(Textbook) Behavior in Organizations, 8ed (A. B. Shani)

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• BADM 633 - Wk 3
• International Business Culture
• Terry Ryan

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British Isles Wrap-up

• Implications for Managers in UK and Ireland

• two countries, separated by a common
• language. George Bernard Shaw
• Language minor challenges
• Laws ? US legal procedures mostly
• based on British precedence
• Regulations many identical, BUT
• applied differently
• Openness to New Business very high
• Inward Direct Investment welcomed

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Illustrations from Ferraro

• Friedman communist bloc free world
• Lowering tariff barriers and explosion of IT
• Illustrations 12.5 or one in eight US
• residents are foreign-born
• Foreign-owned businesses employ gt5MM
• Outsourcing of jobs
• Foreign travel

Outsourcing of religious rituals ( ! ! ! )
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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Friedman Lexus and the Olive Tree
• Berlin Wall
• Weight replaced by speed
• Cold War us vs. them replaced by all
• peoples of the world as competitors
• Historical fiction of industrial complexes
• replacing nation-states
• World-wide production facilities

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Two views of anthology
• Indiana Jones
• Academic
• Anthropology the study of humanity
• Anthropology differs from other studies of
• humans in both geography and history
• Archeology
• Physical Anthropology
• Anthropological Linguistics
• Cultural Anthropology

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Cultural Anthropology Business
• Much of the body of literature features
• American-trained anthropologists
• studying American companies.
• US business organisations are composed of
• people from diverse backgrounds
• Organisations must understand their
• associates just as marketers attempt to
• identify different target segments
• Values, attitudes, lifestyles (VALs) plus
• opinions, expectations and behaviours

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Cultural Anthropology Intl Business
• Expertise ? Travels yes or no?
• Inability to adapt to understand and adapt to
• foreign ways of thinking and acting
• Marketing Miscues
• rendezvous lounges in Brazil
• Perdue It takes a virile man to make a
• chicken affectionate ( ! )
• Got milk?
• Japan team example
• Bahrain example

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• Dominance of US Multi-Nationals
• Changed and continuing to change
• Trade deficits
• Unfair trade practices
• Quintessential consumers
• Expatriate Attrition
• Saudi Arabia 68
• Japan 37
• London 18
• Costs of failure

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Cultural Anthropology International Business

• International Competency
• Knowledge of others
• Knowledge of self
• Skills to interpret and relate
• Skills to discover and interact
• Valuing beliefs an behaviours of others
• Seeing oneself relative to others
• Linguistic competency
• Winthrop recognised need for inter-
• national awareness both in University-
• wide GLI and within the CBA.

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Culture International Business

• Cultured vs. Culture
• Finer things in life
• Interests and tastes
• Culture is everything that people have,
• think and do as members of their
• societies.
• Have material goods or objects
• Think ideas, values, attitudes and beliefs
• Do behave in certain ways (normative or
• expected patterns of behaviour)

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Culture International Business

• Culture is learned
• Nature or nurture
• Born into an existing culture
• Learning abilities are comparable
• Cross-cultural expertise can be learned
• Culture influences biological processes
• Food
• Pain control
• Aesthetics ear piercing, tattoos, plastic
• surgery

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Culture International Business

• Cultural Universals
• 850 distinctly different cultures with mutually
  
• unintelligible languages in Africa alone.
• Number of differences between cultures
• illustrates flexibility adaptability of
  humans
• Maslows hierarchy
• Physiological
• Safety
• Belonging
• Esteem
• Self-actualisation

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Culture International Business

• Cultural Universals
• Economic Systems producing, distributing
• and consuming essentials
• Marriage and Family Systems mating,
• marriage, child-rearing and family formation
• Educational Systems learn the way of life
• Social Control Systems most of the peo-
• ple obey most of the rules most of the time
• Supernatural Belief Systems explaining
• the unexplainable religions help shape
• attitudes towards work, savings, consump-
  
• tion, efficiency and personal responsibility

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Culture International Business

• Cultural Change - All cultures experi-
• ence continual change.
• Internal Forces discovery and invention
• External Forces cultural diffusion
• the innovation is superior
• consistent with existing patterns
• easily understood
• can be tested experimentally
• benefits are clear to a large number of people
• Lets discuss

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Culture International Business

• Cultural Borrowing
• Two-way street
• Primitive vs. Civilised Societies
• Borrowed ideas/items usually not
• transferred in exact original form.
• Some cultural traits more easily diffused
• than others.
• Dynamism of Cultures - Things, ideas and
  behaviour patterns can undergo additions,
  deletions and modifications.

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Culture International Business

• Ethnocentrism Culture-centred
• Tendency to believe that one's ethnic or
• cultural group is centrally important and
  
• that all other groups are measured in
• relation to one's own ( S R C )
• American War of Independence
• Who were the Rebels?
• Who were the Patriots?

• Continentals were the rebels
• Tories were the Patriots who supported
• the Red-coats
• Kings Mountain Col. Patrick Ferguson

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Culture International Business

• Ethnocentrism
• No society has a monopoly on ethnocentrism
• Our" way is right, proper and normal
• Their way is wrong and inferior
• Pronunciations
• Ugly American (1958)
• NYC is NOT the center of
• the universe ?

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Culture International Business

• Integrated Culture
• Cultures thought of as integrated wholes
• coherent and logical systems
• some parts are interrelated
• Marital Practices
• Polygamy Legal barriers notwithstanding, it
• takes lotsa s to support multiple
  wives/progeny
• Polygyny supports social status based on size
  
• of household
• Polyandry-historical examples
• Ped-rage NYC
• Iceland - genealogical books

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Culture International Business

• Precautions
• Learned nature of culture
• Cultural influences on biological processes
• Cultural universals
• Ubiquity of cultural change
• Ethnocentrism
• Integrated nature of culture
• Generalizations
• As with stereotypes, generalisations are
• helpful, but are ONLY a starting point
• Ideal vs. actual behaviour

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Culture International Business

• Generalizations contd
• Rigidity in thinking can be disastrous
• Escalade example
• Japan example in textbook
• restaurant food
• Good vs. real reasons
• IQ Assessments great debate culturally-
• biased testing

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Culture International Business

• Corporations Have Own Cultures
• Shared values, behaviours and
• communications styles
• Symbols, legends, heroes, non-verbal cues
• Corporate Culture
• Identify common beliefs
• Gain consensus
• Document essential features
• Make culture visible to all on a continuing
• basis
• Provide explicit training corporate culture

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Culture International Business

• Corporations Have Own Cultures
• Shared values, behaviours and
• communications styles
• Symbols, legends, heroes, non-verbal cues
• Corporate Culture
• Identify common beliefs
• Gain consensus
• Document essential features
• Make culture visible to all on a continuing
• basis
• Provide explicit training corporate culture

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Culture International Business

• Cultural Differences in Business
• Challenges where do we hear about this??
• Examples?
• Opportunities how can we capitalise on
• differences btwn. corporate cultures??

Examples?
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• 2-1 Sam Lucas, a construction supervisor for an
  international engineering firm, had
• been chosen to supervise construction on a new
  hotel project, in Jidda, Saudi Arabia,
• primarily because of his outstanding work record.
  On this project, Sam supervised the
• work of about a dozen Americans and nearly one
  hundred Saudi laborers. It was not
• long before Sam realized that the Saudi laborers,
  to his way of thinking, were nowhere
• as reliable as the workers he had supervised in
  the United States. He was becoming
• increasingly annoyed at the seeming lack of
  competence of the local workforce.
• Following the leadership style that held him in
  such good stead at home, he would
• reprimand any worker who was not doing his job
  properly, and he would make certain
• that he did it publicly so that it would serve as
  an object lesson to all the other workers.
• He was convinced that he was doing the right
  thing and was being fair, for after all, he
• reprimanded both Americans and Saudis alike. He
  was troubled, however, by the fact
• that the problems seemed to be growing worse and
  more numerous.
• What advice might you give Sam?

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• 2-1 In the United States, public humiliation is
  one of a number of techniques that can be
• used quite effectively to change peoples
  behavior. In the world of Islam, however, where
• the preservation of dignity and self-respect is
  absolutely essential, public reprimand will
• be totally counterproductive. If Arabs feel that
  they have suffered a loss of personal
• dignity because they have been criticized in
  public, they take it as a dishonor to both
• themselves and their families. And when Sam
  insisted on using this motivational
• technique, he alienated not only the individual
  to whom the reprimand was directed but
• also all his fellow workers, who felt hurt on his
  behalf. When this happens, the person
• giving the reprimand loses the respect of those
  witnessing it.

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• 2-2 George Burgess was a chief engineer for a
  machinery manufacturer based in
• St. Louis. His company had recently signed a
  contract with one of its largest customers
• in Japan to upgrade the equipment and retrain
  mechanics to maintain the equipment
• more effectively. As part of the contract, the
  Japanese company sent all ten of their
• mechanics to St. Louis for a three-month
  retraining course under Georges supervision.
• Although George had never lived or worked abroad,
  he was looking forward to the challenge
• of working with the group of Japanese mechanics,
  because he had been told that
• they were all fluent in English and tireless
  workers. The first several weeks of the training
• went along quite smoothly, but soon George became
  increasingly annoyed with the constant
• demands they were making on his personal time.
  They would seek him out after the
• regularly scheduled sessions were over for
  additional information. They sought his advice
• on how to occupy their leisure time. Several even
  asked him to help settle a disagreement
• that developed between them. Feeling frustrated
  by all these demands on his time,
• George told his Japanese trainees that he
  preferred not to mix business with pleasure.
• Within a matter of days, the group requested
  another instructor.
• What was the principle operating here?

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• 2-2 The employeeemployer relationship in Japan
  is very different than in the United
• States. When a Japanese firm hires an employee,
  he or she becomes part of the
• corporate family. Whereas labor and management in
  the United States operate largely
• from an adversarial perspective, the relationship
  between the Japanese worker and the
• company is based on loyalty and a long-term
  commitment to one another. Not only do
• most employees expect to stay with the firm for
  the duration of their careers, but the firm
• also takes an active role in the personal lives
  of its employees and their families. Housing,
• recreation, and schooling for the children are
  just some of the areas arranged by the
• employers for their workers. Moreover, far less
  separation of business and personal
• matters occurs between Japanese employees and
  their supervisors. Thus, it is little
• wonder that the Japanese mechanics thought that
  George was not acting like a
• responsible supervisor because he was unwilling
  to become involved in their personal
• lives.

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• 2-4 Bob Mitchell, a retired military attaché with
  considerable experience in the Middle
• East, was hired by a large U.S. computer software
  company to represent it in a number
• of Persian Gulf countries. Having received an
  introduction from a mutual acquaintance,
• Bob arranged to meet with Mr. Saade, a wealthy
  Lebanese industrialist, to discuss the
• prospects of a joint venture between their
  companies. Having spent many years in
• the Middle East, Bob knew that they would have to
  engage in considerable small talk
• before they would get down to business. They
  talked about the weather, Bobs flight
• from New York, and their golf games. Then Saade
  enquired about the health of Bobs
• elderly father. Without missing a beat, Bob
  responded that his father was doing fine, but
• that the last time he saw his father at the
  nursing home several months ago he had lost
• a little weight. From that point on, Saades
  demeanor changed abruptly from warm and
• gracious to cool and aloof. Though the rest of
  the meeting was cordial enough, the
• meeting only lasted another two hours, and Bob
  was never invited back for further
• discussions on the joint venture.
• What went wrong?

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• 2-5 A U.S. fertilizer manufacturer headquartered
  in Minneapolis decided to venture into
• the vast potential of third-world markets. The
  company sent a team of agricultural
• researchers into an East African country to test
  soils, weather conditions, and topographical
• conditions in order to develop locally effective
  fertilizers. Once the research
• and manufacturing of these fertilizer products
  had been completed, one of the initial marketing
• strategies was to distribute, free of charge, one
  hundred-pound bags of the fertilizer
• to selected areas of rural farmers. It was
  thought that those using the free fertilizer
• would be so impressed with the dramatic increase
  in crop productivity that they would
• spread the word to their friends, relatives, and
  neighbors.
• Teams of salespeople went from hut to hut in
  those designated areas, offering
• each male head of household a free bag of
  fertilizer along with an explanation of its
• capacity to increase crop output. Although each
  head of household was very polite, they
• all turned down the offer of free fertilizer. The
  marketing staff concluded that these local
• people were either uninterested in helping
  themselves grow more food and eat better or
• so ignorant that they couldnt understand the
  benefits of the new product.
• Why was this an ethnocentric conclusion?

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• 2-6 While on a short business trip to Bolivia,
  Dr. Susan Henry, an organizational consultant
• from Atlanta, is invited to the home of one of
  her Bolivian business associates.
• Wanting to express her gratitude, Susan brings
  the host a couple of dozen purple tulips.
• When Susan presents them with the flowers,
  however, she notices that both the husband
• and the wife look startled. After the flowers had
  been taken to the kitchen, Susan feels
• somewhat insulted because they never displayed
  the flowers nor thanked her for them.
• What happened?

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• 2-7 As an organizational consultant from
  Philadelphia working with a Mexican company,
• Dan Shaver has been traveling to Mexico City
  every other week for months to help his
• client develop more-effective management systems.
  On this occasion, Dan scheduled a
• three-day trip, during which he planned to meet
  with a number of employees. But on the
• first day of scheduled meetings, Dan was informed
  that everyone would be leaving work
• at 200 P.M. because it was a fiesta day. Dan was
  furious because he had come all the
• way to Mexico just to have his first day of work
  cut short. As it turns out, Dans Mexican
• colleagues failed to understand why he was so
  angry.
• What was behind this misunderstanding?

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• 2-8 As an international organizational consultant
  from Toronto, Melissa Post was working
• on a two-month project in Quito, Ecuador. After
  several weeks on the project, Melissa had
• become a very good friend with Maria, a local
  employee of her client. Melissa had noticed
• that whenever Maria greeted her other female
  friends from Ecuador, they would kiss each
• other on the cheek. Since Melissa was feeling
  very good about her relationship with Maria,
• she decided that the next time they ran into one
  another outside the office, she would greet
• Maria with a kiss on the cheek. So, several days
  later Melissa unexpectedly met Maria at
• a coffeehouse and greeted her with an
  enthusiastic kiss on the cheek. Much to Melissas
• surprise, Maria seemed startled and somewhat put
  off by the greeting.
• Had Melissa done something inappropriate?

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