WEEK 1
Chapter 1. Determinants of culture
1.1 Facets of culture
What does culture really mean?
Genelot (1998) stresses that men are products of their culture: their representations, their visions of
what is good and what is wrong, their behaviour at work, their concepts of organizations are the fruit
of the representations carried by their ancestors.
Hofstede refers to culture as ‘the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the
members of one human group from another; culture, in this sense, includes systems of values and
values are among the building blocks of culture.’
The group shares meanings that hold them together. The definition also implies that the group’s
culture is learned rather than being innate: passed down generation to generation. Culture is seen as
relative: no cultural group is ‘better’ in any absolute sense.
Norms and values
Each culture can be seen as three layers:
1. First, outer layer: ‘behavioral’ or ‘explicit’ level. It is what you notice immediately when you
go abroad for the first time: language, food, etc.
2. Second layer: ‘norms and values’. Together, these form the national characteristics of a
culture and act as its framework of reference. Norms are the rules of a society, determining
what is good or bad. Values are what is considered important or unimportant, beautiful or not
beautiful, right or wrong.
3. Third, innermost layer: assumptions and beliefs.
Sociologists have concluded that there are four categories within a society:
1. Traditional society, in which religion plays an important role. Large families are encouraged,
conformity is rewarded, individualism rejected.
2. Rational society, in which the interests of the individual come first, birth control is
encouraged and the authority of the state is recognized.
3. A society in which survival is the primary concern, where people aren’t happy and rather
intolerant, where equality between sexes has little chance, materialism is predominant.
4. Post-modern society, tolerant and democratic, such as Scandinavia or The Netherlands.
Politics and norms and values
Humanitarian norms and values influenced by politics are formally laid down in the ‘Universal
Declaration of Human Rights’.
In some countries, politics has a say in education, dress, manners, and other aspects of daily life. For
example, students from Iranian universities heavily criticized their political leaders for prescribing
how Iranians should dress, do their hair, and how they should enjoy themselves.
Conversely, there are degrees of acceptance with regard to what politicians in each country may (not)
do: what causes a scandal and what not. In Nordic Europe, for example, it is known that there is
corruption in political life but it’s not acceptable.
The freedoms a politician may enjoy in their private life are also different per country. Homosexual
politicians may not be accepted in many countries, but in the Netherlands for example, it is regarded
as a private matter.
Can one talk of a movement towards a shared system of norms and values? French philosopher Edgar
Morin declared that the creation of a European culture had nothing to do with dominant basic ideas. It
,had to do with the opposition between ideas. In the forming process, the meeting of diversity, of
opposite poles, the complementarity of ideas were important. Called ‘dialogique’: the union of two
forms of logic, of two different principles, without their duality being lost.
Cultural assumptions in management
Schein defines culture as: a set of basic assumptions – shared solutions to universal problems of
external adaptation (how to survive) and internal integration (how to stay together) – which have
evolved over time and are handed down form one generation to the next.
In terms of external adaptation, this for example means asking: to what extent does management
within a culture assume that it can control nature or to what extent is it controlled by nature?
1.2 Levels of culture
According to Schein, a culture starts developing in a context where a group of people have a shared
experience (sharing life together, a hobby, occupation).
In a business context, culture can develop at different levels – within a department or at the various
ranks of a hierarchy. A company can develop its own culture, provided that it has what Schein calls
‘sufficient shared history’.
Culture and nation
The terms ‘culture’ and ‘nation’ should be carefully distinguished when cross-cultural matters are
under discussion. For example, people in Turkey, Iraq and Iran have a distinctive cultural identity but
live in three nation states with different political boundaries.
At the macro level, the nation, in terms of its laws and economic institutions, must be taken into
account by organizations going about their business. They have to consider the measures taken by the
state to protect its interests and those of its inhabitants (like specific employment laws). These
considerations are subject to change through political changes in government and through the desire
of the nation’s rulers to share legislation at social and economic level with other nations within some
kind of association.
At the micro level, the organization is influenced by cultural elements relating to employer-employee
relationships and to behaviour among employees.
National culture
Tayeb says: there is ‘a constant thread … through our lives which makes us distinguishable from
others, especially those in other countries: this thread is our national culture.’
This national culture is heterogenous in nature, but contains enough elements which together enable a
national culture to be created.
Two elements that contribute to the building of a nation and the creation of a nation culture:
1. The physical environment;
2. The history the nation has undergone.
Tayeb refers to ‘institutions’ that contribute to the establishment of a national culture:
a) Family: the basic social unit where ‘acculturation’ takes place.
b) Religion: religious beliefs can have a significant effect on a person’s view of the world.
c) Education: the value system and the choices it makes in curriculum both help in the formation
of a culture, particularly where educational institutions are well developed.
d) Mass communication media: the ever increasing presence has given a new meaning to shared
experiences: it ‘brings people closer together irrespective of their geographical locations but
also in terms of culture’.
e) Multinational company: a powerful culture-building institution, whose products and services
can influence the way people live, whose operations can affect how and where they work.
, Organizational culture
Power of culture: it determines our behaviour individually and collectively. In organizational terms,
Schein remarks on how cultural elements affect the way strategy is determined, goals are established
and how the organization operates. The key personnel involved are influenced by their own cultural
backgrounds and shared experiences.
Organizational culture is the acceptance – in a tacit/formal way- of norms of specific behaviour by the
members of an organization.
Corporate culture
If an organization develops into a multinational conglomerate, the culture at headquarters may
influence that of subsidiaries abroad. A firm involved in a joint venture with a company from another
country may find that the presence of the ‘foreign’ partners influences the underlying culture of the
company.
Some regard a clearly defined corporate culture as key to a (multi)national company’s success, others
consider a flexible culture to be key to success because it can adapt to/respond effectively to a
local/national environment.
Professional culture
Professional culture is essentially to do with the set of values shared by people working together
professionally.
Schein talks of three professional cultures in management:
1. The ‘operators’ who are directly involved in production of goods or the provision of services.
2. The ‘engineers’, the people who design and monitor the technology behind the production
and/or provision of services.
3. The ‘executives’, the senior managers who share tacit assumptions regarding ‘the daily
realities of their status and role’.
Culture and management
At the basis of all cultures lies the individual’s culture. It is individuals who ultimately form the
culture of an organization.
Nancy Adler gives a definition of what cross-cultural management is about: Cross-cultural
management explains the behavior of people in organizations around the world and shows people
how to work in organizations with employees and client populations from many different cultures.
Cross-cultural management describes organizational behavior within countries and cultures;
compares organizational behavior across countries and cultures; and, perhaps most important, seeks
to understand and improve the interaction of co-workers, managers, executives, clients, suppliers,
and alliance partners from countries and cultures around the world.
From another perspective, more oriented to the management tasks, it can be defined as follows: the
core task of cross-cultural management is to facilitate and direct synergistic action and learning at
interfaces where knowledge, values and experience are transferred into multi-cultural domains of
implementation.
Chapter 5: Cultural dimensions and dilemmas
Preface: motivation – needs and values
At an abstract level, a dilemma is related to the question whether something like an ideal, universally
valid culture exists, one which can be applied to any local culture.
At an emotional and personal level, a dilemma may occur when the cultural actor is trying to modify
certain behaviour or values in a given culture.
