Executive Leadership

Culture & Leadership

Day 19 Jerry Flynn, PhD

Rutgers Business School
 Admin Checkpoint …
 Questions?
 Final Presentations in Two Weeks – Global Leaders!
 Day 1 – Teams 1-4
 Day 2 – Teams 5-8
 Some Team Time Today!

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 Culture and Leadership
 Description
 Culture Defined
 Dimensions of Culture
 Clusters of World Cultures
 Characteristics of Clusters
 Leadership Behavior and Culture Clusters
 Universally Desirable/Undesirable Leadership
Attributes

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 Description
Culture and Leadership--focuses on a collection
of related ideas rather than a single unified theory
Globalization:
 Increased after World War II
 Increased interdependence between nations
o Economic, social, technical, political
 Has created many challenges
o Need to design multi-national organizations
o Identify and select leaders for these organizations
o Manage organizations with culturally diverse employees

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Five Cross-cultural Competencies for Leaders
(Adler Bartholomew, 1992)
1. Understand business, political, and cultural
environments worldwide
2. Learn the perspectives, tastes, trends, and
technologies of many cultures
3. Be able to work simultaneously with people from
many cultures
4. Be able to adapt to living and communicating in
other cultures
5. Need to learn to relate to people from other cultures
from a position of equality rather than superiority

THINK What do you think the biggest challenges would be if

you were asked to lead a global team tomorrow?
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 Culture Defined
Culture:
 Set of learned beliefs, values, rules, norms, symbols,
and traditions that are common to a group of people
 Shared qualities of a group that make them unique
 The way of life, customs, and scripts of a group of
people

Terms related to culture:

 Multicultural--approach or system that takes more
than one culture into account
 Diversity--existence of different cultures or ethnicities
within a group or organization

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 Ethnocentrism
 The tendency for individuals to place their own group (ethnic,
racial, or cultural) at the center of their observations of the world
 Perception that one’s own culture is better or more natural
than other cultures
 Is a universal tendency, and each of us is ethnocentric to
some degree
 Ethnocentrism can be a major obstacle to effective leadership

 Prevents people from understanding or respecting other

cultures

THINK If this is true, how do we overcome it?

!
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 Prejudice
 A largely fixed attitude, belief, or emotion held by an individual
about another individual or group
o based on faulty or unsubstantiated data
 Involves inflexible generalizations that are resistant to change or
evidence
 Is self-oriented rather than other-oriented
 Leaders face the challenge of dealing with their own prejudices
AND those of followers
o Can be toward the leader or leader’s culture
o Can face followers who represent culturally different groups,
and they may have their own prejudices toward one another

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 Early Cultural Studies
 Hall (1976) reported that a primary characteristic of cultures is degree of
focus--on the individual (individualistic) or on the group (collectivist)
 Trompenaars (1994) classified an organization’s culture into two
dimensions:
o Egalitarian-hierarchical--degree to which cultures exhibit shared
power versus hierarchical power
o Person-task orientation--extent to which cultures emphasize human
interaction versus focusing on tasks
 Hofstede (1980, 2001) benchmark research identified five major
dimensions on which cultures differ

Power Distance – Individual/Collective – Masculinity – Uncertainty – Long/Short Term

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Contemporary Dimensions of Culture
 House et al.’s (2004) research on the
relationship between culture and leadership
resulted in the GLOBE Research Program
o Initiated in 1991--this program involved more than
160 investigators
o Used quantitative methods to study the responses
of 17,000 managers in more than 950
organizations, 62 different cultures
o Developed a classification of cultural
dimensions--identified nine cultural dimensions

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 Nine Cultural Dimensions
1. Uncertainty Avoidance*
 Extent to which a society, organization, or group relies on established
social norms, rituals, and procedures to avoid uncertainty
For example, United States promotes entrepreneurship; Middle Eastern
countries value careful business negotiations built on long-term trusted
relationships

2. Power Distance*
 Degree to which members of a group expect and agree that power
should be shared unequally
 Which power bases (legitimate, expert, etc.) are preferred in a
culture
For example, India caste system where everyone has his/her “rightful
place”
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 Nine Cultural Dimensions
3. Institutional Collectivism*
 Degree to which an organization or society encourages
institutional or societal collective action
For example, North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-II, who uses
military to oversee development of cultural values of collective effort
and non-material incentives
4. In-Group Collectivism
 Degree to which people express pride, loyalty, and
cohesiveness in their organizations or families
For example, some Middle Eastern cultures regard family and
religious affiliation above all else; honor killings of family members
who have disgraced or defied the paternal leader of the family

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 Nine Cultural Dimensions
5. Gender Egalitarianism*
 Degree to which an organization or society minimizes gender role
differences and promotes gender equality
For example, in Sweden, men and women share power equally.
Extensive welfare system allows both sexes to balance work and
family life
6. Assertiveness
 Degree to which people in a culture are determined, assertive,
confrontational, and aggressive in their social relationships
For example, German managers use straightforward and direct
language; conflict and confrontational discussion are acceptable
workplace behaviors

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 Nine Cultural Dimensions
7. Future Orientation*
 Extent to which people engage in future-oriented behaviors
such as planning, investing in the future, and delaying
gratification
For example, many Middle Eastern countries are concerned with
traditional values and ways of doing things; North Americans
believe they can plan and control the future and idealize change for
the sake of changing
8. Performance Orientation
 Extent to which an organization or society encourages and
rewards group members for improved performance and
excellence
For example, standardized testing in U.S. schools
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 Nine Cultural Dimensions
9. Humane Orientation
 Degree to which a culture encourages and rewards people for
being fair, altruistic, generous, caring, and kind to others.
For example, Switzerland’s helpfulness to others during and after
WW I and WW II. The country espouses tolerance and responsibility
as central educational goals.

* Similar to Hofstede’s 5 factors describing cultural differences

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10 Clusters of World Cultures

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Characteristics of Clusters

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 Differentiating the World by
Clusters of Characteristics

Characteristics include
 Anglo--competitive and result oriented

 Confucian Asia--result driven, encourage group working

together over individual goals
 Eastern Europe--forceful, supportive of co-workers,
treat women with equality
 Germanic Europe--value competition and
aggressiveness and are more result oriented
 Latin America--loyal and devoted to their families and
similar groups
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 Characteristics of Clusters Continued …
Characteristics include:
 Latin Europe--value individual autonomy
 Middle East--devoted and loyal to their own people, women
afforded less status
 Nordic Europe--high priority on long-term success, women
treated with greater equality
 Southern Asia--strong family and deep concern for their
communities
 Sub-Sahara Africa--concerned and sensitive to others,
demonstrate strong family loyalty

THINK Do any of these characteristics align with your experience

! or surprise you?
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 Six Common Global Leadership Behaviors
(Globe Research)

1. Charismatic/value-based leadership reflects the

ability to inspire, to motivate, and to expect high
performance from others based on strongly held
core values.
2. Team-oriented leadership emphasizes team
building and a common purpose among team
members.
3. Participative leadership reflects the degree to
which leaders involve others in making and
implementing decisions.

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 Six Common Global Leadership Behaviors
(Globe Research)

4. Humane-oriented leadership emphasizes being

supportive, considerate, compassionate, and
generous.
5. Autonomous leadership refers to independent and
individualistic leadership, which includes being
autonomous and unique.
6. Self-protective leadership reflects behaviors that
ensure the safety and security of the leader and the
group.
THINK Do you believe these behaviors are equally transferrable
! across cultures?
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Desirable Leadership Attributes

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Undesirable Leadership Attributes

THINK How do we apply all of these insights? Do you believe

they are consistent enough to rely on?
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 Application
 The findings about culture can help leaders understand their
own cultural biases and preferences.
 Different cultures have different expectations about what
they want from their leaders, and these findings help our
leaders adapt their styles to be more effective in different
cultural settings.
 The findings can help global leaders communicate more
effectively across cultural and geographic boundaries.
 Information on culture and leadership can be used to build
culturally sensitive websites, design new employee
orientation programs, conduct programs in relocation
training, and improve global team effectiveness.
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 Mini- Case – A Challenging Workplace
1. What similarities and differences can you identify
between N.A and Japanese working styles?
2. In what way did this company reflect the
characteristics of other Asian countries?
3. Why do you think Samira was not seen as a team
player?
4. What Universal leadership attributes did Samira
exhibit?
5. What other suggestions would you have in this
situation?

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 Next Time:
 Servant Leadership

 Next Week: Followership & Ethics

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