Week 13 Blogging

Cultural Issues and Public Relations

Chapter 14 was one of the more eye catching chapters in the book. It changed my perspective about how differently we have to treat different cultures when dealing in business.

One of the more interesting parts of this chapter was the bullet points on page 460, which gave some demographics that were startling. I encourage everyone to look over that before continuing to read.

The most interesting things brought up by this chart is how small a slice of the world America really is. Although, most of the time we Americans feel like the center of the universe.

The bullet points explained if the world was a 100 person village, only 9 would speak English, 7 would own a computer, 20 would earn less than a dollar a day, and, the most startling figure, 17 would not be able to read or write.

This chart just gives so much information about how little are culture is in terms of the world. Doing international business, under our policies and attitudes about culture could ruin a business.

It's just interesting to think that no matter how important we think America is in the world it's only similar to a fraction of the world. We are so unique and lucky and many of us take that for granted.

It is up to us, as future professionals, to make sure and learn as much as we can about other cultures so that we can be successful in a global market place.

Brandon Brooks