Journal of International Business Studies (2004) 35, 46–60
& 2004 Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. All rights reserved 0047-2506 $25.00
Empowerment effects across cultures
Michael K Hui1, Kevin Au2
and Henry Fock1
1
Department of Marketing, The Chinese
University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong;
2
Department of Management, The Chinese
University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Correspondence: K Au, Department of
Management, KKL Building, Chinese
University of Hong Kong, Shatin,
Hong Kong
Tel: þ 852 2609 7802
Fax: þ 852 2603 5473
E-mail: kevin@baf.msmail.cuhk.edu.hk
Received: 18 May 2002
Revised: 17 July 2002
Accepted: 28 September 2003
Online publication date: 18 December 2003
www.jibs.net
Abstract
Three studies examined cross-cultural variations in empowerment effects.
Study 1 investigated whether Hofstede’s power distance scores moderated the
effect of job autonomy on job satisfaction using World Values Survey data on
33 nations. Study 2 surveyed frontline hotel employees from Canada and PRC
to investigate the moderating role of power distance at the individual level. In
Study 3, hotel management students from Canada and PRC were asked to play
the role of a frontline employee, who had to handle a special customer request,
in a scenario experiment. These studies show consistently that the cultural
value of power distance moderates the effect of empowerment on job
satisfaction. Moreover, willingness to accept and exercise the discretionary
power allowed by management and desire to satisfy customer needs and wants
are two employee conditions that are essential for the successful implementa-
tion of the empowerment approach.
Journal of International Business Studies (2004) 35, 46–60. doi:10.1057/palgrave.
jibs.8400067
Keywords: empowerment; job satisfaction; power distance; services; China
Introduction
Service employees play the role of boundary-spanners at the
interface between the organisation and the customer, and often
experience role conflict in their jobs when faced with incompatible
requests from customers and management (Schneider, 1980). On
the one hand, service employees are required to comply with
organisational rules and regulations. On the other hand, they are
hired to serve and satisfy customers. When frontline employees
encounter customer requests that require them to violate their
usual work procedures, they are ‘caught in the middle’, and role
stress arises (Singh et al., 1994). Empowerment, defined as
providing employees with discretion and autonomy in connection
with their work, has been widely accepted as an effective means by
which service managers can improve the job performance and
satisfaction of their frontline staff.
More recently, several authors have argued that the effectiveness
of the empowerment approach may vary across cultures. Incon-
gruence between empowerment as a management practice and
cultural values may attenuate the positive effect of discretion and
autonomy on job satisfaction in high power-distance nations where
subordinates are accustomed to taking orders from their supervisors
(Morris and Pavett, 1992; Argyris, 1998; Eylon and Au, 1999; Robert
et al., 2000). However, empirical evidence pertaining to variation in
empowerment effects between high power-distance and low power-
distance cultures is far from being unequivocal. In this paper, we
argue that the investigation of the moderating effect of national
 Empowerment effects across cultures
culture on the relationship between empowerment
and job satisfaction should take into consideration a
number of methodological and conceptual factors.
In particular, we propose and demonstrate that two
conditions are essential for the successful imple-
mentation of the empowerment approach. First,
service employees must be willing to accept and
exercise their discretionary power when serving
customers. As suggested by prior researchers (e.g.
Eylon and Au, 1999; Robert et al., 2000), the cultural
dimension of power distance should affect the
personal value of equal power sharing and hence
the willingness of employees to accept and exercise
discretionary power. Second, employees must be
motivated to satisfy customer needs and wants when
playing out the role of boundary-spanners. Empow-
erment affects job satisfaction because service
employees can make use of their discretionary power
to serve their customers. When service employees do
not consider the delivery of superior customer value
to be their primary work goal and/or when they do
not consider a customer request to be one that
warrants their attention and effort, whether or not
they are given discretionary power to serve the
customer is unlikely to matter.
Three cross-cultural studies are presented to test
our propositions that empowerment effects vary
with (a) the cultural value of power distance, and
(b) the innate and situational factors that influence
the employees’ desire to satisfy customer needs and
wants. Study 1 establishes the generalisability of the
influence of power distance on the relationship
between job autonomy and job satisfaction across a
host of countries. In addition to power distance,
customer orientation and the nature of the custo-
mer request are included in Studies 2 and 3 to
demonstrate that, besides willingness to accept and
exercise discretionary power, desire to satisfy cus-
tomer needs and wants is another employee factor
that affects the significance of empowerment
effects. Study 2 is a cross-cultural survey of the
frontline employees of hotels. Using validated
measures, the study examines at the individual
level the moderating effects of power distance (i.e.
the innate value of equal power sharing between
supervisors and subordinates) and customer orien-
tation (i.e. the innate value of delivering superior
customer value) on the relationship between
empowerment and job satisfaction. Using an
experimental method, Study 3 shows that empow-
erment significantly affects job satisfaction in low
power-distance cultures, and the effect becomes
more pronounced when service employees can
Michael K Hui et al
47
make use of their discretionary power to serve a
special customer request that is backed by a good
reason, one that warrants their attention and effort.
Literature review
Empowerment has been a tantalising notion for
academics and practitioners since the concept
emerged in the 1980s. After two decades of
research, empowerment is now widely accepted as
a potent way to enhance job performance and
satisfaction (Conger and Kanungo, 1988; Bowen,
1995; Spreitzer, 1995), especially for frontline
service employees who perform their job duties at
the interface between a firm and its customers
(Bowen and Lawler, 1992). There is also an emer-
ging belief that empowerment as a management
practice may be more congruent with the cultural
values of some nations than with those of others.
One cultural dimension that has received consider-
able research attention is power distance, which
refers to the extent to which people expect and
accept that power is distributed unequally among
the different levels of the organisational hierarchy
(Hofstede, 1980). In general, members of low
power-distance cultures believe in power sharing
between subordinates and supervisors. In contrast,
members of high power-distance societies believe
that subordinates should play the role of taking
instructions and orders from their supervisors.
Accordingly, service managers should be less will-
ing to delegate decisions and service employees
should be less willing to accept and exercise
discretionary power in high power-distance nations
than in low power-distance nations.
In terms of empirical support, however, Eylon
and Au (1999) failed to confirm the moderating
effect of power distance on the relationship
between empowerment and job satisfaction. Their
results indicated that subjects of both high power-
distance and low power-distance cultures were
more satisfied with their jobs when empowered
than when disempowered. In related work, Robert
et al. (2000) examined the effects of empowerment
on job satisfaction in four nations: India, Mexico,
Poland, and the US. They found that empowerment
was negatively associated with job satisfaction in
India, which is widely regarded as a high power-
distance nation (Ralston et al., 1993). However,
they found no significant association between
empowerment and job satisfaction in the remain-
ing three national groups, which represented both
high power-distance (Mexico and Poland) and low
power-distance (the US) cultures.
Journal of International Business Studies
 Empowerment effects across cultures
48
Conceptual and methodological issues
Three conceptual and methodological factors may
have contributed to the inconsistent and unex-
pected results in previous cross-cultural studies of
empowerment. First, the different cultural groups
sampled might have shared the same set of values
as a result of their affiliation with the same
organisation or institution. As Robert et al. (2000)
noted, their survey results might simply have
reflected a common organisational culture instead
of the four different national cultures, because the
four national samples included in their study were
drawn from subsidiaries of the same company.
Similarly, the subjects in the Eylon and Au (1999)
experiment were local and foreign MBA students
of a Canadian university. Although the foreign
students had different ethnic origins, their
values might have been altered in the process of
acculturation. This is a common phenomenon for
foreigners who need to internalise the knowledge
and skills necessary to function in a new set of
socio-cultural reinforcement contingencies (Jun
et al., 2001). Improper sampling of cross-cultural
sample groups may confound the task of research-
ers seeking to explore the moderating effect of
national culture on the relationship between
empowerment and job satisfaction. Accordingly,
in our three studies, we used independent national
samples to examine empowerment effects across
cultures.
Second, it is important to distinguish between
discretionary empowerment and psychological
empowerment in the cross-cultural comparisons
of empowerment effects. Whereas discretionary
empowerment refers to the management practice of
providing employees with discretion and autono-
my, psychological empowerment refers to the employ-
ees’ feelings of being trusted, informed, supported,
motivated, in control, and competent. Previous
researchers (e.g. Arnold et al., 2000; Spreitzer, 1996)
have argued that it is the perceptions of self-control
and self-efficacy rather than discretion and auton-
omy per se that affect job behaviour. More impor-
tantly, Rothbaum et al. (1982) have argued that,
although the positive consequences of control and
competence may be universal, people may achieve
a sense of mastery over the environment through
two alternative means: either by making use of
their power to actively manipulate the environ-
ment (primary control) or by relying on adaptation
and powerful others (secondary control). As psycho-
logical empowerment refers to the internal feelings
of self-control and self-efficacy, its effect on job
Journal of International Business Studies
Michael K Hui et al
behaviour should be more universal than culturally
specific. This may explain why the studies con-
ducted by Eylon and Au (1999) and Robert et al.
(2000) failed to obtain unequivocal support for
the moderating effect of power distance on the
relationship between empowerment and job
satisf-action. In both studies, the researchers oper-
ationalised empowerment as psychological empow-
erment, the effect of which on job satisfaction is
unlikely to vary across cultures. Furthermore,
although discretionary empowerment provides
employees with primary control, whether it
will result in a sense of self-control and
self-efficacy should depend on the individual’s
preference for primary control or secondary con-
trol, which should be partly shaped by the
individual’s cultural background (Trompenaars,
1997: Chapter 10). We therefore operationalised
empowerment as discretionary empowerment
rather than psychological empowerment in all of
our three studies.
Third, earlier researchers tested empowerment
effects using employees who were unlikely to
experience a significant desire to satisfy customer
needs and wants. For employees who are indifferent
to customer well-being, and for jobs that are simple
and routine, discretion and autonomy may actually
create unnecessary confusion and uncertainty for
the employee (Bowen and Lawler, 1992; Bowen,
1995). For example, the survey of factory workers
by Robert et al. (2000) might not be an appropriate
test of empowerment effects across cultures because
the survey respondents were unlikely to possess a
strong customer orientation, as they were hired and
trained primarily for operating efficiency rather
than for marketing effectiveness. Furthermore,
these respondents were unlikely to experience
significant management–customer conflicts
because of their primary role as back-office workers
rather than as boundary-spanners (Schneider,
1980). Providing these factory workers with discre-
tion and autonomy might produce no, or even
negative, effects on job behaviour. Therefore, we
included genuine boundary-spanners (Study 2) or
asked respondents to play the role of boundary-
spanners (Study 3) in the investigation of empow-
erment effects across cultures. We also tested the
moderating effect of customer orientation (Study 2)
and the nature of special customer requests (Study
3) (two variables that were expected to influence
the employees’ desire to satisfy customer needs and
wants) on the relationship between empowerment
and job satisfaction.
 Empowerment effects across cultures Michael K Hui et al
49

Study 1 are given in Table 1. After dropping nine countries

The purpose of Study 1 was to search for evidence lacking a power distance score in Hofstede (1991),
relating to the moderating effect of power distance we ended up with a final sample of 33 countries.
on the relationship between job autonomy and job
satisfaction. As noted earlier, previous researchers Variables and measurements
(Eylon and Au, 1999; Robert et al., 2000) have In the survey, job satisfaction was measured by the
argued that, as a management practice, empower- response to the question ‘Overall, how satisfied or
ment should be more compatible with low power- dissatisfied are you with your job?’ (1–10 ratings; a
distance cultures than with high power-distance
cultures. Power distance affects the employees’
willingness to accept and exercise discretionary Table 1 Descriptive statistics of key variables by country
power, and therefore should moderate the effect of
Country Job satisfaction Job autonomy Sample size
empowerment on job satisfaction. We therefore
hypothesise that: France 6.78 (1.97) 6.41 (2.66) 1002
Britain 7.42 (2.06) 6.98 (2.54) 1484
H1: The cultural dimension of power distance
W. Germany 7.17 (1.78) 6.18 (2.36) 2101
moderates the relationship between empower- Italy 7.29 (2.08) 6.74 (2.61) 2010
ment and job satisfaction: the larger the power Netherlands 7.48 (1.67) 7.16 (2.26) 1017
distance of the country, the weaker is the Denmark 8.24 (1.66) 7.41 (2.39) 1030
relationship. Belgium 7.79 (1.82) 7.05 (2.57) 2792
Spain 6.99 (2.10) 6.37 (2.80) 4147
Ireland 7.81 (2.00) 6.91 (2.59) 1000
N. Ireland 7.85 (1.89) 6.78 (2.52) 304
Method USA 7.85 (1.88) 7.36 (2.38) 1839
To examine the cross-cultural variation in empow- Canada 7.88 (1.77) 7.22 (2.29) 1730
erment effects, we conducted an hierarchical linear Japan 7.66 (2.31) 7.63 (2.44) 1011
modelling analysis of the data of World Values Mexico 7.66 (2.11) 6.87 (2.69) 1531
Survey II, a large-scale, multi-nation survey (Abram- S. Africa 7.45 (2.48) 6.88 (2.91) 2736
Hungary 7.22 (2.36) 6.18 (2.89) 999
son and Inglehart, 1995). Apart from generalisa-
Norway 7.88 (1.76) 7.01 (2.52) 1239
tions, large numbers of nations and subjects are
Sweden 8.08 (1.79) 7.72 (2.16) 1047
necessary when desire to satisfy customer needs Iceland 7.86 (1.74) 6.94 (2.50) 702
and wants – another employee factor that is Argentina 7.63 (2.17) 7.56 (2.67) 1002
expected to moderate the effect of empowerment Finland 7.56 (2.03) 7.18 (2.31) 588
on job satisfaction – is not accounted for in the S. Korea 6.51 (2.52) 6.85 (2.61) 1251
analysis. Poland 8.25 (2.21) 7.69 (2.91) 938
Switzerland 8.40 (1.88) 7.66 (2.40) 1400
Subjects Brazil 7.52 (2.40) 7.40 (2.77) 1782
Nigeria 7.48 (2.33) 6.99 (2.59) 1001
Between 1990 and 1993, 57,561 adults aged 18
Chile 7.63 (2.29) 7.00 (2.76) 1,500
years and above from 42 nations were interviewed Belarus 6.10 (2.37) 5.06 (2.62) 1015
by professional survey organisations in Western India 7.03 (2.34) 6.54 (2.77) 2500
nations and by local academic institutes in Eastern Czechoslovakia 6.78 (2.27) 5.69 (2.83) 1396
European nations. The sampled nations accounted E. Germany 6.75 (2.11) 6.00 (2.29) 1336
for over 70% of the world’s population. The use of Slovenia 7.21 (2.15) 6.01 (2.80) 1035
quota sampling, assigned according to census Bulgaria 6.20 (2.33) 5.42 (2.79) 1034
records on sex, age, occupation, and region, Romania 6.56 (2.29) 6.05 (2.81) 1103
allowed the survey to include all socio-economic China 7.01 (2.42) 5.88 (2.63) 1000
Portugal 7.42 (2.26) 6.95 (2.66) 1185
groups, and represented the populations in the
Austria 6.63 (3.44) 6.65 (2.98) 1460
respective nations. As a result, the sample para- Turkey 5.72 (2.48) 6.67 (3.32) 1030
meters of the survey were excellent estimates of the Lithuania 6.97 (2.30) 6.17 (2.95) 1000
population parameters (Carroll and Teo, 1996). This Latvia 6.45 (2.49) 6.01 (2.84) 903
is particularly valuable, as representative samples Estonia 6.66 (2.36) 6.24 (2.59) 1008
are rare in international business research, if such Russia 6.28 (2.49) 5.47 (2.86) 1961
data can be collected in the first place (Kotabe, Note: The values with and without parentheses are the means and
2002). The descriptive statistics of the key variables standard deviations of the variables.

Journal of International Business Studies

 Empowerment effects across cultures
50
higher rating indicated greater satisfaction). Past
studies have demonstrated the validity of this
measure by showing that it was significantly
associated with life satisfaction (Oishi et al., 1999)
and intrinsic motivation (Huang and van de Vliert,
2002). Job autonomy was measured by the response
to the question ‘How free are you to make decisions
in your job?’ (1–10 ratings; a higher rating indi-
cated greater autonomy). We conducted several
tests to affirm the validity of the job autonomy
measures. Based on the method in Blanchflower
and Freeman (1997), a one-way ANOVA tested
whether occupations differed in job autonomy
score, F(11, 32914)¼191.90, Po0.01. In line with
the data from the Quality of Employment Surveys
in the US (Karasek and Theorell, 1990: 43), low-skill
occupations (unskilled workers, M¼5.65; semi-
skilled workers, M¼5.78) scored lower than middle
managers (M¼6.59), supervisors (M¼7.08), and
professionals (M¼7.03). These groups, in turn,
scored lower than the self-employed (small busi-
ness, M¼8.17; large business, M¼7.37). The mea-
sure also showed some evidence of concurrent and
discriminant validity.1 Finally, power distance
scores from Hofstede (1991) were used as the
cross-level moderator.
Life freedom was controlled for, as it is related to
job autonomy and job satisfaction. Respondents
were asked to indicate in the survey the extent of
the freedom of choice and control they felt they
‘have over the way your life turns out’ (1–10
ratings; a higher rating indicated greater freedom).
In addition, age and income were included in the
statistical models as controls for demographic
differences (Kohn, 1977). The wealth of the coun-
try, as measured by per capita GDP, was used as a
society-level control variable.
Results and discussion
We used the HLM package (Bryk and Raudenbush,
1992) to conduct the analysis. The cross-level
analysis of the HLM package is conceptually
equivalent to regression analysis with interaction
terms for testing moderating effects. The difference
is that society-level moderators replace the usual
individual-level moderators, such as gender, job
complexity, and locus of control. HLM provides
more precise estimates of the multi-level interac-
tions because it takes into account individual-level
error and sample size differences across societies in
estimating society-level coefficients (Bryk and Rau-
denbush, 1992).
Journal of International Business Studies
Michael K Hui et al
In the hierarchical linear model, job autonomy,
job satisfaction, and control variables were used as
individual-level variables, whereas the power dis-
tance score and wealth were society-level variables.
At the individual level, job satisfaction was
regressed on job autonomy for each society. At
the society level, power distance and wealth
predicted the within-society regression slopes that
indicate the degree of association between job
autonomy and job satisfaction. When entered in
the model, individual-level variables were centred
at the group means, whereas society-level variables
were centred at their grand means.
Original HLM results are rearranged for easy
understanding in Table 2. The coefficients can be
understood as being similar to those in a regression
analysis. A number of results are worth noting.
First, satisfaction increases with life freedom, age,
and income (rows b, c and d). Second, job
satisfaction is positively associated with job auton-
omy (row e), which agrees with the existing
literature (e.g. Karasek, 1979). Third, cultural power
distance is negatively related to the society means
of job satisfaction (row f), indicating that the
higher the power distance, the lower is the average
job satisfaction of the nation. One possible expla-
nation for this result is that power distance is
associated with lower wealth, higher power differ-
ential, and greater income inequality, all of which
are expected to lead to lower job satisfaction
(Hofstede, 1980).
To test the cross-level moderating effect, we
studied how power distance might affect the
coefficient of job autonomy. The coefficient in
row h of Table 2 indicates the interaction effect
involving power distance and job autonomy. The
results show that power distance moderates the
relationship between job autonomy and job satis-
faction (b¼0.003, Po0.01). The negative sign
means that the higher the power distance of a
country, the less positive is the relationship
between job autonomy and job satisfaction. In
nations with high power-distance scores (e.g.
104 for Malaysia), the cross-level moderator
(104  0.003¼0.31) essentially nullifies the
effect of job autonomy (b¼0.30).2 In these nations,
job autonomy would hardly have a positive effect
on job satisfaction. The interaction involving
wealth and job autonomy is not significant (row
i), implying that the moderating effect of power
distance is not caused by spurious effect of wealth.
These results indicate that job autonomy does less
to enhance job satisfaction in high power-distance
 Empowerment effects across cultures Michael K Hui et al
51

Table 2 Cross-level moderating analysis of job satisfaction as a function of cultural power distance and job autonomy using hierarchical
linear modelling

Coefficient Standard error T-ratio d.f.

Individual-level predictors
(a) Grand mean (g00) 7.261 0.091 79.519** 30
(b) Age (g10) 0.007 0.002 4.746** 32
(c) Income (g20) 0.031 0.009 3.592** 32
(d) Life freedom (g30) 0.095 0.011 8.346** 32
(e) Job autonomy (g40) 0.299 0.042 7.087** 30

Society-level predictors
(f) Power distance (g01) 0.015 0.006 2.430* 30
(g) Wealth (g02) 0.000009 0.000013 0.728 30

Cross-level moderator
(h) Power distance  job autonomy (g41) 0.003 0.001 2.533* 30
(i) Wealth  job autonomy (g42) 0.000004 0.000002 1.579 30
Note. As nine countries lacking the power distance score were dropped, the final sample contained 33 countries. Symbols in parentheses are labels from
the HLM output to enable readers familiar with HLM to follow the analysis. *Po0.05; **Po0.01.

nations than in low power-distance nations, as
predicted by Hypothesis H1.
The results of Study 1 provide preliminary
support for cross-cultural variation in empower-
ment effects. Nonetheless, Study 1 succumbed to
two weaknesses. First, the use of single-item
measures, though found to be useful by previous
researchers (Wanous et al., 1997; Huang and van de
Vliert, 2002), is not a conventional practice in
management research. Also, despite controlling
wealth, the use of cross-level modelling cannot
rule out the possibility of other confounding effects
due to variables associated with cultural power
distance (Hofstede, 1991). Demonstrating the mod-
erating effect of power distance at the individual
level (Bond and Smith, 1996) would add weight to
the proof. Study 2 was conducted to address these
two concerns. The study also included customer
orientation, an innate value that affects the
employees’ desire to satisfy customer needs and
wants, in the modelling of empowerment effects
across cultures.
Study 2
In this cross-national survey of frontline hotel
workers, we examined the variation of empower-
ment effects with two innate values of service
employees: power distance and customer orienta-
tion. Whereas we operationalised power distance as
a society-level construct in Study 1, in this study we
used validated measures to test, at the individual
level, the moderating effect of power distance on
the relationship between empowerment and job
satisfaction. As empowerment effects are expected
to vary with the employees’ willingness to accept
and exercise discretionary power, employees pos-
sessing a lower power distance value are more likely
to feel satisfied at work if they can make their own
decisions. We therefore hypothesise that:
H2a: The effect of empowerment on job satisfac-
tion will be more pronounced for service employ-
ees with lower power distance value.
As argued, the employees’ desire to satisfy
customer needs and wants is another employee
factor that should moderate the effect of empower-
ment on job satisfaction. Customer-oriented employ-
ees – those who consider the delivery of superior
customer value to be their primary work goal –
should share a strong desire to accommodate the
requests of customers (Han et al., 1998). Providing
these employees with discretionary power facil-
itates their work and fulfils their desire to do a good
job in serving the needs and wants of their
customers. We therefore hypothesise that:
H2b: The effect of empowerment on job satisfac-
tion will be more pronounced for service employ-
ees with higher customer orientation.
Method
Data collection and sample
Surveys were conducted in Toronto, Canada, and
Beijing, People’s Republic of China (PRC), on

Journal of International Business Studies

 Empowerment effects across cultures
52
frontline employees of up-scale hotels. Sampling
from these two countries ensures a significant
variation in the power distance value of respon-
dents (Hofstede, 1991). Frontline hotel employees
are ideal subjects for this study, as they are typical
boundary-spanners who often need to accommo-
date special customer requests and deliver custo-
mised services (Bitner et al., 1990).
Two graduate students from the hotel school of a
local university visited 27 four- and five-star hotels
in the Greater Toronto area and interviewed hotel
employees with drop-off questionnaires. The stu-
dents returned to the hotel a week later to collect
the completed questionnaires. A total of 196
respondents (74%) out of 264 contacted returned
their questionnaires with completed information.
A majority of the respondents (70%) were in the age
group 21–30 years. Of the respondents, 57% were
female and 60% had post-secondary education. The
respondents had been with their current employers
for an average of 3.7 years.
For the survey in the PRC, a commercial market
research agent was appointed to collect data from
four- or five-star hotels in Beijing. Out of the 363
distributed questionnaires, 200 (55%) were
returned with completed information. Of the
respondents, 61% were female and 53% of them
were in the age group 21–30 years. Thirty-seven
percent had completed vocational education and
another 31% had received post-secondary educa-
tion. The respondents had an average of 4.4 years’
experience with their current employers.
Questionnaire and measurements
The questionnaire for the survey in Canada was
written in English; it was translated from English
into Chinese by a doctoral student from China for
Table 3 Means,a standard deviations, Pearson’s correlationsb and reliabilityc
Variable
Job satisfaction (J)
Empowerment (D)
Power distance (P)
Customer orientation (C)
Power distance  empowerment (P  D)
Empowerment  customer orientation (D  C)
Age (years) (o20; 21–30; 31–40; 41–50; 51–60; 460)
Sex (1¼M; 2¼F)
Education (Grades 1–6; 7–9; 10–13; vocational; university+)
a
Scores are based on seven-point scales (1 – strongly disagree; 7 – strongly agree). Mean values of interaction terms are based on deviation scores.
b
Correlations with value Z70.12 are significant at Po0.01 level; Z70.09 are significant at Po0.05 level; Z70.07 are significant at Po0.10 level.
c
Composite reliability values are shown in the diagonal line.
Journal of International Business Studies
Michael K Hui et al
the survey in PRC. The standard back-translation
procedure (Brislin, 1980) was adopted to ensure
language equivalence and face validity. Included in
the questionnaire was a set of seven-point Likert-
type scales (1 – strongly disagree; 7 – strongly
agree): the higher the score, the stronger was the
measured tendency. A subset of the scales, as given
in Appendix A, was used to test our hypotheses.
Empowerment was measured by Spreitzer’s (1995)
self-determination sub-scale. This three-item sub-
scale was designed to measure perceived autonomy
at work. Power distance was assessed by a total of
five items developed by Brockner et al. (2001). As
predicted, Chinese respondents had a higher power
distance score than their Canadian counterparts
(t¼7.73, d.f.¼394, Po0.01; M¼4.77 vs 4.02). Cus-
tomer orientation was tapped by a set of five items
adapted from Han’s et al. (1998) market orientation
scale. The existing literature suggests that customer
orientation is a key aspect of market orientation
(Jaworski and Kohli, 1993). Finally, the measure of
job satisfaction consisted of two items used pre-
viously in Hartline and Ferrell (1996). Descriptive
statistics of and correlations between the measures
are given in Table 3.
We examined the psychometric properties of the
four measures by putting the 15 measurement
items into a confirmatory factor analysis. The
LISREL results indicated an acceptable fit of the
four-factor measurement model (w2¼235.06,
d.f.¼84, CFI¼0.95, NNFI¼0.94, GFI¼0.93,
RMSEA¼0.067). All l coefficients were significant
(Po0.001) and were above the 0.40 level. These
results confirmed that the items fell nicely into
separate scales, demonstrating convergent validity
of the measures. Discriminant validity was assessed
by constraining the correlation between each pair
Mean s.d. J D P C PD DC Age Sex
(years)
5.15 1.09 0.71
5.09 1.09 0.35 0.78
4.40 1.04 0.21 0.05 0.70
5.72 0.99 0.41 0.18 0.14 0.89
0.06 1.20 0.07 0.07 0.11 0.05 —
0.20 1.13 0.05 0.01 0.05 0.05 0.18 —
2.30 0.71 0.12 0.08 0.01 0.03 0.01 0.01 —
1.60 0.49 0.02 0.03 0.10 0.03 0.06 0.09 0.18 —
4.24 0.80 0.06 0.11 0.18 0.04 0.01 0.02 0.04 0.01
 Empowerment effects across cultures
of factors (the f coefficient) to 1.00. w2 difference
tests indicated that, in each case, the fit of the
constrained model was significantly poorer
(Po0.001) than that of the original model. It could
therefore be concluded that the correlation
between any pair of constructs was significantly
smaller than 1, demonstrating the discriminant
validity of the measures. The reliabilities of all the
four measures were also acceptable. The composite
reliabilities were all above 0.70 (Table 3).
To check for the common method problem,
principal components analysis was conducted on
all the 108 measurement items in the questionnaire
as in Greenleaf (1992). The first component with-
out rotation captured only 23.32% of variance. As
no dominant first component existed (Podsakoff
and Organ, 1986), common method variance
should not be an undue issue in this study.
Results
Job satisfaction was regressed on empowerment,
power distance, customer orientation and two of
the interaction terms. To minimise problems with
multicollinearity, deviation scores (raw score minus
the mean) of the independent variables were used
(Aiken and West, 1991). Gender, age and education
were included in the equations as control variables.
The regression equation was significant when the
main effect terms were entered in Step 1 (R2¼0.29,
Po0.01). As shown in Table 4 (Model 1a), the main
effects of empowerment, power distance and
customer orientation were all positively significant.
It is interesting to note that, whereas Study 1
reveals a negative relationship between power
Table 4 Regression analysis of job satisfaction on empowerment,
power distance, and customer orientation
Predictor Model 1a
Gender (male) 0.01 (0.10)
Age (years) 0.17 (0.07)*
Education (years) 0.12 (0.06)^
Empowerment 0.28 (0.05)**
Power distance 0.13 (0.05)**
Customer orientation 0.38 (0.05)**
Empowerment 
power distance
Empowerment 
customer orientation
R2 0.29**
DR2
Note. The values are unstandardised regression coefficients, and values in
parentheses are standard errors. **Po0.01; *Po0.05; ^Po0.10.
Michael K Hui et al
53
distance and job satisfaction at the society level
(Table 2), Study 2 finds an opposite direction for the
relationship at the individual level (Table 4). Pre-
vious researchers have suggested that society- and
individual-level relationships need not correspond
to each other (Schweder, 1973; Leung, 1989).
Working in international hotel chains to serve local
and non-local tourists and business travellers may
incur relatively higher pay, job status and job
satisfaction for PRC employees than for Canadian
employees, and this may explain why a positive
relationship between power distance and job
satisfaction is found in Study 2.
Two interaction terms – that between empower-
ment and power distance, b¼0.12, Po0.05, and
that between customer orientation and discretion,
b¼0.08, Po0.05, were entered in Step 2 of the
analysis (Model 1b, Table 4). Simple slope analysis
was conducted to interpret these effects (Aiken and
West, 1991; Thomas and Au, 2002). The results
showed that discretion was positively related to job
satisfaction for individuals low in power distance
(1 s.d. below the mean, b¼0.41, Po0.05). The
relationship was still positive but was much weaker
for individuals high in power distance (1 s.d. above
the mean, b¼0.17, Po0.05). Results also showed
that the association between empowerment and
job satisfaction was stronger for individuals high in
customer orientation (1 s.d. above the mean,
b¼0.37, Po0.05) than for individuals low in
customer orientation (1 s.d. below the mean,
b¼0.21, Po0.05). It could therefore be concluded
that the moderating effects of power distance and
customer orientation on the relationship between
empowerment and job satisfaction were in the
direction as predicted by Hypotheses H2a and H2b.
Discussion
This study confirms, at the individual level, the
Model 1b
moderating effects of power distance and customer
0.01 (0.10) orientation on the relationship between empower-
0.17 (0.07)* ment and job satisfaction. Discretionary power
0.11 (0.06)* tends to have a more pronounced effect on job
0.29 (0.05)** satisfaction for service employees who believe in
0.14 (0.05)** equal power sharing and the delivery of superior
0.39 (0.05)**
customer value. These findings provide support for
0.12 (0.04)**
our argument that willingness to accept and
0.08 (0.04)* exercise discretionary power and desire to satisfy
customer needs and wants are two employee factors
0.31** that enhance the effect of empowerment on job
0.02** satisfaction. Nevertheless, it is conceivable that, in
addition to the innate factors of employees (i.e.
customer orientation), situational factors that
Journal of International Business Studies
 Empowerment effects across cultures
54
influence the employees’ desire to satisfy customer
needs and wants would also significantly moderate
the relationship between empowerment and job
satisfaction. We conducted Study 3 to test this
argument. Furthermore, as the survey data used in
Study 2 tentatively pointed in the direction of
causality, another objective of Study 3 was to
provide a more robust test for the causal relation-
ship between empowerment and job satisfaction.
Study 3
Study 3 was an experimental study in which
subjects from Canada and the PRC were asked to
play the role of a boundary-spanner who had to
handle a special customer request that ran counter
to management guidelines. Two variables were
manipulated in the experiment. Empowerment
was manipulated by whether or not discretionary
power was given to the subjects in handling the
customer request. The nature of the request was
operationalised as whether the customer offered a
good reason in support of the special request. The
study aimed to test the moderating effects of
national culture and the nature of the request on
the relationship between empowerment and
employee satisfaction.
As Canada and the PRC represent nations char-
acterised by low power-distance and high power-
distance cultures (Hofstede, 1991; Eylon and Au,
1999), the Canadian subjects, when compared with
their PRC counterparts, should feel more satisfied
and exhibit a higher intention to accept and
exercise any given discretionary power when
handling the special customer request. We there-
fore hypothesise that:
H3a: The effect of empowerment on employee
satisfaction and intention to comply with the
customer request will be more pronounced for
the Canadian subjects than for the PRC subjects.
A legitimate request motivates people to serve
customers. Smith-Bell and Winslade (1994) have
shown that legitimate service requests lead health
professionals to feel significant service pressure. By
the same token, when a special customer request is
accompanied by a good reason, service employees
should feel motivated to comply with the request,
and should feel more satisfied when they have the
discretionary power to do so. As intention to accept
and exercise discretionary power should be higher
for the Canadian subjects than for the PRC subjects
(H3a), the effect of discretionary power on employ-
ee satisfaction should be more pronounced for the
Journal of International Business Studies
Michael K Hui et al
Canadian subjects than for the PRC subjects,
especially when the request is accompanied by a
good reason. The research hypothesis predicates a
three-way interaction effect:
H3b: The interactive effect of empowerment and
request nature on employee satisfaction and
intention to comply with customer request will
be more pronounced for the Canadian subjects
than for the PRC subjects.
Method
The study adopted a 2 (empowerment: present or
absent)  2 (request nature: with or without good
reason)  2 (nation: Canada or PRC) full factorial
design. The first two factors were manipulated
using information embedded in a scenario that
described a service encounter between an employee
and a customer of a hotel. Subjects from the two
nations were randomly assigned to one of the four
scenarios (2 empowerment conditions  2 request
nature conditions) and answered questions after
reading the assigned scenario.
Subjects
A total of 160 university students (20 subjects per
cell) with majors in hotel/hospitality management
participated in this study. The PRC sample con-
sisted of students from a major university in
Huangzhou and from a major university in Shang-
hai. The Canadian sample included students from a
major university located in eastern Canada. The use
of student subjects offers various advantages in
cross-cultural studies in which the primary goal is
theory testing (Malpass and Poortinga, 1986). Many
extraneous variables can be controlled because
students are more homogeneous as a group than
ordinary individuals in the PRC and Canada.
Typical Canadians differ from typical Chinese in
so many aspects that comparing the typical exem-
plars of each group would make it next to
impossible to protect the explanation of power
distance on cross-cultural differences. More impor-
tantly, we considered that using hotel/hospitality
management students in the PRC was necessary.
This group of professionals-to-be could understand
the scenarios and respond to them judiciously. In
common with their Canadian counterparts, their
training enabled them to give meaningful
responses to the scenario, which was essential for
maintaining the mundane realism of the experi-
mental task (Aronson and Carlsmith, 1968).
We established the cultural differences between
the two national groups through a pilot study of 78
 Empowerment effects across cultures
PRC students and 64 Canadian students recruited
from the same universities in the PRC and Canada
as were used for the main study. Power distance was
measured using the same five items as in Study 2
(1–5 ratings; 1 – disagree, 5 – agree). As expected,
the mean score of the PRC respondents was
significantly higher than that of the Canadian
respondents on the power distance scale (M¼3.50
and 3.07; t(141)¼2.41, Po0.01). Therefore, differ-
ences between the PRC subjects and the Canadian
subjects found in the experiment can be partly
attributed to their cultural differences in terms of
power distance.
Service scenarios
The two national groups responded to a question-
naire written in their native languages. The original
questionnaire was in English and was translated
from English into Chinese by the standard back-
translation procedure (Brislin, 1980). One of the
four service scenarios was presented at the begin-
ning of the questionnaire. The following scenario is
for the condition in which there is empowerment
for the service employee and there is a good reason
for supporting the special customer request (see the
bracketed explanations for details of the other
manipulations):
Suppose you work for a hotel as a frontline worker and your
job is to process and confirm room reservations. One day
you receive a telephone call from Mr A, who wants to
reserve a room for the next long weekend. Unfortunately,
the accommodation is fully booked. Mr A tells you that he
and his wife will be very disappointed if they cannot
celebrate their diamond anniversary at your hotel, and asks
for your help to get his reservation confirmed. [The poor
reason condition has no such statement.] Mr A asks you for
help to get his reservation confirmed. While you are
attempting to reallocate the accommodation arrangement,
you find a room available. There are, however, two other
requests on the waiting list ahead of Mr A. The time has
come for you to decide how to handle this problem. In the
operations manual, the hotel manager states that ‘‘all
reservations should in principle be handled on a first-
come-first-served basis, but employees can use their perso-
nal judgement when necessary.’’ [The last phrase was
replaced by ‘and under no circumstances should employees
violate this regulation’ in the empowerment-absent condi-
tion.]
The results of our second pilot study, using 73
PRC students and 69 Canadian students from the
same university populations as the main study,
validated the effectiveness of our experimental
manipulations. The use of a pilot study prevented
the subjects in the main study from guessing the
purpose of the experimental manipulations and our
Michael K Hui et al
55
hypotheses. In the pilot study, we randomly
assigned subjects to read one of the four scenarios
before they were asked to complete a questionnaire
that was designed to measure: (a) whether they
were given discretionary power to handle the
request; and (b) whether they considered the
customer to have a good reason for making the
request. The ANOVA results indicated that there
was a significant effect of the empowerment
manipulation on the perception of discretionary
power (M¼4.22 vs 3.37; F(1,133)¼8.85, Po0.01)
and a significant effect of the request nature
manipulation on the perception of request reason
(M¼5.13 vs 4.18; F(1,134)¼14.40, Po0.001). No
other main or interaction effects were significant.
The manipulations were therefore regarded as
effective.
Measurements
After reading the scenario, the subjects were asked
to complete a short questionnaire consisting of two
scales. The first scale was a two-item measure
(a¼0.73) of the subjects’ intention to comply with
the customer request: that is, to assign the room to
the customer (seven-point ratings; a higher score
indicated a stronger intention to comply). The
second scale was a measure of employee satisfac-
tion, or the extent to which the subjects felt
satisfied with three different aspects of the task
(a¼0.78): overall, rules and regulations, and the
management (seven-point scales; a higher score
indicated a higher satisfaction).
Results and discussion
The two dependent measures were analysed as a
function of the three experimental manipulations
by 2 (empowerment)  2 (request nature)  2
(nation) ANOVAs. Results indicated that the main
effects of empowerment (F(1,152)¼6.63, Po0.05)
and request nature (F(1, 152)¼37.14, Po0.001) on
intention to comply were significant. Subjects
reported significantly greater intention to comply
with the customer request when they were given
discretionary power (M¼4.74 vs 4.11) and when the
request was accompanied by a good reason
(M¼5.17 vs 3.68). The main effects of the three
experimental variables on employee satisfaction
were also significant (nation: F(1,152)¼9.04,
Po0.01; empowerment: F(1,152)¼4.93, Po0.05;
request nature: F(1,152)¼5.18, Po0.05). The sub-
jects reported higher employee satisfaction when
they were empowered (M¼4.90 vs 4.57) and when
the customer request was backed by a good reason
Journal of International Business Studies
 Empowerment effects across cultures Michael K Hui et al
56

(M¼4.90 vs 4.56). These results were similar to

those obtained with intention to comply. Finally,
the PRC subjects (M¼4.95) also reported higher
employee satisfaction than the Canadian subjects 6

(M¼4.51). As mentioned earlier, the effect could be

attributed to the relatively higher job status of hotel

SATISFACTION
employees in the PRC than in Canada. The above
main effects, however, should be interpreted in the
REQUEST
light of the significant two- and three-way interac- 5
WITH REASON
tions reported next.

Hypothesis testing
The two research hypotheses (H3a and H3b) REQUEST
predicted significant two- and three-way interac- WITHOUT REASON
4
tion effects. The results partially confirmed these WITHOUT WITH
predictions. First, the two-way interaction on CANADA
EMPOWERMENT
employee satisfaction was not significant, probably
because this effect is qualified by the significant
three-way interaction (F(1,152)¼4.44, Po0.05).
Interaction contrast analysis (Keppel and Zedeck,
1989) indicated that the interaction between 6
empowerment and request nature was significant
for the Canadian subjects (F(1,152)¼5.58, Po0.05),
SATISFACTION

but not significant for the PRC subjects

(F(1,152)¼0.36, n.s.). Further analysis showed that, REQUEST
WITH REASON
for the Canadian subjects, empowerment signifi-
5
cantly affected employee satisfaction only when
the customer request was backed by a good
reason (M¼5.13 vs 4.35; F(1,152)¼6.93, Po0.01), REQUEST
WITHOUT REASON
as shown in Figure 1. These results revealed that the
interactive effect of empowerment and request
nature on employee satisfaction was more pro- 4
nounced for the Canadian subjects than for the WITHOUT PRC WITH

PRC subjects, as predicted by Hypothesis H3b. EMPOWERMENT

Compared with Chinese, Canadians are more will-
ing to accept and exercise discretionary power,
and when they can use the power to satisfy a
legitimate customer request, they would become
more satisfied.
Furthermore, there was a significant two-way
interaction between empowerment and nation on
intention to comply (F(1,152)¼4.27, Po0.05), but
the three-way interaction is not significant.
Simple effect analysis on the two-way interaction
(Keppel and Zedeck, 1989) indicated that the
Canadian subjects (M¼4.81 vs 3.68; F(1,152)¼5.31,
Po0.05), but not the PRC subjects (M¼4.54 vs
4.66; F(1,152)¼0.06, n.s.), reported significantly
greater intention to comply with the customer
request when they were given the power to do
so (Figure 2). These results showed that the effect
of empowerment on intention to comply was
more pronounced for the Canadian subjects
Figure 1 The three-way interactive effect of empowerment,
request nature, and nation on employee satisfaction.
than for the PRC subjects, providing support for
Hypothesis H3a. However, Hypothesis H3b is not
supported. The effect of request legitimacy on
intention to comply does not vary between the
two cultural groups, although legitimate customer
request tends to spur empowered Canadians to
comply with customer demand more than non-
empowered Canadians (M¼6.05 vs 4.28; Table 5).
Perhaps the manipulation of legitimate request is
not strong enough to cause statistical significance
on behavioural intent measurement due to its
nature.
Another interesting result shown in Figure 2 is
that, although the PRC subjects were indifferent to
empowerment, their intention to comply with the

Journal of International Business Studies

 Empowerment effects across cultures
customer request was higher than that of the
Canadian subjects in the no-empowerment condi-
tion (M¼4.54 vs 3.68; F(1,152)¼3.08, Po0.1). This
result showed that the PRC subjects were less
reluctant than their Canadian counterparts to break
organisational rules when they deemed it neces-
sary. The existing literature provides evidence that
Chinese tend to make judgements dictated by
personal reasons rather than by general rules
(Trompenaars, 1997: Chapter 4). Compared with
Canadians, Chinese may feel less concern about
violating management rules, and hence they may
be more flexible in dealing with interpersonal
matters such as satisfying the customer request.
Accordingly, apart from attitude toward equal
power sharing between supervisors and subordi-
nates, attitude toward organisational rules may also
explain the difference between the two national
5
PRC
INTENTION
4
CANADA
3 their foreign operations (Hewett and Bearden,
WITHOUT WITH
EMPOWERMENT
Figure 2 The two-way interactive effect of empowerment and
nation on intention to comply with customer request.
Table 5 Mean scores of intention to comply with customer request and employee satisfaction as a function of customer request,
empowerment, and nation
No empowerment
Intention to comply with customer request
With a reason 4.28
Without a reason 3.08
Employee satisfaction
With a reason 4.35
Without a reason 4.38
Michael K Hui et al
57
groups in the willingness to accept and exercise
discretionary power.
General discussion
This paper presents three studies to examine
empowerment effects across cultures. The findings
of the three studies fall nicely together, reinforcing
each other. To the best of our knowledge, this is the
first paper that has provided unequivocal empirical
support for the proposition that the effect of
empowerment on job satisfaction is dependent on
the cultural dimension of power distance. Specifi-
cally, Study 1 uses a large-scale, multi-nation
survey to show that power distance is a cultural
value that moderates the effect of job autonomy on
job satisfaction. Study 2 confirms the moderating
effect of power distance at the individual level
and demonstrates that customer orientation may
create a drive that entails empowerment beneficial
to job satisfaction. Study 3, an experimental study,
provides causal support to the survey findings in
Studies 1 and 2 and reveals that, apart from innate
values, the nature of a special customer request is a
situational factor that propels the realisation of
empowerment benefits. These findings prove that
the employees’ desire to satisfy customer needs and
wants, be it stimulated by innate or by situational
factors, is essential for the successful implementa-
tion of the empowerment approach.
Managerial implications
Multinational managers should be aware of the
conditions and limitations of empowerment as a
means of influencing employees’ job behaviour in
2001). There is a general consensus that reliance
on bureaucracy and organisational rules is ineffec-
tive for the assurance of quality service delivery
(Schneider, 1980). Instead of close supervision to
Empowerment No empowerment Empowerment
6.05 5.20 5.15
3.58 3.88 4.18
5.13 4.93 5.18
4.17 4.60 5.10
Journal of International Business Studies
 Empowerment effects across cultures
58
harness employees’ free will, service managers
should consider empowerment as a solution to
enhance the job performance and satisfaction of
their frontline subordinates (Hartline and Ferrell,
1996; Hartline et al., 2000). However, as revealed by
the findings of the three studies, empowerment has
a stronger effect on job satisfaction in low power-
distance cultures than in high power-distance
cultures. Accordingly, multinational service man-
agers need to be more cautious when planning
to adopt the empowerment approach in nations
with high power distance (such as the PRC
and Malaysia) because discretionary empowerment,
as a management practice, is likely to be incompa-
tible with the cultural values of these nations. In
nations where unequal power distribution in
the institutional hierarchy is considered to be the
norm, service employees may feel uneasy and
exhibit significant reluctance to accept and
exercise discretionary power in performing their
job duties. Hence empowerment may have little,
or even negative, effect on job behaviour (Robert
et al., 2000). Other management practices, such
as building and maintaining authoritative but
warm, trusting relationships with subordinates,
may prove to be more effective in influencing job
behaviour.
Findings of Studies 2 and 3 suggest that the effect
of empowerment on job satisfaction also hinges on
the employees’ desire to satisfy customer needs and
wants. Specifically, empowerment tends to produce
a more pronounced effect on job satisfaction when
service employees consider the delivery of superior
customer value to be their primary work goal (Study
2), and when discretionary power helps to satisfy
unpredictable, but deserving, customer needs
(Study 3). Rigorous recruitment and training are
therefore essential for the effective implementation
of the empowerment approach (Bowen and Lawler,
1992). Building a customer orientation should be a
primary consideration of service managers when
designing their recruitment and training pro-
grammes. Moreover, for service employees whose
job nature is simple and routine, tight service
scripts and minimal discretionary power may be
more desirable than empowerment for achieving
high levels of marketing effectiveness and opera-
tional efficiency (Bowen and Lawler, 1992; Bowen,
1995).
Limitations and future research
One limitation common to our three studies is
that only one cultural dimension (power distance)
Journal of International Business Studies
Michael K Hui et al
is investigated to understand cross-cultural varia-
tions in employee responses to empowerment.
The implications of other cultural values (e.g.
Hofstede, 1991; Schwartz, 1994) have not been
fully explored. In particular, individualism–collec-
tivism should be studied because it is a prevalent
construct that encompasses a wide range of
organisational behaviour. Another limitation of
our studies is that we adapt measurements from
various sources. The validity of these measures,
though proven in other settings, may not be
fully compatible with the service setting of
Studies 2 and 3. It is also interesting to note that,
according to the results of Study 3, the employees’
attitude toward organisational rules may also
explain the variation in empowerment effects
between high power-distance cultures and low
power-distance cultures. However, owing to the
limited scope of Study 3, more rigorous tests of
this proposition are necessary before any definite
conclusion can be drawn. Lastly, our studies
operationalise empowerment as discretionary
empower-ment. It is important to note that some
management researchers have expanded the con-
ceptualisation of empowerment beyond discretion-
ary power and job autonomy. Spreitzer (1995),
for example, has conceptualised empowerment
as a psychological construct reflecting an indivi-
dual’s feeling of self-control and self-efficacy.
Other researchers (e.g. Conger and Kanungo,
1988; Arnold et al., 2000) have also argued that
empowerment is a concept that captures the
nature of the relationship between managers
and their subordinates. Whether cross-cultural
variation in empowerment effects, as depicted by
our studies, will be upheld when empowerment is
conceptualised beyond discretionary power and job
autonomy is largely unknown, and this deserves
future research attention. We hope that this study
will act as a springboard to stimulate more studies
based on other methods, cultural values, and
measurements to explore empowerment effects
across cultures.
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by the Hong Kong Research
Grants Council (Ref. No. 4030/00 H) awarded to the
first and second authors. We thank Ilan Vertinsky, Dora
Lau, the departmental editor Kwok Leung, and the
two anonymous reviewers for their comments on this
paper.
 Empowerment effects across cultures
Notes
1
We also correlated, at the individual level in each of
the 42 nations, the scores of job autonomy with
variables that are expected to exhibit substantial or
null relationships. Job autonomy is related to pride in
work (median r¼0.46) and is related moderately to a
broader feeling of self-control measured by perceived
life control (median r¼0.22). All coefficients are signifi-
cant at Po0.05. Discriminant validity is shown when
job autonomy was found to be unrelated to a close,
but different, construct – whether or not one suffered
interference from authorities. Job autonomy was not
correlated to choice to follow orders (median r¼0.02)
and respect for authority (median r¼0.05).
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2
This can be understood intuitively as the following:
Job satisfaction ¼½other variables
þ b1 ðjob autonomyÞ
þ b2 ðjob autonomy
power distanceÞ
or
Job satisfaction ¼½other variables þ ðb1 þ b2
power distanceÞjob autonomy
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Appendix A: Measurement items
Customer orientation (Han et al., 1998)
Our business objectives are driven by customer
satisfaction.
We closely monitor and assess our level of
commitment in serving customers’ needs.
Our competitive advantage is based on under-
standing customers’ needs.
Business strategies are driven by the goal of
increasing customer value.
We pay close attention to after-sales service.
Job satisfaction (Hartline and Ferrell, 1996)
Overall speaking, I am satisfied with my job.
I am satisfied with my organisation’s policies.
Power distance (Brockner et al., 2001)
People at lower levels in the organisation should
carry out the requests of people at higher levels
without questions.
People at higher levels in organisations have a
responsibility to make important decisions for people
below them.
Once a top-level executive makes a decision,
people working for the company should not question
it.
In work-related matters, managers have a right to
expect obedience from their subordinates.
A company’s rules should not be broken, not even
when the employee thinks it is in the company’s
best interest.
Self-determination (Spreitzer, 1995)
I have significant autonomy in determining how I
do my job.
I can decide on my own how to go about doing my
work.
I have considerable opportunity for independence
and freedom in how I do my job.