The Influence of University Activities on Multicultural Teams

An increasing relevance of organizational cross-border relationships, and thereby of Europeanization, globalization, and internationalization, has led to the importance of intercultural competence. To develop this competence among their students, most educational institutions have entered into international partnerships and offer international projects accompanied by intercultural curricula. This article concentrates on the influence of these activities in higher education concerning the success of multicultural student teams. The teams analyzed here consist of students from three different nations working on a joint project. Due to the cultural differences, conflicts can be anticipated (Hofstede, Hofstede & Minkov, 2010; Rohn, 2006) and intercultural competence to overcome those conflicts is needed ( Hiller, 2010 ). To reflect the effect of activities strengthening intercultural competence, four university coefficients were allocated to each team based on the theory of, inter alia, Bennett (2011) and Führing (1996) . In a survey, the students assessed at the end of the project how well they felt supported by the different activities and how comfortable they felt within their respective team. Out of this assessment, team success factors were evaluated. It was expected that a positive correlation between the assessment of activities and the team success factors would result. Interestingly, the sample used does not show this relationship. This article is based on a comprehensive and interdisciplinary study of literature as well as on empirical research. The main result of the research shows the changing importance of activities to strengthen intercultural competence based on the difference between students’ competence from international universities. Accordingly, it might be a basis on which to restructure programs teaching intercultural competence in higher education.