The Corporate Culture Profile Of Henkel's Corporate Culture

Culture is an observable, powerful force in any organization. “Made up of its members’ shared values, beliefs, symbols, and behaviors, culture guides individual decisions and actions at the unconscious level. As a result, it can have a potent effect on a company’s well-being and success” (One Page, n.d.).

“Culture consists of the symbols, rituals, language, and social dramas that highlight organizational life, including myths, stories, and jargon. It includes the shared meanings associated with the symbols, rituals, and language. Culture combines the philosophy of the firm with beliefs, expectations, and values shared by members. It contains the stories and myths about the company's founder and its current leading figures. Organizational culture consists of a set of shared meanings and values held by a set of members in an organization that distinguish the organization from other organizations. An organization's culture determines how it perceives and reacts to the larger environment (Becker, 1982; Schein, 1996). Culture determines the nature

Every country differs in culture which has been there for centuries. The international market is growing rapidly, with more and more multinational organisations entering new markets each day. In this assignment I will evaluate how the difference in cultures affects the performance of international businesses.

Halsall, R., 2008. From ‘business culture’ to ‘brand state’: conceptions of nation and culture in business literature on cultural difference. Culture and Organization, volume 14 (1), page 15-30.

Before this chapter I thought organization’s culture was only internal and outside factors only affect the brand and sales of the company. But I have now learned a lot more about the

     Cultures are varying among different parts of the globe. People with different cultures have different characteristics and viewpoints on the subjects due to diverse understanding and method of learning. During the past few decades, the international trade grows in a very rapid rate due to the advantages that it provides; “increased sales, operational efficiencies, exposure to new technologies and broader consumer choices” (Heslin). Therefore, when considering the culture aspect to current business world, it is crucial for business to understand the culture aspect because of the tremendous growth of international business as well as utilize the international market to its maximum

With the unstoppable trend of globalisation, it becomes extremely significant for international businesses to have a thorough understanding of different cultures. Hofstede (1980, pp. 21-23) defines culture as ‘the collective programming of the mind distinguishing the members of one group or category of people from another’. This essay examines Hofstede’s cultural framework and suggests that Hofstede’s cultural framework is an outstanding and authoritative tool to analyze culture differences. In this essay, cultural frameworks will be discussed firstly, following by a discussion of my cultural scores and background. Finally, recommendations on cross-cultural management between China and Australia will be provided.

Hofstede (2003) defined culture as "the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another". Corporate culture refers to the intangible aspects of companies, including the interactions at an interpersonal level, and values, morals and ethics which permeate the way that decisions are made and polices are implemented (Buchanan & Huczynski, 2011). Just as when one undertakes international travel, and sees different cultures where there are different attitudes and traditions, one can also observe different

Culture and the environment affect a business in many ways. Culture is not simply a different language, a different shade of skin, or different styles of food. Culture, and the environment in which you are a part of, affect the running of day to day business operations of all companies’ day in and day out. This paper will assess how Linda Myers, from the article, “The would-be pioneer,” (Green, S., 2011) was affected by the huge culture shock of working for a global conglomerate from Seoul, South Korea. We will discuss what went wrong with Ms. Myers approach to business, Hofstede’s five dimensions of culture as it

Management researchers seem to agree that the things that companies do called "corporate culture" is an intangible concept and hence difficult to define. Among the attempts to define "corporate culture", the following definition is useful as a starting point:- "culture represents an interdependent set of values and ways of behaving that are common in a community and that tend to perpetuate themselves, sometimes over long periods of time" (Kotter and Heskett,1992,141) Peters and Watermann argue that changing a culture cannot be accomplished.

Geert Hofstede is an influential Dutch researcher in the fields of organizational studies and more concretely organizational culture, also cultural economics and management. He is a well-known pioneer in his research of cross-cultural groups and organizations and played a major role in developing a systematic framework for assessing and differentiating national cultures and organizational cultures. His studies demonstrated that there are national and regional cultural groups that influence behavior of societies and organizations.

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.

Whenever a company is entering a new market it has to take into consideration the cultural differences between countries. Based on the case study analysis, the difference between the two countries in terms of eating out habits and eating preferences seem not to be understood by the Denver headquarter. Denver headquarter believes that it can enforce the same business model applied in the U.S to its stores in China, regardless of local preference. In addition, Foster seems to lack knowledge about the Chinese culture because she was not familiar with the market in China, as she had no experience working internationally. There was a lack of cross-cultural communication between Chen and Foster; even though, Chen had experienced both cultures while studying abroad in the U.S.

Our four bordering cultures clearly all have very different business orientations. Though German business culture might anticipate explicit instructions from their management concerning what their roles and functions involve, the French business culture might prefer an implicit understanding of their roles´ function and the responsibility attached to it. The Italian culture would appreciate a manager with whom they can have a reciprocal relationship in an environment where responsibility, obligation and loyalty are needed within working relationships. Last, British business culture would value indirect and diplomatic communication, along with the qualities of modesty, reservedness and fair play.

According to a study on cultural strategies (Steven H. Appelbaum et al, 2009), the assessment of these cultural variables within organisations has significant relevance to the success of their integration; simply assessing the cultural similarity/differences increase the odds of successful mergers. The more compatible the companies are, the less likely they will face adversity. When it came to operations and management, Daimler Benz and Chrysler could not properly blend due to Germans and Americans contrasting approaches of administrative issues, as well as communication styles and other differences. In fact, a vast number of significant Chrysler executives and engineers resigned which lead to the dissatisfaction of Daimler employees with Chrysler’s division performance. As a result, the two cultures were extremely unhappy working together. One of the Daimler managers (Jürgen Hubbert) stated prior to the merger, ‘We have a clear understanding: one company, one vision, one chairman, two cultures.”, however failing to realise that they were two cultures with strong distinctive heritages — in other words, it was a failure of fit (The Economist “The DaimlerChrysler emulsion”, 2000). It was evident that the people suffered from culture shock, as they were “systematically confronted with behaviour not compatible with their own culturally determined rules of behaviour” (Gerhard Fink et al, 2007). It was obvious that there was a lack of cross-cultural management from