Cross-Cultural Management in a Globalized World: Theories, Practices, and Emerging Trends

Dear Colleagues,

I present to you a proposal for a special edition ‘Cross-Cultural Management in a Globalized World: Theories, Practices, and Emerging Trends’, for the Journal, Administrative Sciences.

1. Scope and Purpose of the Special Issue

Given the mobility of the workforce across borders, cross-cultural management has become a central concern in a highly globalised world where organisations span national borders, engage diverse workforces and navigate governance, leadership and strategy within cultural complexities (Tietze, 2021). While foundational literature has long examined culture’s impact on organisational behaviour, expatriate management and intercultural communication, rapid technological change, evolving migration patterns and geopolitical volatility are reshaping how culture intersects with management practices.

This Special Issue aims to bring together theory, empirical evidence and practice-oriented insights that address both classic themes and emerging fronts in cross-cultural management.

The purpose of this special edition is twofold:

1. First, to advance conceptual and theoretical frameworks that integrate cultural complexity with contemporary organisational challenges (e.g., digital transformation, hybrid work, AI mediation in teams) and
2. To showcase empirical and practice-driven work that illuminates how cultural differences shape leadership, teamwork, decision-making and institutional interactions across global contexts.

This Special Issue will build on established traditions in international business and organisational studies while bridging gaps created by recent socio-technological changes (Kwilinski, et al., 2024), (e.g., virtual multicultural teams, algorithm-mediated interaction). This edition will also connect with related studies in international management, intercultural communication, human resource development and global leadership.

2. The focus of this special edition centres on the processes, outcomes and capabilities of cross-cultural management, as it relates to a highly globalised organisational context. Some of the themes for this special edition include, but are not limited to:

1. Cultural intelligence and adaptive leadership
2. Cross-cultural communication in hybrid and remote work environments
3. Cultural influences on strategic decision making and innovation adoption
4. Interpersonal trust and conflict in multicultural teams
5. Institutional and regulatory cultural embeddedness in multinational operations
6. Digital platforms and cultural mediation in organisational processes

The scope of this special edition will span methodological approaches-quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods, conceptual/theoretical and practice cases. Geographic scope is global, highlighting diverse regions and sectors (private, public, non-profit). It equally values cross-level analyses (individual, team, organisational, institutional) that illuminate culture’s role in contemporary management challenges (Kelley & Worthley, 1981). The purpose of this special edition is to  (i) synthesise and extend theory to reflect current forces; (ii) advance practical insights for practitioners, scholars, academics and policy makers; and (iii) stimulate dialogue in the cross-cultural domain.

3. How This Special Issue Relates to and Supplements Existing Literature

Much of the Cross-cultural management scholarship has traditionally focused on crucial foundations of cross-cultural management; however, several shifts necessitate supplementation: These include the following:

1. Emerging Phenomena: The rise in virtual and hybrid work environments challenges existing models of face-to-face intercultural interaction. New research is needed to understand how culture interacts with digital mediation.
2. Multilevel Integration: Much past research treats culture at a single level (e.g., national). There is a growing need for multilevel approaches that integrate individual cultural intelligence with organizational systems and institutional environments (Lee et al., 2022).
3. Interdisciplinary Threads: Cross-cultural management increasingly intersects with ethics, sustainability and technology adoption studies, requiring more interdisciplinary frameworks.
4. Contextual Diversity: Global shocks (e.g., pandemic, geopolitical realignment) have altered cross-border collaboration. Research that captures dynamic cultural adaptation in these new contexts is limited but essential.

By foregrounding emerging trends and linking them with classic and contemporary theories, this issue will supplement existing streams in international business, leadership studies and organizational behaviour, reinforcing cross-cultural management as a core domain (Kim & Toh, 2019) within administrative sciences.

References

Kelley, L., & Worthley, R. (1981). The Role of Culture in Comparative Management: A Cross-Cultural Perspective, Academy of Management Journal, 24(1), 164–173. https://doi.org/10.2307/255831

Kim, Y. J., & Toh, S. M. (2019). Stuck in the Past? The Influence of a Leader’s Past Cultural Experience on Group Culture and Positive and Negative Group Deviance. Academy of Management Journal,62(3), 944–969. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2016.1322

Kwilinski, A., Merritt, P., & Wróblewski, L. (2024). Advancing sustainable development goals through digital culture: A global research overview. Cultural Management: Science and Education, 8(1), 61-79.

Lee, H.-J., Yoshikawa, K., & Harzing, A.-W. (2022). Cultures and Institutions: Dispositional and contextual explanations for country-of-origin effects in MNC “ethnocentric” staffing practices. Organization Studies, 43(4), 497–519. https://doi.org/10.1177/01708406211006247

Tietze, S. (2021). [Review of Cross-cultural management revisited: A qualitative approach, by P. D’Iribarne, S. Chevrier, A. Henry, J.-P. Segal, & G. Tréguer-Felten]. Journal of International Business Studies, 52(9), 1896–1899. https://www.jstor.org/stable/48686846

Dr. Soma Pillay
Guest Editor

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• cross culture
• virtual work environments
• cultural intelligence
• cultural embeddedness