Week 1: Introduction to cross-cultural management & the challenging role of the

global manager

Lecture: What is cross-cultural management?

Three layers of analysis - Williamson (1996)

Institutional framework: refers to the

background constraints/rules of the game ->
forms the framework in which human action
takes place; include social rewards and
sanctions, build common ground for interacting
& decision-making -> managers might have to
know implicit rules of particular frameworks
Formal: explicit rules e.g. constitutions, laws,
regulations (small part)
Informal: implicit rules e.g. social conventions,
norms, values (big part) -> focus of this course

Different approaches & definitions over the years

- individual behaviour = guided by images & mental models -> images & models are
externally define by the specific social group an individual is embedded & the group’s
cultural norms and values
- Cultural norms and values are created and transmitted via socialisation

General framework on micro conditions & macro outcomes - Coleman (1984)

- “boat” / “bathtub”
- One of the most useful tools for thinking about
macro.micro-macro relations
Framework on how cultural values (macro) are related to individual values & actions
(micro)

Framework on how cultural values are related to international management

Relevance of cross-cultural management

- firms’ international business activities constantly increased in the last decade
- In internationally.oriented countries such as the Netherlands or Germany, every third
person is working in an internationally active firm
- Influence of COVID-19: changes how we work & will probably reduce the number of
face-to face meetings -> video conferences in an international context dearest new
cross-cultural challenges (previous natural disaster have in some cases resulted in an
even stronger international diversification)

Book: The challenging role of the global manager (ch. 1)

- dramatic shifts in economics, politics & technology shape the role of international
management -> globalisation: a process whereby worldwide interconnections in
virtually every sphere of activity are growing; some interconnections lead to
integration / unity worldwide while others don’t
- Increase in interconnections = result of shifts in technological, political & economic
spheres
Four categories of change illustrate the process of globalisation
1. Growing economic interconnectedness
- increased with the advent of free-trade areas in the 1990s
- FDI doubled between 1997 & 2014
- Global economic turmoil indicate that the effects of globalisation ≠ consistently
positive in developed countries
- Globalisation affects organisational boundaries: departments of one corporations
might all be located in different countries to capitalise certain location-specific
advantages
- Emergence of virtual organisations
—> economic globalisation connects countries & organisations in a network of
international linkages that shape the environment in which global managers must
function
2. More complex & dynamic work environment
- downsizing, privatisation & movement towards team-based management -> affect
stability of the work environment
- Increasing number of permanent migrants changes the compositions of workforces
—> these changes contribute to create a more complex and dynamic work
environment for firms around the world
3. Increased use & sophistication of information technology
- dramatic advances in ICT = most significant force towards globalisation
—> work roles of employees & managers will need to be adjusted to reflect an
increasingly information-driven environment
4. More & different players on the global stage
- number of new entrants to the international are increased
- Technology has facilitated the entry if small businesses
- Improvements in transportation, telecommunications and international finance
promote the activities of transnational crime & terrorist groups
—> global managers face an external environment far more complex, more
dynamic, more uncertain and more competitive than ever before

Environment of global managers

- four categories: economic, legal, political and cultural
- Economic, legal & political act as the backdrop against which global managers must
function
- Culture is uniquely important to international management bc:
1. Economic, legal & political characteristics of a country are largely influenced by a
nation’s culture and history
2. Culture = invisible, influence of culture is difficult to detect -> managers often
overlook it
 3. For global managers, interpersonal interactions occur with individuals wh are
culturally different

How global managers carry out their role: sources of guidance

- own judgement = shaped by their experiences & training
- Rely on other people and their role set & norms
- Role set members: colleagues, superiors & subordinates, staff departments, internal &
external consultants, sometimes friends and family
- Norms: explicit organisational rules and procedures as well as governmental laws and
implicit norms about “how we do things around here” that are well known and typically
followed in an organisation or society
—> being aware of the sources that organisation members tend to rely on most heavily in
a particular part of the world can inform an international managers about the ways of
having a constructive influence in an unfamiliar society

Organisational context, culture & managerial roles

- practice of management ≠ static
- Increase in globalisation = increase of intercultural contact in organisational settings —
> inadequacy of present understanding of management to explain and predict
behaviour becomes more apparent

Types of international management research

- Domestic: management studies in a single country; culture is ignored or universality of
theory is assumed -> How can we explain & predict the behaviour of people in
organisations?
- Replication: management study repeated in another country; universality is
questioned, no theory available to predict the effect of culture -> Does the theory that
applies in culture A also apply to culture B?
- Indigenous: individual management studies conceived & executed in one or many
cultures; cultural differences are assumed to exist, indigenous theory is needed to
explain behaviour -> How can we explain & predict the behaviour of people in
organisations in country X?
- Comparative: management study conducted in two or more countries; similarities &
differences exist, there may or may not be a theory available to predict the effect of
culture -> What similarities and differences exist in the behaviour of people in
organisations? Is this theory universal?
- International: studies of multinational organisations; similarities & differences exist, or
culture is ignored -> How do organisations that operate in multiple countries function?
- Intercultural: studies of intercultural interactions in organisations; specific aspects of
culture are part of the theoretical framework underlying the study -> How is this theory
influenced by cultural differences, and how is it universal?
Methodological issues in cross-cultural research
- Studies involving two or more cultures share several common methodological issues
that aren’t present in purely domestic research (equivalence, sampling & data
collection)
- Equivalence: most important issue, cross-cultural equivalence cannot be assumed at
any stage of a cross-cultural study, equivalence must be established at three key
points: conceptualisation of the theoretical constructs, study design & data analysis
- Conceptual or construct equivalence: extent to which concepts have the same
meaning in different countries
- Method equivalence: similarities and differences in the way to which the cultural
groups being studied respond to measurement instruments in general (acquiescence
= tendency for some cultural groups to (dis)agree with all or most questions asked;
extremely bias = extent to which cultural groups systematically choose the extreme
points or the middle points on a rating scale)
- Metric equivalence: extent that questions have similar measurement properties
across different groups
- Sampling: conduct research with a small number of participants who accurately
represent a clearly identifiable population
- Data collection: questionnaires most common quantitative method, interviews most
common qualitative method

Critique of international & cross-cultural research

- questionable theoretical base
- Parochialism. Culture is often ignored & what are really domestic conclusions are
assumed to be universal
- Samples assuming country homogeneity
- lack of relevance
- Reliance on a single method
- Bias towards studying large corporations
- Reliance on a single organisational level
- Limited to a small number of locations

Articles Week 1

Rethinking costs cultural management on a globalising business world - Søderberg,

Holden (2002)
- Model of core problems & solutions in CCM
—>solutions: adaptation, adjustment, development of intercultural skills
 - argue that approach that CCM is a discipline of international management focusing
on cultural encounters between what are perceived as homogenous entities: the
organisations and the country is old-fashioned
- Today, transnational companies that face the challenges of managing global knowledge
networks, multicultural project teams as well as interacting across boundaries —>
alternative approach is needed that acknowledges the growing complexity of inter- and
intra- organisational connections and identities

Beyond sophisticated stereotyping: cultural sensemaking in context - Osland, Bird

(2000)
- Basic lessons that should be learned
- Analysis group disconfirming evidence & instances that defy cultural stereotypes
- Learning cultural schemas that help you be effective
- Use cognitive complexity as a selection criterion for expatriates & people in
international positions
- Stereotyping is useful to a certain degree, but does not convey the complexity of
cultures —> people working across cultures are frequently surprised by cultural
paradoxes that don’t fit with what they learned
- Identify sources of cultural paradoxes & introduce the ides of value trumping: in a
specific context, certain cultural values take precedence over others -> culture is
embedded in the context and cannot fully be understood without taking the context
into consideration
- Propose model of cultural sensemaking, linking schemas to culture

Week 2: What is culture & describing culture

Lecture: What is culture?

A multi-level model of culture - Erez & Gati (2004)

- consists of structural and dynamic characteristics that explain the interplay between
various levels of culture
- Proposes that globalisation (as the macro level of culture), affects (through top-down
processes) behavioural changes of members in various cultures
- Structural dimension: nested structure of culture from the most macro level of a global
culture, through national, organisational and team cultures, and down to the
representation of culture at the individual level
- Dynamic dimension: the dynamic nature of culture conveys the top-down-bottom-up
processes where one cultural level affects changes in other levels of culture
 Global culture: behavioural standards,
symbols, values, and material objects that have
become common across the globe (due to
international flows of commodities, services,
new information technologies and people)
Organisational culture: set of beliefs and
values shared by members of the same
organisation, which influence their behaviours
Group culture: at the team level, shared values
by team members reflect a group culture
Individual: conceptualisation of culture at the
individual level reflects the cultural values as
they are represented in the self
Individual: conceptualization of culture at
individual level reflects cultural values and represents them

National culture

Culture: consist of ideas and “things” that are passed on from one generation to the next
in a society - set of knowledge structures consisting of systems of values, norms,
attitudes, beliefs, rules, language, customs, symbols, material products (such as food,
houses, and transportation) and behavioural meanings that are shared by members of a
social group & society and embedded in its institutions and that are learned from previous
generations
-> culture provides guidelines for living - learning our culture puts our social world in an
understandable framework, providing a tool II we can use to help us construct the
meaning of the world
-> members intuitively understand the basic values, norms or logics
-> culture is learned & transmitted through the process of learning and interacting with
the social environment; learning through stories
-> culture = systematic & organised = integrated coherent system
Values: abstract ides about hat a group believes to be good, right and desirable
Norms: social rules and guidelines that prescribe appropriate behaviour in particular
situations
Society: a group of people who share a common set of values and norms
Socialisation: the process of learning the rules and behavioural patterns approach to
one’s given society e.g. cultural learning

Levels of mental programming - Hofstede (1980)

- country characteristics & national culture interplay, theories assume that culture affects
the way countries develop
- Both also affect the characteristics & values of individuals in a population and there
with all areas of business conduct

Levels of national culture - two popular views

Schein’s Iceberg
1. Artifacts: visible structures and processes (language, technology, art, stratification and
status, systems, family) -> artefacts and creations: the most external level & the
tangible aspect of culture (visible & audible behaviour and the constructed physical &
social environment)
2. Espoused values: strategies, philosophies (ideals, goals, means e.g. heroic paths,
sins, virtues) -> values and ideologies: deeper level that reflects convictions about the
nature of reality and what should be done to successfully cope with reality
3. Basic assumptions: unconscious, taken for granted beliefs, thoughts, and feelings
(ultimate source of values and actions), “man” and nature, time, space, rules of
interaction -> basic assumptions and premises: about human nature and relationships
to the environment form the deepest and invisible layer of culture

Hofstede’s onion
- Practices: visible to outsides and therefore can be learned
- Symbols: words, clothing, hairstyles, jargon, flags, accent
- Heroes. Role models with behavioural characteristics that are highly prized in a culture
- Rituals: collective activities e.g. greeting, ceremonies
- Values: the “core” of culture, implicitly learned so early in our development that we do
not even realise it e.g. evil vs good, clean vs dirty, ugly vs beautiful
-> Practices, symbols, heroes and rituals = external (visible); values = internal (invisible)

Progressive socialisation - Hofstede (2001)

Corporate culture and collective behaviour

- corporate culture may replicate, reject, or ignore national culture’s value and norms ->
create a micro environment in which national norms are reinforced or do not apply
- Many internationally active firms deal with the challenges posed by multiple national
cultures by creating clear behavioural guidelines across the firm
- In intra-organisational interactions, the organisational norms and rules established
within an organisational culture reduce the impact of multiple institutional environments
- corporate culture = created in the minds of employees
- Corporate culture represents perceived realities
- Employee’s perceptions are heavily influenced by managers from the top to the
bottom of the organisation
-> corporate culture reflects the personality of an organisation
-> reflects the national culture where the headquarter is located, the nature & quality of
the employees, the industry & the technologies used

An organisation’s unique corporate culture - Schein (1988)

- Symbols and behaviour: manifestations of culture through the presence of artifacts
and patterns of behaviour: organisations look and feel different to one another ->
symbols and physical characteristics tics provide important information e.g. closed vs
open door, dress code, answering emails and phone
- Power distribution: power structure of the organisation
- Problem-solving process: How does an organisation confronts problems? e.g.
reactive vs proactive
- Esprit or team spirit: How close are teams? Do people like their jobs?
-> you step by step change your behaviour to the culture of the new organisation
Determinants of national culture

Social structure: a society’s basic social organisation

- social groups:association of two or more people who have a shared sense of identity
and who interact with each other in structured ways on the basis of a common set of
expectations about each other’s behaviour
- Social stratification: social categories and status
- Social mobility: extent to which individuals can move out of the strata into which they
are born

Religion/ethical systems: shared beliefs & rituals that are concerned with the realm of
the sacred/set of moral principles, or values, that are used to guide behaviour

Language: the spoken and unspoken means of communication (verbal and nonverbal
communication such as facial expressions, personal space and hand gestures
- Chinese - mother tongue of the largest number of people
- English = most widely spoken language
- Knowledge of local language is till beneficial, and sometimes critical for business
success
- Falling to understand nonverbal cues of another culture can lead to communication
failure

Book: Describing culture - what it is and where it comes from (ch.2)

Assumptions about society’s interactions with the environment

- limited number of common human problems for which all people at all times must find
solutions -> limited number of alternatives for dealing with these
- All alternatives are always present, but preferences
- In changing societies, the ordering of preferences may not be clear

Survival and the emergence of social institution

- Many cultural characteristics originally developed to aid the survival of groups in their
environments
- Ways of dealing with societal problems built into society’s institutions
- Institutions = the structures & activities that provide stability to a society, family,
education, economics, religious and political systems
- Once a cultural pattern is established, it is resistant to change (even when surrounding
circumstances change)

Language
- Particularly prominent role in the way cultural characteristics have spread throughout
the world and how they are maintained within a society
- Powerful role in shaping culture bc we use language to interact with others

Religion and ideology

- reflect beliefs and behaviours shared by groups of people (cannot be verified by
scientific test)
- Religion traditions = closely related to cultural values

Other factors (contributors to cultural variation)

- Climate, topography & the indigenous economy affect traditions and behaviour in the
primitive heritage of modern societies
- Proximity & topography affect the exchange of culture among societies, because
barriers (such as mountains & oceans), limit the potential for cross-cultural interaction
- Economic systems & technology affect the exchange between cultures and hence the
transfer of culture
- Political boundaries define areas where there is more or less interaction among cultures
Debates about culture
- Issues:
- concept of a national culture, convergence or divergence of culture, concept of an
organisational culture, effects of acculturation
- National culture:
- dynamic between cultural fragmentation & national unity raises questions of the
appropriateness of the concept of a national culture
- Convergence, divergence or equilibrium:
- Extent to which cultures around the work are becoming more similar/different
- Convergence: cultures ≠ static -> different environments produce different social
systems, but different environments can produce similar systems and similar
environments can produce vastly different cultures

National culture vs organisational culture

- shared meanings vs shared behaviours, unconditional relationship vs conditional
relationship, born into it vs socialised into it, totally immersed vs partly involved
- Organisational culture is composed of different elements than national culture
- Entry to and transmittal or organisational culture in different ways and at different times
than national culture
- Individuals only partly involved with an organisational culture

Acculturation & biculturalism

- acculturation = the psychological & behavioural changes that occur in people because
of contact with different cultures, can occur on a larger collective scale (migration from
one society to another with mutual adjustment)
- Bi-cultural individual = cultural flexibility through time living in another culture -> can
adjust their behaviour based on the cultural context

Culture and social groups

- key aspect of culture: associated with a specific group of people -> identification with a
group places boundaries around the “in-group” and defines non-members as out-
group -> groups are about differentiation

In-group bias & prejudice

- universal bias in favour of one’s own group bc we derive our sense of self, in part, from
our identification with the groups to which we belong -> maintain self-image by
favourably comparing the attributes of our own group with those of out-group
- Prejudicial judgements about members of out-groups = beliefs about the character of
these groups
Ethnocentrism
- attitude that one’s own cultural group is the center of everything and all other groups
are evaluated with reference to it
- Characteristics:
- Our culture = natural and correct, others = unnatural and incorrect
- Own cultural customs = universally valid
- In-group norms, roles and values = correct
- natural to help and cooperate with members of our in-groups, to favour our in-group,
to feel proud of our in-group, and to be distrustful of and even hostile towards out-
group members

Articles Week 2

A theory of cultural value orientations: Explication and application - Schwartz (2006)

- theory of seven cultural value orientations that form three cultural value dimensions,
also specifies a system of relations among them -> interdependent
- West European, English-speaking, Latin American, East European, South Asian,
Confucian influenced, African and Middle Eastern

National cultural dimensions: the perpetuation of cultural ignorance - Venaik &

Brewer (2016)
- criticises Hofstede and GLOBE frameworks: lack of face, convergent and
discrimination validity, national culture scores for similar dimensions across the two
models are either un- or negatively related while dissimilar dimensions are often more
strongly related
- Concludes that using these frameworks to determine broader characteristics OCF
societies is misleading

Week 3: How to measure and compare culture? & Systematically describing cultural
differences

Lecture

Hall’s typology of high- & low-context cultures (1976,1981)

- High context cultures (e.g. Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese)
- Emphasis on nonverbal & indirect language
- Communication aims at smooth, harmonious relationships -> agreements emphasise
trust
- Establish social trust first
- Negotiations = slow & ritualistic
- Polite, “face-saving” style -> mutual sense of care and respect
- Low context cultures (e.g. German, Swiss, Scandinavian, North American)
- Get down to business first -> direct communication
- Expertise & performance are valued -> clear, efficient, logical delivery of verbal
messages
- Rely on explicit explanations & emphasise spoken words -> agreements emphasise
specific, legalistic contracts
- Negotiations = as efficient as possible

—> interactions between the two can be problematic: low context cultures = vulnerable
to communication breakdowns when assuming more shared understanding, not known
for tolerating and understanding diversity, tend to be more insular

Hofstede’s cultural dimensions (1960/70)

1. Individualism vs Collectivism: extent to which the self-identity of society’s members

depends on individual characteristics or characteristics of the group to which they
belong
2. Power distance: extent that power differences are accepted and sanctioned in a
society
3. Uncertainty avoidance: extent to which societies focus on ways to reduce
uncertainty and create stability
4. Masculinity - femininity: extent to which traditional male orientations of ambition &
acquisition are emphasised over traditional female orientations of nurturance &
interpersonal harmony
5. Long-term orientation: low importance on services to others, high importance on
thrift and perseverance & economic growth
6. Indulgence vs Restraint: indulgent societies have a large proportion of citizens who
are happy, believe that they are in control of their lives and place high importance on
leisure → higher birth rates, higher importance of social life
Individualism: tendency to view each person as independent of others and to be more
concerned about the consequences of a person’s actions for that person alone
→ looseness and complexity
Collectivism: tendency of a society to view people as interdependent with others who
are part

GLOBE cultural dimensions

Schwartz’ s value survey: theory of basic human values (1988-2000)

1. Self-direction: independent thought and action-choosing, creating, exploring

2. Stimulation: excitement, novelty, and challenge in life
3. Hedonism: pleasure or sensuous gratification for oneself
4. Achievement: personal success through demonstrating competence according to
social standards
5. Power: social status and prestige, control or dominance over people and resources
6. Security: safety, harmony, and stability of society, of relationships and of self
7. Conformity: restraint of actions, inclinations, and impulses likely to upset or harm
others and violate social expectations or norms
8. Tradition: respect, commitment, and acceptance of the customs and ides that one’s
culture or religion provides
9. Benevolence: preserving and enhancing the welfare of those with whom one is inm
frequent personal contact (the in-group)
10. Universalism: understanding, appreciation, tolerance, and protection for the welfare of
all people and for nature
Schwartz’ s value survey: cultural value orientations (2014)
- basic argument: all societies confront & must cope with basic problems in regulating
human activity in order to survive
- CVOs represent ideals, aspects of culture that are incompatible with them will generate
tension & pressure to change
- 3 critical societal problems:
- Defining the boundaries and relationships between the person & the group
- Ensuring coordination among people to produce goods/services
- Regulating the utilisation of human & natural resources
-> cultural value emphases justify preferred societal responses to these problems

These CVOs from 3 bipolar

dimensions of culture that
represent alternative solutions to
the three problems.

1.To what extent should people be

treated as autonomous vs
embedded in their groups?
-Embeddedness: people view
other as a part of collectives ->
meaning in life comes from social
relationships, identification with the
group, value social order, respect
for tradition, security and wisdom
- Autonomy: individuals = autonomous, bounded entities who find meaning in their own
uniqueness -> intellectual autonomy: people follow their own ideas and value curiosity,
creativity, and open-mindedness; affective autonomy; individuals independently
pursuer positive experiences that make them feel good

2. How can human interdependencies be managed in a way that elicits coordinated,

productive activity rather than disruptive behaviour or withholding of effort?
- Hierarchy: social system with clearly defined roles to assure people behave
responsibly
- Egalitarianism: think of each other as moral equals sharing basic human interest

3. To what extent should individuals and groups control and change their social and
natural environment vs leaving it undisturbed and unchanged?
- Harmony: understanding and fitting in with the environment
- Mastery: mastering, changing and exploiting the natural and social environment for
personal or group goals

Inglehart’s world values survey (1997, 2004)

- Study of socio-cultural and political change

- Political culture: attitudes towards political system and towards the role of the self in
the system
- “Economic, cultural and political change go together in coherent patterns that are
changing the world in predictable ways”

Traditional values vs secular- rational values

- traditional values: emphasise importance of religion, parent-child ties, deference to
authority and traditional family values; reject divorce, abortion, euthanasia and suicide
-> high levels of national pride and a nationalistic outlook
- Secular-rational values: less emphasis on traditional values; divorce ´, abortion,
euthanasia and suicide are relatively acceptable

Survival values vs self-expression values

- survival values: emphasis on economic and physical security -> relatively ethnocentric
outlook & low levels of trust and tolerance
- Self-expression values: high priority to environmental protection, growing tolerance of
foreigners, gays, lesbians and gender equality + rising demands for participating in
decision-making in economic and political life

Convergence, stability or divergence of cultural diversity

- convergence: closer communication ties and trade links, worldwide marketing and
product distributions, globalisation of business and business education, cultural impact
and penetration
- Divergence: different cultural interpretations, need to maintain cultural identity,
adaptation to different markets, trade disputes
- Culture evolves over time, changes in value systems can be slow & painful for society
- Cultural change = more co mon as countries become economically s stronger (shift
from collectivism to individualism)
- Social turmoil = inevitable outcome of cultural change
- Globalisation = emergence of common worldwide culture -> critics claim it is harmful to
local cultures, others argue its positive bc it permits the flow of cultural ideas
- Homogenisation of culture = demonstrated by the growing tendency of people to
consume the same things e.g. food, drinks, movies, music, cars
- technology encourages convergence
- Cultural homogeneity & heterogeneity ≠ mutually exclusive
- “Death of distance” = demise of boundaries that once separated people, due to ICT
revolution, more homogenised cultures develop
- One emerging global culture? No, different emitters (USA, Europe, Japan) and different
responses (acceptances, rejection, coexistence, synthesis)
- Diffusion through elite (davos culture -> business) and popular (instagram culture)

Articles week 3

Dimensionalizing cultures: the Hofstede model in context (2011)

- describes Hofstede model with the 6 dimensions

Book: Comparing cultures - systematically describing cultural differences

Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck framework (1961)

- societies place different emphases ion three alternative ways of handling each of these
problems

Tropenaar’s dimensions
- 7 value dimensions primarily derived from the work of Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck and
others
- First five dimensions about relationships among people
1. Universalism - Particularism: universalism = what is true can be discovered &
applied universally; particularism = unique circumstances determine what is right
2. Individualism - Collectivism
3. Neutral - Affective: neutral cultures = maintaining self-control is important; affective
cultures = expressing emotions is natural
4. Specific - Diffuse: extent to which individuals allow access to their inner selves to
others -> specific cultures = private life is separated from the public; diffuse
cultures = overlap
5. Achievement - Ascription: how status and power are determined -> ascription
society = status based on who one is; achievement society = status based on
what one does
 6. Time: past vs future orientations, linear vs holistic & integrative
7. Environment: extent to which individuals feel that they themselves are the primary
influence on their lives
-> these first 5 result in two main dimensions of cultural variation, related to Hofstede’s
dimensions of collectivism and power distance
1. Loyal involvement - Utilitarian involvement: representing varying orientation toward
group members
2. Conservatism - Egalitarian commitment: representing orientations toward obligations
of societal relationships

Individualism & collectivism

- most useful & most studied dimensions
- Individualism: tendency to view each person as independent of others & to be more
concerned about the consequences of a person’s actions for that person alone
- Collectivism: tendency to view people as interdependent with selected others who are
part of stable groups & tend to be concerned about the consequence of behaviour for
each person’s reference group and expect people to be more willing to sacrifice
personal interests for the good of the group
-> should not be depicted as self-interest vs concern for everyone in the world
-> collectivism ≠ socialism

Tightness and looseness - Gelfand (2010)

- aspect of the previous, provides better understanding of how society’s norms can be
very different from one’s own
- Contrast between the degree to which social entities are “tight” = many strongly
enforced rules & little tolerance for deviance vs “loose” = few strongly enforced rules &
greater tolerance for deviance
- Cultural tightness = the extent to which individuals express cohesiveness within
societies
- Part of a complex, loosely integrated multilevel system that comprises ecological &
historical threats, broads vs narrow socialisation in societal institutions, thre strength of
everyday recurring situations & micro-level psychological affordances
- Individualism = looseness and complexity e.g. US
- Collectivism = tightness and simplicity e.g. Japan
Vertical and horizontal dimensions
- the way in which people view their status relationship with others
- Vertical = similar to Hofstede’s power distance

Social Axioms
- on top of values, general beliefs & social axioms provide a complementary way to
understand societal cultures
- Social axioms = social axioms are generalised beliefs about oneself, the social and
physical environment or the spiritual world -> basic truths or premises or generalised
expectancies that relate to a wide range of social behaviours across different contexts
- Fit with 4 categories: psychological attributes, orientation toward the social world,
social interaction, the environment -> reduced the number of axioms significantly
-> derived cultural level structure of social axioms: dynamic externality: focused around
religiosity & belief that effort leads to justice; social cynicism: negative view of human
nature

Culture as sources of guidance

- extent to which individuals in different nations rely on others in different roles & on rules
and norms to deal with their daily work situation
- Analyses how societies differ in the extent to which managers consider 8 different
sources o guidance for handling their work situations
1. Organisation’s rules & procedures
2. Superiors
3. Colleagues
4. Subordinates
5. Staff experts
6. Organisation’s norms
7. Society’s norms
 8. Own experience & training

Cultural distance
- Based on Hofstede’s dimensions
- quantitative measure of cultural dimensions -> construct indexes
- Draws analogy with physical distance to consider how culturally different nations are

Use of the frameworks

- much of cross-cultural management relies on overly simplistic models that substitute
the complex reality
- Oversimplification often results in stating that people from this specific culture behave
in this way, whereas those from that other type f culture behave in another way ->
misuse of cultural dimensions to construct sophisticated stereotypes

Week 4: How to measure & compare culture? pt. 2

The strengths and weaknesses of cultural value dimensions

Hofstede
Strengths:
- “homogenous” population of IBM employees across countries
- Cultural value dimensions allow to assess the influence of culture and the
comparison across countries
- High number of countries & high number of individuals
- Starting point for a whole research stream
- Several replications support he study -> strong cultural characteristics
Weaknesses:
- data collection in the 60s & 70s
- Assumption that national territory & boundaries of culture correspond ->
subcultures? Oversimplification? Static vs. Dynamic approach? Isn’t culture more
multidimensional?
- Respondents worked within the same corporation -> national vs corporate culture
- Statistical analysis & overlap in the dimensions -> just mean scores, cannot
generalise and assume the individual is like that
- Face validity of the questions/statements that assessed the dimensions

GLOBE
Strengths:
- large number of countries and middle-managers from different firms (well-developed
quantitative research design & high generalisability)
 - Broader nature & classification of cultural dimensions than Hofstede -> more fine-
grained picture of cultural facets
- Proved broad overview of the acceptance of leadership behaviours across countries
Weaknesses:
- assumption that national territory & boundaries of culture correspond
- Face validity of the questions/statements
- Very long questionnaire -> potential survey fatigue of respondents
- Quality of the measure & the data collection process depends heavily on the country
co-investigators —> should be translated by bilingual people but that’s not the case
- Difficult interpretation due to vague formulations and practice vs value differences
- General limitation: negative correlation of Hofstede & GLOBE for some dimensions

Culture as a bend of dimensions: an archetype approach - country profiles based on

Hofstede’s dimensions
- When measured with a multi-dimensional approach, culture can be conceptualised as
a specific blend of these dimensions
- Specific blend of cultural values can be used to characterise a group of individuals & to
distinguish different groups
- Archetype or gestalt perspective of culture

Do archetypes represent societal/

country-specific blends of
cultural value dimensions?

Schwartz cultural dimensions: an archetype approach

-> each are measured on

a 6 point scale, from 1 =
very much likely
(innermost circle) to 6 =
not at all like me
(outermost circle)
-> 5 global archetype
profiles on the 10 values
-> use groups or clusters to adjust your management styles to these -> individuals from
different countries can have the same cultural profile
-> profiles and archetypes rather than one country = one culture bc culture = country
borders is highly problematic !!

Schwartz: Map of 77 national groups on seven cultural orientations

GLOBE cultural dimensions

Cultural clusters based on Inglehart’s World Values Survey

- shows how scores of societies are located on two dimension -> moving upward
reflects a shift from traditional values to secular-rational values; moving rightward
reflects a shift from survival values to self-expression values

Country clusters by Ronen & Shenkar (1985) through reviewing existing studies
- show that while the different approaches differ in their clustering, the resulting clusters
largely overlap
- Synthesis of cultural clusters:

-> allows researches & managers to view the

world in the form of country clusters functioning
in a similar way
-> within each cluster, countries have similar
work values, geographic location, language &
religion
-> independent countries that do not fit into any
cluster exist
Update in 2013

Week 5: Cross-cultural interaction & How culture works: Fundamentals of cross-

cultural interaction (ch. 4)

Lecture: cross-cultural interaction

How do culturally stereotypic expectations affect behaviour?

- Stereotypes: related to schemas, categorisation of characteristics and behaviour of a

set of people, usually negative -> lazy brain: finding general schemas that help facilitate
categorisation in situations
- National stereotypes: can be intense, but based on limited contact, categorising
cultures based on a few dimensions
- People employ stereotypes, either consciously or unconsciously, because they are
easy means to judge situations and people
- Stereotypes = often erroneous & may lead to unjustified conclusion abut others
- There are real differences among groups and societies: we should examine descriptive
behaviours rather than evaluative stereotypes
- Resistance to new information
- Stereotypic expectations tend to be self-perpetuating
- New information often discounted as not representative
- Complexity and evaluation
- Learned
- More complex stereotypes about more familiar social categories
- Social dominance
- Dominant groups have special privileges
- Attributions help us react to our environment by linking an event to its causes
- Inconclusive information (Attribution error)
- Situation cues can be inconclusive
- Use prior information to make judgement (stereotypes
- High importance of intercultural knowledge
- Fundamental attribution error
- Influenced by whether the behaviour is by a member of our cultural group
- Favourably biased towards own cultural group
- Cultural differences in attribution
- Not consistent across cultures -> less fundamental attribution error in Asia than US
or Europe
- Country of origin effect
- Biased belief systems about members of one’s own national culture are pervasive &
extend to favouritism for products coming from one’s own country

Comparing cultures as overlapping normal distributions

- shows that there are quite some universal cultural values -> focus on what you have in
common rather than looking at the differences

How does culture affect each of the steps between noticing an event & responding
to it?
Cross-cultural communication process
- Communication: act of transmitting messages, including information about the nature
of the relationship, to another person who interprets these messages and gives them
meaning -> can become difficult when crossing borders bc of the interpretation part
- Grounding: vast amount of common information that the sender & receiver must share
for the communication to be successful
- Language = so essential to culture, that many consider linguistic groups synonymous
with cultural groups
- Whorf hypothesis: a society’s language determines the nature of its culture
- Words provide concepts of understanding the worlds, language structures the way
we thinks bout it
- All languages have limited sets of words
- Restricted word sets constrain the ability to conceptualise the world

-> problems with sender & receiver

tend to increase in an online
environment
-> development of trust becomes
harder the less information ins
available
-> cultural background influences
communication
Cultural field = culturally based elements of a person’s background that influences
communication
Cultural field effects: background influences communication

Different communication styles across cultures

- Explicit vs implicit
- High & low context cultures
- Differences in individualistic and collectivist societies
- Formal vs informal
 - Formal: acknowledges rank, titles, and ceremony in prescribed social interaction (US
= among the least formal)
- Direct vs indirect
- Directness associated with individualist cultures, indirectness with collectivist
cultures
- Can depend on social context
- Direct: asks questions, states opinions, comes to the point & lacks ambiguity
- Indirect: state opinions or ask questions by implied meaning, believing direct
communication is impolite
- Silence vs verbal overkill
- Collectivist cultures value silence, individualist culture value talking
- Use of praise
- Frequency, subjects elaboration, and response vary across cultures
- Repertoire of language styles and registers
- Tone of voice
- Pitch, volume, speed, tension, variation, enunciation, breathing’s, creaminess, accent
- Slang and jargon
- Slang = informal
- Jargon = used by particular subgroups, often very specialised
- Helps define group membership, increases possible variations in expression, might
only last for few years, may enhance communication ability of culturally different
individuals
- Euphemism
- Words that by tradition/convention are not often used in public -> “prohibited words”
- Often handled by substituting a bland or less direct expression or euphemism
- Idioms
- Unique ways of combining words to express a particular though
- Often differs from its literal meaning -> problem for translation
- Proverbs and maxims = short, easily remembered expression of a basic principle,
general truth or rule of conduct

Nonverbal communication
- communication without words
- Body positions & gestures
- Can mean different things -> avoid gestures until one is sure of meaning
- facial expression
- Basic expressions = same around the world
- Cultures can influence facial expression
- eye contact
- Cultural differences in gaze patterns
—> the same nonverbal behaviour can have very different meanings in different cultures
- Kinesics = communication through body movements
- Proxemics = focuses on how people use space to communicate (public distance,
social distance, personal distance, intimate distance)
- Haptics/touching = communication through body contact, related to proxemics
- No touching cultures: Japan, US, England, many North European countries
- Moderate touching cultures: Australia, China, Ireland, India
- Touching cultures: Latin American countries, Italy, Greece
- Oculesics: communication through eye contact or gazing
- US & Canada: people are comfortable and expect eye contact
- China & Japan: eye contact is considered very rude & disrespectful

Using interpreters
- role: provide a simultaneous translation of a foreign language
- Requires greater linguistic skills than speaking/translating written documents
- Interpreter must have technical knowledge & vocabulary to deal with technical details
common in business transactions
- Even if a negotiator understands both languages, its best to have an interpreter to
ensure the accuracy and common understanding of agreements
- Spend time with them, so they get to know your accent and generaöapproach to
conversation
- Go over technical and other issues
- I sit on frequent interruptions for translations
- Learn about communication styles & etiquette from the interpreter

Articles

Cross cultural interaction: What we know & what we need to know - Adler & Aycan
(2018)
- we often fail to understand each other -> rather than benefitting from the advanced
technology and global interconnectedness, we fall back on divisiveness
- Article reviews what we know from cross-cultural interactions and outlines what we
need to learn/unlearn -> to be able to see diversity as an asset in helping individuals,
organisations, society to succeed rather than seeing it as a a source of problems
- Field of CCM has moved beyond the originally narrow & misleading labelling to
embracing the broader complexities of culture

Book - ch. 4

Social cognition
- explains how we develop mental representations and how these influence she way we
process information about people and social events
- representations = schemas when they define a category or scripts when they contain
behavioural sequence; cognitive structures = derived from past experiences & are
simple representations of the complex concepts that they represent
- Help us reduce the complexity of our environment
- Type 1 social cognition: happens spontaneously with little or no conscious thoughts ->
most of our behaviour
- Type 2 social cognition: less automatic and requires more conscious thought

Cultural schemas
- shape what people associate with everything
- Self-schemas:
- Characteristics that people associate with the inner self can include personally
significant personality traits
- Include memories associated with personal experiences -> but simplified
- Independent self-schema:
- Typical in western cultures in which people are expected to think & act as
autonomous individuals -> person’s behaviour is expected to be organised and
made meaningful based on the person’s own internal thoughts and feelings
- Interdependent self-schema:
- Individuality is less differentiated & more connected to a particular group of other
people
- Social identity
- The total of the social categories that people use to describe themselves

Cultural scripts & norms

- schemas & scripts influence each other
- One result for identifying with a particular cultural group is consciously seeking to
adopt its norms
- Cultural norms = acceptable standards of behaviour that are shared by members of
your cultural groups -> tell us what to expect from others and what is expected of us
- Social groups only enforce norms if they perform one of the following functions:
- Facilitator groups’ s survival
- Increase predictability of the group members’ s behaviour
- Reduce embarrassment for group members
- Express the central values of the group -> clarify groups identity
-> behaviour of individuals = influenced by cultural norms of society, but only to the
extent that a norm exists for a particular situation & for which societal sanctions for
noncompliance exist
Selective perception
- perception = process by which individuals interpret the messages received from their
senes & thereby give meaning to their environment
- People can be presented with the same stimulus & perceive it differently
- Effect of categorisation of others as out-group members: once categorised, they are
subsequently perceived as being more similar to each other than are in-group member
-> see individual variation that occurs in our own cultural group but perceive other
cultures as homogenous
- Selective avoidance = when confronted with information contrary to our existing view
we “tune it out” by diverting our attention elsewhere
-> cultural differences can influence perception in several ways
1. Cultural socialisation produces schemas that lead us to perceive things in a
particular way
2. Tend to better recall information inconsistent with our views
3. Perceive members of other cultures to be more similar to each other than
members of our own cultural group

Perceived similarity & attraction

- perceptual bias about our own vs other cultural groups has additional implication for
cross-cultural interaction
- Perceptions of similarity lead to interpersonal attraction bc similarity validates our view
of the world & the way it should be (consensual validation)
Self-schemas & motivation
- motivation involves the reasons that people take or persist in a particular action
- Cultural differences might be expected in motivation based on an individual’s internal
representation of self
- Individuals are differentially motivated depending on whether they view themselves as
independent of or interdependent with others

Week 6: Cross-cultural negotiations & The managers as negotiator: Communicating

and negotiating across cultures (ch.6)

Lecture

Cross-cultural negotiation:
- process of making business deals across cultures, precedes any multinational project
- Without successful negotiation & the accompanying cross-cultural communication,
there are seldom successful business transactions
- International negotiation = more complex than domestic negotiation
- Differences in national cultures, political, legal and economic systems can separate
business partners
- Successful international negotiation requires successful cross-cultural communication
- Negotiators must understand all components of culturally different communication
styles, both verbal and nonverbal

The context of cross-cultural negotiations

Stakeholders in cross-cultural negotiations

Steps in cross-cultural negotiations

1. Preparation: determine if negotiation is possible, know exactly what your company
wants, be aware of what cane be compromised, know the other side, send the proper
team, understand the agenda, prepare for a long negotiation
2. Building the relationship: focus ≠ n the business issues, rather on social and
interpersonal matters, negotiation partners get to know one another, develop opinions
regarding the personalities of the negotiators (including whether they can be trusted),
duration & importance of this stage varies by culture
3. Exchanging information and the first offer: parties exchange task-related
information on their needs for the agreement, both sides make a formal presentation
of what they desire out of the relationship, both sides present their first offer -> first
proposal of what they expect from the agreement
4. Persuasion: each side attempts to get the other side to agree to its position -> heart
of the negotiation process, numerous tactics are used -> generally: standard verbal
and nonverbal
5. Concessions: each side relaxes some of its demands to meet the other party’s
needs, sequential approach: each side reciprocates concessions made by the other
side (North America), holistic approach: each side makes very few, if any concessions
until the end (Asia)
6. Agreement: signed contract agreeable to all sides, must be consistent with the
chosen legal system, safest contracts are legally binding in the legal system of all
signers, everyone must understand the contract in principle & have true commitment
beyond legal
7. Postagreement: often ignored but important, evaluation of the success, post
agreement analysis can be beneficial bc it allows the garnering of insights into
strengths and weaknesses of the approach used + can enable members to develop a
closer relationship with their counterparts

Graham’s four stage model

1. Non-task sounding or relationship building
2. Task related exchange of information
3. Persuasion
4. Making concessions and reaching agreement

Cultural differences in negotiations

- culture has significant effects on the negotiation process
- How negotiators plan
- The offers made during negotiation
- The communication process
- How information is shared during negotiation
- effect of culture on negotiator ethics & tactics
- Differences exist in the tolerance of different negotiation tactics in different cultures
- Negotiators who trusted the other party were less likely to use questionable tactics
- effects of culture on conflict resolution
- Within collectivistic countries, disagreements are resolved based on rules
- In individualistic countries, conflicts tend to be resolved through personal experience
and training
The right one: conceptual model of where culture may influence negotiation by Brett
(2001)
- identifies how culture of both negotiators can influence the setting or priorities and
strategies, the identification of the potential for integrative agreement, pattern of
interaction between negotiation
- Suggests that cultural values should have a strong effect on negotiation interests and
priorities, while cultural norms will influence negotiation strategies

Definition of negotiation: contract — relationship

Negotiation opportunity: distributive — integrative
Selection of negotiators: experts — trust associates
Protocol: informal — formal
Communication: direct — indirect
Time sensitivity: high — low
risk propensity: high — low
Groups vs individuals: collectivism —individualism
Nature of agreements: specific — general
Emotionalism: high — low

Basic negotiating strategies

Competitive negotiation: each side tries to give as little as possible & win the maximum
for its side
- Seek win-lose resolution
- Use dirty tricks
- Seldom leads to long-term relationships or trust
Problem solving: negotiators seek mutually satisfactory ground beneficial to both parties
- Search for possible win-win situations
- No dirty tricks
- Builds long term relationships, more successful strategy
Culturally responsive negotiation strategies (Weiss, 1994)

When in Rome, do as the Romans do?

- to what extent should a negotiator adapt to the cultural values of the other party
- Simplistic approach
- Does not account for the dominant role o one or the other partner
- Is it ever possible to “do as” the romans?
- It (wrongly?) assumes that a “roman” will always ac as a roman wit a non-roman in
Rome
- Weiss (1994) considers a “one-size-fits-all” approach to be inappropriate & proposes
strategies that are…
- Culturally responsive
- Reflect the skills of the individuals involved
- Takes account of the circumstances in which they are working
- basic aim in any communicate event: make sense of the interaction
- During negotiations that means both parties need to:
- Recognise each other’s ideas & the types of behaviour evident
- Detect common & differing standpoints
- Ensure that communication is maintained as the negotiation proceeds
- knowledge & skills required to perform these crucial acts is often limited
- Weiss proposes a strategic framework which allows the parties to make sense of the
negotiation and use their own attributes

-> select the most feasible, appropriate

and acceptable strategy
-> choosing a strategy involves
reflecting on one’s own culture as well
as careful investigation into
counterpart’s culture
Five steps by Weiss for selecting a negotiating strategy
1. Reflect on your culture’s negotiation script
2. Learn the negotiation script of the counterpart’s culture
3. Consider the relationship and circumstances
4. Predict and influence the counterpart’s approach
5. Choose your strategy
-> strategies are based on the level of familiarity that a negotiator has with the other
party’s culture

Low familiarity
- Employ agents or advisors
- Useful for negotiators who have little awareness pf the other party’s culture
- Bring in a mediator
- encourages one side or the other to adopt one culture’s approaches or mediator
culture approach
- Induce the other party to use sour approach
- Other party may become irritated or be insulted

Moderate familiarity
- adapt to the other negotiator’s approach
- Involves making conscious changes to your approach so its more appealing to the
other party
- coordinate adjustment
- Involves both parties making mutual adjustments to find a common process for
negotiation

High familiarity
- Embrace the other negotiator’s approach
- Adopting completely the approach of the other party (negotiator needs to be bilingual
and bicultural)
- Improvise an approach
- Crafts an approach that is specifically tailored to the negotiation situation, other
party, and circumstances
- effect symphony
- Parties create a new approach that may include aspects of either home culture or
adopt practices from a third culture

Common mistakes
- Insufficient understanding & knowledge
- Insufficient allocation/attention of time
- Insufficient attention to planning for changing negotiation strengths
- Failure to take other perspective
- Interference by headquarters
- Insufficient planning for internal communication & decisions

Articles

Culture and negotiation - Brett (2000)

- model of how culture affects negotiation processes & outcomes
- Proposes that power & information processes are fundamental to negotiations, culture
impacts negotiation through these processes
- Cultural value of individualism vs collectivism is linked to goals in negotiations
- Cultural value for high vs low context cultures is linked to information sharing in
negotiation
- Article describes why intercultural negotiations pose significant strategic changes, but
concludes that high-quality negotiated outcomes can be achieved nonetheless

The hidden challenge of cross.broader negotiations - Sebenius (2002)

- shows another aspect to cross-border negotiations that’s often overlooked: the ways
that people from different regions come to an agreement / the processes involved
- Decision-making and governance processes can differ across cultures
- Ignoring or underestimating these differences can lead to failure
- Advice on how to anticipate and overcome possible barriers

Do’s & don’s of cross-cultural negotiations - Herbig, Kramer (1992)

- detailed pitfalls to avoid when undertaking cross-cultural negotiations
- Rule for success in negotiations: recognise that a foreign negotiator is different from
you in perceptions, motivations, beliefs and outlook

Book -> all covered in the lecture

Use of a second language

- less automatic & requires more deliberative though
- the greater the fluency of second-language speaker, the more likely they are to be
seem as competent in other respects
- First-language speakers in a cross-language interaction tend to respond to lower
linguistic competency of their partner by modifying aspects of their speech, such a s
slowing rate of speech -> foreign speak might not be well received
- First-language speaker is unable to recognise signals that indicate lack of
understanding or does not work to create an environment in which it is acceptable to
check for understanding
Week 7: Leadership across cultures & multicultural workgroups (ch. 7 & 8)

Lecture

The nature of motivation

- motivation = psychological process through which unsatisfied wants or needs lead to
drives that are aimed at goals or incentives

- the universalist assumption: motivation process = universal -> all people are motivated
to pursue goals they value
- Process = universal
- Culture influences specific content & goals pursued
- Motivation differs across cultures
- the assumption of content & process:
- Content theories of motivation: explain work motivation in terms of what arouses,
energises or initiates employee behaviour
- Process theories of motivation: explain work motivation by how employee behaviour
in initiated, redirected, and halted

Content theory: Maslow’s hierarchy

- Assumptions:
- Lower-level needs must be satisfies before higher-level needs become motivators
- A need that is satisfied no longer motivates
- More ways to satisfy higher-level than there are ways to satisfy lower-level needs

Collectivist need hierarchy e.g. China

International findings of Maslow’s theory

- Haire study indicated all needs important to respondents across cultures
 - International managers indicated upper-level needs of particular importance to them
- Findings for selected country clusters (Latin Europe, US/UK, Nordic Europe)
indicated autonomy and self-actualisation were most important and least satisfied
needs for respondents
- Study of East Asian managers in 8 countries found autonomy & self-actualisation in
most cases ranked high
- Some researches suggested the modification of Maslow’s Western-oriented hierarchy
by re-ranking needs

McClelland (1961)
- Three needs of achievement, affiliation, power (dominance) that vary among individuals

Process theory: equity theory

- When people perceive they are treated equitably, it will have a positive effect on their
job satisfaction
- If people believe they aren’t being treated fairly (especially relative to relevant others),
they will be dissatisfied leading to negative effect on job performance, they will attempt
to restore equity

Work centrality
- importance of work in an individual’s life can provide important insights into how to
motivate Human Resources in different cultures
- Japan = high test level of work centrality
- Israel = moderately high levels
- US & Belgium = average levels
- Netherlands & Germany = moderately low levels
- Britain = low levels

Job design
- Shift from worker efficiency to worker motivation
- Job characteristics model (Hackman & Oldham, 1980)
- Skill variety: different abilities requiring different abilities
- Task identity: completion of a whole & identifiable piece of work
- Task significance: substantial effect on other people
- Autonomy: substantial freedom, independence and discretion
- Feedback: activities provide direct & clear information on performance
- culturally-based differences in the perception of these job characteristics
- Choice of job design might be best informed by cultural dimensions that relate to the
way in which the characteristics of the job fulfil culturally based expectations of what
work is/should be about

Role of cultural values in job motivation

How might culture affect the application of western leadership theories?

- Questions to address
- Is leadership a global concept?
- Are some leader behaviours & styles universal?
- Are universal leader behaviours conceptually & functionally equivalent?
- Are leadership characteristics & behaviours enacted differently?

GLOBE leadership dimensions: the effect of culture on leadership style preferences

1. Charismatic/value-based leadership: ability to inspire, motivate, and expect high
performance from others based on strongly held core values - visionary, inspirational,
self-sacrificing, trustworthy, decisive, performance oriented
2. Team-oriented leadership: emphasises team building and a common purpose
among team members - collaborative, integrative, diplomatic, administratively
competent
3. Participative leadership: degree to which leaders involve others in making &
implementing decisions - participative, non autocratic
4. Human oriented leadership: emphasises being supportive, considerate,
compassionate and generous - modesty, sensitivity to people
5. Autonomous leadership: refers to independent and individualistic leadership -
autonomous, unique
6. Self-protective leadership: reflects behaviours that ensure the safety & security of
the leader & the group - self-centred, status conscious, conflict inducing, face saving

Universally desirable & undesirable leadership attributes

- positive leader attributes
- Trustworthy, foresight, positive, confidence builder, intelligent, win-win problem
solver, administrative skilled, excellence oriented, just, plans ahead, dynamic,
motivational, decisive, communicative, coordinator, honest, encouraging, motive
arouser, dependable, effective bargainer, informed, team builder
- negative leader attributes
- Loner, irritable, ruthless, asocial, no explicit, dictatorial, noncooperative, egocentric

Cross-cultural model of leadership

Multicultural workgroups - group process model

How the cultural composition of international work group affects the way they
function
- three mechanisms:
1. Cultural norms: mix of cultural norms in the group -> different orientations of what
is appropriate in terms of work group function & structure
2. Cultural diversity: number of different cultures in one group, cultural diversity may
have both positive and negative effects, potential subgroups (cultural group vs
task group)
3. Relative cultural distance:extent to which each individual is different from the other
group members (group identity) -> influence on the identification with the group
task
Effect of cultural composition on different tasks and group types

-> the nature of the task & the structure of the work
group influence how much its cultural composition
affects its outcomes
-> limited opportunity for group characteristics to
influence group tasks with limited employee discretion

Advantages & disadvantages of global virtual teams

- Virtual team: a group of individuals who predominantly use technology to
communicate, collaborate, share information & coordinate their efforts in order to
accomplish a common work-related objective
- Virtual communication
- Provides foundation for group work but does not truly replicate face-to-face
interaction
- Reduces ability to sense
- Hinders openness
- Relationship building & conflict management
- Group members are superheated by time, geography, and culture -> trust, respect,
cooperation, and commitment are influenced by the added degree of distance
between work group members
- Task management
- Different virtual teams require different strategies & processes
- Importance if defined roles, clear task strategy and explicit interaction norms is
higher
- Advantage: no restrictions of time and space
- Disadvantage: must overcome additional barriers
Choose the right technology: choose technologies by their richness

Articles week 7

Cross-cultural leadership: Leading around the world - Hanger, Aiken, Park, Su (2016)
- review evidence of societal culture
- Traditional cross-cultural literature shows how culture affects leadership characteristics,
attributes, behaviours & that culture moderates the outcomes resulting from different
styles of leadership
- New literature focuses on leadership when followers are culturally diverse

Cultural intelligence in global teams: a fusion model of collaboration - Jansens,

Brett (2006)
- introduces a new, culturally intelligent model of collaboration for global teams that is
intended to enhance the likelihood of such teams making creatively realistic decisions
- Draws on the culinary tradition of fusion cooking, current political theorising about
pleuritic societies & theories of formation processing and political decision making
- Describe how the fusion principal of coexistence facilitates information extraction &
decision making, make formal interventions to counterbalance the unequal power
relations among global team members
- Point out why fusion is a more culturally intelligent model for team collaboration ->
produces superior solutions to global problems

Book

The manager as leader: motivation & leadership across cultures (ch. 7)

Expectancy theory
- Motivation is result of combination of the expectation that effort (E) will lead to
performance & that this performance will be instrumental (I) in reaching certain
outcomes
- Also recognises that individuals can place different value (V) or any outcome
—> Motivation = V x I x E
- Consequences:
 - Employees will only be motivated to put effort into their work if they a) believe that if
they work hard the will accomplish their task b)believe that task accomplishment will
lead to a reward by their employer c) value the outcomes that they are offered

Model of goal setting

- involve the responses of individuals to the existence of goals and the manner in which
goals were set
- Basic principles:
- Specific difficult (but achievable) goals consistently lead to better performance than
specific easy goals, general goals or no goals
- Goal setting is more effective we there is feedback showing progress towards the
goal

Organisational commitment
- A person’s sustained motivation to carry out a course of action or contribute to the
well-being of some other person, group or organisation
- 3 components:
1. emotional bonds (affective commitment)
2. Interest in continuing a relationship (continuance commitment)
3. Having a sense of obligation (normative commitment)

Sociotechnical systems
- Approach to job design applied in societies that emphasise social goals
- Focuses on integrating the social & technical aspects of the work system
- Individual workers as part of a social system
- Involve autonomous work groups
- Example: Northern Europe

Quality circle
- based on belief that workers understand their own work better than anyone else & can
therefore contribute to its quality control activities
- Small groups that voluntarily & continuously conduct quality control activities
- Example: Japan

Western leadership theory

- Trait theories:
- Inherent difficulty with predicting leadership success from their personality
characteristics, coupled with the fact that these theories ignore both followers and
the effects of differing situations, led researchers in other directions
- Behavioural theories:
 - Change in the assumptions that leaders are born to the notion that leaders could be
developed
- Two dimensions of leader behaviour
- Initiating structure (production or task-oriented) behaviour: assigning tasks to
subordinates, coordinating activities
- Consideration (employee or relationship oriented behaviour: show concern for
subordinates, respecting their ideas & being friendly and supportive
- Contingency theories:
- Developed to reconcile differences between the findings of behavioural studies
- Fiedler’s contingency model:
- Leader’s personality influences the leader’s behaviour style (task or relationship
oriented) & that this situation moderates the relationship between the leader’s style
& effectiveness
- Path-goal theory:
- Describes how leadership influences different aspects of motivation described by the
expectancy theory
- Implicit theories:
- Concerned with the way in which scripts, schemas and other cognitive
characteristics influence how subordinates perceive & react to a leader

Non-western theories of leadership

- Performance - Maintenance theory:
- Describes Japanese managing practices
- 4 types of leadership based on two dimensions, performance and maintenance
- Leadership in the Arab world:
- Strongly influence by the Islamic religion & tribal traditions as well as by contact with
western culture —> authoritarian & patriarchal
- Sheikocracy: hierarchical authority, subordination of efficacy to human relations &
personal connections, conformity to rules
- Prophetic-caliphal model: typifies duality of relationships prevalent in Arab culture
→ prophetic leader: love, voluntary submission
→ caliphal leader: conflict, uses coercion & fear

The challenge of multicultural work groups & teams (ch. 8)

Workgroups
1. Social systems that have boundaries with members who have different roles & are
dependent on each other. In-group & out-group recognises group’s existence
2. Have tasks to perform
3. Need to deal with the relationship between individuals & the group
4. Function within and as part of a larger organisation

Primary types of workgroups

- Task force: focus in the completion of a specific project, typically within a limited time
frame -> members selected on task-related skills
- Crews: focus in tool required to perform a task & the appropriate use of the tools
specifies the interaction among group members
- Teams: sets of people who each have specific skills & abilities and who are provided
with tools and procedures to address a team’s tasks over along period of time
—> differences in work groups highlight the need to recognise the structure of a
workgroup when managing or working in intercultural organisational groups

Work group effectiveness

- Depends on how well the group uses its resources to accomplish its tasks
- Long term effectivenes of a workgroup might not be assessed accurately by
considering only how it is performing at a single point in time
- Criteria for effectiveness:
- Output of the group must meet the quantity, quality & timeliness standards of the
organisation
- Processes employed by the group should enhance the ability of the group members
to work together
- Group experience should contribute to the growth and personal wellbeing of the
group

Group process model -> see lecture

1. External conditions: overall environment, the organisation
2. Group member resources: two types of resources, personal attributes (personality,
values, attitudes) and their skills & abilities (technical and social) -> member skills and
abilities = positively related to group performance
3. Group structure: task force, crew or team-> shapes the behaviour of group members
by prescribing norms, role expectations and status relationships shared by members
4. Group task: the nature of the tasks in which the work group is engaged influences
processes & outcomes; types of group tasks: clearly defined production tasks,
cognitive or intellective tasks, creative idea generation and decision making tasks
5. Group process: how groups achieve their outcome -> communication patterns,
decision processes, conflict reactions -> groupthink = norm for group consensus
overrides the motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action; social
loafing = individuals reduce their Effexor to on group tasks expecting greater that
others will do the work for them
6. Group composition: different genders, ages, experiences, nationalities present in a
group -> homogenous, heterogenous, minority-majority
Group stages - Tuckman (1965)
1. Forming stage: group members just begin to think of themselves as part of a group &
might be uncertain about the group and how they fit into it
2. Storming stage: characteristics, attitudes and expectations of individuals come into
conflict with the structure if the group
3. Norming stage: the group agrees on the expectations that specify the acceptable
behaviour (norms) of the group
4. Performing stage : efforts of the group shift to accomplishing the task at hand
5. Adjourning stage: stage once task is completed (only for task forces and crews)
-> for groups that have a deadline for the accomplishment of their task the punctuated
equilibrium model might be helpful

Culture’s influence on work groups

- the cultural backgrounds of a work group’S members affect the way they function
through 3 general types of mechanisms
- Cultural norms: the orientations of the specific cultures represented in the group ->
different ideas (at least initially) about the group processes
- Cultural diversity: the number of different cultures represented in a group -> increase
group performance through greater variety of ideas & perspectives (process gains),
but also decrease group performance by process losses -> can be minimised by
effective diversity management
- Relative cultural distance: extent to which group members are culturally different
from each other

Organisational context and culturally diverse work groups

- level of management support influences the ability of workgroups to handle the
technological and geographic issues
- Management support:
- Most effective groups when there is high organisational support -> making sure the
workgroups have the material & information necessary to achieve their goals
- Group-level rewards
- Work group status:
- High-group status = positive effect on the individual & workgroup performance
- Extent to which individuals derive their self-esteem from workgroups can vary
- Training:
- Workgroup success requires training in interaction skills
- Self-management:
- If too much authority is delegated, workgroups can charge off in inappropriate
directions -> achieving an appropriate level & type of delegation for multicultural
work groups can be difficult
Managing multicultural work groups
- find ways to maximise the positive consequences of both homogeneity and diversity
while minimising the native consequences of both

Chapter 9: the challenge of international organisations - structure & culture

Structure of the organisation: must be coordinated through differentiation of roles and a
hierarchy of authority to achieve goals → described by degree of complexity,
formalization and centralization → increase complexity
Horizontal differentiation: number of different types of jobs that exist
Vertical differentiation: number of levels in hierarchy
Spatial differentiation: extent to which organisation’s physical facilities and personnel
are geographically dispersed

Formalization: extent to which rules and procedures govern the activities of organisation
members
Degree of centralization: indicated by the extent to which decision-making is
concentrated at a single point
Mutual adjustment: relies heavily on organisational norms, colleagues and subordinates
own judgment to observe what others are doing and to coordinate their own work with
others
Direct supervision: relies heavily on personal judgment of superiors

Standardization of work processes: extensive use of detailed written rules and

procedures
Standardization of outputs: relies heavily on limited set of rules that specify goals and
leave the means of attaining the goals up to the influence of other roles, rules and norms
Standardization of skills: rely heavily on employees’ self-guidance & on professional
societies and the judgment of groups made up of fellow professionals to control these
employees

Organizational design
1. Simple
2. Machine bureaucracy
3. Professional bureaucracy
4. Divisional
5. Adhocracy

Operating core: employees who perform basic tasks

Strategic apex: top-level management with overall responsibility
Technostructure: technical analysts who form rules and procedures
Middle-line: managers who connect operating core to strategic apex (divisional
structures)
Support staff: provide advice, internal consulting and other indirect support services

Ecological theories
- Focus on strategies, structures and management of whole populations of
organisations, such as industries
- Environment determines organizational structure → environmental selection
- Managers have limited ability
Institutional theory
- Focuses on how organisations in shared environments adopt similar structures that are
reinforced in interactions with other organisations
- Explains the structural similarity (= isomorphism) that exists across organisations within
an industry
- Was developed to explain globalization, particularly of national governments
- Three categories of environmental pressures towards institutional isomorphism
1. Coercive isomorphism: patterns of organisation are imposed on firm by an outside
authority, e.g. government
2. Normative isomorphism: professional bodies promote “proper” organisational
structure
3. Mimetic isomorphism: organisations copy the structure of firms that have been
successful in dealing with a particular environment

Culture-free perspective: provides insight in terms of very general structural

configurations

Alternatives: Structural variation across cultures

- The contextual variables (size, technology, strategy) can account for some of the
similarity in organisational structures
- Path left: influenced by acceptance of members of society
- Path right: influenced by management group’s background
Informal organisations = those elements of an organisation that help to reduce individual
variability in the behaviour of organisation members but is not reflected in a formal
organisation chart

Multinational structures
5 ways of integrating international activity
- International division: international activity in one organisational unit
- Product division: groups units based on same products
- Functional division: groups based on location & function
- Geographic division: based on geographic location
- Matrix structure: each subsidiary for more than one group

Barlett and Ghoshal (1989): Categorization of MNO’s

Collaborative alliances: results in new organisational structures

take one of three forms
1. Informal type: limited in scope and no contractual requirement
2. Formal type: requires a contractual agreement and are often indicated by broader
involvement
3. Joint ventures: separate legal entities with joint ownership

International mergers and acquisitions

- Cultural differences in preferences for types of integration process, control systems and
management practices by acquiring firms

Stahl (2008): suggests that culture affects the outcomes of M&A in two distinct and
sometimes opposing ways
1. cultural differences can have an adverse effect on integration outcomes, e.g. creation
of positive attitudes towards new organization
2. Cultural differences can also be a source of value creation (new unique capabilities)
MNO subsidiary structure
- Pressure for local adaptation derive from social nature of organisation and their
tendency to reflect values, norms
- Pressures for conformity to local norms and for internal consistency with the rest of the
organisation can vary from subsidiary to subsidiary
Managerial roles in MNOs
- Loose coupling ob subunits → coordination and control must shift to individuals in
positions that link these subunits
- Managers of subsidiaries of MNOs function across internal & external boundaries (act
as boundary spanning role)
Cultural differences in psychological contract
- Psychological contracts consist of individual beliefs/perceptions on the exchange
relationships between individual and organization
- Transactional aspects of contract: emphasize specific short-term, monetary obligations
- Relational contracts: emphasise broad, long-term, socioemotional obligations, e.g.
commitment & loyalty

Chapter 10: the challenge of international assignments

Role of expatriates
1. Polycentric = local foreign manager only
2. Ethnocentric = home country managers predominate
3. Geocentric = mix of nationalities at home and abroad
4. Regiocentric = mix of nationalities within regions
→ roles vary

Individual staffing decisions:

- reflect overall firm-level staffing strategy
- Employee is expected to fill while on overseas assignment
Selection of managers for overseas assignments
- Technical competence
Decision to accept an overseas assignment
- Motivated primarily by opportunity for career development

Definitions of expatriate success

- Turnover: premature return of expatriates to home country
- Adjustment: ability of expat to overcome cultural shock

U-curve of cross-cultural adjustment

1. Honeymoon stage
2. Culture shock stage
3. Adjustment stage
4. Mastery stage

Adjustment-performance relationship - expat successful if:

- Meets performance expectations of quality and quantity of home and host country
- Develops & maintains satisfactory relationships with local nationals
- Acquires skills related to managing people of different cultures
- Remains on assignment the agreed-upon length of time

Indicators affecting expat success

Individual factors
- Demographics
- Foreign language ability
- Nationality of expat
- Gender
Job and organizational factors
- Expats job characteristics
- Job level
- Expat training

Framework for selecting cross-cultural training

Environmental factors
- Cultural novelty
- Social support+
- Repatriation: requires process of adjustment

Outcome overseas assignment

- Net effect neutral or negative on long-term career

Mock
MCQs
1d
2a
3c
4c
5a
6a
7c
8a
9b
10 d
11 c
12a
13a
14a -> ch. 9
15a
16d
17b
18c
19c
20b
21c
22a
23a
24c
25a
26d
27d
28a
29b
30d

Open questions

Question 1
First level: Artifacts -> visible structures & processes such as language, technology and
art
—> Artifacts are the most external and the tangible aspect of culture
Second level: Espoused values -> strategies, philosophies, ideals, goals and means such
as heroic paths, sins and virtues
—> deeper level that reflects convictions about the nature of reality and what should be
done to successfully cope with reality

Third level: Basic underlying assumptions -> unconscious, taken for granted beliefs,
thoughts and feelings = the ultimate source of values and actions
—> the deepest and invisible layer of culture

Question 2
- Norways scores way lower on masculinity than Turkey -> nurturing others is more
important in Norway while power over others is more relevant in Turkey -> female
leadership is more valued in Norway than in Turkey
- Connection between culture and leadership behaviour
- Paternalistic leaders or Sheikhocracy in Turkey: leadership in the Arab world I
strongly influenced by the Islamic religion & tribal traditions, meaning that leaders are
expected to be authoritarian and patriarchal
- Self protective leadership is common in the Middle East -> want leader that ensures
safety and security of the group -> leader should be self-centred, status conscious,
conflict inducing and face saving
- Charismatic / value-based leadership is valued in Nordic Europe -> want leader to be
able to inspire, motivate and expect high performance from others based on strongly
held core values -> leader should be visionary, inspirational, self-sacrificing,
trustworthy, decisive and performance oriented

Question 3
- Stereotypes = categorisation of the characteristics and behaviour of a set of
individuals, national stereotypes represent a simple or even overly simple
representation of a cultural group, these categorisations and there with expectations of
a cultural group are based on simplifications of information about individuals &
societies that are provided by the environment
- three characteristics of stereotyping:
- Based on limited information
- Generalises social evidence to categorise people
- Can be positive or negative, but usually negative
- Relate to schemas
- Three “errors”
- Social dominance: stereotypes result in a disproportional allocation of privilege
- Resistance to new information: new information may be inconsistent with one’s
stereotype but will still be ignored in order to maintain the original stereotype
- Evaluation and complexity: individuals have better information about more familiar
social categories, which results in less variation for other social categories
- Attribution error: general tendency of people to attribute any behaviour to
characteristics about the individual and underestimate the effects of the situation