Browsing by Author "Weckman, Elvi"

Previous research shows that multicultural and multilinguistic organizations can be more effective and creative than other organizations. Building trust in workplace strengthens commitment to work and eliminates conflicts and disagreements between colleagues. Organizational culture is partly impacted by how trust building materializes in practice in work community. The purpose of the study was to discover how international experts experience trust building and work commitment in a multicultural organization. The study was conducted in the IT organization that is part of a bigger Finnish organization. The study answered two research questions: (1) What should an organization guarantee to its employees to build trust and commitment? (2) What informal factors contribute to building trust in a multicultural work community? This study was conducted qualitatively, and semi-structured interview was used as a method to collect research material. In total, six people were interviewed for the study. They all work for the IT organization and do not speak Finnish as their mother tongue. Three of the interviewees had moved to Finland when they started working for the organization and three others work from their home countries as consultants for the organization. Theoretical content analysis was used as the analysis method. The results of the study suggest that international professional’s benefit from clear goals, roadmaps, and strategies that guide their work. These should be available in English. In addition, multicultural teams’ benefit from being able to build their own ways of working that takes multiculturalism and language barriers into account. Informal acquaintance is also useful in building trust. International colleagues had positive experiences of colleagues and supervisors who had helped them when they moved to Finland, for example. In addition, it has been important for the international experts to learn Finnish and learn about the Finnish culture. In order to build trust and commitment, it is important that the organizational culture supports the needs of multiculturalism and multilingualism, and the employees implements the culture in everyday life. The results of the study can be applied in building trust and commitment of multicultural teams.