multi culture

7/29/2019 multi culture

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International Human

Resources Management

Multiculturalism


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Culture Defined

Culture is understood as the customs,

beliefs, norms and values that guide

the behavior of the people in a society

and that are passed on from one

generation to the next.


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Culture Defined

Culture has a normative value

Culture is a group phenomenon

Cultural practices are passed on fromgeneration to generation


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Culture Defined

Occupationalculture

Organizationalculture

Sub-culture

Dominant culture


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Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism means that people of

different cultures (and countries) interact

regularly.

Global firms are repositories of

multiculturalism


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Cultural predispositions

MNCs tend to have cultural predispositionstowards managing things in a particular waywhich helps identify specific steps it takes:

EthnocentricismPolycentricism

Regiocentricism

Geocentricism


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Ethnocentricism

The home countrys culture is sought tobe imposed on the subsidiaries.

Exports policies and practices from homecountry to the subsidiary

Expatriates from the home countrymanage the affairs

Local employees occupy low-level and

routine jobsDecision making and operations are

largely centralized out of the homecountry HQ


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Polycentricism

The multinational adapts to the localcultural needs of subsidiaries.

Management policy is oriented to suit localneeds

Autonomy in decision making to thesubsidiary to run their businesses

Host country nationals head theorganization supported by extensivetraining by the parent company

Parent company ensures cultural parity andcorporate philosophy across all subsidiaries


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Geocentricism

The multinational runs the subsidiary as aindependent entity.

Localization is replaced with building a

center of excellence at a global levelHiring the best person for the job.. could

be a third country national

Remain guided by Parent company culture

and philosophy


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Regiocentricism

The multinational runs the subsidiary as aindependent entity, within a regionalgeography.

Localization at a regional level, building acenter of excellence at a regional level

Hiring the best person for the job.. usually

a third country national with a regional

experienceRemain guided by Parent company culture

and philosophy


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Cultural Models

Three theoretical concepts that helpunderstand the nuances of different culturesbetter

GLOBE Project

Hofstedes Cultural Dimensions

Trompenaars Framework


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Globe Project

Global Leadership and OrganizationalBehavior Effectiveness

170 researchers, over 7 years from 17000

managers in 62 countries, covering 825organizations

Identified nine cultural dimensions thatdistinguish one society from another thathave important managerial implications


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Globe ProjectGlobal Leadership and Organizational Behavior

Effectiveness

Assertiveness

Future Orientation

Performance OrientationsHuman Orientation

Gender differentiation

In-group collectivismCollectivism/ Societal

Power Distance

Uncertainty Avoidance


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Hofstedes Cultural Dimensions

Based on a study of IBM employees spreadacross the globe

Identified 4 critical cultural dimensions:

Power distance


Individualism

Masculinity


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Power Distance

The extent to which less powerful membersof institutions and organizations accept that

power is distributed unequally.

Countries in which people blindly obey theorders of supervisors have high power

distance

Countries with low power distance tend tobe decentralized and have flatter structures

with more equality and decision making

power


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Extent to which people feel threatened byambiguous situations and have createdbeliefs and institutions that try to avoid this.

Countries with high uncertainly avoidance

have a high need for security and a strongbelief in experts and their knowledge

Countries with low uncertainty avoidance

accept risks associated with the unknown,less structured activities, fewer writtenrules, willing to take risk, show initiative andassume responsibility for action


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Individualism

Individualism is the tendency to look afterthemselves and their family as opposed tocollectivism where people tend to belong togroups and to look after each other in

exchange for loyaltyIn countries with high individualism people

are responsible for themselves, individualachievement is ideal, and self sufficiency is

laudedIn countries with high collectivism group

membership is paramount, groups protectindividuals in exchange for their loyalty to the

group, societies tend to promote nepotism


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Masculinity

Where the dominant values in a societyare success, money and other materialthings.

High masculine cultures distinguishclearly between gender roles where menare dominant and assertive and work

takes priority over other duties, andadvancement success and money areimportant


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Trompenaars FrameworkA European researcher who conducted a

research with 15,000 managers from 28countries, representing 47 national cultures.

Uses seven dimensions to describe culture

also called the 7d cultural dimensionsmodel

Universalism vs. particularism

Individualism vs. collectivism

Specific vs. diffuse Neutral vs. affective

Achievement vs. ascription

Past vs. present

Internal vs. external control


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Global IT Companies On aCultural Make Over

In Atos Origin India ( AOI), part of $ 6.6 billionEuropean IT major Atos Origin about 100 odd staffattend French classes after office hrs.

At IBM employees employees are beingencouraged to think in terms ofa more globallyintegrated orgn and tap into a programme calledShades of Blue to understand business nuances

about any other country.


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Global IT Companies On aCultural Make Over contd..

At Accenture and IBM, there is a shift from acountry specific strategy to a more global sourcingone.

Till recently IBM used to process purchase ordersin 300 destinations. Now it does it in just threeplaces Bangalore, Shanghai and Budapest.

Big Blue has shifted Asia headquaters from Tokyoto Shanghai in a bis to fanthom its new growthmarkets China and India.

Atos Origin sees a savings upwards of 50% forclient work if done from India. To take the benefit ofIndia sourcing, it has send a team from French carmarker Renault to AOI to bridge cultural gaps.


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Parth Iyengar, VP Research,Gartner India says

for multinationals, hiring staff in destinations loke

India is least of the problems. But they are not usedto doing small deals and delivering services out oflow cost destinations. This does require a culturalchange in hoe they work.


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The IBM Case

From doing everything from pay roll todeveloping software to shippingservers as a country specific strategy,IBM is now going for best offshoreoptions.

For IBM Japan the hr is done inManila, Pay roll in Shanghai,

Procurement in Schenzen, accountingin Kuala Lumpur, technology supportin Australia and so on.


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The IBM Case contd..

Its shades of blue cultural orientationprogramme is targeted towardshelping employees understand the

needs of staffers across locationseasily.

The faster they do it the easier it will

be for global giants to catch up withtheir smaller but more nimblecompetitors.


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Cultural Make over of Koreancompanies

Koreans working for Companies likeLG, POSCO, Samsung and CISCO inIndia not only learn Hindi, Kannada

and Oriya but adopt local names too.Posco (had 35 expats working in India

in the year 2009) has made it

mandatory to learn Oriya for a betterunderstanding of local environment


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Cultural Make over of Koreancompanies contd

Anurag is the name of a KOPrian ChangChyong Jung working at LG Greater Noida.

We have Korean interns who do their research

projects with us and they have even shown cultural

adaptation to the extent of adopting Indian nameslike Pragya and Ashim. Some of them have alsovolunteered for a Sanskrit learning coursearranged by LG India .

Yasho Verma , DirectorHR & MS LG India

( LG had 20 expats in the year 2009)


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Cisco Case

All its expats come from 4 places primarily,Europe, Singapore, Beijing and US.

In at least two of these places the first

language is not English. Cisco has alanguage course of 160 hrs.

They have a 2 day orientation foremployee, spouse, and children.

They are planning to relocate over 20% ofits senior team in the next three years to itsglobalization centre.


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Cisco Case Contd..

The language course that we conduct ,could be a combination of 80 hrs. in Hindi,80 in Kannada or 120 in Kannada and 40hrs in Hindi.

Syed Hoda

Senior Director

Operations, Globalization Centre

Cisco


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http://www.nokia.com/corporate-responsibility/cr-report-2007/employees/labor-practices

http://www.nokia.com/corporate-responsibility/employees/who-we-are

multi culture

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