From reviewing Green’s fictional case study, (Green, 2011), the author acknowledges some good points for consideration when one has to determine how much a culture and environment will affect institutions and their management. In this review, Green explores the challenges faced by Ms. Linda Myers when she accepted a job as a VP in a Seoul, South Korea with SK Telecom.
Ms. Myers had what seemed to be all of the right credentials on paper that would make her the ideal candidate for a foreign assignment, except one, she was female. Although she realized initially that the agency contacting her for the assignment referred to her as “Mr.”, she pressed on and assumed it was a simple mistake, however, her experience would be reflective of this
By allowing her attitude to become defeatist, she ultimately allowed herself to remain in a state of shock that ultimately led to her not making any corrections to herself to get up to speed and get moving in the right direction. She instead remained stagnant and this ultimately cost her missing out on the great opportunity she was in search of with SK Telecom.
When one applies Hofstede’s 5 dimensions of culture to this case study, it becomes quickly apparent that there are some vast differences between South Korea culture and the United States. Had Ms. Myers applied the knowledge provided in Hofstede’s 5 dimensions model and utilized some of his tips, there is a very high likelihood she could have been successful in her assignment.
For example, for each category listed below, here are the differences in scores between the U.S. and South Korea:
Power Distance (PD) - In America, this score is 40 where as in Korea, there is much higher emphasis on this category and they score a 60. So, understanding this, Ms. Myers could have recognized early on that she would be facing a more rigid corporate hierarchy with a centralized organization which places a much higher emphasis on their leader’s power and authority (geert-hofstede, 2012).
Individualism (IDV) – This is the most dramatically different category between America and Koreans. In this category the focus is on people and their