Parcial Leer
Parcial Leer
US managers have at times suggested that it is more difficult to get along with the French than any other people
in Europe. Not surprisingly, many French managers feel the same about Americans. Why is this? According to
Edward T. Hall and Mildred Reed Hall, many US managers criticize their French managerial counterparts for a
number of reasons: 16 they won’t delegate; they won’t keep their subordinates informed; they don’t feel a sense
of responsibility towards their subordinates; they refuse to accept responsibility for things; they are not team
players; they are overly sensitive to hierarchy and status; they are highly authoritarian; they are not interested in
improving their job skills or knowledge; they are primarily concerned with their own self-interest; and they are
less mobile than Americans. Obviously, there are variations in such observations, but, according to these noted
anthropologists, this is the gist of American opinion. At the same time, Hall and Hall quote several French
managers who hold similarly negative opinions about their US counterparts: 17 American managers in Europe
are not creative– they are too tied to their checklists; success is not achieved by logic and procedure alone;
American executives are reliable and hardworking, and often charming and innocent, but they are too narrow in
their focus– they are not well rounded; they have no time for cultural interests and lack appreciation for art,
music, and philosophy; too many American executives are preoccupied with financial reporting (this syndrome
produces people who avoid decisions); and Americans don ’ t know how to present themselves– they sprawl and
slouch and have no finesse. Who is right here? Perhaps perceptions by both sides are correct to some extent.
Clearly, one factor that may help explain these differing perceptions is the fundamental difference between
French and American cultures in terms of their time orientation.
CASE 1 - II.
As noted above, most Americans are decidedly monochronic, meaning that they tend to stress a high
degree of scheduling in their lives, with concentration of eff ort being on one activity at a time, and
elaborate codes of behavior built around promptness in meeting obligations and appointments. Put more
simply, many Americans tend to be a bit linear in their thinking and behavior, always focusing on the
ultimate goal. By contrast, most French are polychronic, stressing human relationships and social
interaction over arbitrary schedules and appointments, and engaging in several activities simultaneously,
with frequent interruptions. To many French managers, the journey is probably more important than the
ultimate destination. To many American managers, however, it is all about the goal. Think about it ...
QUESTIONS:
(1) It has been said that the problem with both French and American managers is that they are both too
self-centered. In other words, the fundamental problem is that, while there are certainly cultural
differences, French and Americans are actually too much alike to get along well. Do you agree or
disagree with this assertion? Why or why not?
(2) Please determinate all Hofstede’s cultural dimensions for USA and France that explain characteristics
developed in this case.
(3) Give 3 practical strategies using cultural dimensions.
(4) If you were building a new team consisting of French and American members, what strategies would
you use to get people working together?
CASE 2 - I.
EXPATS at LG.
LG ’ s Nam Yong did not set out to hire a group of aggressive Western-style expatriate managers, but he knew LG needed
change. The company’s South Korean management team had built an engineering powerhouse that excelled at
manufacturing high-quality goods, but the company realized that more than four fifths of its revenue came from overseas
and nearly 60 percent of its manufacturing was done outside South Korea. When Nam took over LG Electronics’ top job,
the company was coasting. It had become a top-five consumer electronics player globally, but had few major hits. Nam
believed the company needed to be a trendsetter if it wanted to prosper in the digital age. To shake things up, he asked
headhunters to find top talent from multinationals worldwide, regardless of nationality. Irish-born Dermot Boden, chief
marketing officer for LG, was the first non-Korean to be hired by LG as an internal change agent. Nam hired the veteran of
Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson to help turn LG into a premium brand. The problem was that LG’s marketing was
uninspiring. So Boden determined to give the brand a
more sophisticated image, with high-end products such as a cellphone co-branded with fashion house Prada and washing
machines costing $1,500 or more. He also took a more organized approach to marketing, by hiring a single international
advertising agency in London to handle advertising worldwide. Other foreign expatriates were asked to standardize the
hodgepodge of processes and systems that LG had developed around the world. Purchasing, for example, was done by
four different business units and was split between factories and subsidiaries in 110 countries. “I’m like a conductor,
getting 2,000 purchasing officers to work in concert to make good music,” says Tom Linton, a twenty-year veteran of IBM
who joined LG as its first chief procurement officer in 2008. Nam said in 2010 that Linton’s efforts to reshape the
purchasing system had already saved the company hundreds of millions of dollars. Meanwhile, LG’ s supply chain was
equally chaotic.
CASE 2 - II.
Didier Chenneveau, a Swiss who left Hewlett-Packard (HP), also in 2008, to become LG’s chief supply-chain officer,
inherited more than ten warehouse management systems, five transportation operations, and four computer systems
to monitor the movement of parts and finished products. His goal: to merge everything into a single global system.
Not unexpectedly, Boden and the other foreign managers were not entirely welcomed by local South Korean
managers. “The biggest worry was the prospect of Western executives imposing a way of thinking that might not work
in our Confucian culture,” said marketing manager Choi Seung Hun. “The prospect of communicating with my boss in
English gave me a headache, ” added Lee Kyo Weon, a purchasing manager. Over time, however, both Choi and Lee
agreed that the newcomers had made an eff ort to bridge the cultural gap. The results of this experiment in
internationalization are interesting. When an anticipated surge in global sales failed to materialize, LG decided not to
renew the contracts of Boden and the other expats. The company announced that it had decided to pursue a
different executive strategy, using mostly South Korean executives, not foreign ones. Meanwhile, across town, rival
electronics giant Samsung continued to hire more expats. Think about it ...
QUESTIONS:
1. How do you explain the rapid build up and equally rapid termination of the expatriate managers at LG??
2. What did LG gain– and possibly lose– from its three-year experiment with expatriate managers?
3. Overall, what lessons emerge from the LG experience for other managers entering into an expatriate
experience?
CASE 3 - I.
LAUNCHING A NEW VENTURE IN INDIA.
Many observers have suggested that the future belongs to India. Everyone seems to be going there these days, and
this developing nation has become a haven for outsourcing. For all its global assets, however, India can be a tough
place for entrepreneurs. Indeed, the World Bank’s “Ease of doing business” index ranks India 165th out of 183
countries in terms of the ease of launching a new business there. Furthermore, India scores 182nd out of 183 (behind
Angola) in terms of the government or legal enforcement of contracts. Why? A large part of the answer to this
question lies in a culture filled with red tape and, at times, nonsensical permits, policies, and procedures. Sometimes
entrepreneurs cannot even discover what the rules are until they are snagged. In Mumbai, for example, there are
thirty-seven procedural hoops to jump through just to gain approval to build a warehouse. Meeting these
requirements can routinely take up to a year to complete. Moreover, many of these rules differ across regions,
increasing the confusion of foreigners. Added to this is India’s endemic corruption, often exemplified by an
unwillingness or inability of many recipients of a bribe to fulfill their side of the bargain even after being paid. Finally,
new start-ups often have difficulty finding or retaining sufficient qualified employees to staff their operations.
Employee turnover is rampant, and companies are expected to invest heavily in training.
CASE 3 – II.
LAUNCHING A NEW VENTURE IN INDIA.
This combination of multiple ambiguous and often conflicting rules, coupled with persuasive rule breaking, often
leads to confusion among numerous would-be investors. In fact, foreign direct investment has fallen by one-third in
just the last year. As with other countries experiencing rapid globalization, the future may be bright, but it is far from
certain. Think about it.
QUESTIONS:
1. Many countries have strong and complex government bureaucracies that often serve to inhibit new
investment – especially by foreigners. As an entrepreneur interested in foreign investment, how might you prepare
yourself for dealing with such bureaucracies?
2. It is said that all countries have corruption; it is just the magnitude or nature that is different. Do you
believe this is correct? If so, how would you determinate the level of corruption that is “acceptable” for you to
continue pursuing business affairs in a particular country?