Geert Hofstede: Cultures and Organizations. Software of the Mind ****************************************************************************************** * Inna Čábelková ****************************************************************************************** Geert Hofstede: Cultures and Organizations. Software of the Mind, Harper Collins Publisher This book is one of the most widely used books about cultural differences by the community firm managers. It explains the differences in thinking of people of differences nationalit globe on the very simple four dimensional scale. In the first and second part of the book describes his four dimensional model of cultural differences, defines the dimensions, and of almost 60 countries on these dimensions. The third part is devoted to organizational cu part is about intercultural encounters and intercultural understanding. Hofstede's dimensions correspond to four main questions each society has to answer or four each society has to resolve in order to function smoothly. The first problem concerns ineq and the relationship with authority. Each institutionalized group of people, be it nation, or work organization, has to somehow agree on the distribution of power within it and the those who are higher up on the power pyramid and those lower down. Most of this "agreement is unconscious and predetermined by the past experiences of the group members, mainly by t were brought up. Geert Hofstede uses the term "cultural programming" of individuals to des predetermination based on the values spread in a culture. Once being "programmed" an indiv aware on the conscious level about the "programs" he or she has. The "programs" manifest t on emotional level. As inequality concerns, we can differentiate between organizations, in nations on so called emotional power distance scale's: whether the emotional distance betw higher-up in the hierarchy and people lower-down is large (power distance is large) or whe in the society is just inequality of roles with little emotional importance (power distanc The author defines power distance as "the extent to which the less powerful members of ins organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally" (Hof p.28). It is intriguing that according to the author it is better to define power distance point of view of the subordinate rather then the boss. "Authority survives only were it is obedience." (Hofstede, 1994, p.28) The author presents the results of the statistical anal ranking of about 50 countries on the power distance scale and discusses the influence of t on the relationships between people in families, schools, workplaces, states. The last poi distance chapter is the influence of this dimension on ideas bred in the countries includi of religious ideologies and philosophical ideas, their economic performance, and, finally, future of the countries as for the power distance dimension. The second dimension of culture author calles collectivism versus individualism. It answer about the relative importance of an individual versus a group. The author defines it as fo "individualism pertains to societies in which the ties between individuals are loose: ever to look after himself and his or her immediate family. Collectivism as its opposite pertai in which people from birth onwards are integrated into strong, cohesive ingroups, which th lifetime continue to protect them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty." (Hofstede, 1994, case of power distance the author discussed the influence of this dimension on family, sch and state. He also looked for correlations between collectivism-individualism index and th of the countries. The interesting result is that nearly all wealthy countries are on the i of the scale, while nearly all poor countries are on the collectivist side. Another import that collectivist countries are more attracted to communistic ideas. Finally the author di particular score on the collectivism-individualism dimension of a country came from and wh may change in the future. The third dimension of culture concerns masculinity versus femininity or, in other words a versus modesty. The author defines it as follows: "masculinity pertains to societies in wh roles are clearly distinct (i.e. men are supposed to be assertive, tough, and focused on m whereas women are supposed to be more modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of li pertains to societies in which social gender roles overlap (i.e., both men and women are s modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life)." (Hofstede, 1994, p. 82, 83). Thi dimension in which men and women scored consistently different. It describes not only the the society toward assertiveness of modesty, but also gender roles typical for that societ discusses the manifestations of masculinity-femininity dimension in family, school, workpl its influence on ideas born in the country and the past and the future of the country's sc dimension. The last dimension presented in book is uncertainty avoidance. This term has been borrowed organization sociology (Cyert and March, 1963). It deals with the extent to which people c tolerate ambiguity, or, in other words, the extent to which people emotionally need rules. defines it as "the extent to which people feel threatened by uncertain or unknown situatio dimension tells us about the level of tension and stress prevalent in the society, whether aggression should or not be shown, to which extent deviant and innovative ideas or behavio As in the case of previous dimensions, the author discusses manifestations of this dimensi school, workplace and the state, its influence on ideas bred in a country and the past and uncertainty avoidance. This dimension ends the part of the book devoted to the cultural differences between natio part of the book is devoted to organizational cultures. It shows the differences between o national cultures, describes six following dimensions of organizational cultures: 1. Process oriented vs. results oriented 2. Employee oriented vs. job oriented 3. Parochial vs. professional 4. Open system vs. closed system 5. Loose control vs. tight control 6. Normative vs. pragmatic (Hofstede, 1994, p. 188). Finally the author presents his ideas about how to manage (or ma organizational culture depending on its score on these dimensions. These part is the most people doing managing work. The final fourth part of the book is devoted to implications of cultural differences. Geer writes about intercultural conflicts, cultural shocks and acculturation, ethnocentrism and group stereotypes and intercultural encounters in different fields of human contacts: tour development cooperation, between host countries and migrants, in international negotiation international business organizations and in the case of multinational corporations. Finall possibilities of intercultural education. It would be very difficult to at least briefly summaries all the important ideas of the bo review. Actually, there is so much of interesting and well structured information, that th used as a textbook. So, I did not dare here to present all the main ideas, but rather trie reader what can be found in the book. The original research of Geert Hofstede, which was later summarized and interpreted in thi impulse to exist for at least three other books by the same author and hundreds of papers the author himself and other researchers of different nationalities. The dimensions are co and published on the author's web pages. On the basis of them new training centers for bus multinational corporations were found. Personally, I consider this book to be very inspiri well the misunderstandings I had with the people from different nations. The book is also Czech language. Literatura: Cyert, Richard, M. and James G. March. 1963. A Behavioral Theory of the Firm. Ehglewood Cl Prentice-Hall. Hofstede, Geert. 1994. Cultures and Organizations. Software of the Mind. Harper Collins Pu 273 p. Mulder, Mauk. 1976. "Reduction of power differences in practice: the power distance reduct its applications." In European Contributions to Organization Theory, G. Hofstede and M. S. Assen Netherlands: Van Gorcum. Mulder, Mauk. 1977. The Daily Power Game. Leiden Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff. After the book was completed the author founded the fifth dimension: long term orientation term orientation. Geert Hofstede is currently the director of the Institute for Research on Intercultural Co at the university of Limburg at Maastricht, the Netherlands. For example Geert Hofstede, 2001. Culture's Consequences : Comparing Values, Behaviors, In Organizations Across Nations. Sage Publications; 2nd edition, April 15, http://www.geert-hofstede.com/geert_hofstede_resources.shtml Inna Čábelková [ URL "LM-124.html "]