Week 2

BUSN115 : Week Two Paper

Nicole Wallace

Professor Robert Goldwasser

BUSN115: Week Two Paper

What cultural factors must U.S. sports franchises overcome to increase popularity abroad? Why?

As defined by our textbook, culture is a shared system of symbols, beliefs, attitudes, values, expectations, and norms for behavior. Your cultural background influences the way you prioritize what is important in life, helps define your attitude toward what is appropriate in a situation, and establishes rules of behavior. In order to be successful on a global level US sports franchises must leaders recognize and respect differences in language, social values, ideas of status, decision-making habits, attitudes toward time, use of space, body language, manners, religions, and ethical standards. Ignorance of or indifference to cultural differences can cause any business to fail (Bovee 57-58).

Sports are very important part of all cultures of the world. To successfully expand into new arena in the world a US based sport must know how to serve new customers; you must understand the cultural differences of their countries and add a sense of interest. In the past American teams have been mainly played by American athletes or American trained athletes. But now as the U.S. sport franchises try and go global they are scouting and recruiting foreign athletes, which makes not only that team but also it might make that sport popular with that country of which these foreign players come from. Players like, Yao Ming was from China helped to draw attention to American basketball in China. An example of the growing interest and popularity of basketball can be seen in the now tough competition of the Olympics. It was once that the USA would dominant in basketball but now the US basketball teams are facing more and more stiff completion due to the global interest in basketball. Also, sports franchises need to be sensitive to other countries religions.

How can franchises ensure its...