Your next boss is Japanese: Negotiating cultural change at a western Massachusetts paper plant

This dissertation is a longitudinal ethnography of a bicultural organization in transition I began in October 1987 directly after the takeover by Japanese management of a Western Massachusetts paper plant. This project documents the experience of both the American workforce and the Japanese management team at the plant, a microcosm of the cultural change process recurrent in modern industrial America. In particular, I examine cultural differences in the understanding of leadership and concept of work, actual and experienced shifts in how inequality is structured, how conflict is managed, and how otherness is defined. The results are organized around four themes which emerged over time from the ethnographic data: (1) a conceptual model of negotiated culture ; (2) national cultural differences in the transfer of technology; (3) effects of culture on labor relations and the collective bargaining process; and (4) bicultural alienation of the American middle manager. This study employs a between-methods triangulated research design involving both a qualitative ethnographic component as well as a quantitative study. The ethnography relies on a dialectical mode of inquiry wherein current anthropological theory and ethnographic data gathered at the field site are constantly compared. The results of the ethnography are then used to inform the generation of strong constructs which are the basis for a quantitatively tested organization-wide census. My ethnographic methods include participant observation and intensive interviewing of the American managers, union committee, blue collar workers, and Japanese management team in the U.S. and in Japan. The quantitative component of my methodology is a retrospective questionnaire administered to the entire workforce (N = 203) which measures their attitudes towards the Japanese management and their assessment of the evolving organizational culture at three distinct time periods: (A) before the takeover; (B) after a $40 million dollar expansion of the facility---a zenith of the company\u27s success; and (C)~the present---after the company has endured its first layoffs in the wake of a severe industry downturn. Results of the questionnaire analysis are woven into the body of the ethnographic reports, sometimes supporting, sometimes adding to, and sometimes challenging the ethnography

From a distance and detached to up close and personal: Bridging strategic and cross-cultural perspectives in international management research and practice

Despite its remarkable achievements, the field of international business (IB) is under attack; its legitimacy and importance are challenged. Structural weaknesses, in particular the existence of two subfields - one drawing on economics and strategy, the other on cross-cultural studies - have contributed to IB, but have failed to build the micro-process bridges that would have united and distinguished the field. The sociology of the field with its dominant positivist research paradigm also has not helped. We propose a multi-method, paradigmatic interplay approach to IB research for building intellectual bridges that would draw on the unique demographics of IB researchers and allow the field to be more united and hopefully produce stronger, more relevant research.International business International strategy Cross-cultural management Research paradigms

Uses and Benefits of Qualitative Approaches to Culture in Intercultural Collaboration Research

International audienceInterpretive content analysis can be used to unveil cultural frames of meaning of actors from different cultural backgrounds working in dispersed teams. When working at a distance, team members are often unaware that they do not give the same meaning to most basic management processes they are concerned with. This presentation will illustrate how qualitative research can provide insights about what decision-making or empowerment mean for employees from different countries. For instance measuring the power relationship index of a country induces managers to delegate more or less to employees. With qualitative understanding of what empowerment and decision-making mean, the question is no longer to know to what extent leaders should delegate but to find the specific conditions of delegation in various countries. This cultural understanding helps people to design management processes matching the requirements of partners from different cultures

International human resource management in an era of political nationalism

In times of the "Brexit" and "America First" policies, several industrialized countries' governments are turning toward more national-oriented migration policies. Simultaneously, societal aversion to immigration is growing. Both trends are sending negative signals to highly skilled employees and making immigrants feel that they are no longer welcome. Consequently, international careers are becoming uncertain, risky, and unpredictable. This new reality in industrialized knowledge-based economies may affect firms' talent pool and the skill set available to a country. To shed light on the new environment of international human resource management, we interviewed Mary Yoko Brannen and David Collings, leading experts in the field, to explore their perspective on how the field is changing. The interviews reported here uncover fascinating insights, including the need to counteract the globalization fears in the West of the predominantly White working and lower-middle class through education. Companies may also rethink their organizational boundaries and the notion of traditional employees by using their agility to counteract the political forces harming their talent pool strategy

Soft Computing for Process Optimization

NRC publication: Ye