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.

This chapter explores the affordances of multicultural classrooms for fostering global competencies. Drawing on transformative learning theory, it argues that there are three important elements that promote the intercultural learning process (a trigger experience, careful reflection on that experience, and the acquisition of new perspectives) and that multicultural classrooms have the potential to offer all of these elements. The chapter reports on a study that examines the importance that students attach to interaction with peers from diverse backgrounds and their actual experiences of doing so. It analyses both quantitative and qualitative findings from a sample of 2360 students studying on English-speaking courses at six universities in Europe. Comparing home, European Economic Area (EEA) and Asian students, it reports that home students attached significantly less importance to interacting with diverse others than EEA and Asian students, and they also experienced it much less. Students' open comments are analysed to gain insights into the reasons behind these results. One key finding that emerges from the study as a whole is the very large amount of variation among students of all backgrounds. It is argued that staff need to be aware of this variation and take it into account in their classroom management.

This chapter reports the findings that emerged from the follow-up survey on leadership skills and on people’s development needs and experiences. It starts by explaining the design of the survey and the key demographics of the people who completed it. It then reports “top ten items” in terms of importance, frequency of occurrence, and the size of gap between the two. Next it reports the three main constructs—participative leadership, transformational leadership, and Leadership Development—that emerged from a factor analysis, including the range of viewpoints held. The results indicate that there is evident dissatisfaction with the current state of leadership and that this is particularly true for Leadership Development. A large number of open comments from the survey provide additional insights on this.

Integration is a concept that is referred to very widely in relation internationalization, yet its meaning is rarely explored and its benefits are often assumed. In this article, we start by reviewing the conceptualization of integration across different fields, notably education and the internationalization of education, intercultural communication, health psychology, and organizational studies. We propose that the varying interpretations within and across these fields can be synthesized by considering the different levels at which integration can be analyzed—individual level, community level, and institutional level. We then review the multiple benefits that integration can bring at these different levels, while acknowledging their interconnections, and noting the potential risks from ignoring integration. We end by proposing a framework to help universities and all of their members (staff and students) develop their own strategies and priorities for enhancing integration.

Most schemes that rank universities for their level of internationalisation are based on compositional criteria, such as the numbers of international students and staff, and student mobility numbers. Yet if such diversity is to be meaningful beyond financial benefits and enhance the quality of education and research, including stimulating growth in (inter alia) intercultural competence, other measures are needed. Research in the intercultural field indicates that two foundational elements are required for this stimulation: (a) positive attitudes (e.g. openness and curiosity) towards diversity and motivation to learn about/engage with it and (b) experiences of difference that challenge people's viewpoints, ideas and ways of doing things. Yet these variables are rarely probed simultaneously in higher education research. This article reports a study that used a tool to probe both of these elements in combination, in relation to three facets relevant to internationalisation: social integration, academic integration and global opportunities and support. The study draws on data from 2360 students, gathered from four different countries, to explore how the opportunity benefits offered by diversity are being perceived and exploited by the respondents. The interconnections between the variables are explored, along with similarities and differences in ratings across regional groups. The article ends by discussing the conceptual and strategic planning implications of the findings.

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to show that Slawek Magala’s theory of management of meaning in organisations can be considered as a step towards a generic theory of organisational change.Design/methodology/approach– The authors are integrating Slawek Magala’s views on the processes, which play a role in changing organisations (i.e. framing, reflecting, negotiating, and seeking new windows of opportunities) with the related types of narratives as developed by David Boje (2001, 2008) and with further extensions by Fink and Yolles (2012), which are based on a model of paradigm change.Findings– The authors develop a theoretical framework, which might serve as a basis for analysis of change processes emerging from different contexts within or outside a firm and offer some reflections about comparing research into issues of organisational change.Research limitations/implications– This is a theoretical viewpoint paper.Practical implications– The extension of Magala’s model offers a practical guide for research into organisational change processes.Social implications– Magala’s model offers a deeper understanding of actual change processes.Originality/value– To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time where a concept about emergent causality deriving from interaction between two conflicting agents (i.e. involved parties as, e.g. managers and subordinates) is applied to emerging stages in change processes.

According to UNESCO statistics, the People's Republic of China (PRC) sends far more students to study overseas than any other country in the world. Similarly, from the receiving countries' point of view, PRC students form by far the highest proportion of international students. In many respects, this is a success story, but it also poses a number of risks to universities. This paper focuses on one of those key risks that of student dissatisfaction (including from PRC students themselves). Using a sequential mixed-method study, it addresses two research questions: (a) Chinese students' level of satisfaction with their social integration into the university community and (b) the barriers that Chinese students' perceive in becoming more socially integrated into the university student community. The research finds that many Chinese students are dissatisfied with their range of friendships and that they find it more challenging to socialise with students of other nationalities than other students do. They point out a number of barriers to integration, with cultural distance playing a major role, but also argue for the impact of individual factors. The paper concludes by considering the implications for universities and suggestions for further research.

According to a recent report, the top skill that employers are looking for in graduates is an ability to work collaboratively with teams of people from a range of backgrounds and countries. So as universities seek to internationalise, an important question is how successful they are in developing this skill. Both research and anecdotal evidence suggest that it is a challenging task and that universities are struggling to achieve it. In this paper, we report a study on working in mixed national groups and its relation to intercultural skills. A total of 2000 students at a UK university responded to a questionnaire that had both closed and open questions. A range of statistical analyses were carried out on the quantitative data, and the open-ended comments were analysed thematically. The responses were compared across national/regional clusters and our findings indicate that mixed national group work is widely perceived across the clusters as enriching and not particularly challenging. Correlations indicate that students perceive such group work as more important for the development of intercultural skills than cross-national friendships.

Findings: Seven major coping strategies were identified in the collected data: (1) coping through learning, (2) coping through resistance, (3) coping through communication (4) coping through comparison, (5) coping through adaptation, (6) coping through isolation, (7) coping through distraction. While some coping strategies reflect more passive behavior, other forms relate to open revolt and proactive interaction between subordinate and superior. It is further shown that coping strategies are related to each other, indicating that individuals pursue several coping strategies simultaneously.

Organizational intelligence and inefficacy set limits to the capabilities of achieving high levels of performance in organizations. Managerial and organizational cognition emerge from organizational intelligences. In this paper we aim at providing theoretical foundations for understanding how managerial cognition in turn can have either a positive or a negative influence on the intelligences and by that can promote or constrain performance. Within the theory of organizational coherence and trajectory the concepts of managerial and organizational intelligence constitute a theoretical counterpoise to the literature on management paradox. What numerous management scholars call ‘a paradox’ and understand as ‘a simultaneous existence of two inconsistent states’ is the normal state of a well-functioning organization, reflecting a necessary and indispensable constituting element of the organization as a viable system.

A generic model of organisational culture is developed, which distinguishes between the internal environment (organisational culture, strategy, structure and operations) and external environment (legitimisation environment and task environment) of an organisation and suggests a set of five bipolar traits to characterise the normative personality characteristics of the organisation. The presented generic model of organisational culture integrates so far separate classes of organisation theory and has the potential to serve as a basis for the identification of types of corporate culture and their dysfunctions.