This is a research paper for course LE 4000 (English for Academic Writing). Te main purpose of this paper is to show the ability of the students to write an academic research paper where the topics are chosen randomly by the students.

1. RUNNING HEAD: CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED
IN FAST FOOD RESTAURANT OPERATION
CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION
AINULFITRIAH BINTI MAT GHANI
(1215776)
AFIFAH NABILAH BINTI MOHAMAD SAFEI
(1321976)
KULIYYAH OF ECONOMICS AND MANAGEMENT SCIENCES
AHMAD ASHAARI BIN ALIAS
LE4000 SECTION 10
INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY MALAYSIA
(27TH
APRIL 2016)

2. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 2
Cross-Cultural Management Should Be Considered In Fast Food Restaurant Operation
Culture differs across the nation. More often than not, it has become an immense
challenge to the businesses to venture a new opportunity at the global stage. Three common
challenges that companies normally have to face when they internationalize their businesses
are poor communication, language, and misunderstanding. Giang (2012) reported that most
of the executives do not take appropriate and sufficient steps to solve poor communication
and language barriers which cost a lot to the companies. Furthermore, Giang (2012)
supported the view from Economist Intelligence Units that almost half of the 572 seniors
agreed that the business deals at international level failed because of misunderstandings and
"messages lost in translation" and 64% of them claimed poor communication skills. In
addition, Kawar (2012) says the problem among people who are working within the same
organization is misunderstanding due to the cultural differences in terms of values, beliefs,
background, etc.
As businesses become globalize and internationalize, cross-cultural management
emerged as a vital role in the diverse workforce environment to achieve the goal to expand
the businesses. Adler (2008) as cited by Kawar (2012, p. 107) stated, “Cross-cultural
management explains the behaviour of people in organizations around the world and shows
people how to work in organizations with employees and client populations from many
different cultures”. The collaboration between companies from distinct countries need to have
knowledge on cross-cultural management to overcome the challenges arise from different
cultural identity (Kawar, 2012). The main purpose of this study is to examine how fast food
restaurants manage their operational system based on cross-cultural management since they
opened branches from outside of the home country. Therefore, cross-cultural management

3. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 3
should be considered in fast food restaurant operation due to three reasons; to improve
product development, to improve service quality and to enhance brand management
strategies.
Cross-cultural management has been a significant element to be considered in fast
food restaurants to improve their new product development. Having said that, most of the
global fast food restaurants use the localization strategies when they enter the new foreign
market. This means that the fast food restaurants has localized their products to adapt with the
cross-cultural differences to meet the demand and needs of the different market. Chen, Li and
Liu (2013, p. 41) reports that, “Majority Chinese people (73%) prefer eating Chinese style
food and 27% prefer western style food.” Chen et al. (2013) also highlighted that KFC
entered and survived in the Chinese market by introducing new traditional Chinese products
in their menu from time to time for the past 20 years.
The cross-cultural localization strategies are important to the development of the new
products which will be introduced in the new foreign market to meet the local demand and to
cater the local customers‟ eating preferences and habits. Different market has different type
of demands. For example, in China, people are not really into the western style due to its own
culture, in fact, there are some who really hate Americans because of the past conflict in
World War II (Fineman, 2014). Therefore, any western fast food restaurants that want to
enter China‟s market cannot use the same western products as in other countries but need to
introduce new products which has been localized with the local demand. And this is where
the cross-cultural management plays its role to enhance and improve the development of the
new localized products.
On the other hand, there are some businesses that do not agree with the cross-cultural
localization strategies and prefer to use the standardization strategies in which they use the

4. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 4
same type of existing products to enter the global market. This is because standardization
strategy incurs a lower cost than the localization strategy. Therefore, in order to minimize the
cost of production, some fast food businesses decide to enter the new foreign market with the
same products as in the home nation (Chen et al., 2013). Instead of spending money to do the
research in regards to the cross-cultural differences to develop the new localized products,
they introduce their existing products from the home nation to the new market. Without
realizing, the fast food businesses unintentionally introduce their home culture and food
preferences to the customers in the host nation.
For example, Starbucks uses standardization strategy to tackle the global market
especially in the Asian market. The management took advantage of the Asian people
behaviour where they view the western country especially United States as an advance and
great nation (Wild & Wild, 2016). They want to be like Americans. So, when Starbucks
enters the Asian market, people will love to drink the coffee at Starbucks to feel like
Americans. However, sooner or later, most of the fast food businesses that started going
international using the standardization strategy will gradually change their strategy to
localization once they are known in the market such as McDonald and Pizza Hut (Wild &
Wild, 2016). This shows that cross-cultural management is very important to improve the
new fast food products development to ensure that the businesses are able to adapt and cater
the demand of the local market.
In addition, cultural adaptation has been a crucial factor to improve the service quality
of the fast foods restaurants. Each country has its specific culture. The Western country such
as United States has a low context culture while Asian country such as Korea has a high
context culture (Min & Min, 2013). Korean customers tend to value employee courtesy

5. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 5
significantly compared to the customers in United States. Furthermore, Min and Min (2013,
p. 18) states that,
“Korean customers are far more concerned with “atmospheric” impression
such as cleanliness of the restaurant than their US counterparts, while they are
less concerned with taste of food than the US customers. This may be
explained by a fact that Korean traditional food is known for its healthy
ingredients and tastiness due to the use of a variety of seasonings and sauces
representing the blessings of nature. With the wide presence of traditional
Korean food restaurants, taste of food alone can hardly attract customers in
Seoul which is considered one of the culinary capitals of the Asia. Thus,
Korean customers tend to appreciate cleanliness of the restaurant significantly
more than their US counterpart.”
In contrast, some fast food restaurants prefer to focus on the type of food that they
offer than focusing on the best service quality that they may provide. Min and Min (2013)
indicates that the top three fast food restaurants in Korea are McDonald, Subway . While,
KFC is not listed in the top three list despite of their mission statement in 2013 which was to
deliver fast and friendly environment to appeal the health minded customers (Jurevicius,
2013). This is because, according to Min and Min (2013), most of the Koreans preferred to
have healthy and nutritious food which differ from the nature of the fried chicken that KFC
offered. Having only a fast and friendly atmosphere but do not actually provide healthy food
in the menu is not the best option for a fast food restaurant to survive in Korea. Therefore, it
is no doubt that a fast food restaurant should consider the cultural adaptation to improve their
service quality as well as their product quality.

6. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 6
Finally yet importantly, fast food restaurants need to implement cross-cultural
management in order to enhance their brand management strategies. McDonald‟s, KFC
(Kentucky Fried Chicken), and Subway are among the brands of fast food restaurants that
successfully entered the international market. An effective branding strategy can increase the
number of loyal customers. Arnold (1992) as cited by Emmanuel and Miloslava (2011,
p.1622) describes, “Branding strategy is the process whereby the offer (product or service) is
positioned in the consumer‟s mind to produce a perception of advantage.” Having said that,
the fast food restaurants should have effective brand strategy to create competitive advantage
that fits and suits the culture of potential customer. Furthermore, Emmanuel and Miloslava
(2011, p.1622) propose “If the branding strategy has to be contextual and in tune with culture,
then the brand positioning variables has to interact, adapt and respond to the cultural
variables in which the brand is operating”. Therefore, it is important to consider cultural
differences to enhance brand management strategies and minimize the cost of wasting capital
and time to try the unsuitable strategies when entering unfamiliar markets.
The empirical study proves the marketing strategies that companies applied to sell
their products and services are influenced by the culture of a certain country and region
(Emmanuel & Miloslava, 2011). Furthermore, culture has been a significant aspect that
influences consumer-purchasing behaviour in market (Emmanuel & Miloslava, 2011;
Hofstede, 1994 as cited by Chui & Ting, 2009). For example, Korean customers consider
restaurant environment as the most important factor but not the taste of the food provided.
Hence, fast foods restaurants that sell tasty food only while ignore the other factor can not
cater Korean customer‟s preference and satisfaction.
According to De Mooij (2004) as cited by Emmanuel and Miloslava (2011), the
managers should make a comparison on culture in different countries to find the differences

7. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 7
and similarities in order to understand consumer‟s behaviour in preparation for implementing
marketing strategies. The Modern approach to fast food restaurants in brand strategies is mass
customization. Emmanuel and Miloslava (2011, p. 1626) say “Mass customization in the fast
food industry focuses on individual creation „have-it-your-way‟ rather than standardized or
mass production approach. Hence, in confronting with people from other countries, the fast
food restaurants should be aware about the culture and behaviour of their potential customers
for the reason to ensure their brand management strategies are acceptable and successful.
On the other hand, modifying brand strategy based on a certain culture is a complex
process, which is not easy to be implemented because of the high cost. Emmanuel and
Miloslava (2011) claim that fast food restaurants in international market must use the
combination of both mass production and mass customization approaches. However, the
adoption of the approaches depends on the cost considerations. Furthermore, these
approaches are only applicable and suitable for SMEs Company in the fast food industry that
makes an effort to suit the taste and preferences of consumers (Emmanuel & Miloslava,
2011). Therefore, creating and implementing branding strategies are not only based on the
culture of a certain country but also depend heavily on the cost considerations since the
businesses also want to minimize the cost of production.
To conclude, fast food restaurants that implement the cross cultural management in
their operations has a better chance to improve the new product development, provide a better
service quality to their customers and construct an effective brand management strategy. In
the Quran (Surah Al-Hujurat, verse 13), it is stated that every mankind were created from
different gender and divided into different nations and tribes so that they can know each
other. This means that, humans are created differently so that each of them may learn each
other‟s culture and preferences. This verse supports the cross cultural management and

8. CROSS-CULTURAL MANAGEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED IN FAST FOOD
RESTAURANT OPERATION 8
motivates the fast food restaurants to expand their businesses to a foreign country in order to
learn and understand the culture of the people in a different nation. Therefore, it is suggested
to the international fast food restaurants to implement the cross-cultural management in order
to learn and understand the culture and preferences of the local customers to survive in the
global market.