intern com strat HP:Layout 1 16/3/09 14:20 Page 1 INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK ii intern com strat TP:Layout 1 16/3/09 14:18 Page 1 INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY Developments in cross-cultural communications, PR and social media Silvia Cambié and Yang-May Ooi London and Philadelphia Publisher’s note Every possible effort has been made to ensure that the information contained in this book is accurate at the time of going to press, and the publishers and authors cannot accept responsibility for any errors or omissions, however caused. No responsibility for loss or damage occasioned to any person acting, or refraining from action, as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by the editor, the publisher or any of the authors. First published in Great Britain and the United States in 2009 by Kogan Page Limited Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms and licences issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be sent to the publishers at the undermentioned addresses: 120 Pentonville Road 525 South 4th Street, #241 London N1 9JN Philadelphia PA 19147 United Kingdom USA www.koganpage.com © Silvia Cambié and Yang-May Ooi, 2009 The right of Silvia Cambié and Yang-May Ooi to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by 2009 in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. ISBN 978 0 7494 5329 9 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Cambié, Silvia. International communications strategy : developments in cross-cultural communication, PR, and social media / Silvia Cambié and Yang-May Ooi. -- 1st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7494-5329-9 1. Intercultural communication. 2. Social media. 3. Public relations. 4. Leadership. I. Ooi, Yang-May. II. Title. HM1211.C36 2009 659.2--dc22 2009008501 Typeset by JS Typesetting Ltd, Porthcawl, Mid Glamorgan Printed and bound in India by Replika Press Pvt Ltd To my mother, for her support. Silvia Cambié To my parents, who encouraged my love of writing. Yang-May Ooi THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK vi Contents About the authors xi Preface xiii Acknowledgements xv Part 1 International communications 1 1. The world we live in 3 China’s global role 4 Courting the fledgling consumer 5 A new type of multinational 7 Not what it used to be 9 The ‘most unappreciated growth story’ 11 The upside of global warming 11 Gearing up for the new era 13 Notes 16 2. Rethinking public relations 19 Becoming part of the story 20 It’s all about lemons 22 A two-way communication 24 Coming of age 26 New tools 27 The middle way 28 Instigating change 31 The other side of the coin 32 Fine-tuning the message 34 Notes 35 3. The global language of corporate social responsibility 39 India: The soda controversy 41 viii Contents China: Mounting pressure 43 Brazil: The future of biodiversity 48 South Africa: Helping a country to surface 51 CSR starts at home 52 Going local 55 ‘Entering a danger zone’ 57 Repositioning CSR 59 Notes 60 4. The dawn of leadership communication 63 Generation Y 63 Cultural intelligence 65 Integrative thinking 67 The ‘dance’ between cultures 69 Welcoming ambiguity 70 ‘Keep repeating’ 71 Send me an angel 73 Mentoring across cultures 75 The spirit of international networks 77 Desperately looking for a new leadership style 82 Notes 84 5. The day after 87 Social business: A new equilibrium 88 The ‘social entrepreneurial version of Google’ 91 Notes 96 Part 2 The role of social media in international communications 97 6. The cultural landscape of social media 99 The present 99 A brief history 100 The need for speed 102 The rise of social media 103 Notes 113 7. Social media as a part of life 117 Shopping 117 Millennials 118 The third age 119 News and politics 121 Contents ix Celebrity through personal expression 122 Is a social media strategy part of your business’s life? 125 Notes 126 8. Authenticity and trust 129 Who can you trust? 129 Being one of us 131 The Goliath problem 134 Inauthenticity 137 Fictitious blogs 139 Authentic voices 141 South Africa: Joining the conversation 143 Malaysia: The bloggers decide 145 The USA: Land of the YouTube video and home of the 149 bloggers Notes 153 9. Connecting communities 159 The tsunami blog 159 Work 162 Home Sweet Home 165 Health 166 Gay, transgendered and intersexed 168 A cautionary tale 169 Notes 171 10. Encouraging new forms of expression 173 Immediacy 173 Mobilization 176 Speed 183 Notes 184 11. The next frontier: Multimedia and beyond 185 Video 186 Podcasting 189 Virtual worlds 191 Mobile communications 193 What next? 198 Notes 200 Conclusions 203 Index 213 THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK x About the authors Silvia Cambié is a cross-cultural communicator and a journalist. She was raised in Southern Europe, educated in a German-speaking environment, speaks five languages and spent her entire career working in an international context. Her background includes reporting from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union for major British and German print media as well as managing communications and public affairs for Brussels- based international trade associations. She blogs about the cross-cultural communication challenges facing the business world at X-Culture and is read by an audience of 8,000 each month. Silvia is based in London, where she advises clients on strategic communication, stakeholder relations and social media. She is a recognized public speaker on multicultural communication. Silvia serves on the boards of two organizations with global outreach, the International Association of Business Communicators and The International Alliance for Women. Yang-May Ooi is a writer specializing in cross-cultural issues and social media. She grew up in multi-racial and multi-faith Malaysia and now lives in London, where she runs her cross-cultural blog Fusion View, an East/West view on people, society and technology. Fusion View is read by over 8,000 unique visitors a month from all over the world, and has been featured on the BBC Radio programme Pods & Blogs. Yang-May has also published legal thrillers with Hodder & Stoughton. Yang-May also has many years of senior executive experience working in local government and corporate environments as a lawyer. She currently works part-time in a management role in a financial institution in the City of London where she has developed and facilitates a blog for the housing finance sector. THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK xii Preface Understanding other cultures and building bridges between ways of thinking have always been important to us. In the course of the years we spent studying and working in environments different from the ones where we grew up, we had the opportunity to develop a number of ideas. Some of these have helped us manage the interactions we had every day with people from backgrounds we knew very little about. Others have become our inner compass, a system we instinctively refer to every time we have to communicate in an international setting. With globalization gaining pace and the world becoming more interconnected, we felt that the time had come to put these ideas on paper. This book is the result of our passion for connections that defeat the cultural divide. We have focused and reflected on three major phenomena that, we believe, are about to change the global narrative beyond recognition. Emerging economies are becoming more and more active on the global business scene and we will soon be working for their multinationals. Technology and social media are widening our horizon and creating new cultures that have nothing to do with shared nationality or demographics. Social business is challenging our collective thinking around resource allocation and the organization of human society. New ways of working and producing wealth are bound to come from this innovative approach. We have researched a number of emerging patterns and observed their impact on current communication practices. We have tried to go beyond seeing what the mainstream sees. We are thrilled to have had the opportunity to add our voices to the global debate on the transformation of communication in the era 3.0. We believe that this change will be very much driven by cultural sensibility. THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK xiv Acknowledgements Many people shared their experiences, knowledge and expertise with us in many different ways and we are grateful to everyone for their input, advice and support. We would like to thank expressly the following: Haifa Fahoum Al Kaylani, Chairman, Arab International Women’s Forum, London, UK; Kevin Anderson, Blog Editor, The Guardian, London, UK; Asohan Aryaduray, New Media Editor, The Star, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Tudor Aw, Digital Convergence Partner, KPMG, London UK; Mai Badr, Editor in Chief, Hia Magazine, Dubai, UAE; Ariana Bradford, Director, Global Outreach, UK Office, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, UK; Sharon Bakar, creative writing teacher and literary impresario, Kuala Lumpur Malaysia; Lea Chambers, Associate, Marketing and Communications, Golder