due to the lack of experience (difficulties with task distribution, understanding subordinates' psychology)

- Drawbacks in the manager's working style, for example, the difference in working behaviour of the previous and the current managers

- The discrepancy of employees' opinions in the assessment of the phenomena of industrial life

- Violation of intra-group norms of behaviour, the collapse of the team into different groups, the emergence of disagreements between different categories of employees (for example, “old-timers” and “newcomers”, the allocation of “irreplaceable” ones)

- Contradictions of people's interests and their functions in the labour activity

- Incompatibility due to personal, socio-demographic (gender, age, social origin) differences. Personal conflicts become more frequent in gender-homogenous teams, they eventually affect the business sphere of employee relations and develop into business conflicts, without contributing to the development of the workforce

- Personal characteristics of individuals - specific features of behaviour, attitudes towards work and team, character traits.

All these sources of conflicts increase the possibility of their occurrence. However, even with a considerable probability of dispute, the parties may not want to be engaged in conflict situations. Sometimes the potential benefits of participating in a conflict are not worth the cost. Once you entered the conflict situation, as a rule, you do everything to ensure that your point of view is accepted, your goal is achieved, and you prevent the opponent doing the same. Here you need to manage the interaction in the conflict. Depending on how effective it is, the consequences of conflict will become functional or dysfunctional.

In the next lecture, we will show you a unique model provided by Gary T. Furlong named “Circle of conflict”. Thank you!

Lecture II: Circle of conflict by Gary T. Furlong

In this lecture, we will show you a convenient model for analyzing the premises of a conflict situation and how to complete this framework.

“Circle of conflict” is a model that helps to analyze and classify the primary sources or “drivers” of a conflict. It categorizes a conflict case into six sections as the focus of conflict solving:

1) Relationships,

2) Moods/Externals,

3) Structure,

4) Data,

5) Values,

6) Interests.

Pic.1 The Circle of Conflict Furlong, Gary T. (2005). The conflict resolution toolbox: models & maps for analyzing, diagnosing, and resolving conflict (1st ed.), Canada: John Wilet & Sons, Ltd.

However, it is a circle only by its name; in practice, you should complete the table with the highlighted categories that are responsible for different descriptions. Thus, the Relationships category describes the background of conflict participants' relationships. It includes the negative experience that could be in the past, some stereotypes that people have about each other, poor communications due to different reasons and negative behaviour towards each other continually repeating. Moods/externals category includes those factors that are not relevant to the essence of conflict, some physiological or psychological reasons such as headache, conflict nature of a person and others, and the reason frequently called “bad hair day” when the bad mood is caused by external things like bad weather, broken alarm, or when coffee was boiled over in the morning. Values category describes differences in belief systems, in perception what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil, what is just and what is unjust. Data category includes troubles with communication, misinformation or, vice versa, too much information. Structure category describes physical resources that are considered to be limited, such as time and money, some authority issues, problems in the structure of an organization and geographical limitations. Interests category, being an additional one, helps to identify what interests the parties have considering the conflict situation, to focus on the interests that these parties may have in common, to find the ways to meet everyone's interests, to prioritize these interests from not important to very important. Here you can find the table itself with bullet points for your convenience:

Pic.2 Circle of Conflict: Diagnosis Furlong, Gary T. (2005). The conflict resolution toolbox: models & maps for analyzing, diagnosing, and resolving conflict (1st ed.), Canada: John Wilet & Sons, Ltd.

“Circle of Conflict” can be applied to any conflict case that entrepreneurs, employees and colleagues may be involved in. Moreover, this tool provides people with a way to determine the various sources of a conflict situation. It helps them to look beyond the current issue to start to challenge the fundamental or root causes. Now you know more about the origins of conflicts that may arise in your workplace and during the next week you will learn about the techniques that can help to avoid the impending dispute. Thank you!

Readings

1. Furlong, Gary T. (2005). The conflict resolution toolbox: models & maps for analyzing, diagnosing, and resolving conflict (1st ed.), Canada: John Wilet & Sons, Ltd. (A case study on pp. 44-60)

2. Bolshakov, A., Nesmelova, M. (2007). Organizational conflict-management. MZ Press, Moscow.

3. Lukin, Yu. (2007). Conflictology: Management of conflicts. Gaudeamus

1 practice exercise (4 questions and 1 task)

Q1: Name 3 out of 8 causes of organizational conflicts that were listed in the lecture I. (describe each of them with a few words)

Q2: How many categories does the “Circle of Conflict” involve? (only one option is correct)

(a) 5

(b) 4

(c) 6

(d) 5 and 1 additional (correct)

Q3: What category of “Circle of Conflict” is considered to be complementary? (only one option is correct)

(a) Moods/Externals

(b) Values

(c) Interests (correct)

(d) Structure

Q4: “Data” category helps to analyze… (fill in the gaps)

(a) Unrelated factors

(b) Lack of information (correct)

(c) Limited resources

(d) Belief system

Q5: Describe a conflict that you have experienced in your life, write up to 200 words about it, then analyze its causes using the diagnosis template for the “Circle of Conflict”. (the task will be checked by the instructor)

Week 3. The preventive techniques to avoid conflicts

Lecture I: Introduction to conflict prevention

This week's lectures will be dedicated to conflict prevention. The main goal of conflict prevention is to create conditions for people's activities and interactions that would minimize the probability of conflict emergence and their destructive development. To prevent negative consequences of conflicts, it is necessary to recognize the conflict situation in time and to avoid the development of a conflict situation in the team.

To prevent conflicts, it is significant to create a favourable social and psychological climate in the team. An unfavourable mental environment in the group causes a decrease in labour efficiency, stress, emotional breakdowns and unconstructive behaviour of employees. For the formation of a favourable moral and psychological climate, it is crucial to follow these six rules:

- To create the right HR policy. Here it means that you need to select and place the staff taking professional and psychological qualities into account. If it is possible, it is better to filter out conflicted personalities during the selection stage. It is also important to take cultural features into account. For example, if you know that these two cultures may face some difficulties during the work based on cross-cultural differences, it is better to separate them into different departments. During the first week, we have learned a lot about these cultural differences.

- To ensure a salary level that meets the expectation of employees, as well as the necessary favourable opportunities for career and professional growth (optimization of the working time for managers and employees; reducing the employees' dependence on the manager (reduce the power distance if necessary); encouragement of the initiative, fair and transparent distribution of workload and material benefits between subordinates).

- To inform the workers about the activities and final results of the organization, to avoid the probable uncertainty if necessary. Awareness of their role in the process of achieving the final result will allow employees to be more responsible in the performance of their duties, as well as strengthen their internal motivation.

- To work with a skilled team who see the positive sides of each other, who are tolerant to cultural differences of each other, who try to smooth out the inevitable stressful situations. Positive traditions in the team, the removal of social and psychological tension by conducting joint recreational activities, including the participation of family members to know each other better can be a good stabilizing factor.

- To ensure that the staff matches their professional skills and their role in the organization. For each employee, it is necessary to develop robust rules of operation. In any company, there must be clear job descriptions that establish the set of employees' responsibilities and that clearly define the role of each employee in the overall group work.

- To ensure that the leadership style and individual qualities of a leader are appropriate. Essential attributes include analytical skills, decision making, high-stress tolerance, self-control, and the ability to build relationships with others effectively.

Without a doubt, a favourable psychological climate is crucial to prevent all types of conflicts in the workplace. During this lecture, we have covered the ways to form this climate. In the next lecture, we will learn specific preventive techniques that will help you to avoid the conflicts. Thank you!

Lecture II: Preventive techniques

To prevent conflict, you need to know the practical techniques that may help you. In this lecture, you will learn these techniques and when to apply them. But before that, it is crucial to know some fundamental pieces of advice for conflict prevention:

- Source of conflict - anticipate, stay alert, eliminate the incompatibility. It means that you as a manager or CEO should foresee the possible causes of conflicts at the workplace and to be ready to prevent them at any stage trying to exclude any incompatibilities of workers including their different cultural features

- Conflict's perception (biases + expectations) - develop cross-cultural competence. It means that a manager should consider others' perception of a probable conflict, know what background relationships the employees have and what they anticipate of the conflict situation to foresee the consequences if a conflict occurs. It is also crucial to develop the ability to be tolerant to the representatives of other cultures, i.e. to be cross-culturally competent.

- Conflict's emotions - control. It means that a manager should control not only his or her emotions but employees' emotions as well to avoid conflict situations at the workplace. Once you have a situation under control, it will give you a benefit in conflict prevention.

Now we are ready to analyze the existing techniques to prevent conflict situations. Mainly we distinguish six preventive techniques that may help you:

- Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT). This therapy was elaborated by Albert Ellis in 1955. The main goal of REBT is to teach rational sociality. REBT is not a treatment, it is not psychotherapy, but the change of behaviour, kind of training. It is a training for rationally meaningful experience coping with vital problems, with your feelings and actions, it is a practice of critical-thinking skills and rational behaviour. REBT includes the “ABC” model, which is the core of the theory. This model describes not only the process of the origin of false emotions and behaviours but also how to eliminate their causes. “A” - activating events - are any current events or your thoughts, feelings, behaviour in connection with these events, memories and thoughts about past experiences. “B” stands for “beliefs” and “C” stands for “consequences”. In “A” each person brings something of their own, namely their goals, physiological predisposition, attitudes, views and beliefs - “B”. And then “B” leads to that particular “C”. So, in this model, all of the points are sequentially connected. “A”, “B” and “C” are related to each other, and none of these elements can exist without each other. It is also crucial to highlight the illogical beliefs that people may possess. Among them are dramatization (something is terrible, disastrous) and condemnation (“all people are acting not the way I want them to”). According to Albert Ellis all these irrational beliefs come down to three statements: 1) I have to do everything right, 2) All people should treat me well, 3) The world must be effortless for me. The core of the REBT lays in the replacement of modal verbs like “have to”, “should”, “must” with rational preferences in such situations. All in all, it is the acceptance of a flexible attitude towards life events in general.

- Distortion of the opponent's perception - “Dome”, “Pillow and Arrows”, “Discharge Pipe”, “3rd Eye”, “Role-playing”.

· “Dome”. You can create a mental energy system around you against negative emotions. If you feel that the pressure is increasing, move your “dome”, your “shield” closer to the person who is exuding negative energy. And then you will be able to do what you need more calmly and comfortably.

· “Pillow and Arrows”. You imagine that unfair remarks addressed to you are sent at you by your opponent. He intends to hurt you. But you have a thick invisible pillow that has the property of retaining sharp arrows. The pillow does not repel arrows to the opponent; it “absorbs” them gently. By moving this pillow in an imaginary space, try to absorb these sharp arrows. But be careful! The stream of arrows may contain important information that might be important to resolve a conflict.

· “Discharge Pipe”. You can imagine that you have a thin pipe inside you. It starts in your ear and ends in your heel. There is a particular “discharge hole” at your workplace. Being an object of indiscretion, injustice, harshness in terms of unequal communication, you turn to the opponent with your “special ear” which is the beginning of the “discharge pipe” and let the unfair remarks flow through this pipe down to the heel letting them drain. A significant clarification - the upper part of the pipe contains a “strainer” that “filters out” the data needed to control the situation.

· “3rd Eye”. You can imagine that you have an extra eye. With the help of this third eye, you try to understand your reactions as much as possible. The look of the third eye should be as critical as possible. In essence, you need to fix in your mind everything that is required to be corrected in yourself, and then note all the achievements and all the failures. For example, “The customer is tough, but I am not irritated, I am not stressed, but I speak too loudly again… Now I've fixed my mistakes, everything is fine… Keep it up!”

· Role-playing. You can imagine that you take the role of your interlocutor. Look at what is happening through his/her eyes and try to anticipate his/her actions. Then you can compare the real actions of the opponent with the supposed ones, and later think about the reasons for the discrepancies.

These techniques help to reduce the degree of involvement of a person in a conflict situation and to maintain self-control.

- Self-control - breathing, smiling, clenching, autogenic training.

· Breathing. Having noticed the anxiety, first of all, you need to inhale vigorously, and then to take the rhythm and depth of your breathing under control.

· Smiling. It causes positive changes in the emotional state. Having learned to smile “by request”, you can use this to make it easier to laugh, to make yourself smile disposing to humour. But this requires a smile, not a grimace. It is essential to remember about its relevance and to take into account the feelings and state of the interlocutor.

· Clenching. During an argument, usually with a raised voice, there is often a feeling of tension in the front of the neck, mainly in the larynx. Facial muscles or hands often get tense and make excessive movements (for example, wrinkling the forehead, pursing lips, clenching fists, playing with muscles, crumpling or twisting something). There might be tension in the abdomen and/or chest.

· Autogenic training. It is a technique of deep muscle relaxation with autosuggestion or hypnosis. Recovery is 1,5 times faster.

- Open honesty. It involves the timely expression of feelings to the opponent. You should follow these conditions:

· You should aim at improving the situation. Make sure that the goal of your statements is to improve the situation, not to worsen it.

· You should avoid punishing your opponent or blaming him/her for something. There is a little, but the essential difference between “you make me angry” and “when you do this, it makes me angry”.

· You should aim at improving relationships and dialogue.

· You should aim at avoiding the repetition of such situations.

- Reframing. It involves changing the assessment of what happened as a result of changing the perception of the situation. Here are some of the approaches:

· Changing the temporal perspective of event perception. For example, “What positive changes can this event bring me in the future?”

· Changing the social context. A person usually estimates the event negatively for himself. He may ask a question: “For whom of the relatives or close friends this event can be positive? Can I endure all this for him/her?”

· Transformation of the relation between positive and negative aspects. You should transfer the focus to positive consequences.

· Preparing for adverse consequences. The sense of threat is partially relieved by getting a clearer understanding of the negative consequences that you can be prepared for: “What is the most undesirable that can happen? Is it that unbearable?”

· Changing the perception of the intention. You should reduce malicious purposes towards the opponent, reduce the emotionality of the reactions.

· The principle of payment. If a person perceives a negatively evaluated event like a fair payment for something that he/she has done or is about to do, it causes fewer worries.

· “To be wise after the event”. You should play out possible scenarios in your imagination. Having chosen the best of them, having reached the “victory” over the enemy and having calmed down, switch to other activities.

- Desensitization. This method was developed by J. Wolpe:

1. At first, situations that cause fear and anxiety line up in a hierarchical system (from those not causing much distress to those causing much of stress).

2. A person learns the technique of muscle relaxation.

3. A person mentally returns from the situation where he/she experienced fear (he/she begins their journey to the past with the most comfortable circumstances).

This technique helps you not only to change your emotional responses to past events but also to prepare for stressful situations in the future.

During this lecture, we have learned the techniques to prevent conflict situations. All of them are different from each other, but we are sure they will help you in the future not to get into a conflict. We also advise you to learn more useful information in the additional texts for this week. Thank you!

Readings

1. Ellis, A. (1994). Reason and Emotion in Psychotherapy: Comprehensive Method of Treating Human Disturbances. Citadel Press, New York, NY.

2. Wolpe, J. & Lazarus, A. (1966). Behavior Therapy Techniques. Pergamon Press Ltd., Oxford.

3. Metlyakova, L. (2016). Conflictology: textbook. PSHPU, Perm.

1 practice exercise (6 questions)

Q1: What can cause an unfavourable psychological climate in the team? (write down the consequences)

Q2: How many rules are there for the formation of a favourable mental environment in the team? (only one option is correct)

(a) 5

(b) 6 (correct)

(c) 4

(d) 7

Q3: What does the acronym “REBT” mean? (only one option is correct)

(a) Rational Emotive Behaviour Theory

(b) Reasonable Emotive Behaviour Therapy

(c) Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (correct)

(d) Rational Emotional Behaviour Therapy

Q4: What does the “Dome” technique stand for? (describe the technique in a few words)

Q5: The “Self-control” technique does not involve … (only one option is correct)

(a) Breathing

(b) Smiling

(c) Clenching

(d) Filtering (correct)

Q6: The method of desensitization was developed by … (only one option is correct)

(a) Joseph Wolpe (correct)

(b) Albert Ellis

(c) Geert Hofstede

(d) Edward Hall

Week 4. The conflict-handling strategies and the role of a mediator

Lecture I: The conflict-handling strategies

During the penultimate week, you will learn what strategies you can apply if a conflict situation occurs, how to resolve a cross-cultural conflict at the workplace and how can the mediation sessions help you handle conflicts.

In this lecture, we will discuss the conflict-handling strategies. Conflict-management is an intentional action to eliminate (minimize) the causes that have led to the conflict situation, or to correct the participants' behaviour during the conflict and to ensure the solution of significant tasks. Modern conflict-management states that any dispute can be resolved or significantly weakened if you consciously adhere to one of the five behaviours elaborated by K. Thomas and R. Kilmann (Thomas & Kilmann, 1974):

- Competing. “The one who is stronger is right”. It is an active, non-cooperative style. This behaviour is necessary for a situation where one of the parties is eager to achieve their goals and wants to act in their interests regardless of the impact this might have on others. This method of conflict resolution involves the subordination of one party to the other that is accompanied by the creation of a “win-lose” situation using competition and playing to achieve their goals.

- Collaborating. “Let's solve this together”. It is an active, cooperative style. In this situation, both sides of the conflict strive for achieving their goals. It involves the desire of problem solving, finding out frictions, exchange of information, and seeing a conflict situation as a great incentive to affirmative solutions. Since finding a solution (that benefits both sides) is considered to be a way out of the conflict, this strategy is often referred to as the “win-win” approach.

- Avoiding. “Leave me alone”. It is a passive and non-cooperative style. One of the parties may recognize that there is a conflict but may choose behaviour that seeks to avoid the conflict or “drown it out”. Such a participant of a conflict situation hopes that it will somehow resolve by itself. Therefore, the resolution of a conflict situation is regularly delayed; various hidden measures are used to avoid a more intense confrontation.

- Accommodating. “Only after you”. It is a passive, cooperative style. In some cases, one of the parties of the conflict may try to calm the other side and to put other's interests above their own. Such a desire to appease the other side implies compliance, submission, and flexibility.

- Compromising. “Let's meet each other's interests”. It is a strategy where both sides of conflict make mutual concessions, partially renouncing their demands. In this case, no one wins, and no one loses. Such a way out of the conflict is preceded by negotiations, searching for options and ways to mutually beneficial agreements.

Also, you can find a convenient and useful template to use in real life to handle conflicts of all types. It may be regarded as a “crib”.

Pic.3 Conflict-handling strategies

If you are not sure what strategy suits you or your conflict situation best, it is possible through “How to score the Conflict Management Assessment” that you may find in the Readings section.

Like any other aspects of cross-cultural communication, the style of conflict resolution is determined by the characteristics of the participants' cultures. For example, one of the primary standards of business cooperation in Japan is the negotiations as a way to solve various complex issues. Many types of business collaboration in Japan are carried out based on an oral agreement between the parties. At the same time, Americans cannot imagine how one can sit down at the table and talk calmly with a partner who does not fulfil one's obligations. Significant cultural differences can be observed in the methods of conflict resolution between British and Chinese managers. In essence, the Chinese prefer more passive styles of behaviour, such as “compromising” and “accommodating”. In contrast, the British are more prone to active methods such as “cooperating” and “competing”. Chinese adherence is due to their desire for harmony and preserving face. People's relationship in Chinese society is based on the awareness that a person exists only as a part of a family or clan. It requires an individual to respect the social hierarchy. The need to show respect for the elders targets the Chinese to submit to the power and to suppress the aggression. The idea of harmony encourages Chinese people to look for the golden middle of extremes and teaches them to achieve balance by controlling emotions. Finally, the concept of “face” teaches the Chinese to be able to maintain self-control, not to lose self-esteem and not to create situations that lead to the “loss of face”.

In the next lecture, you will learn about the strategies and methods to resolve cross-cultural conflicts. Thank you!



Lecture II: Strategies for cross-cultural conflict resolution

In the first lecture, you have learned generally accepted conflict-handling strategies for all types of conflicts. In this lecture, you will learn how to handle cross-cultural disputes in particular. Being participants of any kind of intercultural contact, people interact with representatives of other cultures that are often significantly different from each other. Differences in languages, national cuisine, clothes, social norms, and attitude to work often make these contacts difficult or even impossible. The main obstacle to the successful solution of the problem is our perception of other cultures through the prism of our own culture, so our observations and conclusions are limited to its framework.

There are several effective methods to solve such problems:

- Learning the meaning of words. Various concepts are contained mainly in the language. They make it possible to organize people's experience. For example, we perceive shapes, colours, and tastes of objects, but the world is organized differently in different cultures. The Eskimo language has approximately 50 words to describe the notion of “snow”, while the English language has just over 10. The difference between the two languages is explained by the necessity of the Eskimo people to have words that cover every phenomenon they have considering winter. English native speakers have a less complicated system due to the differences in living conditions; that is why they do not need that many notions. Thus, learning the meaning of words allows a person to navigate the world by selecting the arrangement of their experience.

- Knowledge of values. Values are generally accepted beliefs and norms about the purposes that a person should strive for. They form the basis of moral principles. Different cultures may give their preferences to different values (e.g. heroism at the battlefield, artwork, asceticism), and each social system determines what they consider as a value and what they do not. Therefore, for successful communication, you need not only to have and to adhere to your values but also to know and to respect the values of your communication partner.

- Knowledge of the language realities. While reading foreign fictions, there are often some difficulties in understanding; events that are quite understandable for the representatives of your culture are seemed to be entirely different for the representatives of other cultures. To understand the text correctly, you have to know the correct meaning of the words, to know the realities and traditions of the language used in the text.

Thus, to prevent cross-cultural conflicts, it is necessary to respect the values, customs, and views of other cultures and their representatives, and not to get into meaningless disputes and conflicts. However, this does not mean that successful communication requires renouncing your beliefs and values. Avoiding, accommodating, and compromising are some universal ways to prevent a lot of disputes, including cross-cultural ones.

During this lecture, you have learned how you can handle cross-cultural conflict in particular. In the next lecture, we will discuss the role of a mediator as another way of conflict resolution. Thank you!

Lecture III: The role of a mediator

In this lecture, we will learn about mediation as a way to solve any type of conflicts. Party-directed mediation (PDM) is an approach to mediation developed by Gregorio Billikopf which requires assistance for each side of a dispute, allowing each side to have more direct impact on the resolution of a conflict, by offering means and processes for improving the negotiations skills of opponents. The intended perspective of PDM is to enhance the capability and willingness of disputing parties to deal with further discrepancies. The notion of PDM is that when (or even if) the parties are willing to spend time to purchase the skills that are required to be more successful negotiators, then they can be empowered to reach a self-directed resolution. This concept is efficient for disputing parties who are willing to have a higher hand in resolving their conflict situations. PDM is of particular importance where individuals or stakeholders will keep their interaction as well as for disputed with considerable interpersonal aspects. As people become capable negotiators, they aspire to deal with conflict situations efficiently.

Two of the most significant elements of PDM are:

- A pre-caucus session between a mediator and each of the conflict sides before the joint session. During the pre-caucus, the mediator meets with each party individually, before making a joint session. The main aim of the pre-caucus is to help each side let their consideration enough to allow them to receive a more extensive prospect and to prepare the parties to pursue their agenda in the subsequent joint session.

- A joint session after the pre-caucus, where parties face each other and talk to each other openly. During the joint session, parties of the conflict meet each other face to face so they can address each other directly, not through a mediator. Conflict sides often should be reminded that the mediator is there to help the parties take responsibility for managing their conflict, not to judge between them who is right and who is not.

Thus, mediation is the process of settling a dispute between conflicting parties with the participation of a neutral third party. Mediation has several advantages, and one of the most important is that the resolution of the dispute is achieved by making a decision by the parties voluntarily that equally satisfies all stakeholders of a conflict situation. In the additional texts for self-study, you will find an example of the pre-caucus and joint sessions, so you will see how PDM works. Thank you!

Readings

1. Billikopf, G. (2014). Party-Directed Mediation Facilitating Dialogue Between Individuals (3rd ed.), University of California. (Part IV for a mediation case study)

2. Thomas-Kilmann conflict mode instrument profile and interpretive report sample:https://kilmanndiagnostics.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/TKI_Sample_Report.pdf. Identify the uses of five conflict-handling modes.

3. Golnaz, S. (2012). Conflict's Here. What Now? Industrial Management, Norcross, Vol. 54, Iss. 3.

4. Conflict Management Styles Assessment. Available via the link: www.blake-group.com/sites/default/files/assessments/Conflict_Management_Styles_Assessment.pdf

1 practice exercise (6 questions)

Q1: Choose the wrong name of conflict-handling strategy (only one option is correct)

(a) Collaborating

(b) Competing

(c) Cooperating (correct)

(d) Avoiding

Q2: Give a brief explanation of accommodating strategy.

Q3: Name the strategies for cross-cultural conflict resolution.

Q4: What does the acronym PDM mean? (only one option is correct)

(a) Party-directed mediation (correct)

(b) Partly directed mediation

(c) Party-directed mediator

(d) Party-decision mediation

Q5: What are the elements of PDM? (choose two options)

(a) Common session

(b) Joint session (correct)

(c) Pre-meeting session

(d) Pre-caucus session (correct)

Q6: Give a brief explanation of the essence of the pre-caucus session.

Discussion prompt

Complete the “Conflict Management Styles Assessment” provided in the “Readings” section. What was your result? Do you agree with it? Analyze your usual conflict-management behaviour.

Week 5. Case studies

During the final week, you are welcome to resolve some case studies of cross-cultural organizational conflicts. Having learned the theoretical part during the previous weeks, having read additional texts and having completed all the tests, you are to analyze cases, to describe the implication of cross-cultural differences on the development of conflicts using Hofstede's model, to highlight the premises of the dispute using “Circle of Conflicts” model for your convenience, to think of how the participants of conflicts could prevent the dispute and what preventive techniques they could use, and, finally, to conclude what handling strategies the participants used, was it the best option and what other strategies they could use.

Case 1

Dmitrii Smirnov is the executive of Russian engineering plant who had been in good partnership relations with his associate from Austria, Mr. Brown, who was supplying him with equipment, spare parts, and, if necessary, with carried out repairs of equipment. When they were signing a contract for a new type of equipment, there was a controversy about the selling price per unit of the installation. Dmitrii supposed that $10,000 was way too expensive and insisted on $7,000. Mr. Brown tried to convince him by showing pricelists of other companies insisting that the price was reasonable and fair. However, Dmitrii decided that he had to insist on his opinion. Also, he knew that Mr. Brown's company was experiencing some economic difficulties, and, in that situation, he would have to agree on Dmitrii's terms. The deal was closed on the terms offered by Dmitrii. However, the consequences of the agreement were entirely unexpected for Dmitrii. Mr. Brown could not stand the competition; he went broke and left the market. That deal that was unsuccessful for Mr. Brown played a significant role in his bankruptcy. Later, Dmitrii himself realized that the price that was offered to him by Mr. Brown corresponded to the market conditions. After the relations' breakup with Mr. Brown, Dmitrii faced another problem - the supply of repair parts and components for the equipment that had already been purchased from Mr. Brown. Other suppliers offered Dmitrii similar amenities much more expensive. Also, Dmitrii felt remorse because Mr. Brown and he once had a friendly relationship; they had visited each other's homes, had exchanged greetings for holidays. Several years have passed, but this story still does not give Dmitrii peace.

Case 1 exercises

1. Analyze the role of cross-cultural differences in this conflict situation using Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions.

2. State the premises of a conflict situation using the “Circle of Conflict” model by Gary T. Furlong.

3. State the preventive techniques that both participants could use to avoid the conflict situation.

4. Analyze the conflict-handling strategies used by both participants (from both perspectives). What other strategies could they use? What outcomes could be then?

Case 2

A Canadian-born bank employee described the management style of his Filipino assistant manager as the following:

“During my time at the Royal Bank, I had a highly obnoxious and suspicious boss. As an assistant manager, he had the authority over all employees on the administrative line, including me. The problem was that he didn't trust his subordinates at all. He was always looking over our shoulders, controlling our work, relationships, and punctuality. Although most employees resented this attitude, the assistant manager was an extremely conscientious executive who believed in what he called the “old style” of management. He was sure that all workers were lazy by their nature. Therefore, he believed that they should be forced to work. As a boss, he supposed that the strict treatment of employees was justified. I found that behaviour demeaning and counterproductive. As a group, we [other employees and I] felt that we were trustworthy, and we decided that the boss didn't seem to respect us, so we started to treat him the same way. As a result, an environment of distrust and hostility prevailed at work. This atmosphere affected the work of each of us. In essence, employees were less and less willing to work, and the assistant manager became more and more convinced that the employees were lazy and required even more rigour” (Alenina, 2004).

Case 2 exercises

1. Analyze the role of cross-cultural differences in this conflict situation using Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions.

2. State the premises of a conflict situation using the “Circle of Conflict” model by Gary T. Furlong.

3. State the preventive techniques that both participants could use to avoid the conflict situation.

4. What conflict-handling strategies could both sides use? Would it be better if they asked a professional mediator for help? Could the manager be a mediator in that situation? If you think so, describe the following scenario of the conflict.

Case 3

Employees of the project department at one of American PR & Management companies received a highly prestigious project from their head manager. The task involved the development of a product for one of the regular customers. After a while, it became clear that there is a risk of missing the deadline due to the rigorous approach to project development. The head of the department who was recently hired to the organization from a Russian company stated that it was much more critical to meet the deadline. Otherwise, the employees might get a reprimand by the higher authorities and be deprived of bonuses. However, the chief designer (an American specialist) objected that it was impossible to sacrifice the quality of the product because such an approach might lead to the loss of clients that could damage the reputation of the company. As a result, a conflict emerged between them.

Case 3 exercises

1. Analyze the role of cross-cultural differences in this conflict situation using Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions.

2. State the premises of a conflict situation using the “Circle of Conflict” model by Gary T. Furlong.

3. State the preventive techniques that both participants could use to avoid the conflict situation.

4. What conflict-handling strategies could both sides use? Would it be better if they asked a professional mediator for help? Could the manager be a mediator in that situation? If you think so, describe the following scenario of the conflict.

Conclusion to Chapter II

In this chapter, a design for a practical course was introduced, which can be used to elaborate a proper online course on the Coursera platform dedicated to the resolution of cross-cultural organizational conflicts. An online course is an excellent solution for entrepreneurs to obtain new skills because of the lack of spare time to enter full offline courses. The materials for the course include the role of cross-cultural differences in the conflict situations in people's private life and at workplaces, the premises that a conflict contains, the preventive techniques that might be applied to avoid a dispute, the conflict-handling strategies that participants of a conflict situation may use to resolve it, and case studies as the final step of the course to estimate the knowledge that students received after completing the course. Case studies are checked by the instructors and represent a successful or unsuccessful ending of the course.

Limitations and gaps

The current research may face some limitations as sometimes it is impossible to determine all the existing and possible varieties of cross-cultural organizational conflicts because they might be different in their cultural relevance and categories of organizations that serve as the background information. Nevertheless, it did not affect the impartiality level of the research and the utility of the materials for the course.

Moreover, the lectures and tests provided in the materials are designed for the general public consisting of students who are interested in the realm of management and of entrepreneurs lacking the experience of resolving cross-cultural conflicts. Therefore, the materials are elaborated for standard multinational companies and should be specified in the particular companies.

Further suggestions for the research

The materials for the course dedicated to the cross-cultural organizational conflict resolution could be improved with the help of further research contributions. The number of weeks for the course may be increased by supplementing types of organizations such as the academic environment.

What is more, the materials could be developed with different behavioural styles in conflict and the process of negotiation for particular types of organizations.



Conclusion

Currently, it is essential to possess vital soft skills such as conflict resolution to operate successfully in the multinational companies, which are a common phenomenon in the fast globalizing world. That is why the elaboration of the materials for an online course dedicated to the resolution of cross-cultural organizational conflicts is considered to be topical nowadays.

The main aim of the current research was the creation of the materials for an online course based on the “Coursera” platform dedicated to the resolution of cross-cultural organizational conflicts which was achieved by applying the qualitative method of theoretical analysis, along with creating a solid basis for an online course consisting of the reasons of conflict emergence and ways to resolve it.

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