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Importance of national culture
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Developing Managers: The Functional, the Symbolic, the Sacred and the Profane [*].
Author/s: Ken Kamoche
Abstract
This paper offers a new perspective on international management by examining the role of culture and management development in creating international expertise, a sense of identity and realizing organizational control. A critical analysis of the culture transmission and management development philosophy and practice of a UK-based transnational reveals how the transmission of culture accomplishes management development objectives, while management development itself serves as a vehicle for the transmission of the desired corporate values. This recursiveness is sustained by a corporate ideology that urges the creation of integrative values and, in turn, is legitimized by the quest for favourable functional and symbolic consequences.
Descriptors: management training and development, culture, ideology, functionalism, symbolism
Introduction
Reconciling headquarter-subsidiary interests while maintaining a distinct identity continues to be a major challenge for multinational firms, hence the think global/act local paradox. For Ghoshal and Bartlett (1990) this problem can be addressed by effectively handling the network of exchange relationships. Other solutions include socialization and the management of expatriates (e.g. Edstrom and Galbraith 1977; Tung 1982); managing relationships between expatriates and host-country subordinates (e.g. Shaw 1990); creating cultural synergy (e.g. Adler 1980); fostering cooperative relationships and developing conflict-resolution mechanisms (e.g. Doz et al. 1981); diffusing 'best proven practices' (e.g. Rosenzweig and Singh 1991); reconciling organizational linkages (e.g. Borys and Jemison 1989) and diffusing and leveraging knowledge (e.g. Gupta and Govindarajan 1991; Kamoche 1996). Bartlett and Ghoshal (1989: 187) found that successful transnational firms used management development 'to build cultural norms, sha pe organizational processes and influence individual managerial behaviour in a way that reinforced worldwide strategies and organizational objectives'. This implies a potentially integrative role for culture and management training and development (MTD).
Going beyond the typical concern with 'better skills', this study offers a much more complex and multi-faceted picture of MTD which reveals an intricate interplay between MTD and corporate culture. We show how managers in a multinational firm disguised as International Products (IP) account for their training and career development activities and how they rationalize such activities in terms of an integrative corporate culture. [1] Thus, MTD serves as a tool for the transmission of culture, while a putative integrative culture in turn furnishes the rationale for MTD. This recursiveness finds legitimacy in the ideological premise, promulgated by senior management, that it is in the joint interests of the firm and the managers to absorb and internalize the organizational values inherent in the corporate culture, because this helps managers to secure a high-flying career.
Moorhouse, A. (2005, November). International Management Organizational Behavior. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from University of California Berkley: http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~matran/Files/proKarenLeary.doc
Zellmer-Bruhn, M., & Gibson, C. (2006). Multinational Organization Context: Implications for Team Learning and Performance. The Academy of Management Journal , 49 (3), 501 - 518.
Management and leadership skills in nursing and other healthcare professions are becoming a more and more widely spoken of subject, as they are essential skills for everyday practice in delivering care (Gopee and Galloway, 2009). Effective management requires the nurse to be able to draw on evidence based knowledge and experience to develop the ability to manage competently during practice. Skills without knowledge, appropriate attitude and understanding will not equate to competency (Watson, 2002).
In the last century, globalization has become a very tangible part of how business is conducted. Technological advancement allows international trade and commerce to happen rapidly and easily while the advancement in how goods are transported and how people communicate have had a drastic effect on the globalization of business. Management practices and culture also has a bearing on how international enterprise has is conducted. Managers have to adapt to different management practices, adjust to a new culture, and sometimes face ethical issues in a foreign field. Management is an important role in finance and enterprise that has far reaching consequences on the globalization of business.
What is leadership? Leadership is having the ability to give guidance to those that will follow. Those that follow will help to complete the mission. Leadership is a soft science, just as anthropology, sociology and psychology. It cannot be proven exactly what it is. Leadership is an art, the skillful application of leadership behaviors beyond techniques is much the same as the skillful application of brushstrokes by a master painter. Leadership is both rational and emotional. It involves both sides of human experience. It includes actions and influences based on reason and logic as well those based on inspiration and passion. Leadership is a social process shared among all members of a group. Leadership development comes through experience. We all learn from our different experiences. Whether positive or negative, they are our tools for growth and development.
Managers nowadays do not actually do what a manager really should do back in the eighties. Changes that occurred in the new economy, the increasing use of technology in business, and the effects of globalisation towards business world have led management into a whole new dimension. New managers are expected to be able to manage on an international scale, act strategically, utilize technology, establish values, and of course, act responsibly as well. (Crainer, 1998) Henry Mintzberg once asked, "What do managers do?" After conducting his research based on a study of five CEOs, he concluded that managerial work involves interpersonal role, decisional role and informational role. And the fact is that, managers get things done through other people. Therefore, managers are required to possess certain skills and competencies which allow them to play these roles effectively and efficiently throughout the four functions of management. (Mintzberg, 1998)
In the article, Cultural constraints in management theories, Geert Hofstede examines business management around the globe from a cultural perspective. He explains how he believes there are no universal practices when it comes to management and offers examples from the US, Germany, France, Japan, Holland, China and Russia. He demonstrates how business management theories and practices are very much subject to cultural norms and values and by understanding these differences, it can give managers an advantage in global business practices.
Globalisation allows individuals, groups, corporations, and countries to reach around the world farther, faster, more deeply, and more cheaply than ever before. Most large local companies regard globalisation as opportunity, thereby exploring overseas markets for maximum market share and optimum business strategies. However, managers would face a series of challenges caused by leadership models, cultural backgrounds, political and economic risks, HR management, etc. To study multinational management skills is very useful for my future career. In this essay, I will set goals for this subject, identify the skills I have honed and need to improve, and explain my strategies for achieving goals.
Ahlstrom, D., & Bruton, G. D. (2010). International Management: Strategy and Culture in the Emerging
In today’s competitive business environment, effective management plays a crucial role. The article Five Minds of a Manager by Jonathan Gosling and Henry Mintzberg, identify some important aspects of effective managers. According to the author, “The world of the manager is complicated and confusing.” Consequently, mangers need to think above ordinary employees. In particular, managers should, think global and act local, collaborate through competitions, be agents of change and maintain order. This paper provides a reflective review of the article Five Minds of a Manager by Jonathan Gosling and Henry Mintzberg.
It is a “pattern of beliefs, values and learned ways of coping with experience” (Brown 1994) that manifests itself into three layers: artefacts at the shallowest, values and beliefs in the middle and basic assumptions at the deepest. It is inseparable from the organisation that cannot be easily manipulated as it is fundamentally non-unitary and emergent. Finally, organisational culture is important as it is one of the main determinants as to whether a firm can enjoy superior financial and a comparative advantage over firms of differing cultures.
Globalized companies have gone through a huge process to make the company work intentionally through developing an effective cross cultural training. In this paper we will discuss from advantages and disadvantages of cross-cultural ability to the procedures of developing the training to make a company sustainable to keep it steady in a business world.
With the rapid growth in globalization there are a number of firms who have taken their businesses abroad. Their challenge, cross cultural management and communication. An effective communication strategy begins first with understanding who the sender of the message is and who the receiver of the message is. Many companies have realized this and offer training in the different cultures to help better facilitate communication between leaders (Cross-Cultural Communication, mindtools.com). Without this basic understand between sender and receiver it can be very difficult for companies of multicultural to even begin to communicate. The second important understanding is that leaders must demand a cultural tolerance of acceptable behavior between cultures to facilitate effective communication (Cross-Cultural Communication, mindtools.com).
11. Satish P. Deshpande and Chockalingam Viswesvaran, "Is Cross-cultural Training of Expatriate Managers Effective: A Meta Analysis," International Journal of Intercultural Relations 16 (1992): 296.
Miroshnik, V. (2002). Culture and international management: a review' The Journal of Management Development 21(7): 521-544