The Relationship of National Culture to Employees' Values Buchkatalog

In today's global economy, when U.S. corporations expand abroad they usually bring with them management practices ingrained in U.S. culture and management theory. Literature has indicated that often these management practices do not transfer well to foreign locations, undermining effectiveness and productivity. Values are a central component of culture. Work values are a special component of the overall value system, which, in turn, is reflective of the national culture. This study compared the work values of workers from Poland, Mexico, and the United States. The participants were local-national employees of a U.S.-based multi-national corporation. The Survey of Work Values was deployed, and the means were compared. The results confirmed significant differences on five out of six scales of the survey.Based on the findings, recommendations for managers and leaders of U.S.-based multinational corporations are presented. This study supports the premise that traditional ways of managing local workforces in foreign locations may benefit from adjustments to account for the local national culture and specific work values typical to it.