Lecture 1

What is Cross-cultural management about?
It is not so much a managerial functional activity or specialized field (finance, HRM, logistics, marketing...).
Within these functions, increased cross-border variety redefines existing managerial activities and introduces new managerial issues.
For instance:
Who will be in charge of subsidiary X in country Y.
Where do we build a new factory?
How to manage multicultural teams (costs/benefits)
How do I handle my boss who comes from another country.
Developing global managers: cultural skills and competences or even cultural intelligence?

Where do you find cross-cultural interactions in the managerial world?
Where takes the encounter place?
-  Manager – manager / employee - employee
-  Manager – employee
-  Board member - manager
-  Shareholder – board member
-  Client – employee
-  Manager – consultants
-  Expat family – local living conditions
-  Impats – ....
-  ....
-  Over time the relevance/likelyhood of these encounters changes.
A variety of options with different problems, dynamics and consequences.

History of “culture” concept:
Long history in philosophy and social sciences (anthropology, sociology, psychology, economics).
Basic issue: distinction between nature and society.
Culture is `... that which distinguishes men from animals ...’( Ostwald 1907).
... `While human nature is biologically innate and universal, culture is learned and may vary from one society to another’ ... (Inglehart 1990).
The more people start crossing borders, the more they are confronted with cultural differences between groups of people
Issue with a very long history
Roman empire, crusades, Catholic church, Dzjengis Khan, colonial empires (VOC!), WW1, interbellum globalization, WW 2, .... and nowadays, multinational companies and global institutions as the... Interested? Read the instructions below in order to read the full content of this page.