Cultural Differences between the UK and India
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE UK AND INDIA
IS INDIA SUITABLE TO OUTSOURCE TO?
PROS
‘India has become the offshore outsourcing capital of the world.’ Reasons behind this include:
Employee’s attitudes towards their career are more weighted towards work life than family life hence their productivity should be greater if they are putting more effort in. Indians work for longer hours in comparison to Americans, for an average of 10-12 hours a day, which does seem impressive however they take longer lunch and coffee breaks. This also means the factory will have to be kept open and running longer, increasing costs. A longer working day may also decrease production as workers get tired from the long day and therefore become less efficient. In addition to this, Indians are not very timely people and tend not to keep to deadlines which means offshoring could be unreliable as transporting the manufactured goods to the UK could be delayed at short notice.
The hierarchy system in India is also very different to that of the UK; the relationship between bosses and subordinates is more informal in the UK and more ranked in India. As a result of this Indian employees tend not to have a clear idea of their role in the company and so efficiency may not be maximised. Due to their different approach to timings and deadlines, meetings can often be cancelled at short notice due to the absence of higher ranking members of staff. The fact that managers do have a greater responsibility does lead one to believe that communication should be easier across continents as there are no middle men who aren’t entirely up to date with activities.
In mentoring it is believed that Indians are less likely to point out mistakes, areas of weakness or constructively criticise employees. This may mean that problems are not being resolved and the firm is not working to the best of its ability. To overcome this it may be necessary to ensure a third party is also responsible for quarterly
IS INDIA SUITABLE TO OUTSOURCE TO?
PROS
‘India has become the offshore outsourcing capital of the world.’ Reasons behind this include:
Employee’s attitudes towards their career are more weighted towards work life than family life hence their productivity should be greater if they are putting more effort in. Indians work for longer hours in comparison to Americans, for an average of 10-12 hours a day, which does seem impressive however they take longer lunch and coffee breaks. This also means the factory will have to be kept open and running longer, increasing costs. A longer working day may also decrease production as workers get tired from the long day and therefore become less efficient. In addition to this, Indians are not very timely people and tend not to keep to deadlines which means offshoring could be unreliable as transporting the manufactured goods to the UK could be delayed at short notice.
The hierarchy system in India is also very different to that of the UK; the relationship between bosses and subordinates is more informal in the UK and more ranked in India. As a result of this Indian employees tend not to have a clear idea of their role in the company and so efficiency may not be maximised. Due to their different approach to timings and deadlines, meetings can often be cancelled at short notice due to the absence of higher ranking members of staff. The fact that managers do have a greater responsibility does lead one to believe that communication should be easier across continents as there are no middle men who aren’t entirely up to date with activities.
In mentoring it is believed that Indians are less likely to point out mistakes, areas of weakness or constructively criticise employees. This may mean that problems are not being resolved and the firm is not working to the best of its ability. To overcome this it may be necessary to ensure a third party is also responsible for quarterly