International Perspectives in Organisations - Literature review Example

International Perspective In Organisations Introduction The internationalization of organisations has influenced the tendency of corporations from different parts of the geography to expand their operations across national boundaries. This procedure is gradually changing organisational work culture and behaviour along with managerial and leadership perspectives (Knight, 2004). The further discussion will critically evaluate different dimensions of international perspectives in organisations. The first sections of the study will critically evaluate various arguments regarding the accountabilities of corporations and business enterprises towards the global populations. The next sections of the discussion will emphasize on the constraints of different global cultures in the theoretical approach of management. The study will further illustrate the cross-cultural differences and its impact in management and leadership. The last section of the critical analysis will elaborate the effect of business downsizing on the organisational behaviour and sustainability. Obligation of International Business towards the Global Populations The argument of this article is based on the responsibilities of international corporations and organisations on the global population. In this argument Arnold (2012), has elaborated and defended the views that are supporting and promoting the role of transnational corporations and business entities as the agent of justice for the base of economic pyramid. This argument has explained the role of corporations in the reduction of global poverty and inequality. The author has also discussed two separate perspectives of normative legitimacy that support the role of corporations and other business entity as the agents to promote global justice (Arnold 2012). The first perspective focuses on the normative legitimacy of different international institutions which are responsible for governing various international trade regulations and business activities. Though this domain of normative legitimacy has accrued huge attention of political and legal scholars, the author of the article has pacifically focused on the second perspective which evaluates the legitimacy of corporations in regards to its activities within global societies. This argument has detailed the importance of ethical and moral legitimacy of corporations in regards to their global activities (Buchanan and Keohane, 2006). According to the view of Palazzo and Scherer, (2006) moral and ethical legitimacy of organisations is not dependent on the legal and political norms but it is influenced by the deliberative communication process. During the explanation of the moral legitimacy of corporation the author has contradicted the political view of Rawls, (2009) which emphasizes on the integration of political system in the global socio-economic justice procedure. According to Rawls, (2009), global justice needs to be considered as a political value rather than ethical or moral value. The supporters of this view have explained that the political corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the most viable socio-economic justice procedure to eliminate poverty and inequality for the global population (Rawls, 2009). Palazzo and Scherer, (2006) has explained that the political CSR is an extended version of governance which depended on the contribution of transnational corporation and global firms towards the global regulations and availability of public goods. The author has argued that the Rawlsian view of global justice is only suitable for well-ordered societies which are non-aggressive as share similar concept of justice. On the other hand, the illiteracy, resource deprivation and vulnerability within the population of different global society hinder their equal participation in the process of global justice. Therefore, the article emphasizes on the feasibility of ethical and moral CSR by challenging the concept of political CSR. Therefore, the author has highlighted the importance of cosmopolitanism of human rights to improve the moral legitimacy of corporations and global organisations. According to Pogge (2002), cosmopolitanism of human rights and justice supports the views of individualism, universality and generality. These views influence organizations to consider every part of the population equally while ignoring the difference of society, race, culture and family values. The ambiguous and overlapping explanation of these views has somewhat weakened the argument of this article. Hence, this author has established the importance and essentiality of ethical concept of CSR within transnational organisations and other business entities to ensure the modesty of organisational activities that can improve their relationship with different stakeholders. This concept provides cosmopolitan scope while eliminating the overlapping analysis of human rights. Cultural Constraints in Management Theories Hofstede, (1993) has illustrated the effect of cultural differences within different geographical locations in the adaptability of different management theories and practices. In this article the author has argued that management theories are modified by organisations according to the changes in cultural norms and values. The author has elaborated that the ideas, decisions and judgements of employees and managers of any organisation across the globe are hugely influenced by the specifications of their cultural environments. Therefore, Hofstede, (1993) explained that there is no universal management theories. The author has supported his arguments by evaluating the differences in management practices within different parts of the world. According to the general definition of management, managers are responsible to planning, directing and monitoring a group of individual to achieve a certain goal. Motivating the employees on a regular basis can be considered as one of the major responsibilities of managers (Hofstede, 1993). On the other hand, the management procedure in Germany only entitles the managers to distribute tasks and solve technical problems. Responsible and skilled workers in Germany hardly require any managerial motivation. The absence of secrecy within the organisations of Japan has enabled them to minimize the importance of management. The worker group is mainly handled by the peer groups rather than the managers (Hofstede, 1993). The author has strengthened his argument by demonstrating five cultural dimensions, such as power distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation. These dimensions have assisted the author to explain the differences of culture within nations and their effect in the assessment of management theories (Thomas and Peterson, 2014). Power distance explains the intensity of inequality within population. Individualism evaluates the degree to which population act as an individual rather than the part of a group. Masculinity explains the influence the competition, assertiveness and success in the society rather than personal relationship and care. High degree of uncertainty avoidance demonstrates the preference of structured situation in a society. Long-term orientation depicts the likeliness of value addition to the future perspectives (Thomas and Peterson, 2014). Therefore, the analysis of these cultural dimensions has demonstrated the differences of American management practice in comparison to different other geographical locations. For example, the cultural structure of the US shows low degree of uncertainty avoidance and power distance than German and French culture. On the other hand, they are highly individualistic and masculine than German. This cultural aspect of the US has hugely impacted on their management theories that stresses on individualism and focuses on managers rather than workers. Though the author has established a strong argument regarding the importance of cultural differences in the validity of management theories, the absence of political, economical and technological dimensions have somehow weakened the illustration. Cross Cultural Lessons in Leadership Javidan, wt al., (2006) have illustrated the effect of cultural and behavioural dissimilarities in the practices and effectiveness of global leadership. According to the authors, the existing literatures on the global and cross-cultural leadership provide vary limited and conceptual views which provide general and context-free advices to the executives regarding leading the global business platform. The argument of Javidan, wt al., (2006) has utilized the research reports of Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness (GLOBE) to provide a wide description regarding the behavioural and conceptual differences in leadership across the globe. The authors have illustrated the concept with a hypothetical case where an American executive has evaluated the differences in the leadership requirements within the geographies of Egypt, France, China and Brazil. Therefore, the article has described the challenges faced by leaders in a global platform. It has also described the processes of developing the capabilities for global leadership. Differences in the behaviour and work attitude of the workforce due to variation in the cultural values are one of the major challenges faced by leaders during their activities in the global platform. The Scarcity of easily accessible information regarding cross-cultural issues can be considered as another challenge confronted by global leaders (Javidan, wt al., 2006). The evaluation of work culture in the four geographical locations has demonstrated a number of differences in the requirement and implications of leadership capabilities. The work culture in China is focused on in-group collectivism. It is also highly performance-oriented and institutional orientation. Developing personal relationship is an essential part of leadership in China. On the contrary, leaders in American organisations are supposed to create distinct characteristics within the group. They need to be directive rather than compassionate. The Egyptian work culture also defines the leader as a parental figure who possesses emotional relationship with the worker. Alternatively, leadership in France demonstrate very impersonal and formal relation with the workforce. The power distance is very high within the leader and team members (Ely and Thomas, 2001). Therefore, the authors have suggested that leaders need to evaluate the cultural differences of other countries before analysing the possible leadership capabilities. They need to be open-minded and should compare their own culture with the culture of other countries to assess the behavioural differences. The article has detailed nine cultural dimensions, offered by research program of GLOBE, which can assist leaders to distinguish between two different cultures. These dimensions are assertiveness, Institutional Collectivism, future, performance and human orientation, In-Group Collectivism, Uncertainty Avoidance, power distance and Gender Egalitarianism (Ager and Brückner, 2013). The authors have also recommended the availability of information regarding cross-cultural and global issues in a huge number of books, journals, websites and software packages. They have also mentioned that diversified work experience and frequent international assignment will also be effective for developing global leadership capabilities (Chhokar, et al., 2013). Though the discussion is very influential regarding the development of cross-cultural leadership capabilities, the authors have offered very limited recommendations and suggestions. Business downsizing and its effect on changing behaviour of organisation The business article by Butler, et al., (2011) has demonstrated the reasons of business downsizing and its effects on the work culture and employee motivation and organisational sustainability. The article has also discussed the solutions to the consequences of rapid downsizing of organizations. The authors have explained that the growth of emerging market and cost effectiveness in the developing market is forcing various organisations in the UK and US to downsize or close their different local operation and open it in different geographical locations. They have also argued that this downsizing is also hampering the sustainability of the organisations. Cascio, (1993) has explained a number of consequences of downsizing organisations. Lack of policies regarding employee retaining and job redeployment is one of the major reasons for the lack of sustainability of downsized organisation as it causes the lost of skilled manpower. The absence of motivation and over burdened of work also hamper the moral of the existing employees of these organisations. The existing employees also become very risk averse and narrow minded that hampers the work progress of the organisations. Butler, et al., (2011) have provided various suggestions to manage corporate brand identity, management of communication, closure and investment on employees. The solutions are also focused on managing the continuity of operations. The authors have suggested that leaders and management of organizations need to provide due importance to the well-being of their workforce and they need to motivate them in a regular basis. They have explained that workforce can assist organisations to fight against the economical downfall. They have also recommended that all the organisational functions should be integrated and handled with similar importance (Butler, et al., 2011). Link and reflect on the four articles All these articles have evaluates the responsibilities and accountability of the management and leadership on the motivation and well-being global population as well as their own workforce. The articles have defined that the corporations and business organisations are formed with different stakeholders from different cultural backgrounds. Proper understanding their cultural diversification and their requirements can assist organisations to achieve desired results. Moral concept of CSR and strong bonding with the stakeholders can enable organisations to eliminate the threat of unsustainability. Conclusion The critical analyses of the four articles have detailed the importance of ethical and moral concept of CSR. It has also evaluated the importance of in-depth analysis of the cultural diversification of different geographical location to ensure proper leadership and management procedure. It has also evaluated the importance of employee-employer relationship and motivation in the sustainability of organisations. Reference List Ager, P. and Brückner, M., 2013. Cultural diversity and economic growth: Evidence from the US during the age of mass migration. European Economic Review, 64, pp. 76-97. Arnold, D. G., 2012. Global justice and international business. Business Ethics Quarterly, 23(1), pp. 125-143. Buchanan, A. and Keohane, R. O., 2006. The legitimacy of global governance institutions. Ethics & international affairs, 20(4), pp. 405-437. Butler, M. J., Crundwell, D. and Sweeney, M., 2012. Rethinking change: downsizing businesses, changing behaviours and still managing to come out on top. Management Articles of the Year, pp. 22-28. Cascio, W. F., 1993. Downsizing: What do we know? What have we learned? The Academy of Management Executive, 7(1), pp. 95-104. Chhokar, J. S., Brodbeck, F. C. and House, R. J. (Eds.)., 2013. Culture and leadership across the world: The GLOBE book of in-depth studies of 25 societies. London: Routledge. Ely, R. J. and Thomas, D. A., 2001. Cultural diversity at work: The effects of diversity perspectives on work group processes and outcomes. Administrative science quarterly, 46(2), pp. 229-273. Hofstede, G., 1993. Cultural constraints in management theories. Academy of Management Executive. 7(1), pp. 81-93. Javidan, M., Dorfman, P. W., De Luque, M. S. and House, R. J., 2006. In the eye of the beholder: Cross cultural lessons in leadership from Project GLOBE. The academy of management perspectives, 20(1), pp. 67-90. Knight, J., 2004. Internationalization remodeled: Definition, approaches, and rationales. Journal of studies in international education, 8(1), pp. 5-31. Pogge, T. 2002. World poverty and human rights. Maiden: Polity Press. Rawls, J., 2009. A theory of justice. Harvard: Harvard university press. Scherer, A. G. and Palazzo, G., 2011. The new political role of business in a globalized world: A review of a new perspective on CSR and its implications for the firm, governance, and democracy. Journal of management studies, 48(4), pp. 899-931. Thomas, D. C. and Peterson, M. F., 2014. Cross-cultural management: Essential concepts. New York: Sage Publications. Read More