Transcript Cultural Dimensions

Cultural Dimensions
•Geert Hofstede. His study used IBM employees
across 50 different countries.
•His survey consisted of 126 questions which
resulted in a creation of 5 broad independent
dimensions which could be used to measure
culture variability.
•Subsequent verification studies by others covered
students in 23 countries, elites in 19 countries,
commercial airline pilots in 23 countries, up-market
consumers in 15 countries, and civil service
managers in 14 countries
Cultural Dimensions:
•Individualism/Collectivism
•Uncertainty Avoidance: High vs. Low
•Power Distance : High vs. Low
•Masculinity/Femininity
•Long vs. Short term Orientation
Individualism vs. Collectivism
Individualism refers “ to a society in
which the ties between individuals are
loose; everyone is expected to look after
himself or herself and his or her
immediate family only. Individual needs
and goals take precedence over the
needs of others”.
Individualism vs. Collectivism
Collectivism ( Low Individualism) refers to a
society in which from birth onwards are integrated
into a strong, cohesive in-groups, which
throughout people’s lifetime continue to protect
them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty.
individual needs are sacrificed to satisfy the group
Hofstede’s Description
• Individualism on the one side versus its opposite,
collectivism, that is the degree to which individuals are
integrated into groups. On the individualist side we find
societies in which the ties between individuals are loose:
everyone is expected to look after him/herself and his/her
immediate family. On the collectivist side, we find
societies in which people from birth onwards are integrated
into strong, cohesive in-groups, often extended families
(with uncles, aunts and grandparents) which continue
protecting them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty. The
word 'collectivism' in this sense has no political meaning:
it refers to the group, not to the state. Again, the issue
addressed by this dimension is an extremely fundamental
one, regarding all societies in the world
Individualistic Country Summary
See overhead
Are all
Individualists/Collectivists?
Triandis: Within every culture there are
people who are:
• Idiocentric- think feel, behave like people
with individualistic tendencies
AND
• Allocentric- think, feel, behave like people
with collectivist tendencies
• Collectivist cultures: 0-35% Idiocentric
• Individualistic cultures:0-35% allocentric
Idiocentrics vs. Allocentrics
• Idiocentrics (Ind)
– High in expressiveness
– Dominance
– Initiation of action
– Logical arguments
– Strong opinions
Allocentrics (Coll)
High on accommodating
Avoidance of arguments
Shift opinions easily
Emotional arguments
Implications For a Cross Cultural Manager
•Performance Appraisals
•Training Methods
•Hiring Practices
Work Trait Summary: Collectivist
•Employees act in the interest of their in-group, not
necessarily of themselves
•Hiring and promotion decisions take employees’
in-group into account
•Relatives of employer and employees preferred in hiring
•Employer/employee relationship is basically moral/ like a family
link
•Poor performance reason for other tasks
•Employees perform best in in-groups
•Training most effective focused at group level
•Relationship with colleagues cooperative for in-groups, hostile for
out-groups
•Incentives to be given to in-groups
•Direct appraisal of performance is threat to harmony
Work Trait Summary: Individualist
•Employees supposed to act as economic men
•Hiring and promotion should be based on skills and rules only
•Family relationships seen as a disadvantage in hiring
•Employer/employee relationship is founded in ‘labor market’
•Poor performance reason for dismissal
•Employees perform best as individuals
•Training most effective focused at individual level
•Relationship with colleagues do not depend on their group
identity
•Preferred reward allocation based on equity for all
•Incentives to be given to individuals
•Direct appraisal of performance improves productivity
Power Distance
Power Distance is the extent to which the less
powerful members of institutions and
organizations within a country expect and
accept that POWER is distributed unequally.
High Power Distance- high acceptance of inequality
Low Power Distance- low acceptance of inequality
Hofstede’s Description: Power Distance is
the extent to which the less powerful members of
organizations and institutions (like the family) accept and
expect that power is distributed unequally. This represents
inequality (more versus less), but defined from below, not
from above. It suggests that a society's level of inequality is
endorsed by the followers as much as by the leaders. Power
and inequality, of course, are extremely fundamental facts of
any society and anybody with some international experience
will be aware that 'all societies are unequal, but some are more
unequal than others'.
Country Summary /Power Distance
See Overhead
Implications For a Cross Cultural Manager
•Tall organization structures (concentration of power)
•Authority as a right or rank
•Preferred Manager
•Job Satisfaction and Supervision
Management Implications Low Power Distance
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Decentralized organization tendencies
Flatter organization structures
Equal power among subordinates
Access to information
Smaller proportion of supervisory personnel
Lower strata of the workforce often consists of
highly qualified people
• Accessibilty to CEO
Management Implications High Power Distance
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Centralized organization tendencies
Taller organization structures
Unequal power among subordinates
Limited access to information (information
is key to power retention)
• Larger proportion of supervisory personnel
• Inaccessible to CEO
Uncertainty Avoidance
Uncertainty Avoidance is the extent to which the
members of a culture feel threatened by
uncertain or unknown situations
High Uncertainty Avoidance – uncomfortable
with uncertainty
Low Uncertainty Avoidance – accept uncertainty
Hofstede’s Description:
Uncertainty avoidance deals with a society's tolerance for uncertainty
and ambiguity; it ultimately refers to man's search for Truth. It
indicates to what extent a culture programs its members to feel either
uncomfortable or comfortable in unstructured situations. Unstructured
situations are novel, unknown, surprising, different from usual.
Uncertainty avoiding cultures try to minimize the possibility of such
situations by strict laws and rules, safety and security measures, and on
the philosophical and religious level by a belief in absolute Truth;
'there can only be one Truth and we have it'. People in uncertainty
avoiding countries are also more emotional, and motivated by inner
nervous energy. The opposite type, uncertainty accepting cultures, are
more tolerant of opinions different from what they are used to; they try
to have as few rules as possible, and on the philosophical and religious
level they are relativist and allow many currents to flow side by side.
People within these cultures are more phlegmatic and contemplative,
and not expected by their environment to express emotions.
Uncertainty Avoidance Country Summary
See Overhead
Uncertainty Avoidance Trait Summary
Low UA
•Weak loyalty to employer: short average duration of
employment and higher turnover
•Preference for smaller organizations
•Tolerance for ambiguity in structures and procedures
•Belief in generalists and common sense
•Organizations encourage employees to use their own
initiative
•More risk taking by managers
Uncertainty Avoidance Trait Summary
High UA
•Preference for tasks with sure outcomes, no
risks, and following instructions
•Strong loyalty to employer: long average duration of
employment and low turnover
•Preference for larger organizations
•High formalized conception of management
•Belief in specialists and expertise
•Organizations less encouraging for employees to use their
Own initiative
•Less risk taking by managers
•Emphasis on career stability
Uncertainty Avoidance Test
• Compare your level of UA with two other
country averages
• http://www.itapintl.com/ITAPCWQuestionn
aire.htm
Masculinity/Femininity
•Stands for a society in which social gender roles are
clearly distinct.
•Masculinity:
Men- supposed to be assertive, tough, and focused on
material success, expectation of women to play a more
domestic role
Femininity:
Women- supposed to be more modest, concerned with
quality of life, understanding
Hofstede’s Description
• Masculinity versus its opposite, femininity, refers to the
distribution of roles between the genders which is
another fundamental issue for any society to which a
range of solutions are found. The IBM studies revealed
that (a) women's values differ less among societies than
men's values; (b) men's values from one country to
another contain a dimension from very assertive and
competitive and maximally different from women's
values on the one side, to modest and caring and similar
to women's values on the other. The assertive pole has
been called 'masculine' and the modest, caring pole
'feminine'. The women in feminine countries have the
same modest, caring values as the men; in the masculine
countries they are somewhat assertive and competitive,
but not as much as the men, so that these countries show
a gap between men's values and women's values.
Masculinity Country Summary
See Overhead
Masculinity Trait: Management Effect
•Live in order to work
•Managers are expected to be decisive, firm, assertive,
aggressive, competitive and just
•Successful managers are seen as having solely male
characteristics
•Fewer women in management
•Career ambitions are compulsory for men, optional for
women
•Managers are more prepared to uproot their family career
reasons
•Resolution of conflicts through denying them or fighting until
‘ the best man wins’
•Less sickness absence
•Higher job stress
•Competitive advantage in manufacturing industries, price
competition, heavy products, and bulk chemicals
Femininity Trait: Management Effect
•Work in order to live
•Managers are expected to use intuition, deal with feelings
and seek consensus
•Successful managers are seen as having both male and
female characteristics
•More women in management
•Career ambitions are optional for women and men
•Managers are less prepared to uproot their family career
reasons
•Resolution of conflicts through problem solving, compromise
and negotiation
•More sickness absence
•Less job stress: less burnout
•Competitive advantage in service industries, consulting, live
products and biochemistry
Video: Masculinity in Japan
• Watch the video and consider the values
underlying the behavior seen in highly
masculine oriented cultures.
Long/Short Term Orientation
(Confucian Dynamism)
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Chinese Values Survey: 1988 by Hofstede and Bond
Result of the cultural bias in original survey
University students from 22 countries-5th dimension
Confucian Dynamism Index (CDI)-High
– Long-term oriented in their thinking
– More receptive to many truths and are pragmatic more
able to accept changes in their life
– High perseverance
– Value thrift in their investments
– Need to plan and anticipate
• This long term orientation or future oriented
aspect of Hofstede’s Confucian dynamism
is rather close to what the Master in his
Analects stated
– “If a man has no worries about what is far off,
he will assuredly have troubles that are near at
hand”
Confucian Dynamism Index (CDI)
LOW
HIGH
Absolute Truth
Conventional/Traditional
Short Term Orientation
Concern for Stability
Quick Results Expected
Spending for Today
Many Truths (Time/Context)
Pragmatic
Long Term Orientation
Acceptance of Change
Perseverance
Thrift for Investment
Importance Of CDI
• Persistence and Perseverance
• Ordering relationships by status and
observing this order
• Thrift
• Emphasis on long term planning
• Emphasis on group centered decision
making
Subcultures
• Residents of the country only conform to
the national character to a certain degree
• Could be from ethnic, geographic, or other
variables
• Good managers treat people as individuals
and they avoid any form of stereotyping