Traveling to a different part of the country for business is very prominent in today’s day and age. Depending on what your field of work is the differences between state to state here in the US are not all that different. That was definitely not the case when traveling to Southern Africa for a business study abroad. One of the first things that I noted when arriving in Capetown, South Africa was how Westernized it was. It did not really feel like I was in Africa at all. Honestly, it felt as if I was in San Fransisco or somewhere more along those lines. Some of the other interesting key aspects were when everyone arrived at work as well as how they seemed to conduct their business. To go more into detail about the first one, here in the US every business typically starts work at around 8 am if not earlier. But in South Africa, most business was not conducted until after 9 am. I was kind of shocked to learn that the hustle and bustle didn’t start until well after the sun had come up, unlike it is here. I also noted how friendly everyone was with their clients or customers. It was very cool to see how accommodating every place that we visited was, even if we were just a group of young American students. I was also able to learn early on that the accounting practices and focuses in South Africa are very different from those in the United States. I learned that it was not until recently that South Africa had more centralized rules for its different accounting practices. I am interested to learn more about the civil unrest that is taking place in the country right now and how that is going to affect not only the business world but the accounting industry specifically.
Center for International Business Studies Blog