Riassunto esame Inglese monografico 3, prof. Rossi, libro consigliato Riding the waves of culture, Trompenaars e Hampden,Turner

Bohr's Theory of Complementarity

Bohr proposed a theory of complementarity. All seven dimensions have represented continua with two extremes. Universalism and particularism are not separate but different, on a continuum between rules and exceptions. Things are more or less similar to the rule, or more or less dissimilar and hence exceptional. You could not even define rules without also knowing what exceptions were. The terms are therefore complementary. It is the same for all seven dimensions. The individual is more or less separate from the group. "Being by yourself" requires a group if the difference is to register. There can be no specific part without a concept of the diffuse whole. Directing yourself from inside outwards is necessarily in contrast to being directed from the outside inwards.

Using Humour

We become aware of dilemmas through humour, which signals an unexpected clash between two different perspectives. Values taken to extremes often suggest that the opposite value is really present, rather than

The proclaimed one. Corporations who announce that they “trust their people” may end up breaking into their offices at night and rifling their desks, because they cannot be seen distrusting them publicly but are secretly concerned about a spate of thefts. 743.

Mapping out a cultural space

Another effective process for exploring dilemmas is to turn their “two horns” into axes to create a cultural space. We can map all of the seven dimensions on this cultural space. The map is constructed through either interviews or questionnaires. Issues mapped include: Given the pluralism of local initiatives in Europe, is it possible to exercise any strategic leadership from US headquarters which is applicable to all the units concerned? (Universalism-particularism dilemma), but they can also include achievement-ascription dilemma or short-term-long-term dilemma.

This was the response of the dilemma:

Universalism-particularism dilemma

The markets in Europe could be served much better if

our American HQ could only understand the particular needs we have over here.

If the Europeans could only understand what it takes to become a truly global company.

We know here in the USA very well what different markets need, but we need to co-educate them in order not to fall into the trap of having very happy clients but no margins for us. Economies of scale force us to limit our offerings.

This shows that basic dilemmas that are inherent in cross-cultural debates. In intercultural encounters people frequently complain of excessive rivalry and an inability to harmonise the efforts of different units, representing different cultures.

Dilemma A can be mapped between the pluralism of local initiatives on the horizontal axis and the universal truth of HQ on the vertical axis.

From nouns to present participles and processes

A noun could be defined as "a person, place or thing". But a value is none of these, so we get into difficulty when we use nouns like universalism or particularism,

1. loyalty ordissent to describe the horns of a dilemma.
2. It is the convention of the social sciences to make phenomena look and sound physical, but it is misleading.
3. So, as a step on the road to reconciliation, we shall turn all nouns into present participles, ending in -ing, which transforms them into processes.
4. So:
   • Universalising-particularising
   • Individualising-communing
   • Specifying/analysing-diffusing/synthesising
   • Communicating neutrality-communicating emotion
   • Achieving-ascribing (status)
   • Directing oneself from inside-going with the flow of the environment
   • Sequencing time-synchronising time
5. This is made to render the value as a process requiring the participation of people.
6. Since processes mingle in a way that things do not, we are now much closer to understanding that all seven dimensions are really continua, with a preponderance of one process at one end and a preponderance of the other process at the other end.
7. Language and meta-language
8. It's important to also consider how language

achieves reconciliation. It does so by using a ladder of abstraction and putting one value above the other by using both an object language and a meta-language and allowing them to join. This applies to the seven dimensions:

You must, for example, be able to see that a particular customer request is outside the universal rules your company has set up yet be determined to qualify the existing rule or create a new rule based on this case.

We could do the same for any of the seven dimensions. Take a small business unit which has enjoyed extraordinary success:

Top management has encouraged achievement in a particular unit and has ascribed universal importance to the strategy employed, so that other business units can benefit by emulating the particular achievement. Here both particularising and universalising and achieving and ascribing have been reconciled.

6. Frames and contexts

So, the meta-level frames the object level. The usefulness of thinking in frame and contexts is that the latter contain

andconstrain the picture or the text within them. There isalways a danger of people’s value extremes “running away”.“To see that things are hopeless” can lead to despair, unlessframed by “a determination to make them otherwise. Textand context are reversible, as are the picture and the frame.We could focus on a very intelligent person and say: or wecould say: 767. SequencingValues appear to clash when we assume that both must be expressed simultaneously. Itisn’t possible to be right and wrong, to universalise and particularise, to be steeredfrom inside and from outside at the same time. One obviously precludes the other. Butit is possible to go wrong and then correct, to particularise and then generalise, toobserve outer trends and dynamics and then direct yourself at your objective. So, amajor element in reconciling values is to sequence processes over time. One of theframes and contexts comments on what your

present action is leading to:or:8. Waving/cycling

Common sense assumes values to be like coins, jewels or rocks, but they are more like water waves or sound waves.

Consider music on various frequencies: if we have two different frequencies, 50Hz and 60Hz, these combine to form a beat frequency of only 10Hz, because a low-frequency wave has been created by harmonising the two waves. The high-frequency sound is now “within” the low-frequency beat. If values are like sound waves, no wonder their harmony can be more beautiful still. We can draw the waveform between the axes as in the figure.

Here we first err, then correct, then err again, then correct again and so on. The entire process is called an error correcting system. We avoid both catastrophic mistakes and the straight-jacket of never making a mistake. If we want to learn fast, many small errors which are corrected might be the best way. The notion of learning by error correction is important, so the authors include this idea in all the dilemmas,

especially the seven dimensions. A wave-form between universalising and particularising might look like the figure 13.7. This is a diagram of how particular exceptions are encountered and noted before encompassing them within changed or reformed rules. No scientific law can ignore anomalies. No corporate procedures can fail to account for a growing number of exceptions. So, the old rules must be reformed or new ones created, rules must be open to refutation if we are to improve them. The idea of error correction by rendering our wave-form as a cycle. This assumes that we will periodically get things wrong and have to make a second "try" or circuit before improving on both axes. 9. Synergising and virtuous circling An important test of optimal reconciliation which includes both ends of the values continuum, in even greater harmony, is the criterion of synergy. When two values work with one another they are mutually facilitating and enhancing. So, ascribing importance to a major

project makes it more likely that your working group will be inspired to achieve that project. That your company has recently been seen to be achieving the project makes it far more likely that senior management will ascribe great importance to it in next year's strategy deliberation. The virtuous circle looks like the figure.

10.The double helix DNA, the double helix molecular structure, can be used as a metaphor. The double helix model helps to summarise the steps to reconciliation. The ladder of protein synthesis has four rungs. We have a ladder of values synthesis with seven rungs. The twisted ladder is full of complementarities. When the "pairs" come together unexpectedly it can be funny. We can use the uprights on each side of the ladder as cultural space for mapping. The twisted elements of the ladder constitute a growth process. Each twist of the spiral speaks the language of growth and contains coded instructions. Each turn of the helix is framed and contextualised by

The helix within and around it, containing and constraining. The process is sequential. It constitutes waves and cycles, with synthesis producing growth and synergy. So, the double helix helps summarise all nine processes by which values are reconciled.

Chapter 14 – South Africa: the rainbow nation

This chapter and the next one discuss the diversity we find within cultures and illustrate ethnic differences within the USA and South Africa and the effect on culture of gender, age, functional background and type of industry.

The cultures of nations are an important factor in defining the meaning which people assign to their environment, but that other factors should not be ignored.

So far, this book has concentrated on national cultural differences. In this chapter the authors discuss the differences found within one of the most pluralist societies in the world, South Africa. Happily things have changed in South Africa and a man has been brought to power who has the creativity and courage to

reconcile cultural opposites. One of President Nelson Mandela's prime goals seems to be reconciliation, to unite the variety of cultures in South Africa around one major cause: a free and democratic nation in which bloodshed and conflict define the past, not the future. After his inaugural speech he has been very clear about his strategy. The white population, Afrikaaners and English-speaking whites, are seen as an essential component in South Africa's future economy. Mandela has done his utmost to convince foreign investors that reconciliation between races can be the basis of stability in South Africa. Afrikaaners received a presidential guarantee that their language and culture would not be attacked in revenge for the past. And it should not be forgotten that some prominent Afrikaaners, like former Vice-President Frederik Willem de Klerk, c