GLOBAL MBA 21-22
What is culture?
Business and Culture
Workshop One
Week 4
Exploring the nature of national culture and
workplace culture
Learning
Objectives
• What is culture?
• Understanding the layer of
culture
• Sharing cultural experiences
• Sterotyping
• Why does culture matter to
Business
Ship Wrecked: 26 different
nationalities, no common
language, different ages,
men, women and children.
What are some of the big
decisions you would need
to make?
Defining culture …
the coherent, learned, shared view of a
group of people about life’s concerns that
ranks what is important, furnishes attitudes
about what things are appropriate, and
dictates behaviour”
Varner & Beamer, 2011, p.5)
Learned: we are not born with it; culture is learned from those
View of a group : around us agreed, shared views of a society
What is important : influences what we see as important
Impacts behaviour: influences the way we do things
Defining culture …
“a complex frame of reference that
consists of patterns of traditions
beliefs, values, norms, symbols, and
meanings that are shared to varying
degrees by interacting members of a
community”
(Ting-Toomey, 1999, p.10)
Traditions: rituals, ceremonies, rites of
passage
Beliefs values, norms: underlying principles
governing behaviours
Symbols: language (verbal, non-verbal) also
images
• Defining culture …
“a complex frame of reference that
consists of patterns of traditions beliefs,
values, norms, symbols, and meanings
that are shared to varying degrees by
interacting members of a community”
(Ting-Toomey, 1999, p.10)
Meanings: Interpretations of symbols held by
members
‘Shared to varying degrees’: Not every single member
of the culture to the same degree!
“A frame of reference” for making sense of the world
The Iceberg of Culture
In awareness
Out of conscious
awareness
Visible
Invisible
The Iceberg of Culture
Fine arts Literature
Drama Classical music Popular music
Folk dancing
Games
Cooking
Dress
Notions of modesty Conceptions of beauty Ideas about child raising
Rules of descent Cosmology Relationship to animals Courtship practices
Patterns of superior/subordinate relations
Definitions of sin
Conceptions of justice Notions of leadership Incentive to work Tempo of work
Attitudes to the dependent Approaches to problem solving
Patterns of group decision making Eye behaviour
Conceptions of cleanliness
Theories of disease Conception of status mobility
Roles in relation to status by age, sex, class, occupation, kinship etc
Definition of insanity Nature of friendship Conception of self
Patterns of visual perception Body language Facial expression
Notions of logic and validity Patterns of handling emotions Conversational patterns
Conception of past & future
Ordering of time
Preference for competition or cooperation Social interaction rate
Notions of adolescence Arrangements of physical space
The Fundamentals of Culture (Hofestede)
Signs and Symbols
Visible culture
…open to the foreigner
Behavioural
Norms
Values
& Beliefs
• Think How long might it take an outsider to understand these values?
Culture’s rules
…an effort for the foreigner
Culture’s core assumptions
…difficult to access for the foreigner
Sharing your Dominant National Identity
TASK!
Create a
visual
representatio
n of your
National
Identity,
Include, text,
videos
1. Start with the visual cues that are easy to identify
(National symbols, objects with meaning, national heros,
culture, language, words, music, art)
2. Can you identify some behaviors/cultural norms to your
national identity
3. What are core values to your National identity.
Tip on Values! Read the descriptions of national values for
China, India and Britain
(handout ‘National Values’ in Learning Materials)
Ireland Signs & Symbols
Irish Behaviours and Norms
• Irish Humor: “The Craic”
• Meeting Etiquette: Handshake and Eye Contact, Causal, Friendly
• Communication Style: appreciate modesty and dislike a superiority complex of any sort.
Understated, and avoid conflict and offence. Expect a great deal of discussion at meetings.
• Irish work hard but they also take time to enjoy life and expect others to do the same.
• Employees expect to be consulted on decisions
• They prefer to offer noncommittal responses such as "maybe".
• The Irish are more impressed by results than promises.
Irish Values and Beliefs
Superiors are accessible….low power distance
Individualistic
Masculine society
Ok with uncertainty. Indulgent
Word Cloud: Modesty, Patriotism, Creativity, Earn Respect,
Low context culture, direct/indirect feedback, trusting, very low comfort with silence
Comparing and Contrasting National Values
Hofstede
‘The Onion’
Manifestation
of Culture at
Different
Depths
HOFSTEDE & MINKOV, M. (2010). P8
Symbols: words, pictures, objects that carry a meaning, superficial easy to copy
and disregard
Heroes: alive or dead, real or imaginary who possess characteristics that are high
valued in society
Rituals: greetings, religious and social ceremonies
Practices: (rituals and heroes) visible to the outside observer, but cultural meaning
is invisible
Values: tendencies to prefer certain states of affairs over others (Moral vs
immoral, evil vs good, ugly versus beautiful, forbidden vs permitted
The Learning
of Values and
Practices
HOFSTEDE & MINKOV, M. (2010). P8
Bi-culturalism and
cultural hybrids
• Bi-cultural individuals identify with the values
and cultural practices of two different
cultures.
• Bi-culturals navigate different worlds in
their working and social lives,
constantly switching cultural frames.
• Cultural hybrids have absorbed several cultural
influences. They may include ‘3rd culture kids’
whose cultural identity lies in-between space.
Infra-national levels:
below the level of
nation
Layers or levels of
culture
Can you think of Examples for both?
Supra-national levels:
above the level
of nation
Layers of culture:
sub-cultures
• In every society there are also many
other types of sub-cultures, defined by, for
example:
• social class, gender, sexual orientation,
occupation, age (youth culture), political
culture (e.g. dissident subcultures).
• Members of these subcultures vary in
certain distinctive ways from the norms
and values of the national culture
(spreading around the central tendency).
NATIONAL
CULTURE IS…
‘…the collective programming of the mind
that distinguishes the members of one
group or category of people from others’
•
•
‘…shared values and belief systems’
•
‘…culture is learned’
Source: Cultures & Organisations: Software of the Mind
(3rd Edn) Hofstede, Hofstede, Minkov
Multi-cultural societies
Global migration on an unprecedented scale in the last decades has
contributed to diversity and change in the world’s populations.
The world today has huge populations living outside of their country of
birth/citizenship: transnationals *
Cultures shift from homogenous to heterogenous
Rise of new global cities.
* Includes
economic migrants
migrants for settlement
educational migrants
refugees & asylum seekers
‘Superdiverse’ cities
• Since the early 90s, the scale of
migration has escalated to a point where
‘multicultural’ has now been replaced by
‘superdiverse’.
• Superdiversity* refers to the
transformation of large numbers of world
cities: ‘the world in one city’
“Is Dubai a Super-diverse City”?, what are
examples of Super-diverse city.
WHY DOES NATIONAL CULTURE MATTER?
•
Culture frames our personal preferences
Culture frames our behavioural
expectations of others
•
Culture frames our reactions to others’ behaviour
•
Culture is ‘The Software of the Mind’
(Hofstede)
•
WHAT ABOUT CULTURAL
STEREOTYPING?
•
Cultural Generalization: Making a
statement of probability based on
systematically collected data;
identifying a tendency demonstrated by
a majority of cultural group members
•
Stereotyping: The application of a
cultural generalisation to every
member in a cultural group, or
generalising from only a few group
members or inadequate data
WHAT ABOUT CULTURAL STEREOTYPING?
..normal distribution / national average scores
Group Learning task
• What challenges in dealing
with other cultures, have you
found so far in university,
business, personal?
• Why does it matter in a
business or work context?
• Have you found cultural
differences coming to Dubai,
ever experience differences
working in teams, in the
Workplace or in University,
any challenges you noticed?
What is organizational culture and why
does it matter so much?
• Organisations have their own culture: values, practices, procedures,
conventions
• Frameworks for national cultures cannot necessarily be applied to
organisations
• When two organisations merge – clashes of culture are common, though it’s
not always clear if it is a national culture clash or an organisational culture
clash
• Employees overnight are expected to follow a new and different code of
values, procedures and expectations of behaviour.
• When an individual moves from working in one company to another, similar
‘culture shock’ can be experienced because of different organisational
cultures.
“Appreciating cultural differences is
paramount to the success of a deal;
companies who pass over them pay
a steep price” Katherine LaVelle, Managing
Director of Accenture, 2021
“Cultural factors and organizational
alignment are critical to success (and
avoiding failure) in mergers. Some
95 percent of executives describe
cultural fit as critical to the success
of integration. Yet 25 percent cite a
lack of cultural cohesion and
alignment as the primary reason
integration efforts fail” McKinsey,
2019
“CULTURE has become
one of the most
important business
topics of 2016. CEOs and
HR leaders now
recognize that culture
drives people’s behavior,
innovation, and
customer service: 82
percent of survey
respondents believe that
“culture is a potential
competitive advantage.”
Deloitee, 2016
Accenture (2021):
“Acquiring companies in
mergers with a particularly
wide cultural disparity
between the acquirer and
the acquiree saw an
average net income drop of
more than US$600 million
per year. Companies looking
to complete a merger often
fail to follow through with
assessing and creating a
long-term strategic
roadmap for merging
cultures, thus creating an
opening for deal failure.”
Some Takeaways
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Definitions of culture
The iceberg and the onion
Presentation Takeaways
Multi-culturalism
Sterotyping
Corporate Culture
Next Cultural Frameworks
Resources
• National Values Handout
• Hofstede and Minkov (2010)
• Spencer and Oatey (2009)
• Hofstede (2011) Dimensionalizing Cultures