Doing business across cultures_3

FURTHER VALUE DIMENSIONS Figure 3.5 Average “Specific” score across age ranges which is made up of business people, and may experience detach-ment from the family and its more diffuse dynamics. Lowest (most important variable) Highest (least important variable) Country Industry Religion Age Gender Education Job function Corporate Climate/Culture 69 BUSINESS ACROSS CULTURES RECONCILING SPECIFIC AND DIFFUSE CULTURES We can observe this dimension in action in the various alliances betweenmanyofthemajorairlines.InourworkwithBritishAirways and American Airlines, we helped the parties recognize and respect different ways in which they define the relationship with their pas-sengers. It is typically American to emphasize “core competencies” and “shareholder value.” In contrast, British Airways emphasize ser-vice with hot breakfasts, champagne in some classes, and the like. In this “One World” alliance the options were: • “Serve the cattle with Coke and pretzels.” • Serve not only hot breakfasts but also add some massage, shoe polishing, and other extras and hence “go bankrupt on the flight.” • Compromise and serve hot pretzels, so it becomes certain that you will lose all the passengers. Reconciliation here is the art of trying to define specifically those areas that provide a more personal service and deepen the relation-ship in the service being provided. Only this would work. The success of the alliance will depend on this very reconciliation: the competency of the employees of the airlines to consistently choose those specific moments to deepen the relationship in the ser-vice being provided. A compromise – hot pretzels – will lead to a business disaster, and we have often seen them in alliances. Some two years ago, Merrill Lynch (ML) was facing fierce competi-tion from Charles Schwaab on the Internet. While ML’s financial consultants were used to developing long-term and expensive rela-tionships with their clients, Charles Schwaab decided to put its efforts into helping clients online. After a couple of years, ML saw a 70 FURTHER VALUE DIMENSIONS dramatic rise in market share go to the online traders. The specific services of the Internet were winning over the diffuse relationships, which were much more costly. After long deliberation, ML decided to introduce online trading but in a more subtle and sophisticated way than Schwaab. The sophistication lay in how they combined (reconciled) the different cultures of the Internet and the financial consultant. First, the consultants mined their own Internet clients to identify those they could help further through more personal contact on the Internet. And conversely, regular clients were helped to install web cams allowing them to contact their consultant more quickly on the Internet; they were also able to access their own portfolios immedi-ately online. MLcreated clicks that stuck. The market share has been regained with an improved fee structure.3 That’s how the Internet can be used to deepen a relationship. Barnes and Noble sell more books online than Amazon.com, because they have bookshops. Reconciliation is the integration of both the specific and diffuse services. ACHIEVED VERSUS ASCRIBED STATUS All societies give certain members higher status than others, signal-ing that unusual attention should be focused upon such persons and their activities. Some societies accord status to people on the basis of their achievements whereas others ascribe status by virtue of age, class, gender, education, etc. The first kind we call achieved status and the second ascribed status. While achieved status refers to doing (what you do), ascribed status refers to being (who you are). Achievement-oriented cultures will market their products and ser- 71 BUSINESS ACROSS CULTURES vices on the basis of their performance. Performance, skill, and knowledge justify their authority. Ascription-oriented cultures often ascribe status to products and services. In particular in Asia, status is attributed to those things which “naturally” evoke admiration from others, i.e., highly quali-fied technologies or projects deemed to be of national importance. The status is generally independent of task, specific function, or technical performance. There are more implications in terms of the values given to authority and accountability. In achievement-oriented cultures, it is assumed that people in positions of authority will feel a sense of accountabil-ity for the accomplishments of an organization. This is based on the rationale that if someone is the boss, they must be there because they’ve earned the title and position. But in many cultures, positions of authority are natural consequences of who your family are, of having gone to the right school, having been born into the right class, or gender, or having seniority. So the fact that someone is in a position of authority doesn’t necessarily mean that they will need to achieve, or be motivated to achieve the objectives of the organiza-tion to remain worthy of the position. You can imagine how this can impact on personnel planning and career development if you are relying on managers in remote loca-tions to prepare the groundwork for your efforts and to follow-up after training is delivered. In some ascribed cultures, this just won’t work because the managers are not in their positions based on their achievements (as we define them in Western Society) and you can’t simply replace them by managers who achieve results. Any such new management would be viewed by employees with ascribed status as having no status at all, no standing within the organization, and no credible authority. 72 FURTHER VALUE DIMENSIONS This dilemma is obviously a great challenge when business partners have different traditions for how people move up the ladder in the organization. In achievement-oriented cultures, your position is best secured by what you deliver. In the worst case, you are only as good as your last performance. In ascribed cultures, seniority and long-term loyalty are very much more important. We asked our 65,000 participants to give their opinion about the fol-lowing statement: The most important thing in life is to think and act in a manner that best suits the way you really are, even if you do not get things done. The results are shown in Figure 3.6. The issue therefore is how can one ever respect the status attributed to people whose whole society and history has been built on avoid- Figure 3.6 Percentage not agreeing with “acting as you really are” 73 ... - tailieumienphi.vn