Brazil's Cultural Environment, Opportunities & Challenges For Investors Wanting Do Business In Brazil

Culture is extremely important when doing business in other countries, as it affects all business functions including marketing, human resources, production, accounting, finance, and leadership. Culture varies from country to country and defines the boundaries of different groups. This paper will analyze Brazil’s cultural environment and will examine opportunities and challenges for investors wanting do business in Brazil. Like any other country there will always be challenges and opportunities, but how you navigate the cultural environment is crucial to success.

When I think of Brazil, I automatically think of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio De Janeiro, the amazon rainforest, soccer, the carnaval, and even music like samba. Although, these are all part of Brazil’s culture, there is so much more to be said about Brazils cultural environment and once these factors are identified one can successfully do business in Brazil. Using Hall’s framework Brazils cultural environment, you would either classify Brazil as a low context or high context culture. Brazil is South America’s largest country and like most countries in South America, Brazil is a high context culture.

High context culture is described as communication conveyed by context and communication tends to be implicit and indirect, basically how the message is communicated is more important than the words. As a result, personal relationships are important when conducting business in Brazil. Other characteristics of high context culture are polychronic, which is having to do with simultaneous activities or multitasking. Characteristics that make Brazil fall into the high context category are Brazilians are very religious and emotional people who tend to focus on personal relationships with face to face communication. For example, personal space ideals in Brazil are different than those in the U.S., it is common for a local contact to stand very close while speaking, place a hand on a business contacts shoulder, or even hug. (https://www.export.gov/article?id=Brazil-Business-Etiquette-Language).

Reading our textbook, Global Environment of Business, we know that in using Trompenaars’ framework there are seven dimensions to analyze Brazil’s cultural environment. The first dimension is universalist versus particularistic and Brazil would be a particularistic culture. Reason being because like mentioned before Brazil is a high context culture and context applies to which rules apply to whom, so they consider context before they apply the rule. The second dimension is individualism versus communitarianism and Brazil would be a communitarianism culture because they are relationship and family oriented in where they look after each other and protect each other in return for loyalty, so the whole group benefits. The third dimension is neutral versus affective and Brazil is an affective culture, it is known Brazil is emotional and focuses on personal relationships.

A great example is that it is encouraged to talk about anything from personal life to politics. The fourth dimension is specific versus diffuse and in relation to Hall’s framework most high context cultures are diffuse. Diffuse culture meaning private life undifferentiated from public life and as mentioned they like to share personal information. The fifth dimension is achievement versus ascription and Brazil has an ascription culture where because of who a person is, like a hierarchy whoever is at the top like in a family or age, they are highly valued. The sixth dimension is attitude towards time and Brazil’s attitude toward time is not really focused at any one point of time, but more of the present and how people’s behavior and feelings now in present time. Also, Brazil has a synchronous or polychronic in that they are flexible, and many actions can occur the same time.

The final and seventh dimension is attitude towards environment. Brazils attitude towards the environment is that of trying to control the environment it as it can be seen through deforestation of the amazon jungle and other environmental issues that brazil is controlling. (https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/encyclopedia/Assem-Braz/Brazil-Doing-Business-in.html)Now that we have discussed Brazils cultural environment, there will be challenges and opportunities doing business in Brazil with these cultural identifiers. First challenge would be, since Brazil is such a high context culture, A US investor can not just expect go and dive straight into doing business without first building relationships and getting to know their business partners.

Other challenges could stem from many aspects of cultural differences from the US and Brazil, like how they view rules. For example, protecting intellectual property would be a huge concern because Brazil has a high level of counterfeiting and piracy. In general, a US investor must be aware that doing business in Brazil is going to be way higher context and about building relationships. Although there are challenges, there are also some amazing opportunities for US investors. A challenge is also an opportunity, since Brazil is super high context it gives US investor a chance to genuinely build trust and develop long lasting relationships with Brazil because Brazil values this so much it could pave the way for more opportunities in Brazils goods and services ranging from there growing infrastructure to their tourism and even their private sectors. In general Brazil is great opportunity because it’s the seventh largest economy in the world and has high economic diversification, it just makes sense for the US to take advantage of Brazils high context culture and become part their amazing growth. (https://www.export.gov/article?id=Brazil-Market-Overview).

My recommendation for a US investor wanting do business in Brazil would be to actual visit Brazil and meet one on one with potential partners and try to build relationship while showing them what you can offer and follow up with more personal meetings. My other recommendation would be work with an already established representative or distributor in Brazil since they know the culture there and can give insight the Brazilian Market. I highly recommended both these options because they are the safest bets when dealing with the Brazilian cultural environment. The first option you are going out and screen potential partners while adhering to their cultural environment and by building relationships you are minimizing the challenges in entering market. The other option pretty much does the same in that when working with someone who already does business in Brazil you are working with some who has already established relationships and trust with Brazil. In conclusion, Brazil has many opportunities and challenges, but it is most important to build relationships, its all about relationships and building more relationships in Brazil.