Cultural Dimensions and Managing Organizational Culture

This article discusses the cultural dimensions of Dominican Republic and United States using Hofstede, Trompennars and GLOBE data. It also explores managing organizational culture, diversity and teams, cross-cultural communication and negotiations. The article provides recommendations for organizations to manage the culture of Dominican Republic and overcome communication barriers.

Running head: MILESTONE 2
Milestone 2
-Cultural Dimensions
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Cultural Dimensions:
1. Hofstede dimensions and Dominican Republic:
According to Hofstede Insights, the Dominican Republic scores 65 on Power Distance,
(which shows it is a hierarchical society); 30 on Individualism (which shows it is a
collectivistic society); 65 on Masculinity-Feminity (which shows the society has masculine
characteristics in the behavior of people); 45 on Uncertainty-Avoidance (which shows the
society is fairly pragmatic in terms of avoidance of uncertainties), 13 on Long Term
Orientation (which means the country has a normative culture) and 54 on Indulgence (which
means the society is fairly indulgent) (hofstede-insights.com, 2018; Bakir et al., 2015).
2. Trompennars and Dominican Republic:
The Onion Model of Trompenaar’s can be used to explain the culture of Dominican
Republic in three layers:
The Outer Layer: This layer consists of the food, clothing, and visual reality of behavior and
language of Dominican people and shows the explicit aspects of the culture.
The Middle Layer: This layers consists of the social norms and values of the Dominican
people and what they consider as right or wrong.
The Core: This consists of implicit aspects of the culture such as basic assumptions and social
rules.
(Brucker, 2015; Young et al., 2017)
3. GLOBE and implications for management:
GLOBE project is a comprehensive study of culture and leadership across 62 societies
which helps to understand how specific traits of the culture and how it can affect the

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leadership. From the study, six leadership styles have been identified such as performance
oriented, team oriented, participative, humane, autonomous and self protective. The project
also helped to identify nine cultural dimensions: power distance, uncertainty avoidance,
institutional collectivism, in group collectivism, assertiveness, gender egalitarianism, future
orientation and performance orientation (Binder, 2016; Beugelsdijk et al., 2015).
Managing Across Cultures:
1. Cross cultural differences and similarities between Dominican Republic and United
States
Similarities and differences between the cultures of Dominican Republic and United
States could be compared using the Hofstede scores. Discussed below is the comparison:
Power Distance: Dominican republic (score 65) has a more hierarchical society compared to
United States (score 40) which has more equality among people.
Individualism: Dominican Republic (score 30) is a collectivist society compared to United
States (score 91) which has a highly individualistic society.
Masculinity: Both Dominican Republic (score 65) and United States (62) has a very
masculine society where they want the best of what is available.
Uncertainty Avoidance: Both Dominican Republic (score 45) and United States (score 46) are
very pragmatic cultures in terms of uncertainty avoidance.
Long Term Orientation: Both Dominican Republic (score 13) as well as United States (score
26) has a normative culture and are prone to analyze any new information to check if it’s true
or false.

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Indulgence: Both Dominican Republic (score 54) and United States (68) have a very
indulgent culture, and shows less restraints over their urges, however, people of United States
are more indulgent than Dominican Republic.
(hofstede-insights.com, 2018; Vaiman & Brewster, 2015)
2. Comparison using GLOBE data from a management perspective
GLOBE data for Dominican Republic shows the following information:
The culture is performance oriented, follows institutional and in group collectivism,
pragmatic assertive and hierarchical. This shows that Dominican people can work well within
an organization and follow the organizational rules (Beugelsdijk et al., 2015).
GLOBE data for United States shows the following information:
The culture is performance oriented, highly individualistic, pragmatic, and assertive
and based on the values of equality for everyone. This shows that the people are very creative
and tend to work using their individual strengths and weaknesses (Beugelsdijk et al., 2015).
Organizational Cultures:
1. Cultural dimensions and managing the culture of Dominican Republic and
recommendations for Organizational Culture:
The cultural dimensions for Dominican republic shows that the people prefer a
hierarchical structure of society and have a collectivist mentality and have very masculine.
They can be motivated through rewards and can work well in a hierarchical organizational
structure which is recommended for the organizations. The people are also somewhat
indulgent and prefer to avoid uncertainties and ambiguities and hence organizations should

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have clear and unambiguous statements and support better performance through positive
reinforcements and indulgences (Bakir et al., 2015).
2. Diversity and Teams in relation to culture of Dominican Republic. Advantages and
potential problems:
One of the biggest advantages of having Dominican people in a diverse work team is that
they can work very well as a collective unit, are highly driven by the best outcomes and can
be indulged by positive reinforcements. However, the disadvantages can be the propensity to
avoid uncertainties and a lack of long term orientation, which makes it difficult to manage
them in uncertain conditions to orient them to long term goals (Brucker, 2015).
Cross Cultural Communication and Negotiations:
1. Communication barriers and how to achieve communication effectiveness:
Communication barriers are factors (such as differences in perceptions and cultures,
emotional barriers and language differences) which prevent or limit communication between
individuals and groups. In order to overcome the barriers it is vital to ensure that effective
verbal as well as non verbal (such as body language) communication is used as well as the
usage of common language and cultural competencies in communication (Milovanova &
Salikaeva, 2017).
2. Discussions of negotiations and the role of culture in negotiations- comparison
between Dominican Republic and United States. Types, cultural differences, tactics
and behaviors:
Negotiations are a form of discussion which helps to establish an agreement between two
or more parties. Culture can play an important role in negotiations since it influences the
expectations of people and thus the effectiveness of negotiation strategies. Comparison of the

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cultures of Dominican Republic and United States shows that both the cultures are very
masculine (they want the best of all available options), pragmatic (wants to avoid
uncertainties) and indulgent (lacking restraint) which can influence effective negotiations
with the people. On the other hand, Dominican republic has a more hierarchical and
collectivist society compared to United States due to which social positions and collective
values have more significance among Dominican people (Bird & Mendenhall, 2016).

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References:
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Dimensions of National Culture Stable over Time? A Cohort Analysis. Global
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Binder, J. (2016). Global project management: communication, collaboration and
management across borders. Routledge.
Bird, A., & Mendenhall, M. E. (2016). From cross-cultural management to global leadership:
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Brucker, M. (2015). A Comparison of the US-American and German Culture by one Aspect
of Trompenaars" Model of Culture". GRIN Verlag.
hofstede-insights.com. (2018). Country Comparison - Hofstede Insights. Retrieved from
https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison/the-dominican-republic,the-
usa/
Milovanova, A. V., & Salikaeva, O. V. (2017). Cross-cultural communication. Проблемы
геологии и освоения недр: труды XXI Международного симпозиума имени
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дня рождения профессора МИ Кучина, Томск, 3-7 апреля 2017 г. Т. 2.—Томск,
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Vaiman, V., & Brewster, C. (2015). How far do cultural differences explain the differences
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Young, K. L., & Rudin-Brown, C. M. (2017). Designing Automotive Technology for Cross-
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