Understanding Organisational Culture: The Hofstede Theory

Running head: ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE
ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE
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Part one: The Hofstede Theory:
After globalisation the country boundaries have been shipped by the spread of
communication networks as well as their development of communication along with
transportation. Therefore countries have been closer than they were before. Through trade,
education, science and Technology where each and every National culture is proving
themselves effective or dominating for the other. This is the reason why in 1970 The Scholars
like greet Hofstede head started to record the importance of cultural differences in the
business life and how the business relates to the communication among the people having
different cultures. According to him the culture is the source of conflict than of synergy
(Hofstede-insights.com 2019).
Culture is intensely rooted in the different aspects of business live where people needs
to interact with others like buyers employees, suppliers and other stakeholders. Therefore
when a company enters the market of another country must respect and gain knowledge the
cultural dimension of that particular country (Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017). As
different cultural dimensions regulate the behaviour and understanding of the employees, the
management or the Human Resource Department actually handle the conflicts among the
local and expatriate employees in the organisation. This is the reason why when a company
of UK enters the market of Argentina or China, needs to be aware of the national as well as
organizational culture of the country. This will help it to manage the employees, understand
the demands of the suppliers and other stakeholders.
Hofstede cultural framework is considered to be the most important method of
understanding the national culture and how they affect the organisational culture itself.
According to this theory there are 6 dimensions based on which the people of a particular
Nation prove their values, understanding, expectations and styles of working. These 6

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dimensions include power distance individualism vs. collectivism uncertainty avoidance,
long term orientation, masculinity versus femininity and intelligence versus restraint.
Proper understanding of the culture of the organisation, the understanding of the
values, understanding, motives and working methods must be known. Only then the
organisations after entering the foreign market can effectively operate and create a positive
image in the minds of the employees as well as the other stakeholders like customers most
importantly. Hofstede’ cultural dimension framework is practical for uncovering the facts of
differences and conflicts of the cross-cultural business as well as communication
(Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017). Only when the people of the organisation understand
the cultural differences concluded by Greet Hofstede and then take proper measures as well
as communication style, they can management properly and the business will have success in
the foreign lands. It is all about matching the culture of the organisation with that of the
nation or more precisely the market.
However, many intercultural scholars have pointed out different factors which cannot
be explained through the framework of Hofstede. According to these critics, the theory by
Hofstede does not mentions or provide valuable guiding intelligence and regard those as
some absolute assumptions (Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017). Various languages or
contents objectively impact upon the understanding of the conversation. It plays an
irreplaceable position in the intercultural communication. In addition to this, the gestures and
body language also play important role in maintaining good relation with the people from
other culture. This is effective in eliminating any type of misunderstanding among the people
from other cultures. What is considered in one culture may not be accepted on the other
(Block and Walter 2017). Therefore, in order to mix with the culture of the market, the
knowledge of language is important as this is the key to enter the minds of the people but
Hofstede’s national cultural dimensions do not detail about it.

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Hofstede culture also does not focus on the time management aspects which are
different in different culture. Some of the cultures do not take much time to consider the
issues or segments but make prompt decisions without thinking the facet on the relationship
(Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017). On the contrary, the other cultures do not allow
people to make easy or prompt decisions but focus on the outcome in the future including the
relational factors for that matter. Moreover, the cultural dimension of Hofstede’s theory does
not detail priorities in the goals orientation and relationship orientation cultures of the
organisations. To most of the cultural critics, it is the result of narrow research as the data
collected by Hofstede only focuses on the English speaking people working in IBM and
evaluation of their work attitude as well as values (Degens et al. 2017). Therefore, there are
gaps in understanding of the national as well as organisational culture which may have
negative effect on the decision making process or policy issuing segment.
Part two: Comparison of Argentina and UK
The power distance dimension defines how people of a nation can perceive unequal
power distribution in the society or for that matter in the organisation. This is derived from
the value of less powerful citizens which indicate that the level to which the citizens can
accept the power inequality. The low score define that the members of the society prefer
equality and higher power distance index means that the people are ready to accept larger
power differences in the organisation (Beugelsdijk, Kostova and Roth 2017). In this type of
workplace hierarchy plays an important role where the operations and positions divide among
people. In the power distance dimension, UK scores 35 and Argentina is in 49 (Hofstede-
insights.com 2019).
As mentioned before the lower the score is the preference for equality in the society is
higher. The UK sits in the lower ranking of the PDI that is the society that believes that the