Cultural Intelligence And Capability: An Analysis Of Workplace Culture And Communication

Cultural Intelligence is referred to the effectiveness of all the aspects of culture, which include generational, national, ethnic, organizational dimension and ideology of culture. Culture deals with diversity and it is being revealed from different researches that four capabilities generally exist within effective individuals among the diversified culture (Quappe & Cantatore, 2015).

The report throws light on cultural intelligence and its capability, an analysis of the safe and unsafe processes and recommendations to improve the safety of the space. Creation of the safe spaces needs cultural safety and self awareness, cultural capability and also cultural intelligence. The assignment focuses on a specific episode of ‘Friends’ to promote the fundamentals of safe spaces and workplace effectiveness.

The report highlights the points of cultural intelligence and capability. It mainly focuses on a specific episode of the TV series ‘Friends’, which portrays workplace issues. The report discusses regarding the particular scene where Rachel’s boss doesn’t want to lose her and makes her look bad in front of the interviewer of a new job where Rachel has applied. It specifies about workplace politics which may hamper a person’s growth and progress and how the workers are exploited by the employers for their own benefit (Fullepisodes.biz, F. 2017).

Safe spaces are created in the culture when each and every one in the society is given the authority to engage themselves in particular activities. Being more specific, safe space in a society refers to the creation of an atmosphere or environment, which allows all the members of the society to involve in the societal activities accordingly. It is crucial for any society to create a safer place, so that each and every individual can reside without any commotion or issues. It is essential for their betterment and progress. The need for safer spaces becomes apparent when the individuals face several difficulties while adapting the cultural diversities and differences. It is considered to be very crucial to avoid the unsafe spaces which exist within the societies. This particular thing can only be done when safer spaces are created in the society for the individuals’ betterment (Doutrich et al., 2012).

For instance; if an individual wants to create a safer space for interacting online, in order to avoid conflicts and confusions with other people, he/she needs to focus on creating a safe online space, which further includes some factors related to his/her safety. Moreover, as it is crucial for the society to create a safer space for psychological as well as physical safety of the individuals, it is also important for the individuals to maintain peace and harmony among the society (Dyne, 2012).

The video clip is being chosen from the popular TV series Friends, season four and episode number nine. The episode entitled “The One Where They’re Going to Party” was aired in the year 1997, December 11. One of the protagonists of the TV series, Rachel wants to opt for the job of Assistant buyer, but her boss is not happy with her decision. She does not want to lose Rachel as she is a good assistant and intentionally makes her reputation bad in front of the interviewer. This makes Rachel mad as she couldn’t make it through the interview because of her boss Joanna. Rachel wants to quit her present job, but her boss then reveals the fact of how she doesn’t want to lose a good assistant like Rachel, and that is the main reason of her boss maligning Rachel’s reputation in front of the interviewers (Fullepisodes.biz, F. 2017). 

Seeing Rachel mad and horrified at the whole situation, her boss Joanna tries to ease her by offering the position of assistant buyer at Joanna’s department. This included a raise in her salary; she would get her own office and an assistant of herself. Happy and satisfied with the offer, Rachel accepts the deal and changes her decision of quitting the job. However, her wish of becoming the assistant buyer of Joanna’s department will not probably get true as Joanna meets with an accident and dies. She was about to get promoted but unfortunately a tragedy strikes. Therefore, the situation became unfortunate and she might not get promoted as nobody else knew about their agreement, at the workplace (Flanja, 2012).

Cultural self awareness, therefore, refers to the communication’s foundation, which involves the ability of understanding as well as becoming aware of the cultural beliefs, perceptions and values. Cultural safety includes the actions which proves the fact whether a society is safe for the individuals or not. The video gives evidence of the society being unsafe as the boss died after meeting with an accident. The untimely death of Joanna brings in cultural shock and questions the cultural safety. Moreover, the factor of workplace safety also comes into play. Rachel might not get promoted because of her boss’s unfortunate death. This also proves the factor of communication lack between the organization’s employers (Holley & Steiner, 2015).

Cultural intelligence became apparent as Rachel was ready to work in a different work culture and environment, but unfortunately her boss stops her. Moreover, it gives an idea regarding workplace politics, as Joanna intentionally maligned Rachel’s reputation in front of the interviewers, just to stop her switch her position. However, Rachel failed to understand her boss’s motive and interpersonal skills in the beginning, but she got her facial expression as well as voice tone later. This gives evidence regarding the communication gap between Rachel and her boss. The cultural shock occurred when her boss died and she was doomed (Quappe & Cantatore, 2015).

To critically analyze the season 4 episode 9 of the ‘Friends’ sitcom, it can be said that the scene between Rachel and her boss is the most important part of the whole episode. In that part, it is seen that Rachel wanted to apply for a post higher in ua in her office and asks permission to apply for the post from her boss. At that moment it was seen that her boss was happy about it but her body language was not appropriate and she even discouraged Rachel to some extent. The next moment again Joanna, the boss again encouraged Rachel to go for the interview and wishes her all the best for the interview and let her know that she will be present at the interview board. Quite astonishingly at the interview table, Joanna does not help Rachel, and even she is seen trying to ridicule her in front of the other board members at the time of interviewing Rachel. Joanna breaks the barrier of professionalism and invaded the personal space of Rachel disclosing her personal life and influencing the panel not to consider her as a potential candidate for the post (Wambui et al., 2013).

Later in the video, it is seen that enraged Rachel visits Joanna’s office and breaks down to tears as she felt utterly humiliated in front of the interviewing panel and she made her mind to quit the job. When she was trying to talk about the matter with Joanna, Joanna tried to stop the conversation and to do that she even humiliated another office assistant and made her an object of joke. After that Rachel was determined to leave the job and when she started packing her things, Joanna said that she will create a post in her department to retain a good responsible employee like Rachel and she confessed that she has done all the wrong things at the interviewing time as she did not want to lose an important assistant from her department as she cannot depend on the other assistant she has. Joanna even offered Rachel a personal office space and an assistant and gave her the position of an Assistant buyer with a raise.

The main point in the story is Rachel was ridiculed in front of the higher authorities of her organization for nothing and her boss Joanna made a lot of foul comments involving Rachel’s personal life in front of the higher officials and that is grossly inappropriate. At the time when Rachel asked for the permission to apply for a higher post from her boss, she showed perfect cultural intelligence and it was evident by her ways of communicating with Joanna. At that moment the viewers can get a notion that Joanna can create some problems for her. Joanna’s body language was to some extent very slothful when she was asked for the permission and that clearly indicated that she does not want Rachel to get the higher post. At the interviewing time Rachel got a shock at t interview table when Joanna started suddenly ridiculing her in front of the higher authorities and she was very shocked and mentally dismantled into pieces as she did not expect something like that to happen. Rachel was so shocked that she burst into tears and she confronted Joanna for some clarifications and there she got to know that as Joana does not want to lose her from her department, she stopped her promotion (Bowles & Cooper, 2012). One thing that is not at all accepted that in this situation that Joanna talked about Rachel’s personal life and about her drinking issues. For these kinds of comments the reputation of Rachel could have crumbled down to pieces and Joanna did not even consider this fact at all (Lea & Nicoll, 2013).

The way Joanna ridiculed Rachel, that part is completely against the norms and Joanna broke the code of professionalism there and what she did was completely unaccepted and no one should treat an subordinate employee like that. Rachel was told that she would expect one familiar face at the time of interview and Joanna would be present there and that would make her comfortable, but, when the time came, Rachel got a shock to find that Joanna is the one who is blocking her promotion and projected her as a drunk women who gets overly friendly with the clients of the organization and that clearly ended the hope of Rachel to get the promotion.

It is a fact that what Joanna did to Rachel is completely unethical and unjustified. She could have told Rachel that she does not want to lose an important employee like her and solve the issue. At the interviewing time little did Rachel knew that Joanna would be pulling the strings and become a barrier to her getting a promotion. The shock Rachel got due to this situation was not at all accepted though Joanna gave her a new post in her department. These kinds of behaviors can potentially ruin a career for individuals in real life situations (Jack, 2014).

From the given video, it is seen that Rachel was shocked due to the turn of events at the interview table and that deeply hurt her and even she wanted to resign. These kinds of behaviors from the higher authorities are clearly not acceptable and thus no one should practice these kinds of behaviors in workplace. In workplace, the management must not forget the fact that it is the duty of all the employees to maintain the right culture within the organization and the higher authorities must take care of the subordinate staffs and help them if required. It should be the duty of the management of the organizations to maintain an appropriate office culture within the workplace so that all the employees get motivated and remains loyal towards the organization. As a senior employee what Joanna did, can easily be considered as a bad example of behavior within the organization and with a valid reason that culture shocked Rachel and in real life situation that can potentially harm the employees (Kirmayer, 2012). Thus it is highly recommended that every individual must be aware of the cultural safety and security while conversing or getting engaged in any social activities be it in the workplace or someplace else.

To conclude, the report focuses on the safe cultural spaces and intelligence. It includes the factors related to workplace safety and politics, how the employers can malign someone’s reputation intentionally. In regards to the TV series, Friends, it depicted that the society is unsafe through various communication and physical factors as discussed. It also revealed how workplace lacked communication at that time, which hampered a person’s growth. However, the TV series portrayed all these situations in a very hilarious way, these situations give evidence of the cultural barriers which were faced at that time. This gives an overview of cultural self awareness, intelligence and capabilities. Details of cross cultural communication and cultural shock are also portrayed. Therefore, this report suggests and effectively promotes that the TV series is culturally not a safe space.

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