Management In Action

Joshua Gaines

Management in action

Dr. Jacobs

1. Which of the recommendations presented in this chapter's Practical Action box titled "Being a World Citizen: Learning to Be a Success Abroad: did Steven Coyle and his team of trainers follow? Explain.

Mr. Coyle and his team followed several of the recommendations presented in this chapter. They first had to learn how not to be an "ugly" American. In being a U.S. citizen in Malaysia you can be looked at in a different perspective that you might imagine yourself to be. The book says that a lot of times Americans are seen throughout the world as being arrogant people totally self absorbed and loud, and uninterested in the world. Steven Coyle and his team were in a whole different environment from being back home and their job was to train this people who had all various cultures beliefs and ethnic backgrounds. They had to teach these people despite their differences and in order to get that done they couldn't be disliked therefore they had to break this stereotype and make these people in Afghanistan willing to learn so they couldn't portray themselves as superior or better and they had to treat everyone as equal and a team even though being faced with so much diversity with in the group. (Things like different beliefs, prejudices, gender, and age.) Coyle's team of trainers also had to learn patience because some students did not actively participate in the classroom and often liked being called on. Obviously they had to be good listeners to understand other languages, and communicate effectively. They also had TNA a training needs analysis to understand this country and their sales styles, and processes to come with the best type of curricula to train. They also had to learn appropriate behavior. An example of this was when they found out that a lost of women were not comfortable sitting next to men. They Team also had to be sure they knew their field and what they were talking about in order to be able to convey this training to class.

2. Why was it important for the trainers to avoid ethnocentric and polycentric tendencies? Explain.

It was important for the trainers to avoid ethnocentric and polycentric tendencies because it would have caused a lot of chaos and made training even more difficult. Ethnocentric views believe that their native country, culture, language, and behavior are superior to all others. This would clearly not be good because you are expecting people who have grew up in totally different cultures to believe that your ways of teaching is right when their whole life they may have been taught something different. This is not good for business because it can cause animosity and there was already enough with in the classroom already, these people would not have listened well if you were telling them the way they think is wrong Polycentric views are that native managers in the foreign offices best understand native personnel and practices, and so the home office should leave them alone. This would not hold true because Coyle and his team were not native and they did not know what was best for these individuals, in fact there was a learning curve for the trainers as well as the trainees they had to figure each other out in order to make things run smoothly.

3. To What extent was the training needs analysis consistent with a geocentric approach to management? Discuss.

Geocentric managers- accept that there are differences and similarities between home and foreign personnel and practices and those they should use whatever techniques are most effective. When they did the TNA they found that it was invaluable to truly understand their skill level and fears. It "allowed them to revamp their supervisory and sales curricula, and create company specific case studies, projects, and role-plays.

4. Based on information in the case, how would you rank Afghanistan in terms of Hofstede's model of cultural differences and the nine cultural dimensions identified in the GLOBE project? Discuss your rationale.

In terms of Hofstede's model Afghanistan basically touched more than one just category. It touched the first one because it used individualism/collectivism. It showed exactly how loosely and tightly people socially bonded by showing that women didn't like to sit with men or that women's business skills were not as great as men or the people who fled were said to be smarter. This also ties in with Power distance and masculinity/femininity where the male is stereotyped to have certain traits the female lacked. As far as the Globe project Afghanistan also tied into more than one of the nine cultural dimensions. They used Institutional collectivism when they were trying to install team work where a lot of the students were trying to out shine the other students. They then touched up on in group collectivism by trying to install the importance of a group instead of individualism. They also touched on the power distance when some of the people felt they were more powerful that others, they also had to practice uncertainty avoidance because there were so many cultural differences where no one culture could be set to be the best. There was also gender differentiation the classrooms were 80% men which was mainly because of the Taliban era where woman were not allowed to work. They also touched on the future, performance, and humane orientations where they offered prizes best project work

5. Would you like to conduct training in Afghanistan? Why or why not?

Yes I would like to conduct training in Afghanistan. I think it would be fun yet challenging