International Management #4 Cont...

[samvara]

Review of previous week - notes to self from previous week very helpful. Team is busily doing background analysis for group assignment -  lovely, lovely team ;)

This week

Culture defined

• The acquired knowledge (collective mental programming) that people use to interpret behaviour and to generate social behaviour (Jung’s definition - collective unconscious)
• The customary and traditional way of thinking and doing things which is shared to a greater or lesser degree by all members – a construct!
• Forms individual values, beliefs, attitudes and influences behaviour – becomes second nature!
• Manifested at different levels of depth –artifacts (symbols, heroes, rituals), values and norms, basic underlying beliefs –the cultural iceberg
• Culture is learned, shared, transgenerational, symbolic, patterned and adaptive
• Cultural environment formed by language, religion, law, education, politics, technology, social/family organisation
• Altogether a fuzzy concept as group members unlikely to share identical values and beliefs but to rather show “family resemblances”
• Culture is very difficult to change because of “the cultural immune system” –any threat to tradition and order by the “change virus” is resisted.
• The outcome of culture is climate

Cultural boundaries

• National societal culture and sub cultures (ethnic groups) – world cultures: North American Western, European Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic – orthodox, Latin American, African
• Organisational or corporate culture - can plan or let it happen
• Professional or work type culture
• Organisational behaviour influenced by integrating effects of societal, corporate and professional cultures
• (Most people are members of many cultural groups and their behaviour often depends on how they resolve the inevitable clash between these cultures)

Importance of culture

• In international business it affects technology transfer, managerial ideology/attitudes, • employee behaviour, business/government relations and how people think and behave in • regard to certain products and services
• Arguably, cultural knowledge and understanding is more vital to success in international business management than technical know how
• Cultural sensitivity is often not on the selection criteria list for choosing international managers – quick question, how could you measure it?

Key ideas on culture

• Understanding one’s own culture is a precursor to understanding another’s culture – however, we rarely examine our own cultural norms and values, we just live them
• “ecological fallacy” - difference between understanding and applying that understanding, or, shifting from one level(culture) to another level (individual)
• [Frontstage culture and backstage culture (Goffman – Presentation of Self in Everyday Life) – in Japan epitomised as honne and tatemae, the real mind and the veneer]
• High context culture and low context culture (See Reading 1 in text edition 5)
• Communication effectiveness in cross cultural settings is largely determined by the amount of cultural understanding between participants – importance of language (learn or at the minimum learn enough to show respect)
• Culture shock – occurs during expatriation and repatriation
• Stereotyping ( See Reading 3 in text edition 5)
• The “in group” and “out group” syndrome – applies in all cultural settings

Cultural stereotyping

• HEAVEN is where the police are British, the chefs are French, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian and it is all organised by the Swiss
• HELL is where the chefs are British, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, the police are German and it is all organised by the Italians

Cultural frameworks

• Kluckhohn and Strodbecke - variations in values cause differences in dealing with the same issues or problems.
  • Relationship of people to nature - subjugation, harmony or mastery
  • Time orientation - past, present or future
  • Belief about basic human nature - evil, neutral or good
  • Activity orientation - being, controlling, doing
  • Relationships among people - hierarchical, group or individualistic
  • Orientation to space - private, mixed or public
• (Chapter 2 of text, note particularly figure 2.7 on page 58, the COF – this is Lane et al’s favoured framework for use in MBI model Chapter 3)
• Geert Hofstede and the four major dimensions of culture:
• Power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism and masculinity/femininity
• Used to develop two dimensional figures or clusters to understand cultures in different countries
• An addition - the Confucian dimension
• (P. 38 Edition 6 and Readings 1 and 2 of edition 5)
• Fons Trompenaars and relationship orientations (P.38 of text)
  • Universalism and particularism
  • Individual and collective
  • Neutral and affective
  • Specific and diffuse
  • Achievement and ascription (value measured by what you achieve vs where you are in hierarchy)
  • Time - sequential and synchronous

Using frameworks

• Undertaking managerial tasks such as planning, controlling, decision making, organising, staffing, directing and communicating will be influenced by the cultural differences inherent in the frameworks.
• Concept of scripts eg Western vs Asian
• Reading books focused on other countries, talking to people with experience and getting information from Government trade organisations can also aid understanding

Key issues/questions

• Will the cultures of the world converge more or diverge further in future?
• How can managers be trained in cultural understanding and action?
• Can Western management practices be “exported” to different cultures?
• Economics/growth versus quality of life – the globalisation debate/battle

Review of readings: be familiar with MBI model for exam

Break!

Video on doing business in Asia - family connections and relationship building far more important, possibility that family model breaks down after organisation reaches a certain size.

Case study - Nth American female consultant Ellen providing expertise to large Korean team who turned out to be less experienced than initially claimed. Organisational chart put her at the same status as local project manager Jack who did not have the skills but did compete with her for leadership - team was willing to be led by her in his absence but when present eventually led to higher management shouting matches about whose minion was the problem - Jack or Ellen.

1. What are the problems and why do they exist? (is Ellen the problem?) - two leaders, female leader + outgroup + expertise vs male local - who to follow? Ellen is the problem in that she exists, not that in she is doing anything wrong
2. What alternatives exist at this point? Clarify authority structure - maybe make Ellen the boss but make Jack the public face of authority - Ellen gets to tell Jack what to do. Or "promote"Jack to another country for a year
3. In Andrews position, what would you do - could negotiate for above solution.
4. What changes would you recommend making for future projects? Clarify hierarchy earlier

Actual outcome: Jack "promoted" sideways, Andrew co-leader with Ellen, another consultant boosted project management experience. Completed within tolerance - almost on time.