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CHAPTER RESOURCES Reading Content Introduction 8.1 What Is Culture? 8.2 What Does Culture Mean for Business? 8.3 Managing Cultural Differences 8.4 Building Cultural Intelligence Summary and Case ORION: Build your
Proficiency Videos Animations Multimedia Study Tools Business Hot Topics
COURSE RESOURCES
Career Center Business Hot Topics Videos Animations
PRACTICE Chapter 8 Reading Quiz
APPENDIX
Summary and Case
Summary
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.1 Define culture and describe its characteristics.
Culture is a society's unique set of values and norms, which governs how people live and interact with each other. Values are a society's guiding principles about what is good, right, and desirable. Norms are the social rules that govern people's interactions; these can be customs or social mores. Language, religion, and education are three measurable factors that influence culture, with other factors operating behind the scenes.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.2 Describe the business implications of culture.
Because international businesses span geographic and cultural boundaries, culture plays a critical role in determining the appropriate approach for business leaders in foreign markets. Cultural factors such as social stratification, work motivation, relationship preferences, risk-taking behavior, and information and task processing have huge implications for the ways employees and consumers interact with their environments. Ignorance or disregard of these factors can easily lead to business failure.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.3 Identify ways to manage cultural differences in the workplace.
To conduct business across cultural boundaries, managers need to build common ground. They can do so by recognizing that differences exist, respecting and even embracing those differences, and then reconciling differences to build a framework that both sides understand and can operate within.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.4 Discuss how to adapt to different cultures.
Cultural intelligence (CQ) is a measure of an individual's cultural awareness. It represents the ability to distinguish cultural traits from those that are universal and those that are specific to a given individual. CQ has three aspects: cognitive, behavioral, and motivational. Managers can cultivate CQ by taking assessments or getting other feedback, undertaking training to remedy weaknesses, and then organizing daily activities to reinforce that training.
A Cultural Challenge in Managing Ace Adams Ace Adams had been working as a consultant for a company called Management Systems International (MSI) in Washington, D.C., for three years, but he wanted more cross-cultural experience. When he was younger, just after college, he had worked for two years in Bulgaria with the Peace Corps. It was there that he learned Bulgarian and fell in love with the country's culture and people. Being fluent in Bulgarian and ready to move abroad, Ace asked his boss whether he could be transferred for a year to their Bulgarian office.
MSI had a small office in Bulgaria because one of its clients had moved there to manufacture skis. However, once the company realized the potential to consult with a growing set of foreign and domestic information technology (IT) companies that were capitalizing on the high levels of education and IT specialization within the country, it decided to set up a permanent office. As a U.S.-based consulting company, MSI was good at
Case Study
DOWNLOADABLE eTEXTBOOK PRINTER VERSION BACK
CHAPTER RESOURCES Reading Content Introduction 8.1 What Is Culture? 8.2 What Does Culture Mean for Business? 8.3 Managing Cultural Differences 8.4 Building Cultural Intelligence Summary and Case ORION: Build your
Proficiency Videos Animations Multimedia Study Tools Business Hot Topics
COURSE RESOURCES
Career Center Business Hot Topics Videos Animations
PRACTICE Chapter 8 Reading Quiz
APPENDIX
Summary and Case
Summary
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.1 Define culture and describe its characteristics.
Culture is a society's unique set of values and norms, which governs how people live and interact with each other. Values are a society's guiding principles about what is good, right, and desirable. Norms are the social rules that govern people's interactions; these can be customs or social mores. Language, religion, and education are three measurable factors that influence culture, with other factors operating behind the scenes.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.2 Describe the business implications of culture.
Because international businesses span geographic and cultural boundaries, culture plays a critical role in determining the appropriate approach for business leaders in foreign markets. Cultural factors such as social stratification, work motivation, relationship preferences, risk-taking behavior, and information and task processing have huge implications for the ways employees and consumers interact with their environments. Ignorance or disregard of these factors can easily lead to business failure.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.3 Identify ways to manage cultural differences in the workplace.
To conduct business across cultural boundaries, managers need to build common ground. They can do so by recognizing that differences exist, respecting and even embracing those differences, and then reconciling differences to build a framework that both sides understand and can operate within.
L E A R N I N G O B J E C T I V E 8.4 Discuss how to adapt to different cultures.
Cultural intelligence (CQ) is a measure of an individual's cultural awareness. It represents the ability to distinguish cultural traits from those that are universal and those that are specific to a given individual. CQ has three aspects: cognitive, behavioral, and motivational. Managers can cultivate CQ by taking assessments or getting other feedback, undertaking training to remedy weaknesses, and then organizing daily activities to reinforce that training.
A Cultural Challenge in Managing Ace Adams Ace Adams had been working as a consultant for a company called Management Systems International (MSI) in Washington, D.C., for three years, but he wanted more cross-cultural experience. When he was younger, just after college, he had worked for two years in Bulgaria with the Peace Corps. It was there that he learned Bulgarian and fell in love with the country's culture and people. Being fluent in Bulgarian and ready to move abroad, Ace asked his boss whether he could be transferred for a year to their Bulgarian office.
MSI had a small office in Bulgaria because one of its clients had moved there to manufacture skis. However, once the company realized the potential to consult with a growing set of foreign and domestic information technology (IT) companies that were capitalizing on the high levels of education and IT specialization within the country, it decided to set up a permanent office. As a U.S.-based consulting company, MSI was good at
Case Study
https://edugen.wileyplus.com/edugen/lti/main.uni 2020/6/13 17<30 第 1 ⻚页（共 2 ⻚页）
managing its consultants in the United States and allowing its foreign offices quite a bit of autonomy. The situation was no different for its Bulgarian office. The team in Bulgaria consisted of the country manager, a Bulgarian named Stoyan, and a group of ten other Bulgarian consultants. Stoyan had received his MBA from Temple University in the United States and gone back to help MSI start up a consulting branch in his home country.
Once Ace arrived in Bulgaria, reporting to Stoyan, he started a large-scale project with a cluster of IT companies based in Sofia. These companies had collectively hired MSI to provide benchmarking data about the local IT market. The project first required Ace to collect survey information about the different companies. He spent a couple of weeks interviewing managers from the different companies and then quickly developed and sent out a survey.
Stoyan soon received an email from one of the companies asking whether it was a legitimate survey and, if so, why there were so many spelling and grammatical errors in it. Moreover, why did it come from someone named Ace, and not from Stoyan himself? Stoyan couldn't understand why Ace had sent the survey without checking with him first. He felt he understood how to manage Americans, but this incident came as a bit of a shock to both him and the other Bulgarian colleagues. He wondered why Ace had done what he did.
Stoyan began to reflect on his understanding of the cultural differences between Bulgaria and the United States. After all, Bulgaria does seem to differ from the United States in terms of cultural dimensions. For one, Bulgaria ranks 70 on power distance, whereas the United States ranks 40. This means employees in Bulgaria tend to accept a hierarchical order in which everybody has a place. Subordinates usually expect to be told what to do, and the ideal boss is one who is kind but makes most of the major decisions. U.S. employees tend to bristle at hierarchy and prefer to be treated as equals. This means they don't like to be told what to do by their boss. Rather, they like to be “supported” and “empowered” by their bosses and be allowed to make some major decisions on their own.
Moreover, in the United States, employees are highly individualistic, ranking 91 on the individualism index. This high score in individualism combined with a low score in power distance (40) means U.S. employees and their managers tend to share information openly with one another. It also means employees are likely to look after themselves and take the initiative. Their managers often expect them to be self-reliant.
Stoyan wasn't sure whether he had to handle a cultural misunderstanding or whether Ace simply didn't realize the significance of his actions. He needed to talk to Ace about this, but he wasn't sure what to say.
1. How could Stoyan conduct his meeting with Ace?
2. How should Stoyan separate Ace's culture from his character as an individual?
3. What should Stoyan do to correct the situation? What should Ace do?
Copyright © 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.
Case Discussion Questions
managing its consultants in the United States and allowing its foreign offices quite a bit of autonomy. The situation was no different for its Bulgarian office. The team in Bulgaria consisted of the country manager, a Bulgarian named Stoyan, and a group of ten other Bulgarian consultants. Stoyan had received his MBA from Temple University in the United States and gone back to help MSI start up a consulting branch in his home country.
Once Ace arrived in Bulgaria, reporting to Stoyan, he started a large-scale project with a cluster of IT companies based in Sofia. These companies had collectively hired MSI to provide benchmarking data about the local IT market. The project first required Ace to collect survey information about the different companies. He spent a couple of weeks interviewing managers from the different companies and then quickly developed and sent out a survey.
Stoyan soon received an email from one of the companies asking whether it was a legitimate survey and, if so, why there were so many spelling and grammatical errors in it. Moreover, why did it come from someone named Ace, and not from Stoyan himself? Stoyan couldn't understand why Ace had sent the survey without checking with him first. He felt he understood how to manage Americans, but this incident came as a bit of a shock to both him and the other Bulgarian colleagues. He wondered why Ace had done what he did.
Stoyan began to reflect on his understanding of the cultural differences between Bulgaria and the United States. After all, Bulgaria does seem to differ from the United States in terms of cultural dimensions. For one, Bulgaria ranks 70 on power distance, whereas the United States ranks 40. This means employees in Bulgaria tend to accept a hierarchical order in which everybody has a place. Subordinates usually expect to be told what to do, and the ideal boss is one who is kind but makes most of the major decisions. U.S. employees tend to bristle at hierarchy and prefer to be treated as equals. This means they don't like to be told what to do by their boss. Rather, they like to be “supported” and “empowered” by their bosses and be allowed to make some major decisions on their own.
Moreover, in the United States, employees are highly individualistic, ranking 91 on the individualism index. This high score in individualism combined with a low score in power distance (40) means U.S. employees and their managers tend to share information openly with one another. It also means employees are likely to look after themselves and take the initiative. Their managers often expect them to be self-reliant.
Stoyan wasn't sure whether he had to handle a cultural misunderstanding or whether Ace simply didn't realize the significance of his actions. He needed to talk to Ace about this, but he wasn't sure what to say.
1. How could Stoyan conduct his meeting with Ace?
2. How should Stoyan separate Ace's culture from his character as an individual?
3. What should Stoyan do to correct the situation? What should Ace do?
Copyright © 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.
Case Discussion Questions
https://edugen.wileyplus.com/edugen/lti/main.uni 2020/6/13 17<30 第 2 ⻚页（共 2 ⻚页）
