»culture examples«

While I needed the summaries to understand what Hall was actually talking about, I summarize my own little reflections on it here:

Hall bases most of his findings on his experiences with the Navajo and Hopi. This sometimes makes it difficult to transfer his theories on expatriates encountering a new cultural environment. Nevertheless he provoked quite some thoughts.

1. language.
I had always thought of language to reflect the life of the respective culture. I had thought of the Inuit for example whose language offers them ten words for white while we have only one. Thus: since they experience a lot of different "whites" they need more words to articulate this experience. Vice-versa: since white is not important in our all-day life, we did not invent any words for it. Hall says that man's explanation of nature tells much more about man than about nature. It shows how he sees the world.
At the same time language, according to Hall, is limiting: while it reveals how man perceives the world, it also limits him in his perception. This becomes obvious when you learn a new language and there are simply no equivalent words to express yourself in just the same way as you would in your mother tongue. English for example is regarded as action-orientated and expressing thoughts in another language can provoke completely different images.
I actually get a little stuck in this concept because experience does not equal language. Language is just a model to structure and share experiences and thoughts.
This leads to another of Hall's ideas: we mistake the model, the symbolization of something as the thing itself. This means that we take poor expression for little intelligence. Thus poor English skills is often interpreted as incompetence. This becomes especially awkward regarding the fact that in most cross-cultural encounters English is not the mother tongue for either party. Culturally-learned concepts are transferred into the foreign language which already does not make sense and are then further translated/interpretated by yet another understanding of language. On official meetings this means that it might make sense to rely on professional translators.
This relates to another of Hall's concept: situational frames. People always approve to be addressed in their situational dialect (e.g. ordering something in a restaurant asks for a special style of talking, acting, ... just like any other situation consists of an appropriate catalogue of language, actions, behaviors). Using the situational dialect tags the speaker as insider and earns him recognition. But using the dialect wrong ultimately declares him as outsider.

2. situational frames and action chains
Hall defines all human interactions as situation which are culturally bound by situational frames and follow patterned action chains. While action chains are not explicitly expressed, they define which behavior is culturally appropriate. Not following the expected action chains is ultimately disrupting.
This shows in all aspects of life. While the question "How are you?" seems to be universal, the answers can be very different. Germans, I generalize at this point, like to hold a monologue on how bad everything is. North-Americans on the other hand regard this question only as an opener and are always fine. North-Americans are regarded to be superficial while Germans are just big whiners. Good start for a talk.
On a higher business level all organizational aspects are defined by action chains: who takes part in a meeting? Where does the meeting take place? Who is seated where? Who gets to talk? Who gets involved in conflict resolution?
On a political level this is worked out in the diplomatic etiquette (sag ich mal so!): which country is visited first? Which at all? Which officials are honored with a meeting?...

In Japan Hofstede sees the core of every enterprise to be the permanent worker group. Those workers are hired for all practical purposes in general and strive for life-long employment. On the contrary there are non-permanent work groups which are easily laid off if necessary. University graduates would first join a worker group and wait to later be assigned to various other tasks. Payment is structured according to seniority (Dienstalter) rather than position. Decisions are made in group consultations. This might take rather long but proves implementation to be much easier.

Hofstede tells about the research done by J.Tobin, D.Wu and D.Danielson of the University of Hawaii. They filmed two pre-school classes, one in Japan, one in the States. While the ratio teacher-kids in the States amounted to 1:9, it amounted 1:29 in Japan. In both classes there was a troublesome kid. When a Japanese kid alarmed the teacher of the other kid's misbehavior the teacher was reported to have answered: "what are you calling me for? Do something about it?" The American kid, on the other hand, when behaving badly was put in the corner and thus punished by the teacher.

Hofstede picks this example up to show how early structures of hierarchy are already implemented. He concludes that in Japan control of situations is guaranteed by groups, respectively peers. Consequently the Japanese conducted their own theories about leadership. These base on the ideas of performance and maintenance by which the latter refers to maintenance of social stability.


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[p.20]
Holland on the other side - following d'Iribarne is driven by the "need for consensus among all parties". Consensus is reached without regard towards contractional relationships or class membership. The ideal is an "open-ended exchange of views and balancing of interests".
Further research (Hofstede et al.) among American and Dutch business students on their expectations on the ideal job, showed the Dutch students to strive for:

• freedom to adopt their own approach,
• being consulted by their boss in his/her decisions,
• training opportunities,
• contributing to the success of their organization,
• fully using their skills and abilities, and
• helping others.

[p.21]
Hofstede sees the roots for this careful balancing of interests in the Dutch history: As the first republic in Western Europe (1609-1810), the Netherlands had to handle a multi-party system.

The down-sides of this system of consensus Hofstede sees to be mediocrity and jealousy. He critizes, too, that consultations nowadays only seem to hold up the face of cooperation and modesty while in fact they are only time-consuming.


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France from a German perspective: difficult. I have a loose notion about France but nothing tangible. Taking numbers, concepts, systems, structure, ... Germany and France seem to be so much alike but still ... they are different.

Janet tried to establish a deeper understanding asking around in her French community.

Cadre labels a social group of very different professions (but office jobs in general). In order to become a member of cadre you should have attended one of the Grands Ecoles. At the same time Julien with his Bac +5 (having graduated and then studied for 5 years) and now working on his PhD is also considered cadre. Even though he did not study at one of the Grands Ecoles.
To attend one of these Grands Ecoles you have to follow a two year preparatory program which is said to have the highest suicidal rate among students.

(the article Kay quoted allows a glance on the importance of the Grands Ecole)

The bac is differentiated into different fields: science, language, art, social science,... With 15, 16 students decide into which direction they will move and hardly ever change afterwards.

Non-cadre are normally technicians and workers but there are also middle-class-cadres. Thus the sections cannot be separated so clearly anymore.

The non-cadres are tightly organized in unions which like to push their claims with strikes. Which supports Hofstede's statement that each group carries its own pride even though it does not explain the come-abouts.

All in all groups seem to stick to their group members: designers among themselves, programmers among themselves, sociologists among themselves (and Janet among all those groups). I actually think that that is due to the fact that you know most people from your studies. In Germany it often shows to be much the same. (Maybe a Western-European style?) Nevertheless, I found it quite striking that people actually apply terms like bac +5, or cadre and non-cadre. This very much supports Hofstede who said that the individuals are aware of their position in the hierarchy. In Germany I do not necessarily find that to be true. We have terms like the Bildungsbürgertum (I'll write on that later...) but I do not see such fixed groups. But obviously I need to investigate into that.

[p.21]
Enterprises are usually small and family-owned. When needed they undergo cooperations with other small businesses to which they are interrelated through personal networks. Hofstede sees them to mainly focus on one market/one product, aiming on a "growth by opportunistic diversification". The process of decision-making is usually centralized to the head of the family. Family members are absolutely loyal and wait till they get the chance to prove themselves in new ventures. Sons and sometimes daughters will be send to prestigious business schools abroad but are expected to return to the family business. The idea of management is based on Confucian values, such as loyalty, thrift (Wirtschaftlichkeit, Sparsamkeit) and persistence.
Hofstede describes the historical base for this idea of business and management as a "society, in which there were no formal laws, only formal networks of powerful people guided by general principles of Confucian virtue." Authorities and their opinions could change daily which made the family to be the only reliable institution. This effect is further deepened by the fact that the overseas Chinese in the respective countries always formed an ethnic minority.


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Not relying on expatriates the station in Poznań became a regular company with warehousemen, executives in the warehouse, people for administration, controlling, human resource management, planning, computing, accounting, purchasing, technical administration, ... Thus it is an independently functioning company - set up as a Polish company with its own board of executives.

When establishing the station, Panopa was looking for a closer contact to the technical university and logistic institute. Installing all the cross-divisional supply chain functions it would have been a unique chance to bind junior staff members to the company. Being in the early stage of development it would have been quite easy to integrate students writing their examination paper who in return could have profited from the experiences of the experts responsible to build up the company. Unfortunately, Panopa did not succeed. The only student who was interested was a guy who had Polish roots but had grown up and studied in Germany.

A lose exchange with the German headquarter is established when Polish employees attend programs on how to meet the quality standard of calculating propositions. Therefore they visit the German headquarters and are introduced how propositions are made, which devices are used, how the program works, ... Based on the same idea the Polish man in charge for controlling spends several weeks at a time in Germany to watch and learn when new software was purchased.
Besides the technical aspects this sort of exchange is to get acquainted to the practices of doing things, to the way decisions are made... ("So das nach Möglichkeit die Standards und Entscheidungswege so wie wir sie hier haben nach dorthin übertragen werden." Dr. Hucht, 16.02 min.) This ensures a smooth working flow: a decision on investment in or for Poznań is a decision that has to be backed up by the German parent company as well. This means that the decision making process is initiated and prepared in Poznań, that the plan then is accredited by the board of executives and is afterwards - like all other projects of Panopa - passed to the German board of executives. Therefore it is helpful to work by the same structures and the same forms and preprints.
In the field of qualification management all employees are trained in Germany. Workshops are certified on a pan-European level and employees in all divisions and countries of Panopa can take part in a training run in Duisburg by the German headquarter. The participants then are observed by the responsible German employees of Panopa in an auditing at their respective work setting. Participating successfully employees can acquire a pan-European certificate guaranteeing quality management.

Besides this advanced training, Panopa conducts driving classes for forklift drivers. This is simply due to the fact that the company did not find enough employees in this field. Panopa also faced problems with fake documents ("Sie können in Polen nicht unbedingt glauben, dass wenn Ihnen einer einen Schein vorlegt, dass das nicht der vom Bruder ist." Vieth, 18.07 min.) Consequently every applicant gets to take driving classes to make sure he can actually drive a forklift. This training is completely financed by Panopa even though they are confronted with a high fluctuation rate: potential employees take the benefits of the extra qualification and apply at other companies. Nevertheless, Panopa sees this to be the only way to get qualified forklift drivers. ("Anders hat man keine Chance - sie kriegen keine Staplerfahrer." Vieth, 18.32 min.)

In general the workforce is characterized by a high fluctuation rate. Panopa tries to meet that by appropriate payments and by fair working conditions, thus keeping their staff happy. However, the extreme high fluctuation rate does not come about by employees switching to other companies in the area of Poznań but by the general shift of workforce towards other European countries, especially Ireland and England. Last year 8000 young people from the area of Poznań alone moved to work abroad. Having graduated from university and knowing English well enough they plan on two, three, four years abroad to earn the big bucks and to then return to Poland when the market has grown even more. By then they know perfect English, German already anyway and have a solid education. ("Die sprechen dann Deutsch, sprechen Englisch und haben eine entsprechende Ausbildung." Vieth, 19.29 min.)

Education in general plays an important role. Mr. Vieth says that he experienced the Polish staff to be extremely eager for knowledge. Being offered a training at the weekend Germany employees would ask for extra payment and a substituting day off, while Polish employees would only ask for the training's fee to be paid. ("Die polnischen Mitarbeiter, so wie ich sie da kennengelernt habe, sind unheimlich wissbegierig. Ich bring's mal knapp auf einen Nenner: wenn Sie in Deutschland ein Mitarbeiter fragen, ob er Samstag, Sonntag Zeit hat, dann ist meistens die erste Frage: 'Wie wird das vergütet?', 'Wann krieg ich dafür frei?' [...] In Polen ist die einzige Frage: 'Wer bezahlt den Lehrgang?' [...] Der Mitarbeiter will nichts haben." Vieth, 19.45 min. "Da ist der Wille zu lernen deutlich stärker ausgeprägt als bei uns." Vieth, 20.30 min. "Das ganze Ausbildungsgeschäft läuft Samstag/Sonntag, nicht unter der Woche." Vieth, 20.38 min.)
Meeting this eagerness to learn with additional training offers, Panopa manages to bind employees to the company and profits from the advantages of home-grown staff.

Nevertheless, Panopa has problems to find enough employees. Additional to the high emigration rate there is also a tight competition among companies because they are all looking for the same kind of employee. Even though they are partners Volkswagen and Panopa ran into problems building up their subsidiaries at the same time. While Volkswagen was stocking up their staff from 2000 employees to 5000, Panopa was complementing their staff from 130 to 700 employees nowadays. Consequently it was difficult to alone fill the positions but also to find good people for the managerial levels. To keep the people in the management level proves to be just as difficult for the very same reasons: the competition for good employees is high. But competing in raising the salary is difficult. The budgets are quite reduced since everybody tries to produce as cheap as possible. ("Das heißt, da war der Bedarf für Leute da, gleichzeitig der wachsende Trend ins Ausland zu gehen, gepaart mit anderen Unternehmen, die sich in Polen ansiedeln, das heißt der Wettberwerb um gute Leute ist schon sehr groß. Damit natürlich auch die Schwierigkeit, die dann über finanzielle Möglichkeiten - denn was anderes ist es im Endeffekt erstmal nicht - so zu motivieren, dass sie bei der Stange bleiben. Weil gleichzeitig unser Kunde natürlich nach Polen geht, um günstiger zu werden. Das heißt, es ist auch nicht so ohne weiteres möglich über einen festgelegten Preis pro Fahrzeug, den wir da bekommen für unsere Dienstleistung, jetzt zu sagen, ich halt die Führungskräfte indem ich finanzielle Zugeständnisse mache. Weil der Topf aus dem das bezahlt wird, der ist einfach mal fix. Unser Kunde wird da nicht sagen: 'Na gut, dann zahl ich dir auch wieder mehr, weil du jetzt mehr Geld ausgeben musst, um deine Leute entsprechend zu motivieren." Dr. Hucht, 21.36 min).

Talking so much about education, I wondered if many people take vocational retraining like it happened in Germany after the reunification.
Mr. Vieth says that actually a lot of people understand their German studies and their accordant language skills as a basis to work in a German company. Even though they are not qualified for any specific job. ("Viele, die Germanistik dort unten studieren, nutzen ihre Deutschkenntnisse, um in deutschen Unternehmen zu arbeiten. Das hat nichts damit zu tun, dass die vom Fach sind. Sie werden dort unten niemanden finden, einen Polen, der deutsch spricht und nebenbei perfekt im Buchhaltungswesen ist. Den werden Sie überhaupt nicht treffen. Den müssen Sie ausbilden. Die Bereitschaft muss man mitbringen, wenn man sich dort langfristig etablieren will und auch einen vernünftigen Stamm ausbauen will." Vieth, 22.40 min.)
In general there is no system of apprenticeship like we know it in Germany. While we run through a dual structure of training-on-the-job and additional school, people in Poland get into their jobs by additional training. If somebody might apply for a job in accounting that person would attend a three-week program in accounting. The workshops would of course take place during the weekend while the applicant learns the actual work on the job. ("Das läuft wirklich gezielt: So, sie soll jetzt in die Buchhaltung. Jetzt macht sie drei Wochen an den Wochenenden jeweils den Lehrgang, den Lehrgang, den Lehrgang." Vieth, 23.32 min. "Das läuft also nicht wie bei uns im dualen Ausbildungssystem mit Berufsschule und nebenbei arbeiten." Vieth, 23.53 min.)

At the same time Panopa employs quite some students. Financially limited most students have to work to afford their studies. Thus they work as forklift driver during the week and study at the weekend: up to 18 hours. ("Die müssen einerseits das Geld verdienen, damit sie ihre Wohnung, ihre Familie bezahlen können und das Studium läuft am Wochenende, Samstag, Sonntag: Samstag 10 Stunden und Sonntags acht Stunden. Da machen die jedes Wochenende 18 Stunden." Vieth, 2nd: 02.01 min.)
Thus working at Panopa is not seen as a basis for entering a career in the company - it simply pays money. On the other hand studying - as was mentioned before - serves first of all the purpose to obtain a certificate of higher education. Everything else can be arranged afterwards.
Most of the staff will not stay at Panopa once they finished their studies. The company simply cannot take so many employees considering that there are only around 60 positions in administration while the rest of the 650 jobs are merely operational.

Just like in Japan there are non-permanent work-groups of unskilled workers. When one of the chaebols first had to put off workers due to economical problems, it was quite a shock to Korean society.

Since there is no official social system unskilled workers are left to sell things on the street or to collect garbage. Since the streets in Seoul are rather narrow, there is no organised garbage collection. Every house has a garbage room instead to which poor people come and take what they are "collecting" thus earning their living.

Altogether beggars, homeless and disabled people are often left to themselves.

My interview partner's company does not especially prepare their expatriates for their mission. Since they preferably hire people coming from a multi-ethnic background or having lived in another culture, they accept them to cope well in any cross-cultural setting. Prior to their employee's departure they conduct a so-called exit-interview. In this they simulate the employee's financial situation before and after his expatriate-mission, they talk about social insurance, the company car, .... and hard facts like that. My interview partner was actually disappointed that I did not show any interest in these facts, while they make up 90% of the future expatriate's concerns. Only by the time that they are on their second or third mission, they will start asking about the soft facts concerning the foreign culture and foreign attitudes.
In the host country a start up team which is assigned by the division manager is renting housing and helps organizing the required documents. If no facilities are available and the projects are planned to take longer, the company puts up its own camp.
The expatriates themselves are expected to learn the apparent cultural gestures of their host country and as said before they are expected to cultivate networks. The company understands itself as guest in the foreign country and it wants to keep that status/reputation. ("Wir sind Gäste in dem Land. Wir wollen auch in fünf Jahren noch willkommen geheißen werden.")

Additionally, it has to be mentioned that working for a big constructing company expatriates are not going to a "Polish" construction site - big construction sites are international by matter of investors and experts joining in. On 80% of their sites English is spoken as common language.
It also has to be remembered that expatriates are not coming to an unknown setting - they have worked on that project already for at least four years and know the relevant people on the other side, plus the colleagues they met in common workshops or trainings before. In addition construction sites offer a huge pool of diverse people thus it should be possible for everyone to find somebody he gets along with well. And, too, my interview partner says that it is still business and not about finding buddies.

They have hardly any problems with the acceptance of expatriates in the host country: On the one hand the expatriates are committed to excellence in their job, they want to show their best talents and thus are dedicated to absolute professionalism. ("Ich hab hier eine Aufgabe und ich zeige euch, dass ich das auch kann.") On the other hand their higher payments are usually accepted by host country nationals if they prove to be experts. ("Nach dem Motto 'ah-ha, der kann was', dann wird das auch akzeptiert.")

Nevertheless, expatriates especially in Eastern Europe hardly ever have problems with socializing. This is due to what my interview partner called "double binding". While it is simply their mentality to be more cordial than Germans, they are also aware that these are high-ranked people who are sent to them and they meet them as welcomed guests. Apparently, the biggest problem for expatriates is how to return this affection. Most of them can easily go along but then experience frustration and disappointment as part of a reversed culture-shock coming back to Germany. Others though perceive the call for socializing as an obligation and have a hard time to escape from it without appearing solitary.

In all cases it is up to the expatriate's personality if he succeeds in diminishing power structures or not. My interview partner argues that they never had any problems. "We are not putting anyone in a role, he couldn't play."
Every now and then they might have to send somebody who does not necessarily suit the expatriate profile but is an expert in a certain technique. In these cases it might happen that expatriate and host country nationals do not find a way to work together at all. But since the company cannot abandon the expert, they send a second expatriate to pour oil on troubled water by involving people in personal conversations, outlining the problem and showing empathy for the difficult situation. ("Ein Mensch kann nicht alle Fähigkeiten haben - in bestimmten Fällen muss man Abstriche machen. Da schickt man dann notfalls einen Gutelaune-Clown hinterher.")

While I tried to get an overview over different countries, Christof earned smart points by telling me about Korea. Having studied half a year in Seoul I considered him to be quite an expert. Nevertheless I had asked him about his impressions thus the following should be granted the benefits of subjectivity.

Just like China he sees Korea to be much influenced by the ideas of confucianism. This is not all too surprising considering the geographical neighborhood and the fact that Korea was quite frequently occupied by China.

Most obvious confucianism becomes in terms of education. Universities select their students by a centrally-organized entrance examination. For this occasion even air planes are taken off schedule so that the students are not disturbed. Depending on the score you are qualified to enter different schools. To really enter into a career it is indispensable to visit one of the big universities. There, networks and life-long friendships are being established. If entrance to these universities is refused, students might actually take a whole year off just to study for the qualifying examination.
For parents it is very important that their children obtain an excellent education. This includes learning English at an extremely young age and the expectation to only come home with the best marks.

The Korean society appears to be very hierarchical.
When first meeting somebody new the first question will be which occupation the other one holds? About the marital status and at which university the other one studied. This ceremony is often accompanied by handing over visit cards. In that case it is very important to take the card with both hands and look at it for quite some while. This shows interest and respect. This also helps to figure out how to address the other person. Depending on the status of the other person different forms of address are applicable, in which case verbs are formed differently (honorifics).
In general the younger one owes respect to the older one (which came in quite handy for Christof who never needed to tidy up the volleyball court) while on the other hand the older one is responsible for the younger one.
Traditionally, it is the one holding the higher status who is paying the expenses when going out. Nowadays this is not necessarily true among young people anymore and hardly ever when there are Western people in the group (so Christof was not lucky in this point :-(

In public it is very important to never lose 'face'. Nobody is showing emotions in public and hardly ever is critic articulated openly. Tasks seem to be performed obediently. Christof suggests that that might lead to quite some frustration which is then tackled in evening activities.

A usual Korean evening would start off in a restaurant, then move to a bar and later end with karaoke in a singing-room (noraebang). Drinking is a big part of this happening and usually it is not allowed to turn down drinks offered by some older person.

Back to business: the Korean economy is traditionally run by conglomerates (such as Samsung, Hyundai,....) so-called chaebols, family-controlled corporate groups, which are deeply interlinked with the state.
Professional life is characterized by extremely long working hours. It sometimes seems as if employees are competing in after-hours to demonstrate their loyalty and solidarity with the organization. Meeting in study groups with Koreans it was important to first socialize: eat together and talk. Only when you knew who the other person was, the working process was initialized and then often interrupted by further socializing. While the work still needed to be done, the Koreans effortlessly cut down on sleep. Work is often understood as working out tasks rather than working independently on own projects.

So far.... merci Christof.

Hall defines action chains as "a set sequence of events, reminiscent of a dance that is used as a means of reaching a common goal." (p.141) As far as I understood it action chains are basically what happens in different situations or is expected to happen: how does it come about to meet friends, which steps are to be taken to engage, to buying something or to writing a book....

While he takes the example of cultural-different approaches to dating someone, I was rather thinking of protocols in politics: which country is being visited first? Which at all? Which officials are honored with a meeting? .... And on a lower business level it is just the same...

Coming to Covert Culture and Action Chains Hall gives various examples. Being asked about how they are doing, Americans would answer in a very self-orientated way while the Pueblo Indians were much more concerned with the groups well-being. In the same way might German answers be disruptive to Americans. Germans like to whine and say directly what all is going bad while Americans often mean that question as an opener to an informal talk.

Disrupting action chains. also lead to problems when criticism is expressed in culturally different ways. While Japanese, according to Hall's observations, tend to not openly express emotions, e.g. anger about a certain behavior, Western people expects to be told when they reach their borders. (cp. p.161)

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jumping some questions right to chapter fourteen