In addition to the above institutional differences there are some cultural differences between countries that effect MNCS and HRM. The work of Hofstede focuses on how perceptions and values influence the way people interact and react to each other with the help of five cultural dimensions. Cultural difference namely power distance is the degree to which people in a society perceive the power to be distributed unequally. The high score of PD represents countries with the more organizational hierarchy and more power held by the people at the top levels of the hierarchy. Countries with a high Score of PD include India, China and South American countries. On the contrary, U.S can be one example of countries with low power distance (Hofstede, 2001). The second dimension is of Uncertainty Avoidance. It is the degree to which the individuals in a society are threatened by uncertainty risk. Countries like Saudi Arabia with high power distance and uncertainty avoidance tend to have rigid rules and leaders have more power. For example, India has a unique and diverse culture with a set level of hierarchies. The employees at the top level of hierarchy have more power that can be misused as those in power are backed by governments and unions. The social inequality, poverty and unstable political environment explain the high uncertainty avoidance in the Indian culture. Therefore, HRM uses training and career development programs as means of improving this high level of uncertainty
Relocating into a senior care facilities can be a frightening experience for the aging population. Getting familiar with new surroundings, new organization structure, and new people that can cause anxiety to rise. For a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer individual, this experience can be traumatic. The fear of harassment, hostility, and neglect by healthcare providers and caretakers can keep LGBTQ people from seeking care until their health begins to critically decline. LGBTQ cultural competency training is highly recommended for healthcare professionals and social service organizations. The greatest barrier that prevents quality health care for LGBTQ people is the lack of competence among the healthcare professionals.
This report examines cultural and institutional factors of Mexico and how they can impact global HR management and practices. Specifically, by analyzing Mexican culture based on Hofstede’s dimensions, economy, labor legislation, union and employment tradition we reached the conclusion that the features of Mexican culture (high power distance, strong collectivism, high level of masculinity and uncertainty avoidance) and institutional factors have a strong impact on management styles and HR practices of business in Mexico and may arouse some challenges for global company and their expatriates, especially those from countries that bear different cultural features and institutional conditions. In order to minimize the potential conflict between Mexican local employees and expatriates, parent companies need to provide trainings (culture assimilation, country condition, etc.) before sending anybody to Mexico. Also, whether the expatriates should put more effort to disseminate home country (headquarter) culture or to adjust to local culture depends on the company’s strategy in terms of being localized or standardized around the globe.
It is hypothesized that cultural differences in behaviour will mean differences in HRM practices within different cultures but those within the same cultural cluster will be similar whereas those in different clusters will be dissimilar. Employees and managers from different cultures take decisions in different ways – the processes, behaviours and values are not the same. People have different value orientations as a result of individual psychology, life-stage and generation and assumptions about behaviour determined by cultures are linked to a variety of organisational behaviours.
Compare structure and culture of two or more firms in the same industry. Which would you prefer to work for?
Hofstede defined the culture as “the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group from that another”. His five types of cultural dimensions are the most popular in many cultural area studies, include: (1) power distance; (2) individualism vs. collectivism; (3) uncertainty avoidance; (4) masculinity vs. femininity; and (5) long-term vs. short-term orientation. These dimensions offer an insight towards behaviors and standards in the cultural context which are useful for many motivators to explore the people in different culture. The text suggested that countries with high uncertainty avoidance will lead to more job security, whereas people with low uncertainty avoidance (for example, U.S.) are motivated by new ideas and innovation. People with high power distance are motivated by relationships between subordinates and their boss, while people with low power distance are motivated by team work and relationships with their peers. On the other hand, individuals from high individualism are motivated by opportunities and autonomy; collectivism (for example, Japan) suggests that motivation should be done with group goals and support. Individuals from high masculine culture are comfortable with the tradition and division of works and roles; in a feminine culture, the motivators help people through flexible roles and work
Today’s management in the workforce is composed of all types of people verses thirty years ago when white males held a majority of upper-management positions in companies. These positions are now held by a mixture of ethnic back grounds and women who hold just as many if not more management positions then men. Just by looking at the changes in management demographics shows how important it is for people to understand cultural competency in the workplace. Dr. Roosevelt Thomas Jr. (1999) stated, “Diversity is the collective mixture of whomever we have in our workforce characterized by their differences and similarities” (p.11). Managers and supervisors must understand the characteristics of a diversity mature individual; they also need to be
This posed a challenge for the Polish managerial experiences because they were still using a state controlled system and the U.S based their decisions to better the society as a whole. The Polish felt it necessary to resolve problems with their own interest at heart and not pay attention to the needs of other in the organization. When you only think about your own good, it hinders the organization from reaching success as a team. It does focus on team building skills and lacks structure that is needed in every organization whether working independently or as a joint venture. The Hofstede dimension model can be helpful to the Polish community by applying human resource management skills to their operation, leadership styles, multinational assumptions, decision-making and organizational design, and building a strategy to assist in daily operations. The Polish can address the human resource management skills by selecting qualified workers. This will require them to train individuals and ensure they are knowledgeable of the core concepts of being a HR manager. The Polish organization will also have to evaluate the employees for managerial position and promote employees that meet the requirements for the position of a manager. Polish organization workers will then decide on how to compensate the qualified individuals and differentiate the pay from other workers. Every employee that is working there should not be on the same level meaning there should be
The first dimension in Hofstede’s theory is power distance, which is considered high in Brazil, and the strong belief in power distance means that the power is distributed unequally, where the less powerful members of organizations within the country accept the difference. With a high distance, Brazilians believe that everyone has a place in the social hierarchy and accept inequalities amongst people; thus, the power holders have more benefits than the less powerful in society. In organizations, authorities and responsibilities in the Brazilian work environment are often centralized. Therefore, the decision-making need to make by the high-ranking people, which evident what hierarchical business is in Brazil. Also, it is important to show status symbols of power to indicate the social position and get respect from others. In contrast, the US score is low which indicates
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.
The importance of understanding cultural, ethnic and gender differences by managers and professionals in a business setting is essential to make the work environment comfortable. In every culture there are basic standards of thinking, and acting and these cultural differences strongly influence workplace values and communication. What may be considered acceptable and natural in the workplace for one person may be unacceptable for another person. People from diverse cultures bring new ways of thinking, creativity and language skills needed to survive in today’s work force. In many
The dimension of power distance affect the HR activities by reactions to management authority differently among cultures. There will be greater status and authority differences between superiors and subordinates if the power distance increases. The next factor is individualism which it can up to which people in a country prefer to act as individual in the group. Asian countries more toward to group-oriented meanwhile United Stated more prefer to individualism. The last factor are masculinity and femininity which means masculine is for men and femininity is for women. The person with assertiveness, success, and competitiveness well known as masculine meanwhile feminine known by quality of life, close personal relationships, and
Managing HR in MNC is different from the way the HR is being managed in the country, According to Morgan (1986) there are three factors that differentiate between IHRM and domestic HR: First, the countries of operations such as the -country where a subsidiary may be located, the host-country where the subsidiaries are located, and other countries. Second, the different types of employee, in international environment the HR management have to deal with the host-country nationals (HCNs), expatriates or home-country nationals (PCNs) and third country nationals (TCNs), for example if L’Oreal hired an Indonesian employee in their Indonesian subsidiary the employee is a HCNs, and when manager from L’Oreal Headquarter in France came to work in Indonesian subsidiary the manager is a PCNs, and if L’Oreal employs manager neither from Indonesia nor France to work in their Indonesian subsidiary the manager is TCNs. Third, is the way HR practices (eg. staffing, compensation, training, and etc) are conducted. Although IHR practices seems to have the same activities as domestic HR, in IHR the manager will be dealing with different environment and diversity of employees from different cultural background. Moreover, as mentioned earlier dissimilarities between domestic and international HR management mostly due to profound differences between host and home countries in term of culture,
This paper will be about the relation between the cultural dimension ‘power distance’ and three management principles we chose and will also be about the applicability of these management principles. This is quite interesting because even though we know that the cultural dimensions, by Geert Hofstede, and the management principles, by Fayol, have something to do with each other, the more the cultural dimensions differ, the more the ranking of the management principles will differ in the compared countries. We will now try to find out if some of these principles are more linked to a certain cultural dimension, in our case Power Distance, than others and we will find out whether these
| * India scores high on this dimension, 77, indicating an appreciation for hierarchy and a Top – Down Structure in society and Organizations. dependent on the boss or the powerholder for direction, acceptance of un-equal rights between the power-priviledged and those who are lesser down in the pecking order, immediate superiors accessible but one layer above less so, paternalistic leader, management directs, gives reason / meaning to ones work life and rewards in exchange for loyalty from employees. * Real Power is centralized even though it may not appear to be and managers count on the obedience of their team members. * Employees expect to be directed clearly as to their functions and what is expected of them. * Communication is top down and directive in its style and often feedback which is negative is never offered up the ladder
According to “Professor Geert Hofstede, culture is defined as “the collective programming of the mind distinguishing the members of one group or category of people from others” (Geert-Hofstede, 2015). According to his research there are six dimensions of national culture.