The Issue of the Language Barrier Among Walmart Employees

 The Issue of the Language Barrier Among Walmart Employees

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Introduction

Walmart is a retail company that believes in the rule of offering its various products to customers with low prices on a daily basis. The company embraces over 28 countries and has attained globalization over the years due to its diverse regional stores. Up to date, Walmart still upholds its values as well as virtues as set by Sam Walton – the founder of the company (Diermeier & Diermeier, 2017). The company has expanded regarding businesses as well as its various products over the last ten decades. Due to the quality customer service, the experience is worth attracting potential clients on a daily basis. Therefore, the company stocks various goods available for all customers despite the age or gender.

Problem statement

Despite Walmart being a reputable company, it has faced some challenges due to the different changing market dynamics. According to Diermeier and Diermeier (2017), Walmart is a global company providing service to millions of customers located in 28 countries. As mentioned earlier, the company aims at setting low prices for its prospective clients. However, the issue of language barrier has significantly affected its performance over the years. Different countries have various rules and regulations as well as different means and modes of communication. Walmart is becoming one of the world’s top retailers, creating the need for more employees in different parts of the world. In a bid to solve its current problem, Walmart ought to seek help from a business consultant. The consultant is in a position to recommend various remedies related to the current challenges.

Background

The problem of language barrier emerged as a result of globalization. Walmart is operating in 28 countries at the moment, and half of these countries are located outside America, consequently, the issue of language appears. As a result, its rapid growth calls for an increase in the number of employees. An increasing amount of staff will lead to outsourcing from various destinations. New retail offices will need a manager of American origin who, in turn, sees that the company’s virtues are being upheld. Due to the difference in cultures as well as background, communication between people of different nations is minimal. Consequently, this leads to misunderstanding and rigid flow of information among the employees (Tabari, Wilson & Ingram, 2016). The problem of language barrier might be dealt with the ways of training employees. Furthermore, Walmart can opt to employ people conversant with the culture of the host country as well as other options.

Project objectives

The project objectives help in solving the issues of the dealt language barrier, which is an advantage of Walmart Retail Company. The project aims at accomplishing various goals in the company:

Organization performance by creating dynamic language and communication channels.
Better employer-employee relationship. According to Dos Santos (2016), communication allows both parties to air out their grievances and arrive at a universal consensus.
Training employees presupposes equipping them with various skills such as communication and customer service.
Current process

Walmart involves its various employees in the process of decision-making. As the issues of a language barrier being a major hindrance to its performance, the company ought to convene a meeting to address the same. The current existing problem will affect the performance of employees as communication is one of the various dynamics that work towards an organizational performance. Information from the top level of management has to be passed down to different departments. Understanding the information without a universal way or language of communication will lead to misunderstanding. Consequently, employees are not in the position to deliver as well as attend to the assigned directives.

As per Kokemuller (2017), the language barrier leads to constant supervision by the subordinates as well as supervisors. Consequently, this leads to the lack of motivation among the employees and little performance at the workplace. In relation to Maslow’s theory explaining the hierarchy of needs, an employee should be provided with the various facilities such as a conducive working environment (Tanner, 2016). The language barrier hinders the conditions for a better workplace since there is no interaction. As a result, employees will in turn show the low level of performance.

The process of the breaking language barrier will affect all departments. Processes such as employee retention are bound to occur in various departments. Performing employees will be retained as the non-performing ones will be replaced by a lot of new employees who will either need training or work addressing previous experiences.

Requirements

Overcoming language barrier calls for some requirements