Analysis Of Hofstede

The IBM study of employees from the 70 countries was the basis for the dimensions and has been critized since there was only one company in the data set however, Hofstede’s belief was that using just one company would better reveal the national differences. According to the authors Phatak, Bhagat, and Kashalk (2009), he believed this because the IBM employees were the same in other respects like type of work, job descriptions, and education. This study has been stated to be the most comprehensive study of how values are influenced in the workplace (Itim International, 2012). Itim International, (2012) noted that Hofstede’s work established a paradigm in international economics, communication, and cooperation, from which Hofstede developed the first emphirical model of “dimensions” for national organizational culutre.

Using the Hofstede's and 7d cultural dimension model, explain some of the cultural differences noted in the

Dr. Hofstede performed a comprehensive study of how values in the workplace are influenced by culture. In the 1970’s, as a Dutch researcher Dr. Geert Hofstede, collected and analyzed data from 116,000 surveys taken from IBM employees in forty different countries around the world. From those results, Hofstede developed a model that identifies four primary dimensions of differentiate cultures. These include: Uncertainty Avoidance (UA), Masculinity-Femininity (MAS), Individualism-Collectivism (IND), Power and Distance (PD). After a further study of the Asian culture by researcher Michael Bond in 1991, Hofstede added a fifth dimension in his theory, Long- and Short-term time orientation (LTO), also referred to as the Confucian Dynamism. His research has framed how cultural differences can be used in professional business transactions. Geert Hofstede 's dimensions analysis can assist the business person in better understanding the intercultural differences within regions and between countries.

He supposed that culture is a common psychological program of people in same environment, which can separate a group of people from another group of people. This theory is widely used in academic researches and cross-cultural practices and has become an important theory for measurement of cultural differences among different countries. Hofstede's cultural dimension theory is divided into five dimensions, these are Power-Distance、Uncertainty Avoidance、Individualism versus Collectivism、Long-term and Short-term Orientation、Masculinity versus Femininity

As far back as history can be told mankind has struggled between balancing culture, power and politics. Many wars have been fought and many people have placed their lives on the line in order to stand up for what they believe in. The combinations of culture, power and politics have spilled over into the workplace. In today’s business environment individuals have much more to worry about than just completing their assigned tasks. Organizational culture, power and office politics influence day to day operations as well as govern the atmosphere within the organization. The amount of impact that power and politics have in the workplace, directly reflect the organization’s culture formally as well as informally.

When a business decides to venture internationally into different countries with its products, services, and operations, it is very important that the company gains an understanding of how the culture of the different societies affects the values found in those societies. Geert Hofstede conducted one of the most famous and most used studies on how culture relates to values. Hofstede study enabled him to compare dimensions of culture across 40 countries. He originally isolated four dimensions of what he claimed summarized different cultures — power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism versus collectivism, and masculinity versus femininity (Hill, 2013, p.110). To cover aspects of values not discussed in the original paradigm Hofstede has since added two more dimensions — Confucianism or long-term orientation and indulgence versus self-restraint (Hofstede, n.d.). Because of the way Hofstede’s cultural dimensions are given an index score from 0-100, it is easy for a company to get a general comparison between the cultures they are expanding into and the culture they are already in.

We will argue that it is possible to say that Danish national culture is reflected in the corporate culture of Flying Tiger Denmark. Organizational culture is ultimately created by individuals, whom are already influenced by their national cultural background, therefore national culture affect organizational culture (Schein, 1997). The non-hierarchical and direct tone at the Flying Tiger headquarter are well aligned with national Danish culture of egalitarianism and low-context communication (Hall, 1976; Hofstede,

The term culture is defined by a number of authors. Shankar (2003) has defined culture as “complex and interrelated set of elements, comprising knowledge, beliefs and values, arts, laws, and habits acquired by a human as a member of a particular society. These act together to distinguish one group from another. “Culture determines the identity of a human group in the same way as personality determines the identity of an individual” (Hofstede, 1984). Further he always defined culture as the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one human group from another. In order to compare the cultures of different organisations Gerant Hofstede discovered five dimensions which he found universally present in different nations and organisations. They are Power distance, Uncertainty avoidance, Individualism vs

The United States and China boast the two largest economies in the world but, despite this fact, these two countries have very little in common. At first glance, this may seem very obvious to most people but, what exactly is it that makes these two countries so different? How is it that such different perspectives and approaches can both lead to great success? Hofstede’s six dimensions of culture are an attempt to answer these questions and more. Dr. Geert Hofstede, studied employees of the computer firm IBM in over fifty different countries. When he examined his findings he found “clear patterns of similarity and difference along the four dimensions” (Manktelow, Jackson Edwards, Eyre, Cook and Khan, n.d.). The fact that he focused his research on solely IBM employees allowed him to eliminate company culture as a differentiating factor and “attribute those patterns to national and social differences” (n.d.). He used his findings to originally identify four dimensions, later expanded to six, that could “distinguish one culture from another” (n.d.). The six dimensions all on a scale from 0 to 100 are:

For years, the most renowned dimensions of culture have been those proposed by Geert Hofstede (Baack, 2012). Hofstede’s five cultural dimensions are: power distance, individualism, masculinity/femininity, uncertainty avoidance, and short/long-term orientation.

A Dutch Social psychologist, Geert Hofstede carried out research studies on cross-cultural groups and organizations. He defined culture as a collective programing of the mind that makes the members of one group different from those of another group. His studies were instrumental in the developing of a systematic framework that is used in the assessment and the differentiation of organizational and national cultures. The framework was designed to show how a society’s culture affects the values of the members, and also, how the values relate to their behaviors. Hofstede was born on October 2nd 1982 and was an employee of IBM. At IBM International, Hofstede worked as a trainer in management and also as a manager of research on personnel. It is at this point, when he made a transition into psychology from engineering. He was highly recognized through his work on developing the cultural dimensions theory. His work was found useful by scholars and practitioners who took interest in the relationships between different cultures. His position in IBM International gave him opportunities to interact with and study different cultures around the world. This is because IBM had over 70 subsidiaries in different countries around the world. Hofstede travelled and conducted surveys and interviews in different parts of the world regarding people’s behaviors in their workplaces and how they interacted.

Hofstede 's value dimensions were identified by the Dutch scientist, Geert Hofstede. He "identified four dimensions of national value systems that influence organization and employee working relationships." (Daft, 2014, p. 118)The dimensions are, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism and collectivism, and masculinity/femininity. There is a distinct difference between the United States’ culture and South Korea 's culture as it relates to the four dimensions. The following defines each of the dimensions and the differences between the two nations’ culture as they relate to the dimensions. (Hofstede, 2001)

Created by Geert Hofstede the five dimensions describe the effect of a society’s culture on the values of its members. Hofstede developed his original model as a result of using factor analysis to examine the results of a world-wide survey of employee values by IBM between 1967 and 1973. Hofstede found that managers and employees vary on five values of dimensions of national culture which are power distance, individualism versus collectivism, quantity of life versus quality of life, uncertainty avoidance and long-term versus short orientation. Power Distance is defined as the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept power that is distributed unequally. The Hofstede Center states that “With a score of 68, France scores fairly high on Power Distance. It is, therefore, a society in which a fair degree of inequality is accepted” (pg.1). Studies have shown that there is a wide gap or emotional distance which is perceived to exist among people at different levels of the hierarchy. Most French companies have normally one or two hierarchical levels, top managers have more privileges than others. Chief executive officers of larger companies are referred to as Mr. PDG (President Director General). Simply calling individuals Mr. PDG gives them more power than others. Moving towards the individualism versus collectivism aspect of

This research will determine the impact of culture in international depend on five dimensions of Hofstede’s framework. This research collects data of UK companies in Malaysia and China.

Hoifstede (1984) asserts to have formulated the focal scopes of the notion of culture that affect work practices in varying countries. These differentiating components of culture are: Power distance, uncertainty avoidance, collectivism vs individualism, femineity vs masculinity and short vs long term orientation.