Daniel Dauber

Creativity and flourishing are core aims of higher education (HE) institutions and government initiatives globally. Large‐scale projects have linked creativity and flourishing with cultural diversity, yet their associations with majority‐group acculturation (i.e., how members of dominant culture groups adopt minority‐cultural elements and/or maintain their national culture) remain unexplored. We tested relationships between majority‐group acculturation and seven components of creativity and flourishing in UK (Study 1, N = 323) and Chinese (Study 2, N = 174) majority‐group university students and a three‐wave, English majority‐group longitudinal sample (Study 3, N at Time 1 = 219). Results found integration (i.e., adopting other cultures while maintaining one's own) predicted higher cognitive flexibility (Study 1), meaning‐in‐life (Studies 1 and 2) and quality of interpersonal relationships (Studies 1 and 2), while cultural adoption predicted higher cognitive flexibility, curiosity‐exploration and flourishing over time (Study 3). Findings align majority‐group acculturation with key priorities of HE and government programmes.

Organisational culture change is the process of modifying values, strategies, structures and behaviours established in an organisation to ensure its social and financial viability in the present and future. Organisational culture change can be triggered due to internal and external factors. Thus, such change processes are not always undertaken proactively by the organisation. Organisational culture changes can be of different scales and happen at different speeds. Mergers and acquisitions are one of the most dramatic forms of organisational change where two organisational cultures need to be harmonised. Appropriate management of people in such turbulent times is challenging and is often blamed as the primary source of failure in organisational culture change processes. Change managers must enable their organisational members to comprehend and implement the cultural changes that are necessary. However, there is no consensus on whether organisational culture can be fully managed and controlled.

Organisational culture is defined as the shared values among organisational members, which guide their behaviour. It affects organisations in multiple ways, e.g., their values, strategies, structures, and business operations. While some components of organisational culture are visible (rules, norms, routines, etc.), others are not (e.g., underlying values). Organisational cultures are socially co-constructed by organisational members. While in very small organisations, organisational culture might be primarily influenced by the founders’ values, large organisations often consist of many subcultures, reflecting different sub- groups of individuals in the organisation, such as different departments. There are essentially three approaches to analysing, understanding, and modelling organisational culture: Dimensions approaches, interrelated structure approaches, and typology approaches (Dauber et al., 2012). Organisational culture is often considered a source of competitive advantage and is difficult to copy and change. The intangibility of organisational culture makes it difficult for analysts to determine its impact on other aspects of the organisation, e.g., employee well-being or motivation and financial success. Organisational members’ identification and acceptance of organisational cultures are essential for a socially and financially viable organisation.

Communication skills are highly sought after by employers, as industry reports repeatedly show. At the same time, those reports also reveal that many employers are dissatisfied with their newly hired graduates’ communication skills. In addition, increasing globalisation has led to the call for ‘global graduates’ who can function well in culturally diverse contexts. Considering both aspects, it is important, to explore which factors help foster students’ global communication skills. This paper investigates this issue, testing the impact of potential factors identified from previous literature. Data was collected from 2359 students in seven different institutions located in five different countries. A linear regression model was tested to identify those factors which most contribute to global communication skills development. Results show that motivation to improve communication skills and the experience of social and academic integration into the campus community made the most significant contribution to participants’ higher levels of global communication skills development. Besides, students who were presented with relevant opportunities and support from their respective institution and those engaged with foreign languages also demonstrated higher levels of global communication skills development. The paper concludes that for students to acquire the communication skills needed for working successfully in diverse contexts, and hence to become ‘global graduates’, it is essential that they venture out of their comfort zones and engage with the diverse campus community. At the same time, this engagement requires universities’ guidance and support to help maximise the learning gains from such intercultural encounters.