How a Country’s Culture Affects Motivational Efforts
Activity 4.1: How a Country’s Culture Affects Motivational Efforts
Carlos J. Rivera
Indiana Wesleyan University
How a Country’s Culture Affects Motivational Efforts
When employees and managers from the US and other countries are mixed together in any intense environment they often bring with them different expectations about workplace success factors, rewards and career development as well as differences in motivational wiring.
Managers need to be sure they understand these differences and adapt them appropriately can become a key strategy to be used. Failure to do can lead to critical misunderstanding. Some of the major differences in these area can create the most difficult situations; management styles, job security and compensation, career development, performance evaluation and motivational strategies.
The preferred management styles vary depending on the individual, but we can identify several similarities among cultures. Employees among the US prefer a boss or supervisor that is friendly and professional with them, treating them as equals while keeping all the expectations a boss should have. Americans prefer managers that expect them to be independent and self-motivated. Managers and employees do not expect the boss-subordinate relationship to be strongly hierarchical, or to be one of strongly committed personal loyalty: it is all about mutual respect. These cultural characteristics can create issues, since for other countries the relationship with the boss can even become quasi-paternal.
A critical area that can affect employee motivation across cultures is the job security and compensation structures. Regardless of the countries been evaluated, most of the people live in a day to day basis where they have the need to work in order to sustain himself or even their whole family. Therefore job security has become a topic that every employee wants to keep clear at all times. The US has been through a workplace revolution in which expectations of
Carlos J. Rivera
Indiana Wesleyan University
How a Country’s Culture Affects Motivational Efforts
When employees and managers from the US and other countries are mixed together in any intense environment they often bring with them different expectations about workplace success factors, rewards and career development as well as differences in motivational wiring.
Managers need to be sure they understand these differences and adapt them appropriately can become a key strategy to be used. Failure to do can lead to critical misunderstanding. Some of the major differences in these area can create the most difficult situations; management styles, job security and compensation, career development, performance evaluation and motivational strategies.
The preferred management styles vary depending on the individual, but we can identify several similarities among cultures. Employees among the US prefer a boss or supervisor that is friendly and professional with them, treating them as equals while keeping all the expectations a boss should have. Americans prefer managers that expect them to be independent and self-motivated. Managers and employees do not expect the boss-subordinate relationship to be strongly hierarchical, or to be one of strongly committed personal loyalty: it is all about mutual respect. These cultural characteristics can create issues, since for other countries the relationship with the boss can even become quasi-paternal.
A critical area that can affect employee motivation across cultures is the job security and compensation structures. Regardless of the countries been evaluated, most of the people live in a day to day basis where they have the need to work in order to sustain himself or even their whole family. Therefore job security has become a topic that every employee wants to keep clear at all times. The US has been through a workplace revolution in which expectations of