MANAGING ACROSS CULTURES

1
Introduction

• Managing Across Cultures
• Private business goal to stabilize profits.
  Success is
  influenced by
• Foreign sales
• Foreign resources
• Government business may or may not be
  profit-motivated (i.e. political motivations)

2

• Reasons for Recent International Business Growth
• Expansion of technology
• Business is becoming more global
• Transportation is quicker
• Communications enable control from afar
• Costs are more conducive for international
  operations
• Liberalization of cross-border movements
• Lower governmental barriers

3

• Development of supporting institutional
  arrangements
• Institutional arrangements
• Made by business and government
• Ease flow of goods
• Reduce risk
• Increase in global competition
• More companies are managing across cultures
  because
• New products quickly become global
• Companies can produce in different countries
• Domestic companies competitors, suppliers, and
  customers become international
• Competing more and more in knowledge-based
  industries

4
Prerequisites for International SuccessorHow
does a firm overcome its"Liability of
Foreignness"?

• Motivation
• Strategy
• Organization
• People

5
Motivations for Overseas Expansion
Traditional Market Seeking (Sales
Expansion) Resource Seeking
Diversification New' Knowledge/
Innovation Options for Strategic Moves/
Countermoves
Materials Cheap Labor Capital
6
The Connections
"International" "Multinational"
"Global" "Transnational Metanational
STRATEGY
ORGANIZATION
PEOPLE
7
Organization of the Course

• MACRO Cultural Embeddedness or The Many Faces
  of Culture We Encounter at Work
• And MESO Culture in Context or How Strategy /
  Organization / Culture Interconnect
• MICRO The People Factor or Culture in Practice
  (the Nitty Gritty of) Managing Across Cultures

8
External Influences of Managing Across Cultures

• Physical and Societal Environments
• History
• Geography
• National Culture
• Legal and Political Environments
• Each country has its own laws regulating
  business. Agreements among countries set
  international law.
• Competitive Environment
• Financial/ Economic
• Interfirm Structures
• Intrafirm Organization

9
DOES CULTURE MATTER?
10

• When Im angry I.......
• If I dont agree with an idea I.......
• When someone in my team has done a good job
  I.......
• If someone hasnt been pulling his/her load
  I.......
• A meeting is to...........
• If Im shown a picture of someones family and
  one of the members is fat

grin and bear it say that its interesting and
Ill think about it reward the group leave it
up to group pressure formalize a
decision laugh and comment on persons health
11
(No Transcript)
12
WHAT IS CULTURE?
Culture is learned H.E.L.P.
H abits E xpectations L anguage P erception
13
Culture is a system of H.E.L.P.

• Habits
• Patterns of behavior and thought
• Expectations
• For ourselves and others, accepted norms
• Language
• Language and symbols with shared meaning
• Perspective
• About how the world works, assumptions

14
CULTURE IN CONTEXT
Transformation Process
Culture
Input
Output
Environment Culture Politics Economy Legal Resourc
es History
Organizational Group Individual
Task
Formal Organizational Arrangements
Individual
Feedback
From Nadler Tushman, A General Diagnostic
Model for Organizational Behavior