PosamentengalerieICM Aschaffenburg, November 2004
CULTURAL DIMENSIONS
CASE: JULIUS SCHEUERLE GmbH
Intercultural management
November 2004
Monica Boucht FIN
Ohla Bura D
Laszlo Füleki HU
Robert Scholtens NL
TABLE OF CONTENT
1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Team and report
1.2 Julius Scheuerle GmbH
2 POWER DISTANCE
2.1 Theory
2.2 Case company
3 UNCERTAINTY AVOIDANCE
3.1 Theory
3.2 Case company
4 INDIVIDUALISM / COLLECTIVISM
4.1 Theory
4.2 Case company
5 FEMINITY / MASCULINITY
5.1 Theory
5.2 Case company
6 HIGH / LOW CONTEXT
6.1 Theory
6.2 Case company
7 TIME
7.1 Theory
7.2 Case company
8 LONG- TERM VERSUS SHORT- TERM ORIENTATION
8.1 Theory
8.2 Case company
9 BEING VERSUS DOING
9.1 Theory
9.2 Case company
10 CONCLUSIONS
Appendix 1: Questions
Appendix 2: Individual LOG’s
1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Team and report
Our team is an international team, consisting of four members from four different countries. Monica is from Finland, Ohla is from Germany, Laszlo is from Hungary and Robert from Holland. We have been working together as a team for two weeks in Aschaffenburg, at an intensive course of Intercultural Management (ICM).
The aims of this report is to show how the cultural dimensions are in our case company, Julius Scheuerle GmbH. The reference for this report is gathered though Hofstede’s theory of cultural dimensions, and the interview with the owner and manager of Julius Scheuerle GmbH, Lars Kuhlmann.
1.2 Julius Scheuerle GmbH
The company Julius Scheuerle was created in 1900 in Frankfurt and
since then it has been dealing with trimming for upholstery and window decoration. Trimming is a general term for such products as trimming, cords, fraying, edgings, rope, which are used mainly as a decoration. The business is a family estate and is leaded by the fourth generation.
The customer of the firm are about 1500 small and mid-size companies of the German home decoration sector: upholsterers, interior decorators, furniture manufacturers. Besides, there is an export rate of about 1%. Among the foreign customers are small firms in Holland and Austria. Consultations, sales and dispatches take place in Frankfurt through the direct contact with the customers. The sales network is expensive and doesn’t exist.
The team consists of 6 co-workers. The brand is named Scheuerle Posamenten. About 20 machines are used in the manufactring process. The production art is job processing and batch processing. The manual work plays an important role as well.
The wholesale assortment with collections of German and international
manufacturers is new and offers the trimmings under the brand PosamentenGalerie. The company is constantly looking for new posamenten –manufacturers and is open for cooperation.
The annual turn over in 2003 was approximately 270.000 EUR.
2 POWER DISTANCE
2.1 Theory
According to Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, power distance shows how equal people are; variation is status, hierarchy, wages, power, rights, and so on.
2.2 Case company
The hierarchy in Julius Scheuerle GmbH is not that big. The five employees, and the employer, have all their own tasks to perform. The owner / manager Lars Kuhlemann takes care of the management and financial tasks of the company, and helps with the actual work at three fourth of his time. A woman is doing the administrative tasks and business contacts, and the rest four employees do the actual work. Lars Kuhlemann has the most power in the company, because he is the only one who has the ability for it. There is some level of team work in the organisation. The manager assists in the work a lot, and is therefore working as a part of the team. But the different job tasks are done in different rooms, because it is more convenient, so there is not much actual team work between the employees.
The company has a dependency relationship with the previous owner of the company. Every year when Lars Kuhlemann goes on his holiday, in the meantime his father will run the company and assist with the work. Also when the woman doing the administrative tasks has her holiday, Lars Kuhlemann’s mother will replace her.
3 UNCERTAINTY AVOIDANCE
3.1 Theory
Hofstede claims that uncertainty avoidanceis about the acceptance of rules and deviation; new situations seen as threat or opportunity, relying on common sense or specialisation, etc.
3.2 Case company
The competition and future of our case company’s sector is tough. The company has always a sort of fear for the future, because the trend of trimmings fluctuates continuously in a five years period. The manager studies the competitors all the time, so that he would be aware of the latest trends. The biggest competitors are Gerster in Germany, Houles in France and Santa Maria in Spain.
The atmosphere is more informal and more family-like. There are no strict rules, about dress codes or behaviour, but all employees must do their tasks.
The company has increased its business to wholesale for two years ago, and that can be seen as a risk- taking move. In the past, there has been also risk taking, when the company tried to expand their export, but the transport costs exceeded the actual cost of the product, so it was not use, and they learned to be more careful.
4 INDIVIDUALISM / COLLECTIVISM
4.1 Theory
Individualism versus collectivism is according to Hofstede all about self- realisation.
4.2 Case company
Julius Scheuerle GmbH has an individualistic business culture. The tasks are performed on a more individual basis, the employees are familiar and friends to each other, but they have their own private life and need their own space. For example, if one of the employees has birthday she/he brings usually a cake to the workplace. Everyone sits down for a half an hour and talk, and then they return to their tasks.
5 FEMINITY / MASCULINITY
5.1 Theory
According to Hofstede, feminity versus masculinity tells the quality of life; achievement, success, understanding, consensus, individual decisions, or group decisions, etc.
5.2 Case company
There are three women and three men in the whole organisation, so in this matter it is very equal.
There are some masculine features in the business culture, for example, strength is needed when using some of the machines, the owner / manager Lars Kuhlemann makes individual decisions, there is periodical stress when an order has to be fulfilled, and the company is achievement oriented because it would not survive without the products they are making, so nothing can be left undone.
Some feminine features are, for example, the customer contact service that a woman is responsible for, and the environment in the company is social and relaxed.
6 HIGH / LOW CONTEXT
6.1 Theory
Hofstede’s context measures the non-verbal and verbal communication; body language, words, and so on.
6.2 Case company
The communication culture is usually more verbal than non-verbal. But when they receive big order, the manager does not have to tell the employees to work harder, they know it and do it automatically.
7 TIME
7.1 Theory
The usage of time, according to Hofstede, can concentrate on the past or the future, can be circular or linear, be monochromic or polichronic, be simultaneous, cause-effect, or have symbols if status.
7.2 Case company
Since the 80s, as Lars Kuhleman became the owner of the company, the turnover has been constantly decreasing. The success of the company depends on the trends of fashion, and the product is not popular nowadays. The owner does not make long term plans because the future of the company is not clear. The future of the Posamentengalerie is depending on fashion of furniture. The plans that are made are based on the past and the horizon is for one year. The owner of the company is hoping that the ‘golden’ times of the seventies are coming back again. If that is going to happen is not sure. The changing cycle of furniture fashion is more or less ten years and we are in the middle of a cycle right now.
8 LONG- TERM VERSUS SHORT- TERM ORIENTATION
8.1 Theory
Long-term versus short-term orientation concentrates, according to Hofstede’s, on future orientation, persistence, respect for nature, and respect for tradition, favours, pursuit of happiness.
8.2 Case company
The company used to be long term orientated, because the company is a family enterprise and was future orientated. The company is in hands of family Schuerle for 104 years now. And the persistence of the company was much bigger than nowadays. Nowadays the Posamentengalerie is short term orientated. The reason for that is that the business is depending on fashion of furniture. Because the company is small a short term orientation is possible. Plans can be adjusted very quickly and easily, this is a big advantage of the Posamentengalerie in comparison to other bigger competitors. An other reason for the short term orientation is the respect for traditions. The posamenten business is a very old and traditional business for example the production methods and the products. A short time plan of the company is to be the only provider of trimming and other kind of posamenten in Germany.
9 BEING VERSUS DOING
9.1 Theory
According to Hofstede, being versus doing is nature controls us versus we control the nature. As for a company culture, it could be being- oriented, if a status or a background of the co-workers is important. It could be also doing-oriented, if efforts and the motivation of the colleagues are more important as the status or the university they graduated from.
9.2 Case company
All the employees are unskilled and of a different origin. One of the men working in the Posamentengallerie comes from Egypt, another comes from Yugoslavia. There is no doubt, that they have very different backgrounds and experience. But for the owner of the firm the most important role plays the result of their work (how they work) and not their status in the society (what they are). To conclude it, we can say, that the company culture is doing-oriented.
10 CONCLUSIONS
To crown it all, the culture of Julius Scheuerle GmbH is as following: both the power distance and the uncertainty avoidance are low. It is run individualistically rather than collectivistically. The culture is a bit more masculine than feminine. The communication is of low context; meaning more verbal than non-verbal. The concept of time is short- term and circular, and the culture is doing-oriented.
Appendix 1: Questions
Basics about the company
- Can you tell something about structure of the company?
- Are there any competitors in your market?
- Are there any subsidiaries?
- What is your turnover?
Hierarchy
- Is there a lot of teamwork?
- Can you tell me something about he company hierarchy?
- How do you motivate your employees?
- Is there working pressure (stress, deadlines)?
- Are there any women at high positions?
- Has a female employee the same position as a male employee?
- Are there any teambuilding sessions?
- Who is responsible for the end product and the financial position of the company? Are there any control systems ?
Decision making
- How are decisions being made? Is a discussion possible (authorithy)
- Are the employees part of the decision making?
- How fast are decisions being made? (time, day week)
- Is the decision making democratic? (majority agrees)
Future
- How do you see the future of the company? (In ten years)
- Are you willing to take risks with new markets and other opportunities?
- How do you plan your future? (strategy, goals)
- Do you keep eye on your competitors? And how?
- Do you have some ongoing projects? (new products, new markets,etc.)
Appendix 2: Individual LOG’s
Personal reflection Robert Scholtens The Netherlands
When I was coming to Aschaffenburg I don’t know what to expect of this two weeks. After the first lesson I tought this two weeks would be very boring and not exciting. After two days I came to the conclusion that my first impression was a wrong impression. I changed my opinion because in the first place I thought mine group members were not very exciting people. But after two days they opened up and we had a lot of conversation about our cultural diverences. Those conversations were very interesting and I person learned a lot of it. That was the first reason why I changed my opinion, the second reason was that the lessons became more interesting. For example the lessons about your personality and the personality of your group members I found very interesting and exciting. And the lesson about negotiating was also very interesting. In the first two days my group members were shy in comparison to the Dutch people but after a couple of days the opened up. My group exists of 4 people including myself:
- Monica from Finland
- Ohla from Germany
- Laszlo from Hunary
- Robert from The Netherlands
Monica from Finland was in the beginning shy but after a couple of days she opened up. Besides that she is a smart person with very good ideas. Ohla from Germany is a open person who is very precise and adequate, we had a lot of disagreements but we never came in real ‘fight’. I think it is good to have discussions about certain problems, it helps to come to a good and satisfying solution or end product. Laszlo from Hungary is a very kind person who has a lot of good ideas and he has another point of view on things, this very important for a good end result. In group discussions Ohla and I were very often taking the lead and discussing, after that Monica and Laszlo were giving their opinion about he subject. After we have heard everyone opinion we made a decisions about the subject. We don’t had a real
organisation in our group, it was a natural process. The main lesson that I learnt of this two weeks that Dutch people are sometimes too much directly and they want to convince other people of their right. Other cultures can see that as dominant and they don’t like that.
Monica Boucht, Finland
I found it very difficult to work with people who I have known for only a short time. I feel that I am not always making myself very clear, because I feel that I am misunderstood very often. Maybe it is a cultural difference of interpretation, when we do not always mean the same thing with the same English words. And because our English language skills vary, it is sometimes difficult to understand what another person tries to say. The motivation for the assignments vary a lot from person to person, and I think that it also has influenced the efficiency of our team work, as well as the individual initiative-taking. I think that our report turned out to be good, but it could have been better if everyone would have been more active, flexible and interested in doing it. I have had a nice and interesting, and I have learned a lot of not only other cultures and people, but also about my own culture and myself.
Laszlo Fuleki’s personal experience of ICM
I was excited when we arrived to Aschaffenburg. There was a lot of unknown things and face but after all I know all of them. I enjoyed to meet and work together with other people.
Aschaffenburg is a beautiful German city. It has a nice environment. We also were in Frankfurt and we saw sky-scrapers and interesting shops with large assortment.
Our team members are Ohla from Germany, Monica from Finland and Robert from the Netherlands. We are only four because the Belgian group member have not come. They are very polite and friendly people. We made a lot of conversations about our countries. We were also together at nights and real conversations happened than. I really enjoy to work together and we could do things quickly. For example when we visited our company we could share the tasks easily. I got a lot of experience about negotiation skills and how to make a good presentation. During the lessons there were so much interesting games such as situations and presentations.
I waited the ICM very much but now this is the end of a beautiful journey. I hope it will be the same again in the future.
Olha Bura from Germany
Different from the other groups, our group consists only of four members. Finnland was represented by Monika, Hungary by Laszlo, Netherlands by Robert. The 5th person from Belgium has become ill and could not take part in the project. But it was not a disadvantage in our case. During a discussion a lot of ideas came from Laszlo, even though he did not always take an active part in the discussion. Monika used to summarize everything. Robert and I discussed almost every point of a topic and tried to motivate the other members to say their opinions and attitudes.
At the beginning, as we did not know each other, we were rather considerate and quiet. After we worked on our group name, logo and a flag, we got a feeling of being together. There was no leader in our team, and we organized us naturally, according to a situation. As we had a certain task to do, we divided the whole into the subtasks and everybody was responsible for his part. But we helped each other during working and gave pieces of advice if needed.