Emerging businesses often come with fairly inexperienced entrepreneurs. When it comes to expanding overseas and capturing a global market, these newly established brands tend to struggle. Fortunately, Global Strategic Advisory and Dr. Rajesh Kumar are here to elevate entrepreneurs towards capturing a worldwide audience.
Taking a brand and growing it commercially all over the world needs to take things into heavy consideration. This is in due part caused by national culture differences that tend to hamper a certain brand or company’s global influence.
This brings us to the topic of National Culture, an invisible but extremely powerful aspect to be considered when doing business. It can impact business relationships, a client’s strategy execution, and the interface with the local customer. Impactful as it is, many companies/managers underestimate its role in shaping business success.
Dr. Kumar worked on a project for an Indian company that was expanding globally. They faced a myriad of challenges in their global expansion rooted in part to the cultural gap between collectivistic India and the individualistic West. The Indian top management did not want to delegate authority to local managers, and this created friction. The cultural difference could not be bridged effectively, and the morale in the organization became very low.
The largest and most influential companies are not exempt from this rule. Walmart, the iconic US retailer, exited Germany because its strategy did not dovetail with the local requirements of the culture.
It’s clear to see that culture plays a significant role in trying to penetrate a given market. Culture, after all, conditions the way we think, how we interact with others, and the way we deal with conflict, among others. It is so ingrained in our personalities and our psyche that it often affects our choices at a subconscious level. The same goes for how we do business and the brands and products we tend to gravitate towards.
The first step towards addressing the cultural challenge is awareness. A brand or an individual hoping to penetrate a global market must be aware of the cultural differences beforehand. Furthermore, they must have a good understanding of the lay of the land to discern which cultural differences actually matter and under what conditions the potential impact might be.
Operating globally is definitely not for everyone. One must have sufficient desire, commitment, and will to succeed in order to pull it off. But the benefits can be very rewarding. For example, Apple gets more than 50% of its revenue overseas, while Intel gets 80% of its revenue overseas.
One final thing to consider for a company is the resource hired to perform its overseas operation. A company must choose managers who have the right mindset to push their brands to a global market. They need to be culturally skilled and have the patience, flexibility, and the will to succeed.
Global expansion might, at one level, appear very challenging, but if you are brave enough and committed enough, you will surely succeed. Following the steps in this written piece will grant the knowledge and expertise to succeed. The only thing quite left in your hands is the amount of effort and determination.
