Skip to main content

Faculty & Research

Hospitality Leadership Through Learning
Faculty & Research

Developing Hospitality Managers' Intercultural Communication Abilities: The Cocktail Party Simulation

Share

By: Daphne Jameson Ph.D.

author-image

Executive Summary: The ever increasing globalization of the hospitality industry and movement of people across international borders heightens the need for intercultural education and training. However, few intercultural training materials have a hospitality focus, and customized instruction is costly. The tool presented here helps reduce cultural barriers by providing a low-cost, hospitality-specific intercultural simulation that hospitality practitioners and educators can use with a wide variety of audiences.

In the simulation, participants play the roles of members of three companies, each from a different fictional culture. At the simulated cocktail party that opens a series of important business meetings concerning a joint venture in the hospitality industry, participants establish business relationships and strive to overcome cultural differences that may impede those relationships.

A debriefing discussion after the event reinforces the following key themes:

  • Cultural values are relative, not absolute;
  • Intercultural communication involves emotional as well as rational responses;
  • Invisible cultural differences, such as values, attitudes, and beliefs, are more difficult to handle than visible differences, such as manners, customs, and rituals;
  • Deciding who adapts to whom-and how-is the greatest challenge in intercultural interactions; and
  • Cultural identity is multidimensional, involving far more than nationality alone.

During the debriefing, participants apply these themes to their own work lives and past experiences interacting with culturally diverse colleagues, clients, guests, and business associates. Several follow-up options are possible to help participants use the knowledge they have gained.

This report provides full instructions so that hospitality practitioners and educators can use the Cocktail Party Simulation in corporate-level management development programs, property-level training, executive education seminars, and college courses.

Suggestions for adapting the simulation to different audiences, situations, and segments of the hospitality industry are included.

Your Comments Please

If this CHR Report made a positive impact on your management approach or business operations, we welcome your commentary. We would like to post your comments on our website. Please submit your comments to js372@sha.cornell.edu and rohit.verma@cornell.edu.

Download The Report
To view the whole report, please click on the link below

If you have trouble downloading a pdf, and are able to install software on your computer, try upgrading to the latest version of Adobe Acrobat Reader to see if that allows you to read it.

Other Reports or Articles You May Find of Interest

About Daphne Jameson Ph.D.

Daphne A. Jameson studies and teaches about how language is used in business, technical, and other professional contexts, with special attention to the hospitality industry. Using theories, methods, and epistemologies of the humanities, she has explored how narrative discourse and rhetorical strategy influence management action, financial decisions, and quality service. Her interest in the intersection between language and technical subject matter arose from her dual background in mathematics and literature. After receiving a Ph.D. in English from the University of Illinois, she joined Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration, where she has created and taught courses in managerial, intercultural, and organizational communication, as well as serving as Director of Graduate Studies. Past president of the Association for Business Communication and active in the Modern Language Association, Jameson has won numerous awards for her publications and service to the field.

For more information visit http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/facultybios/faculty.html?id=38