Culture Case

Culture is composed of the beliefs, values, attitudes and behavior and these components vary from individual to individual. Hence differences in the culture across nations

become inevitable. This variation in these cultural components gives rise to a phenomenon known as 'Cultural Diversity'. Cultural Diversity plays a significant role while undertaking business operations internationally. Thus, it becomes necessary

for an international manager to understand these cultural differences and manage them effectively. The variations in cultures across nations is caused by different factors/variables.

culture is a major influencing factor for the individuals as well as the organizations

and that culture across nations differs a lot, so it becomes necessary for each and every international manager to develop a culture-specific understanding about the countries he/she needs to operate in. For this purpose, the approach is to develop a

cultural profile of the country with which he/she is to do business. To develop a cultural profile, one needs some familiarity with the cultural variables universal to most cultures.

From these universal variables, one can identify specific differences found in each country or people-and hence anticipate their implications for the workplace. We describe eight categories of cultural variables and explain their implications.

Kinship

A kinship system is the system adopted by a given society to guide family relationships. Some countries may consist of nuclear family culture whereas other may consist of an extended family with many members, spanning many generations. For example, in India the concept of immediate family includes the parents also whereas in USA it only includes husband, wife and their children.

Education

The formal or informal education of workers in a foreign firm, received from whatever source, greatly affects the expectations placed on those workers in the workplace. Education also influences manager's choices about recruitment and staffing practices, training programmes, and leadership styles. Training and development programmes also need to be consistent with the general level of educational preparation in that country. For

example, Russians are excellent learners and possess flair for learning. They are the best people for the jobs that starts with a compulsory instructor-based training.

Economy

Whatever the economic system, the means of production and distribution in a society (and the resulting effects on individuals and groups) has a powerful influence on such organizational processes such as sourcing, distribution, incentives and

repatriation of capital.

Politics

The system of government in a society imposes varying constraints on the organization and its freedom to do business. It is the manager's job to understand the political system and how it affects the organizational processes, to negotiate positions within the system, and to manage effectively the mutual concerns of the host country and the guest company. For example, in country like India where political parties that

believe in 'swadeshi' aspect, the MNCs may hesitate to come.

Religion

The spiritual beliefs of a society are often so powerful that they transcend other cultural aspects. Religion commonly underlies both the moral and economic norms.

Association

Many and various types of associations emerge out of the formal and informal groups that make up society. Whether these associations are based on religious, social, professional, or trade affiliations, managers should be familiar with them and

the role they may play in business interactions.

Health

The system of health care in a country affects employee productivity, expectations, and attitudes towards physical fitness and its role in the workplace. These expectations will influence managerial decisions regarding health care benefits, insurance, physical facilities, sick days, and so forth.

Recreation

Closely associated with other cultural factors, recreation includes the way in which people use their leisure time, as well as their attitudes towards leisure and their choice of whom to socialize with. Worker's attitudes toward recreation can affect their work

behavior and their perception of the role of work in their lives. For example, in USA people prefer going out on picnics with their immediate family only, for the purpose of recreation. On the other hand, Arabian culture emphasizes upon visiting relatives and friends or calling them over feasts to own place for recreation. Another view of culture, focuses of culture as a set of values and attributes of a given group, and the relation of the

individual to the culture, and the individual's acquisition of those values and attributes

The individual and the culture in which is lives is a complex set of relationships. On the one side, the individual determines its culture, on the other, it is determined by its culture. By contributing to the culture around him, the individual is part of the cultural change. S.G. Summer introduced the concept of "Ethnocentrism" early this century: it refers to the tendency that most people see their own culture as the 'center of the world'. Often this phenomenon has been seen as a result of "naive" thinking, following from the assumption of the world in itself being like it appears to the individual: a set of 'self-evident' rules, roles, categories and relationships, seen as 'natural'. The concept of ethnocentrism is often displayed in the form of nationalism.

The National Character/Basic Personality

Each nation has its own character, the French are not like the English, and the Dutch not like the Germans. However, the attempt to define what makes each of the characters distinct will provide massive difficulties. The idea of a 'national character' is based on the assumption that people from one nation share basic common behavioral patterns and personality traits, differentiable from other nations. The concept has however been often criticized, and is often only fueled by perceptions of the one nation towards the other, resulting in a number of attributes that one nation apparently displays: the Germans are

orderly, hard-working and humorless... However, findings in that field have been often contradictory,