CULTURE DICTATES HOW TO BEHAVE

To continue the example of the previous discussion, a brief expression of sympathy by one businessperson to a bereaved work associate at their next meeting is appropriate British behavior. If the association is longstanding, perhaps a card is sent. In Mexico, on the other hand, much more than an expression of sympathy is appropriate behavior. Business asso­ciates may attend the funeral, send flowers, offer services such as transporting family members, and visit the family home to show respect.

Behavior comes directly from the attitudes about how significant something is—how it is valued. Values drive actions. Business is a composite of actions. So we're back at the point made earlier: Cultural priorities motivate business behavior.

In business, cultural differences usually make themselves known first by behavior, which is related to attitudes and which springs from priorities (values) in the culture.

Take the case of an overdue report in the following scenario. A Japanese employee in Tokyo whose report is not ready by the deadline goes to his superior and explains that problems at home with his wife have driven him to drinking more than he should and going home very late after the employees' evenings out. The result is a raging hangover that makes him unable to concentrate on writing the report. For the Japanese worker, neither the excessive drinking nor the domestic problem is a source of shame, and his expectation is that the superior's attitude will be acceptance and a paternalistic concern for the employee's plight. The superior's behavior is probably to counsel the employee and to inquire into the domestic situation in subsequent weeks.

When this scenario is presented to businesspeople in the United States, they typically say that an employee who explained that he had failed to complete a report because of a hangover from excessive drinking (whether or not it was to escape domestic problems) would probably incur double condemnation, at least in the mind of the superior. He would be criticized for drinking too much and also for not completing the report on time. Generally speaking, in the United States the superior's behavior would be to tell the employee to get hold of himself and get some help or else expect the unpleasant con­sequences that follow from failure to perform one's work. The employee in the United States may be no less debilitated by a hangover than his Japanese counterpart, but he will offer some other reason for not being able to get the report done: He may call in saying he's ill.

Behaviors by the employee and the superior in Japan and the United States are differ­ent; attitudes about the role of the superior are different; attitudes by the superiors toward the employees' situation are different. All these differences can be traced to the root dif­ference: The cultural priority placed on submitting a report on time is different. In Japan, the passed deadline may not be as significant as the maintenance of the relationship between employee and superior, and that relationship is a kind of paternalism or patron-client relationship. In the United States, an employee's performing work on schedule is significant as an indicator that the employee is responsible, shares the organization's goals for achievement, and puts the organization's goals for performance above personal mat­ters. Of course, individuals and individual organizations will not all share these general­ized characteristics, either in Japan or in the United States. But when this scenario is pre­sented to Japanese and American groups, they respond with these generalizations.