Analysis of Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions in Study Skills Report

This report delves into Hofstede's cultural dimensions, examining their influence on study skills and leadership. It begins with an introduction to Hofstede's theory, explaining how cultural values shape thought and behavior. The main body analyzes dimensions like individualism/collectivism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity/femininity, providing definitions and examples. The author then expresses their agreement with individualism, citing a real-world example to support the argument. The report concludes with suggestions for addressing gender inequality and emphasizes the importance of cultural values for effective international business practices. References to academic sources are also included.

STUDY SKILLS

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
1. Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions..............................................................................................1
2. Which do you agree with?.......................................................................................................3
3. Suggestions.............................................................................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
Study skills are part of an individual personality where gaining new information in
organisation, dealing with assignments held. It affects skills like concentration power, retention,
note making. This assignment lay emphasis on Hoftstede's dimensions. It frames a culture which
provides guidance regarding how to think and behave. Cultural dimensions refers to independent
references to distinguish between countries from state affairs. These dimensions affects business
environment. This assignment outlines dimensions like collectivism, power distance, uncertainty
avoidance, femininity. It will also frame ideas to recommend the situations which are adopted
and make suggestions over it.
MAIN BODY
1. Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions
Illustration 1: Hofstede's cultural dimensions
Source: (The six dimensions of Vietnamese culture
2018)
It is a theory framed by Greet Hofstede. It describes culture of society based on values of people
and these values refer to thought and behaviour. It includes factor analysis through which
culture values are analysed.(Taras, 2017) There are for dimensions of Hofstede culture to analyse
culture values which are explained below:
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1. Individualism/Collectivism:- This dimension gives score about individual strength to
have mutual connection between self and their community.
Individualism refers to self only. It shows that individual are expected to think about themselves
only and their separate family. People keep privacy of their work in this dimension and gains
respect and rewards for their hard work which leads to high score of cultural dimensions (Le,
2016). It frames to form a loose relationship within community. Countries which have high individualism, individual promotion helps in targeting people
to aware about their product to have benefits which lead to impact on international
business.
Collectivism refers to a group which is strongly tied up in a relationship in families or any other
group. This dimension has high loyalty between people and support them unconditionally. This
dimension has low score because it needs a lot of skills and talent to become an expert of some
matters.
 To have effective global trading, marketers need to sell products to whole community to
gain more profit.
2. Power distance- This dimension gives a score about measuring of inequality that
exist or not.
A low score of power distance refers to inequality between people where people strikes for
justification to have equality in terms of distributing power and demand.(Favaretto and et.al.,
2016)
 In this, managers face a problem to gain profit because they have to interact with
ordinary people and takes time to take a decision.
A high score of power distance refers to equality between people. There is no justification
needed by people as they have different unique place to take decisions efficiently.
 Leaders take decisions fast for benefits organisation without any discussions with team
members.
3. Uncertainty avoidance- This dimension gives score about tolerance of society with
unknown situations.
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High Uncertainty Avoidance refers to avoid uncertain situations by following rules and
regulations. It is a situation where people know the truth so that they do not react over it. It does
not need to accept tolerance of ambiguity(Sasso, 2016). People whoo promote their product has high patience level to characterise its advantages
and disadvantages related to their product to gain profitability.
Low Uncertainty Avoidance refers to accept tolerance of ambiguity. It frames to accept more
different ideas and thoughts. It doesn't need more regulations as people do not feel comfortable.
In these dimensions, people more conscious about practice counts than principles. In this, people generalise the product and related to lifestyle promotions. They just prior
to have benefits and want positive change.
4. Masculinity/Femininity- This dimension gives score about society is indulged to
male and females in terms of cultural values(Andrijauskienė and et.al., 2017).
High Score for masculine refers to strength, performance and success. In this, women feel
competitive and assertive with males.
High score for feminine refers to sensitivity, modesty and quality. In this male and female are
treated equally to share modest, trusty and caring views. A neutral approach is required for promoting products as individual role is important
because market needs correct gender related to products.
2. Which do you agree with?
As per my point of view Individualism is the best dimension to measure culture values.
Because societies which have high individualism score earns more profit than others(Merkin,
2015). It is based on individual potential to promote products to have effective productivity
across international boundaries as well. I want to explain this by taking a example which I have
experienced.
 Example, there is a company L'oreal in which an individual employee is targeted
to sale 200 pieces of kajal per day and there is a group of 5 employees which has
targeted to sale 1000 pieces of kajal per day. At the end of day, it is realised that
individual employee has achieved its target rather than a group one because all
members of group have strong bound and they go all together to promote product,
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it takes time. But in individual case, it has freedom to go anywhere to achieve
target.
So, by above example it can be concluded that individualism is the best dimension which I liked
most to have international business or domestic one. It gives benefits.
3. Suggestions
I disagree with masculinity/femininity dimension because gender inequality in society
stops to take benefits across international boundaries. For example, in a Cadbury company, to
promote products and to get benefits, business do not see that it's a female or male, it sees
individual potential to promote products and have more market share So, I give suggestions to
all nations which have gender inequality issues to have equal rights for both male and females so
that female feel comfortable to work in every organisation. It will increase market share of
business unit speedily and effectively.
CONCLUSION
This assignment concluded by best and worst dimension to measure cultural values. It is
summarised that cultural values are the norms and factors for better productivity of international
business. There were four dimensions to measure values of culture based on
individualism/collectivism (I or We), tolerance of ambiguity, power to maintain equality in
society, cultural norms related to male and female. This assignment has given suggestions
regarding masculinity/femininity dimensions to improve it because it summarised that it stops
business unit to have effective profitability.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Andrijauskienė, M. and et.al., 2017, October. Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions and National
Innovation Level. In DIEM: Dubrovnik International Economic Meeting(Vol. 3, No. 1.
pp. 189-205). Sveučilište u Dubrovniku.
Favaretto, R.M. and et.al., 2016, September. Using group behaviors to detect hofstede cultural
dimensions. In 2016 IEEE International Conference on Image Processing (ICIP) (pp.
2936-2940). IEEE.
Le, T. and Wejrot, L.B.P., 2016. Global competitiveness, human capital, and Hofstede’s cultural
dimensions: Does culture influence national competitiveness?.
Merkin, R., 2015. The relationship between individualism/collectivism. Journal of Intercultural
Communication. 39(4).
Sasso, M.N., 2016. Cultural efficiencies: exploring the main differences in cultural dimensions
that drive performance.
Taras, V., 2017. Cultural Dimensions, Hofstede. The International Encyclopedia of Intercultural
Communication. pp.1-5.
Online
The six dimensions of Vietnamese culture 2018. [Online]. Available through.
<http://www.workwithvietnamese.com/the-six-dimensions-of-vietnamese-
culture.html>.
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