Managing Cultural Diversity in Amazon UK Warehouses - A Case Study | Desklib

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PROPOSAL TOPIC and (if
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Research Question
 TOPIC
An investigation of cultural diversity on organizational
management – case study of Amazon warehouses UK
Module Title
Business and Management Dissertation:
PART 1 (proposal 3000 words)
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Moodle and in LTAFP)
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Table of Contents
Title of Topic/Project Proposal....................................................................................................................3
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
Aim of the research project.....................................................................................................................4
Research Objectives and Research Question(s).......................................................................................4
Literature Review........................................................................................................................................4
Organizational culture.............................................................................................................................4
Workforce diversity.................................................................................................................................7
Intra-group conflict, organizational culture, and diversity.......................................................................9
Methodology...............................................................................................................................................9
Research paradigm..................................................................................................................................9
Research tools.......................................................................................................................................10
Ethics.....................................................................................................................................................11
Data analyses.........................................................................................................................................11
Limitations.............................................................................................................................................11
Appendices..............................................................................................................................................20
References..............................................................................................................................................21
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Title of Topic/Project Proposal
An investigation of cultural diversity on organizational management – case study of
Amazon warehouses UK
Introduction
Globalization and the free access at labor market determined in the last decade the
access of cross-cultural employees on various organizations worldwide and,
consequently in UK. The management of cross-cultural interactions become nowadays
a necessity in business
environment. Even the business operates through outsourcing processes in a new
country or establish operations abroad, the managers must acknowledge and consider
that there are cultural differences in these will significantly influence the organization
strategies and overall performance.
Cultural diversity must be considered and analyzed in the current business context,
where employees coming from various cultures must be integrated properly and
managed towards the achievement of organization objectives. The aim of the current
research is to review the current literature related to the management of diverse
workforce and determine its impact on business management.
Cultural diversity in the workplace will influence in a negative or positive way on
business management and can be influenced by the degree in which the leaders are
able to deal with this aspect, with focus on minimizing the negative impact (Martin,
2014).
As many other warehouses in UK, Amazon had until few years a monocultural structure,
but currently become an employer of people from various cultures and countries. An
issue that must be considered is the impact of workforce cultural diversity on the
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business management and what are the best solutions for managers to integrate the
cultural differences to develop multicultural teams ready to deliver in an efficient way the
business objectives.
Aim of the research project
Current paper aims to evaluate the degree in which a diverse workforce determines
changes on management activities and organizational culture within organizations. A
case study Amazon UK warehouses were selected, as organizations where multicultural
employees are working.
Research Objectives and Research Question(s)
Based on investigations related to influence of a diverse workforce on management
processes and organizational culture, the research questions are:
1) in which extent a multicultural diverse workforce changes an organizational
culture?
2) how the cross-cultural workforce can be effectively managed?
3) what tools and processes can warehouse managers use to minimize the
negative impacts of workforce cultural diversity and to maximize its integration
in organization
Literature Review
Search keywords: workforce, cross cultural diversity, integration, Hofstede, multicultural
diversity
Organizational culture
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Culture is considered nowadays an important and integral constituent in the
organizational research (Kartolo and Kwantes, 2018). Even there are multiple definitions
of the organizational culture in the literature, a general viewpoint can be identified,
outlining that organizational culture reveal and is influenced by values, attitudes,
expectations commonly possessed by the members of the organization, being
approached as unconscious basic assumptions of the organization associates(Schein,
2004). These basic assumptions are visible through shared behaviours and artifacts
(Brettel et. al., 2015).
Hofstede (1991) defined culture as “the collective programming of the human mind that
distinguishes the members of one human group from those of another, adding that a
culture can be understand as a system of valued held in a collective way.
Organizational culture similarity has been identified as being associated in a positive
manner with the organization performance (Schein, 1995).
Organizational culture has a dual influence, at organizational and employee level, being
seen as a power that keeps organizations together (Goffee and Jones, 1996), aspect
that holds a significant importance in the success or breakdown of a certain
organization in different business areas, including the implementation of its strategy
(Vaara et. al., 2010), organizational development and in the processes linked with
mergers and acquisitions (Weber, 1996). Organizational culture impact on employee’s
performance is visible in job performance and the intention to remain within the
organization (staff loyalty or turnover intention) (Murphy et. al., 2013). According to
Cooke and Szumal (1993) the organizational culture reveals two important constituents:
the shared expectations from behavioural perspective and the normative beliefs.
Normative beliefs are linked with the individual beliefs and knowledge in relationship
with what is expected from the members of a certain group or organization (Fishbein,
1972), while the shared behavioural expectations are determined by the normative
beliefs and defines the set of expected and shared behaviours from the members of a
certain group or organization (Cooke and Szumal, 1993). The behavioural norms
mention the expected way in which the group members are expected to deal with their
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tasks, create standards that need to be adhered by the members and support the
members to assess as appropriate or inappropriate various interactions (O’Reilly, 1989).
Further dimensions of the culture were theorized by Cooke and Szumal (1993): a) the
focus on behavioural norms linked to tasks versus people (in which extent the
organization is concerned about the quality of the tasks performed by the employees or
about the quality of the relationships between the organization members); b) the focus
on behavioural expectations meant to protect the personal status in comparison with
behavioural expectations that satisfies higher placed needs of the employees. The
outcome of the model based on the two above mentioned dimensions is a framework
that outlines 3 main clusters of cultural norms: constructive, aggressive – defensive and
passive – defensive, resulting in 12 styles of organizational culture (detailed in Appendix
1).
Constructive culture norms demonstrates and organizational culture in which the
individuals are expected to interact and develop evocative relationships fact that
contributes to the tasks approach in a manner that covers the organizational and group
needs. The organizations with constructive culture norms promote the team effort and
recognition of task performers with a reasonable treatment for every member within the
organization (Cooke and Rousseau, 1988). Organizations with the constructive culture
norms shows positive outcomes as an increased level of performance, low level of
employees’ turnover and a high degree of job satisfaction (Klein, 2011).
Passive-defensive culture norms demonstrates and organizational culture in which
the members belief is that they must create relationships and cooperate with other
employees in the manner that will not threat own status and/or security. Therefore, in
this kind of organizational cultures the approval is seek for the behaviour, traditional
values are promoted, a high dependency on the individuals perceived as authority in the
organization, while the responsibility is avoided to prevent and minimize potential
mistakes (Cooke and Rousseau, 1988). The effect of these passive-defensive culture
norms is a decreased level of leadership, decreased level of wellbeing of the staff and
increased levels of turnover (Balthazard et. al., 2006).
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