The impact of facets and levels of culture on cross-cultural management in the international business environment
The concept of culture reflects the collective experiences of the society, mainly the large groups of national and ethnic groups. Culture represents the beliefs, values, rituals and behavior that considered part of the community. Within the modern workplace and as a result of globalization and the emergence of the multinational corporations, the cross-culture (CQ) concept has emerged in the research work. CQ aims to increase the international leaders’ effectiveness through eliminating potential miscommunication and intercultural conflict that could emerge due to working with people from different cultures at the workplace (Laurea, 2013/2014).
The following section provides an analysis of various topics associated with cultural differences in doing global business
The international business is heavily connected with economics. It mainly concerns with the quantitative and generalizability of the results of the economic-based strategies. The economic activities on the international level could only be understood by recognizing the human behavior. That is why many researchers have shifted their studies from the economic-based to psychology-based and human-centered research. Culture is the core of the societal concern, it has to be included in studying the international business aspects. This represents the emergence of the culture-inclusive paradigm. These developments resulted in the rise of the Japanese economy and the Western business organizations. The management principles in Japan are very different from those in the West (Pudelko, Tenzer, & Harzing, 2015).
Rockstuhl et al. (2011), as cited in Ott & Michailova (2018), argue that leaders who work in the host countries need to adapt to the diverse environments. The problems associated with the leadership are mainly social and influenced by culture. The CQ is very important to the global leaders as it indicates their level of effectiveness. Studies proved that the international leaders can improve their competency by increasing their CQ. It could be increased through training and educational programs either before, during or after the international mission.
Peng et al. (2015), as cited in Ott & Michailova (2018), argue that the higher CQ motivational activities can facilitate learning, especially if they took place before the international experience. It results in an increased culture effectiveness.
The Hofstede’s cultural factors theory assumes that the individual differences affect people’s attitudes. Hofstede (1980), as cited in Valaei et al. (2016), argues that there are five factors of cultures. These factors are individualism-collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, power distance, masculinity versus femininity and long-term orientation. Although it is argued that the cultural factors are not constant all the time, they witness waves of changes over the time.
Applying three of Hofstede’s national cultural dimensions on the Australian culture and the East Asia cultures (Japan and Malaysia)
Regarding the power distance dimension, it argues that people in the societies are not equal, it measures the cultural attitudes towards inequalities. It is defined to be the extent that the less powerful individual expects and accepts the fact that power is unequally distributed. Australia reported very low consideration of the power distance. For example the Australian society is independent, enjoys equal rights and the management empowers people (Hofstede Insights, 2018). Malaysia was reported as high in power distance in 2002, in another study conducted in 2007, it was reported to be low in power distance (Valaei et al., 2016). Japan was reported to be at an intermediate level (Hofstede Insights, 2018).
Individualism versus the collectivism dimension refers to the degree of interdependence maintained by the society among its members. The individualist culture encourages people to look after themselves only. On the contrary, the collectivist culture encourages people to act as a group and devote care to another in exchange for loyalty. Australia is an individualist society, where people only care for themselves and families (Hofstede Insights, 2018). Malaysia was reported to have medium collectivism (Valaei et al., 2016). Japan was reported to be an individualistic culture, unlike its Asian neighbor countries, figure (1) shows Japan collectivism orientation argument map. But Japan still keeps some collective attitudes, for example, it encourages the harmony of the group more than individuals (Hofstede Insights, 2018).
Uncertainty avoidance is about the level of ignoring the circumstances that will happen in the future and the way the society deals with it. It reflects the level of feeling threatened by the unknown future situation that created a belief in avoiding it. Australia reported a high score of uncertainty avoidance that reflects people’s ability to be busy and work hard, avoid risk and maintain security (Hofstede Insights, 2018). Malaysia was reported medium-high in uncertainty avoidance dimension (Valaei et al., 2016). Japan was reported among the most uncertainty avoiding countries on the earth (Hofstede Insights, 2018).
Figure 1: Japan collectivism orientation argument map
The corporate culture reflects the way of interaction between the employees and management according to the prevailing beliefs and behaviors that are accepted within the organization to guide its practices. In Australia, the employer to employee relationship depends on mutual advantage and the promotion decision depends on performance only. The management is the individuals’ management (Hofstede Insights, 2018).
Malaysia is witnessing professional returnees that the government need in order to achieve its long-term aspiration of becoming a high-income economy by 2020. Malaysia works on improving the working environment for the returnees of the reverse brain drain phenomenon and career aspiration. The Malaysian organizations were formed by a variety of management practices, different business organizations including, governmental companies, multinational corporations and small and medium enterprises. However, the cultural differences in organization and communication represent the main challenge at the workplace (Kunasegaran et al., 2016). Malaysia has many ethnic groups that are totally different from each other (Hassan, 2015).
The meaning of corporate culture and its application in Australia and East Asia
The Japanese corporate culture maintains the junior to the senior relationship. The younger employee is the junior where the senior is the mentor for junior and it is the junior responsibility to help the senior. Employees tend to be formal, for example the customer service employees represent formality and politeness, although they do not express warm feelings (Aliasis, 2018).
The Hinduism culture is reported to be high scored in hierarchical structure according to Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. It reveals a high level of power inequality, for example: at the workplace, the decisions taken by managers are never questioned, employees should respect the authority. The categorization of people has evolved from the Hinduism beliefs (Laurea, 2013/2014).
The Confucian concepts have evolved from the samurai elite. But the Neo-Confucianism has evolved to become the umbrella that attracted the illiterates and the elites as well (Mosk, 2015). Confucian represents the traditions that have shaped the Chinese culture for centuries. At the workplace, Confucianism hierarchal structure takes place. It represents respect and obedience from juniors to seniors as well as in the Hinduism management culture. Also, employees are highly devoted to knowledge and practicing what they have learned as part of the process of self-cultivation. The educated employees are highly appreciated and perceived as intelligent (Cocodia, 2014).
Conclusions
Culture is the core of the societal concern, it has to be included in studying the international business aspects. This represents the emergence of the culture-inclusive paradigm.
The corporate culture reflects the way of interaction between the employees and management according to the prevailing beliefs and behavior accepted within the organization that guides its practices. The CQ motivational activities can facilitate learning, especially if took place before the international experience.
References
Aliasis. (2018, June 6). Cultural differences between the USA and Japan. Retrieved from owlcation: https://owlcation.com/social-sciences/Cultural-Differences-Between-the-US-and-Japan
Cocodia, E. (2014). Cultural perceptions of human intelligence. Journal of Intelligence, 2(4), 180-196.
Hassan, H. (2015). Social semiotics: Realizing destination image by means of cultural representations. International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, 5(1), 149-153.
Hofstede Insights. (2018, October 5). Country comparison: Japan. Retrieved from Hofstede Insights: https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison/japan/
Kunasegaran, M., Ismail, M., Rasdi, R., & Ismail, I. (2016). Intercultural and workplace adaptation: A case study of Malaysian professional returnees. Social and Behavioral Sciences, 219, 448 – 454.
Laurea, T. (2013/2014). Managing cultural differences in international business: Indian & Italian multicultural encounters. Venice: Ca’ Foscari University.
Mosk, C. (2015). Capitalism and religion. Canada: University of Victoria.
Ott, D., & Michailova, S. (2018). Cultural intelligence: A review and new research avenues. International Journal of Management Reviews, 20, 99-119.
Pudelko, M., Tenzer, H., & Harzing, A. (2015). Cross-cultural management and language studies within international business research: Past and present paradigms and suggestions for future research. UK: Middlesex University.
Valaei, N., Rezaei, S., Ismail, W., & Oh, Y. (2016). The effect of culture on attitude towards online advertising and online brands: Applying Hofstede’s cultural factors to internet marketing. International Journal of Internet Marketing and Advertising, 10(4), 270-301.
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