CLIR100 Winter 2024 Global Models in Intercultural Relations CULTURAL DIMENSIONSStudent Name: ___Nguyen Anh Khoa____ Deadline: Thursday, July 11th, 2024 Background As announced in the course syllabus and discussed in class, each student must purchase a license to complete one personal “Culture Compass” survey online. The license should be purchased from the Toronto Metropolitan University Campus Store (at a substantial student discount compared to online pricing). The link to purchase the code has been posted to the Week 8 folder, and the survey can be accessed via the following hyperlink once you have received it: https://www.hofstedeinsights.com/launch-culture-compass/. Follow the instructions on the website and below to complete your assignment. Here is the website description of Cultural Compass Survey: The Culture Compass™ was developed by Hofstede Insights. The purpose of the survey is to make you aware of potential cultural pitfalls and to increase your effectiveness in dealing with those being born and raised in your country of interest. Since you as a person probably differ from the average score of your home country, this survey will measure your personal score on Hofstede’s model in order to give advice as accurately as possible. Your personal score will be compared to the score of your country of interest. Procedure Your Culture Compass code can be purchased from the TMU Campus Store website. The link is provided via our Week 8 Moodle folder. Once you have purchased the code, you will receive an order confirmation. A representative from the campus store will then e-mail your code to you. You may need to wait up to 24 hours to receive your code during the week, and no codes will be sent on the weekend, so please plan accordingly. Please note that if shipping charges are listed in your order total, you can simply ignore them. Our campus store representative assures us that shipping will not be charged to your card once the order is processed since the codes represent free delivery. You can also stop by the Campus Store during business hours and ask for Risto to purchase the code for CLIR 100. After receiving your code from the campus store representative, visit the Hofstede Insights website: https://www.hofstede-insights.com/launch-culture-compass/, enter your code, check your email for a link to the survey, read the instructions, fill out the form, select your capacity/role, and begin. You will select three countries of interest to you (not including Canada). These countries should represent places you may actually wish to live in for an extended period of time in the future. You will respond to all survey questions (42 pairs of statements). This will generate a report for you to download and examine. After examining the report, you will write out a reflection based on instructions listed in Parts 2–3 of the assignment below. You will then upload two documents to the assignment the assignment Dropbox on Moodle: One, the pdf. file of your survey results generated by the website, and two, this completed document (including your responses to Part 2 and Part 3) in pdf format. Grading Breakdown This assignment is worth 15% of your course grade. The assignment is marked in three layers: • ϖ Completeness (5/15): Are all three parts of the assignment present and complete? • ϖ Carefulness (3/15): Have you carefully proofread for style, grammar & punctuation? • ϖ Awareness (7/15): Have you thoroughly and thoughtfully responded to Parts 2–3? Part 1: Upload Your Personal Report After completing the survey and receiving your response results pdf, download the pdf report to your hard drive; then, close the report and upload it to the assignment Dropbox on Moodle. Part 2: Country Selection Prepare background context for interpreting and discussing your results by responding to the following two questions. Remember, Hofstede’s Country Comparison Tool can help with this. 1. Which three countries did you select for the current Cultural Dimensions exercise and why? The three countries that I chose are Germany, Luxembourg and South Korean. Personally Luxembourg is the one that has the most interesting for me with the unique of high standards of living, and both Germany and South Korea is quite a bit of history due to WW2 made it become more developed and changed in culture and economic. 2. Using the Country Comparison Tool on the Hofstede Insights website, provide a summary profile for each country you are comparing in the current Cultural Dimensions exercise relative to Hofstede’s first four Cultural Dimensions (Power Distance, Individualism, Motivation towards Achievement and Success, and Uncertainty Avoidance). Canada is filled out as an example below. My status: Power Distance: Individualism: Motivation/Achievement/Success: Uncertainty Avoidance: ambiguity) 83 (high: hierarchical society) 34 (moderate low: slightly collectist) 39 (moderate low: consensus society) 34 (moderate low: somewhat open to Country Selection 1: Germany Power Distance: Individualism: Motivation/Achievement/Success: Uncertainty Avoidance: 35 (moderate low: egalitarian tendencies) 79 (high: strongly individualist) 66 (moderate high: a decisive society) 65 (moderate high: well-thought-out) Country Selection 2: Luxembourg Power Distance: 40 (moderate low: egalitarian tendencies) Individualism: Motivation/Achievement/Success: Uncertainty Avoidance: Napoleonic time) Country Selection 3: South Korea Power Distance: Individualism: Motivation/Achievement/Success: Uncertainty Avoidance: 60 (moderate high: somewhat individualist) 50 (moderate: subdued competitive drive) 70 (moderately high: common sense since 60 (moderate: slightly hierarchical society) 58 (moderate: slightly individualist) 39 (moderate low: consensus society) 85 (high: highly uncertainty avoidance) Part 3: Response Write-up Discuss your results by providing a summary discussion of anything you found interesting, surprising, or otherwise noteworthy in carrying out this exercise and viewing your results. What questions does it bring up? In what ways does it confirm or conflict with what you might have guessed? How might the results from this report help you better prepare to be more interculturally competent when visiting your chosen host countries or interacting with others from the host country? Please also organize your response into paragraphs based on the questions provided and/or the thematic links between them. Remember to save this file as a separate pdf document prior to uploading. No other format is acceptable. Recommended length: 500–600 words. WRITE YOUR RESPONSE HERE (Single-space) According to my cultural compass report, the four indicators of power distance are high. Individualism, achievement motivation and uncertainty avoidance are low to moderate. 1. My power gap with the other three countries is significantly high at 83 points, while only South Korea is 60. Germany and Luxembourg are both below 40. These scores indicate the extent of power distance in these countries, with higher scores suggesting a greater power distance. The gap is apparent, highlighting the differences between Asian and European countries. In addition, the fact that I grew up in Vietnam in a society with a vast power differential also influenced me a lot. 2. I also scored 34 on the individualism index, which measures the degree of individualism in a culture. This score indicates that I have learned to appreciate and navigate the two distinct cultures of Canada and my homeland, Vietnam. 3. My drive toward success and uncertainty avoidance scored 39 and 34, respectively. Because I became more open and comfortable with myself, I became less concerned about uncertainties and more motivated to succeed. Based on these statistics, I have grown and realized what I almost missed before the combination of cultures between my home country and Canada. Studying abroad made me lose sight of the Vietnamese people with many cultural values. By combining with the culture learned in Canada, I am becoming increasingly complete with many cultures worldwide. Finally, doing the survey also helps me understand the lifestyle and thinking of most people in the three countries mentioned above, helping me gain an objective and reputable view to advise in advance when making decisions. For example, working in Germany can make me feel like I'm not close to anyone because they often hide their private lives from you or in Luxembourg, you can start to feel as uninterested as you. If you only have a little time to do your own thing, you may feel imprisoned by all the structures, procedures, and rules imposed on you. Without these parameters and predictions, it seems that absorbing these cultural values will take more time. However, these parameters are only for knowing whether I am suitable. I have to experience it to understand.
