The Handbook of Organizational Cultureand ClimateOrganiz

The Handbook of Organizational Culture
and Climate
Organizational Culture, Multiple Needs, and the
Meaningfulness of Work
Contributors: M. Teresa Cardador & Deborah E. Rupp
Edited by: Neal M. Ashkanasy, Celeste P. M. Wilderom & Mark
F. Peterson
Book Title: The Handbook of Organizational Culture and
Climate
Chapter Title: "Organizational Culture, Multiple Needs, and the
Meaningfulness of Work"
Pub. Date: 2010
Access Date: October 26, 2018
Publishing Company: SAGE Publications, Inc.
City: Thousand Oaks
Print ISBN: 9781412974820
Online ISBN: 9781483307961
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781483307961.n10
Print pages: 158-180

© 2010 SAGE Publications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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note that the pagination of
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Organizational Culture, Multiple Needs, and the Meaningfulness
of Work
M. TeresaCardador
Deborah E.Rupp
In modern organizations, it is increasingly difficult to find
managers not concerned with the
development, maintenance, and/or change of organizational
culture. An important reason for
this is that an effective organizational culture has been
identified as a major factor that
differentiates extraordinarily successful firms from their
competition (Berson, Oreg, & Dvir,
2008). Organizational culture has several definitions, but most
converge on the notion of
culture as the taken-for-granted, underlying assumptions,
expectations, and definitions
present in an organization (e.g., Schein, 2004; Schneider,
Ehrhart, & Macey, in press).
Organizational culture has often been referred to as the
underlying glue that holds

organizations together (Schein, 2004).
In line with this notion of culture, scholars have noted that
culture shapes the meaning and
interpretation that members attach to actions and experience in
the organization (Peterson &
Smith, 2000) and influences personal sensemaking within an
organization (Weick, Sutcliff, &
Obstfeld, 2005). Research has explored organizational culture
as a correlate of organizational
performance and competitive advantage (Sorenson, 2002) and
has examined the ways in
which culture is managed and changes over time (Kavanagh &
Ashkanasy, 2006). Although
some individual-level correlates of culture have been
explored—for example, employee
schema creation (Harris, 1994), participation and ownership
(Fey & Denison, 2003), and
organizational commitment (Baek-Kyoo & Taejo, 2009), there
is a paucity of work on how
organizational culture influences employees' personal
experiences of work.
This chapter examines the relationship between organizational
culture and employee
experiences of work as meaningful. Meaningful work is defined
as work that is considered by
individuals to be, at a minimum, purposeful and significant
(Pratt & Ashforth, 2003). When
work is significant, it has importance to the individual and
allows him or her to pursue goals
that he or she cares about (Nord, Brief, Atieh, & Doherty,
1990). When work is purposeful, it
has an obvious and consequential intent (Martin, 2000). Thus,
for work to be meaningful, it
has to be perceived by the individual as both personally

important and associated with
outcomes of personal consequence (Chalofsky, 2003).
Though there is evidence that meaningful work has benefits for
both workers and their
organizations (Baumeister & Vohs, 2002; Wrzesniewski, 2003),
scholars have noted that
employee perceptions of work as meaningful are declining (e.g.,
Sennett, 1998). In response
to this observation, scholars and practitioners alike have argued
that organizations need to
devote more attention to identifying opportunities to foster
perceptions of meaningfulness
among their employees (Pratt & Ashforth, 2003). This chapter
focuses on theorizing about
how organizational culture might contribute to employee
meaningfulness.
As noted, the current organizational culture literature provides
few clues as to how
organizational culture and meaningful work might be linked.
Similarly, the meaningful work
literature provides little direct guidance as to how contextual
factors—such as organizational
culture—serve a sensemaking role to inform employee
perceptions of work meaningfulness.
The purpose of this chapter, therefore, is to draw from the
existing organizational culture and
meaningful work literatures to present a theoretical framework
linking these two concepts.
Although there is no research that has directly linked
organizational culture and perceptions
of meaningful work, this chapter draws on several theories that
help to explain this
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Copyright © 2011 by SAGE Publications, Inc.
The Handbook of Organizational Culture and ClimatePage 2 of
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relationship. Specifically, the chapter leverages the multiple
needs model of organizational
justice (Cropanzano, Byrne, Bobocel, & Rupp, 2001) to suggest
mechanisms through which
individuals derive meaningful work via their organizatio nal
culture. In doing so, the chapter
attempts to answer the following question: Do certain types of
organizational cultures more
readily provide employees with opportunities to perceive their
work as meaningful? In
examining this, we make propositions about how organizational
culture (a group level
phenomenon) shapes particular contextual elements
(organizational practices), which in turn
influence how employee needs are met in the organization and
thus how employees come to
realize meaningfulness in work.
The chapter begins with a brief review of the types of
organizational culture and the main
sources of work meaningfulness that have been identified
through extant research. Then
types of organizational culture that should be expected to meet

various psychological needs
and, consequently, foster employee meaningfulness are
identified. Organizational cultures
characterized by high innovation and support should be more
likely than others to provide
employees with opportunities to realize meaningful work; the
implications of combining
multiple cultural elements are described. An argument for why
cultural consistency should be
expected to influence the relationship between organizational
culture and access to sources
of work meaningfulness is presented. The chapter concludes
with a summary of the
theoretical and practical implications of the framework offered.
Types of Organizational Culture
The study of organizational culture stems from an
anthropological base and typically focuses
on trying to understand the deeply embedded assumptions and
values of the organization
(Kuenzi & Schminke, 2009). Organizational culture researchers
have identified numerous
dimensions of culture, including culture strength and
congruence (Schein, 2004); internal
versus external focus (Arnold & Capella, 1985); integration,
differentiation, and fragmentation
(Martin & Meyerson, 1988); and efficient versus inefficient
(Wilkins & Ouchi, 1983). Some have
noted that the broad and inclusive nature of organizational
culture necessitates the numerous
dimensions offered (Cameron & Quinn, 2005). Nevertheless,
organizational culture typologies
have congregated around four recurring cultural types within
which organizational scholars
argue most organizations can be classified (Berson et al., 2008;

Gregory, Harris, Armenakis, &
Shook, 2009; Tsui, Zhang, Wang, Xin, & Wu, 2006).
Innovative cultures (also termed entrepreneurial or adhocracy)
are characterized by a
commitment to entrepreneurialism, experimentation, and being
at the leading edge of new
knowledge, products, and services. These organizations
typically hold values that focus on
adaptability, flexibility, creativity, and cutting-edge ideas
(Song, Kim, & Kolb, 2009; Taylor,
Levy, Boyacigiller, & Beechler, 2008). Bureaucratic
organizational cultures (also referred to as
hierarchy and rule oriented) are characterized by a high degree
of formalization and structure
and values related to maintaining efficient and reliable
productivity (Zammuto, Gifford, &
Goodman, 2000). As the name suggests, market organizational
cultures (also referred to as
competitive or results oriented) operate primarily through
economic market mechanisms and
the focus is on conducting transactions with others to create
competitive advantage and
enhance market share (Gregory et al., 2009). The core values
associated with market cultures
are competitiveness, productivity, and profit. Finally,
supportive cultures (also termed clan or
relationship oriented) are generally characterized by shared
values and goals, cohesion, and
a sense of “we-ness,” leading some to observe that these sorts
of organizations seem less like
economic entities and more like extended families (Kwantes &
Boglarsky, 2007; Richard,
McMillan-Capehart, Bhuian, & Taylor, 2009). The core values
associated with a supportive

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23
culture include employee empowerment, participation, and
commitment to a human work
environment.
Within any of these types of cultures, the degree to which
organizational values align with
organizational practices can vary (termed consistency or
congruence, Martin, 1992; Gregory
et. al., 2009). Similarly, these culture types are not necessarily
independent, as organizations
might contain elements of multiple cultural types (Van Maanen
& Barley, 1985). Though these
types of organizational cultures are considered the dominant
cultural profiles, scholars have
noted that among these types of cultures, bureaucratic and
market cultures appear to be the
most common (Cameron & Quinn, 2005). However, as will
become evident later in the
chapter, despite the prevalence of bureaucratic and market
cultures, these may be the culture
types least likely to provide employees with opportunities to
meet their psychological needs
and, consequently, derive meaningfulness from their work.
Theoretical arguments for why the
innovative and supportive culture types should be the cultural
types most likely to foster
perceptions of employee meaningfulness through work are
presented. Before making this

case, however, the main sources of work meaningfulness
identified in previous research need
to be highlighted.
Antecedents of Meaningful Work
Work as a source of meaningfulness has been a topic of interest
to organizational scholars
and practitioners for some time. This interest has been spurred
in part not only by the
assumption that meaningful work is positively associated with
employee motivation and
performance (Roberson, 1990), but also by the belief that
finding meaning within work is
considered by many workers to be as, if not more, important
than security and pay (O'Brien,
1992). In fact, many theories equate optimal human functioning
with the capacity for
meaningful work (Baumeister & Vohs, 2002).
This review focuses on meaningful work as it has been
examined in the organizational
literature.1 Research in this area has pointed to three primary
antecedents of work
meaningfulness: (1) meaningful work tasks, (2) meaningful
relationships, and (3) furthering
meaningful goals and values. Research on meaningful work
tasks has shown that job
characteristics associated with enhanced intrinsic motivation
and self-determination are critical
to employee experiences of meaningful work (e.g., Ryan &
Deci, 2000). Intrinsically motivating
activities are those that people do naturally and spontaneously
when they are free to follow
their inner interest (Deci & Ryan, 1987). Individuals are more

likely to experience intrinsic
motivation when they are afforded volition and agency and
when personal needs in
relationship to the social context are unconstrained (Gagné &
Deci, 2005). Intrinsically
motivating activities are experienced as enjoyable and
interesting in part because they are
self-directed and in part because one feels competence and
relatedness in performing them.
Similarly, scholars of job and work design have shown that the
job characteristics of skill
variety, task identity, and task significance were most likely to
influence a state of experienced
meaningfulness (e.g., Fried & Ferris, 1987). Research has also
provided evidence that
additional features of the job such as autonomy, competence,
enjoyment, and optimal levels
of challenge were also critical for fostering meaningful work
(Csikszentmihalyi, 2003; Deci &
Ryan, 2000). The idea is that these task characteristics allow
workers to more fully engage
themselves in what they do (Kahn, 1990) and to experience
greater “flow”2 and authenticity
through work (Waterman, 1993). Emphasis is placed on the
internal enjoyment or interest that
the individual expects to experience from a work-related task or
activity. For example, personal
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expressiveness, personal engagement, and flow at work have all
been linked to experienced
meaningfulness (Macey & Schneider, 2008). Each of these
concepts emphasizes the ways in
which work is considered meaningful when work tasks foster
certain types of employee
experiences, such as person-organization fit (e.g., through
personal expressiveness;
Edwards, 2008), opportunities for expression of one's preferred
self in task behaviors (e.g.,
through work engagement; Macey & Schneider, 2008), and the
opportunity to satisfy the
individual's context-specific needs (e.g., via work involvement;
Schaufeli & Salanova, 2007).
This body of work has tended to focus primarily on individuals'
connections to their work
rather than on their connections with other individuals, leading
some to suggest that such
approaches to work meaningfulness fail to consider relational
elements of meaningfulness
(Schwartz, 2000). In response to this criticism, Jane Dutton and
Emily Heaphy (2003) have
theorized that work is more meaningful when employees
develop positive and mutually
reinforcing personal relationships at work. Research by Amy
Wrzesniewski, Jane Dutton, and
Gelaye Debebe (2003) highlight the importance of interpersonal

interactions as a source of
information regarding the value or significance of work.
Through interpersonal cues,
employees can determine if their work is meaningful or not.
Moreover, social relationships
serve as resources for personal recognition, attention, esteem,
support, and acknowledgment
(Hanley & Abell, 2002) and as a resource for personal growth
and learning (Hall, 2004).
Work by Michael Pratt and Blake Ashforth (2003) and by
William Kahn (1990) draws on social
identity theory to suggest that meaningfulness can also stem
from feelings of social
connectedness derived from group membership. According to
social identity theory, people
classify themselves into a multitude of social categories, one
being related to their employing
organization (Ashforth, Harrison & Corley, 2008). Social
identities are derived from those social
categories to which one feels a sense of belonging and self-
definition (Haslam, Jetten,
Postmes, & Haslam, 2009). Research focused on the antecedents
of organizational
identification has tended to emphasize characteristics such as
organizational distinctiveness
and out-group salience, which distinguish the organization from
other targets of identification
(Ashforth & Mael, 1989; Hogg & Terry, 2000), and on
characteristics such as organizational
prestige, attractiveness, and sense of community that are likely
to increase members' self-
esteem (Ashforth et al., 2008) and help them to grasp the shared
purpose of their work
(Gagné & Deci, 2005; Pratt & Ashforth, 2003).

A third body of research suggests that an important source of
work meaningfulness stems
from the opportunity to further meaningful goals and values
(Wrzesniewski, 2003). Goals and
values are defined as the end states that people desire or feel
that they have realized through
working (Nord et al., 1990). This could refer to individual goals
and values, such as personal
development and self-expression (Waterman, 1993), or to
collective goals and values, such as
providing a high quality product, experiencing a sense of
belongingness (Baumeister & Leary,
1995), or having a positive impact on others through work
(Grant, 2007). When individuals feel
positive about the personal or collective outcomes of their
work, they are better able to
perceive a relationship between what they do and with other
valued ends (Baumeister &
Wilson, 1996; Cardador, 2009). Thus, furthering personally
relevant goals and values allows
individuals to access important sources of development: (a)
development as an individual
outcome or work as a means to develop and express oneself
and/or (b) development as a
collective or social process, whereby work is a means through
which people relate to and
impact others (Nord et al., 1990).
Taken together, this body of work suggests that perceptions of
meaningfulness are fostered
through meaningful work tasks, meaningful work relationships,
and the sense that work is
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23
furthering meaningful goals and values. Although this research
has not specifically looked at
the role of organizational culture in fostering meaningfulness
associated with these sources, it
presumes that features of the organizational context can create
the conditions under which
individuals perceive work as meaningful. One of the ways this
is thought to occur is through
employee need satisfaction. Needs refer to innate tendencies
considered fundamental to all
humans (Deci & Ryan, 2000). Research linking meaningful
work to need fulfillment presumes
that meaningful work is experienced when people are able to
satisfy their basic psychological
needs as they pursue and attain valued outcomes (Baumeister &
Vohs, 2002).3
Russell Cropanzano et al. (2001) have applied Kipling
Williams's (1997) needs model to
understand how employees make sense of their work
environments. This model includes the
interrelated needs of control, belongingness, and meaningful
existence. Control needs involve
the sense that one has mastery over one's social environment
and over the course of events
in one's life. Thus, control needs are similar to competence
needs that reflect the need to feel
capable of performing effectively (Ryan & Deci, 2000).
Belongingness refers to the
fundamental human need for connection with others as the

essence of meaningfulness
(Baumeister & Leary, 1995). Finally, the need for meaningful
existence is satisfied when one
has a moral purpose or a reason for being. This is similar to the
need for purpose, or the
sense that actions and events are associated with the fulfillment
of important goals and
values (Baumeister & Wilson, 1996).
A s t h e p r e c e d i n g r e v i e w h i g h l i g h t s , f u l f i
l l m e n t o f t h e s e n e e d s c a n b e l i n k e d to
meaningfulness in work (Rupp, Williams, & Aguilera, 2010).
For example, individuals
experience meaningfulness when work fulfills needs for control
by providing workers with a
sense of agency or autonomy in work (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003).
Workers experience work as
meaningful when needs for belongingness are met through
positive interpersonal connections
with others, through the sense that membership is special and
enriching (Dutton & Heaphy,
2003), or through the engendering of social exchange
relationships (Cropanzano & Mitchell,
2005). Finally, most treatments of meaningful work include
meaningful existence as a defining
element of the experience (see Feldt, Kinnunen, & Mauno,
2000)—that is, work is thought to
be more meaningful when it allows individuals to fulfill a social
or moral purpose, or broader
reason for being (Weiss, Skelley, Hall, & Haughey, 2003).
Organizational Culture and Meaningful Work
Thus far, four main types of organizational culture—innovative,
bureaucratic, market, and
supportive—have been presented and the experience of

meaningfulness at work has been
noted to stem from three main sources—meaningful work tasks,
meaningful relationships,
and opportunities to further meaningful goals and values. Work
is perceived as meaningful in
these ways when it contributes to the fulfillment of important
human needs (i.e., control,
belongingness, and meaningful existence). In this section, a
theoretical framework that
highlights how the four types of cultures should be expected to
influence employee
perceptions of meaningfulness will be presented. The arguments
are underpinned by the
notion that different types of organizational cultures can be
described in terms of their values,
their approaches to employee management, and their leadership
styles and that these three
characteristics serve a sensemaking role as employees seek to
navigate the organizational
landscape (Peterson & Smith, 2000). Consistent with theories of
sensemaking (Weick et al.,
2005) and social information processing theory (Salancik &
Pfeffer, 1978), these
organizational elements influence how individuals attach
meaning to what they experience at
work. This chapter builds on this work to suggest that through
these distinct organizational
SAGE SAGE Reference
23

elements, different types of organizational cultures provide
employees with differential
opportunities to feel that their needs for control, belongingness,
and meaningful existence are
met. In turn, need fulfillment creates the conditions under which
individuals come to
experience meaningful work tasks, meaningful work
relationships, and the sense that they are
furthering important goals and values through their work.
Figure 10.1 summarizes these
relationships.
Figure 10.1 Organizational Culture, Multiple Needs, and
Meaningfulness of Work
Framework
Innovative Organizational Cultures and Meaningful Work
As noted earlier, organizations characterized by innovative
cultures are dynamic,
entrepreneurial, and committed to innovation (Taylor et. al.,
2008). Innovative organizational
cultures foster employee creativity, risk taking, and employee
growth and development
(Gregory et al., 2009). Approaches to employee management
foster employee risk taking,
innovation, freedom, and uniqueness, and leaders are
entrepreneurial, visionary, and
innovative (Cameron & Quinn, 2005). Success is generally
defined by the organization's
ability to develop unique cutting-edge products or services, and
by employees experiencing
creativity and growth.
WuXi AppTech provides an example of an organization with an
innovative culture. A drug-

research company based in China, WuXi PharmaTech (the
parent company of AppTech)
provides scientific outsourcing for research and development
around the globe. Recognized
as a top innovator, the company promotes a fast-paced,
energetic, and dynamic working
environment and employs people with a passion for quality.
WuXi is known for valuing
employee self-management and teamwork and encouraging
employees to proactively take on
responsibility.
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As illustrated in Figure 10.1, this type of culture, through its
focus on autonomy and
responsibility, should be expected to maximize the fulfillment
of employee needs for control
and meaningful existence. In turn, fulfillment of these needs
should be associated with
perceptions that work tasks are meaningful and that one is
furthering meaningful goals and
values through work. There are several reasons for this. With
respect to meaningful work
tasks, the emphasis on freedom and creativity associated with
organizational values and
management practices in innovative organizations should be
associated with structuring jobs
to enhance intrinsic motivation—the desire to perform work for
its own sake (Deci & Ryan,

2000)—and to allow employees opportunities to be self-directed
and autonomous in their
work. These task characteristics allow workers to feel
competence and control, which in turn
allow them to feel more fully engaged in their work (e.g.,
Macey & Schneider, 2008). This also
allows workers to experience entrepreneurial passion, where
individuals experience
enthusiasm, joy, and zeal stemming from the energetic pursuit
of worthy, challenging, and
uplifting work (Cardon, Vincent, Singh, & Drnovsek, 2009).
Employee involvement practices
associated with innovative organizations empower workers and
encourage and reward
employee skill acquisition (Lawler, Mohrman, & Benson, 2001).
In other words, employees are
given opportunities and resources to express their best potential
through work (Gardner,
Csikszentmihalyi, & Damon, 2001).
Proposition 1a: Employees in innovative cultures will be likely
to experience their
work tasks as meaningful.
Proposition 1b: Meaningfulness is derived from innovative
cultures in part via the
fulfillment of control needs.
Innovative organizational cultures should also provide
employees with the sense that they are
furthering important goals and values through work. Leader
behaviors in innovative cultures
are characterized by entrepreneurialism and vision, encouraging
employees to strive to be the
best in relationship to a particular product or service (Cameron
& Quinn, 2005). For example,

3M leaders encourage employees to take pride in reaching their
target goal of 25% annual
revenue from new product sales. Employees take pride in
reaching this goal and in the
realization that their products and services are utilized by
millions of people worldwide. This is
in line with research that supports the notion that people can
experience work as meaningful
when they see that they are performing a meaningful public and
societal service (Colby,
Sippola, & Phelps, 2001; Rupp et al., 2010). Thus, employees in
innovative organizations can
experience a sense of social contribution by providing products
and services that are valued
by the broader society (see Nord et al., 1990). In short,
innovative organizational cultures help
to foster what Pratt and Ashforth (2003) have referred to as
“meaningfulness in working,”
whereby organizations tap into employees' desired identities by
making the tasks one
performs at work more purposeful and by helping employees to
experience their work as tied
to a broader set of personal and collective goals.
Proposition 2a: Employees in innovative cultures will be likely
to experience
meaningful work through the sense that they are furthering
important values and
goals.
Proposition 2b: Meaningfulness is derived from innovative
cultures in part via the
fulfillment of needs for meaningful existence.
Supportive Organizational Cultures and Meaningful Work

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23
Supportive organizational cultures are characterized as friendly
and personal places to work.
These types of organizational cultures place high value on
treating employees like extended
family, fostering supportiveness and cohesion and encouraging
employee teamwork and
participation (Richard et al., 2009). The management practices
of supportive cultures typically
emphasize teamwork, employee participation, and consensus
(Cameron & Quinn, 2005). In
supportive organizations, attempts are often made to reduce
status differences among
employees and to foster more effective information sharing and
communication within the
company. Leaders act as facilitators, mentors, or parent figures,
helping to create a family-like
atmosphere where employee contributions are recognized and
appreciated (Kwantes &
Boglarsky, 2007). Success is defined by employee cohesion and
morale and by a concern for
employees and customers.
Kingston Technology provides an example of a supportive
organizational culture. Recognized
5 times by Fortune magazine as one of the 100 best companies
to work for in the United
States, Kingston Technology places high value on respectful,
safe, and healthy employee and

business relationships. Recognized for fairness and employee
trust, Kingston Technology
provides an environment where employees feel appreciated and
valued, and where they
experience a strong sense of organizational cohesion and
commitment.
As illustrated in Figure 10.1, supportive organizational cultures
should be expected to provide
cues that allow employees to derive meaningfulness from their
work. These types of
organizational cultures are expected to provide work contexts
that fulfill employee needs for
belongingness and meaningful existence and thus provide
relationships, goals, and values
that are perceived as meaningful. This type of culture fosters
positive, supportive, and trusting
personal relationships among employees, which are an
important source of recognition,
esteem, and support (Dutton & Heaphy, 2003). Teamwork and
employee participation build
trust and encourage employees to view the organization as self-
referential (Cheney, 1983),
thus focusing employees beyond simply …
Organizational Culture in Action
Offering students and practitioners an applied approach to the
subject, Organizational Culture in Action (OCA)
walks them through a six-step model for analyzing an
organization’s culture to provide insight into positive
communication practices to improve organizational ethics and

effectiveness.
The authors review relevant theory while integrating a
constitutive approach to studying organizational
culture and communication. Practical guides for multiple data
collection methods are provided, and the
workbook format is full of interactive tools that engage students
and reinforce learning. The revised OCA
cultural analysis model in this edition provides the below
elements.
• The revised first step in the model – “articulating the value of
cultural analysis” includes connections to
public relations and crisis management.
• A definition of communication and the analysis process that
foregrounds ethics throughout the book is
included.
• Recent research on organizational moral learning is integrated
in the ethics chapter, and throughout the
book.
• The Communicative Constitutive of Organizations is now
foregrounded throughout the book, and
reflected in a table capturing variable and metaphor approaches
to culture.
• The latest applied research is integrated in units on diversity,
change, leadership, and effectiveness in
relation to positive organizational communication.
• Enriched guides on multiple data collection methods now
include surveys.
• Cases, examples, and applications relevant to crisis, employee
engagement, virutal organizations, conflict

management, and public relations are provided.
Professionals come away equipped to apply cultural insights
into fostering inclusiveness in relation to
diversity, supporting organizational change, making leadership
more dynamic, understanding the link
between ethics and culture, and achieving personal and
professional growth.
Gerald W. C. Driskill is a Professor at the University of
Arkansas—Little Rock, USA. He teaches
undergraduate and graduate courses in organizational
communication, theory, and intercultural
communication.
This page intentionally left blank
Organizational Culture in Action
A Cultural Analysis Workbook
Third Edition
Gerald W. C. Driskill
Third edition published 2019
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
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known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
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Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be
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and are used only for identification and explanation without
intent to infringe.
First edition published by Sage Publications, Inc. 2005
Second edition published by Sage Publications, Inc. 2011
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To Angela Laird Brenton, who had the vision to develop a
cultural analysis course to
serve students decades before this book or others had been
written. To her passion
as an educator and a leader; to her love for her husband, Keith,
and children
Matthew and Laura, who gave her time and space to serve
others; to her mother,
Harriet Laird, who served as her perpetual role model and
encourager. Angela will
always be missed yet her faith and love, even in the midst of her
battle with cancer,
remain an inspiration.
To Angela, Eli, and Abigail, who gave the smiles, hugs, and
laughter to remind me
what matters most; and to my parents, Ferne and Lawrence
Driskill, who are always
in the back of my mind as models of love and perseverance.
Contents

Preface to the Third Edition ix
Acknowledgments xi
PART I
Cultural Analysis Planning 1
1 Introduction: Setting the Stage 3
2 The Significance of the Stage: The Value of Cultural Analysis
20
PART II
Cultural Analysis Basics 33
3 Constructing the Set: The Concept of Culture 35
4 Understanding Roles: Cultural Elements 51
PART III
Cultural Data Collection and Interpretation 77
5 Method Acting: Textual Analysis 89
6 Method Acting: Observation 99
7 Method Acting: Interviews and Surveys 113
8 Getting Inside the Character: Interpretation 129
PART IV
Cultural Analysis Application 147
9 Casting against Type: Diversity 151
10 Improvisation: Leading Change 175

11 An Honest Portrayal: Ethics 199
12 The Director’s Chair: Symbolic Leadership 221
13 Reading Reviews: Organizational Effectiveness 239
14 Opening Night: Conclusion 250
Index 264
viii Contents
Preface to the Third Edition
In 1984, Angi Brenton, Ph.D. introduced a course on
organizational culture to the graduate students in the
Masters of Interpersonal and Organizational Communication at
the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
Her students came from a wide array of organizations (high tech
to medical to industry) and positions in
those organizations (management to HRD to entry-level
employees). This same array of students continued
to participate in this course when Gerald Driskill, Ph.D., began
to teach the course in 1994. Over time, our
approach to working with these students resulted in this
application-focused workbook.
Fast forward to 2018. Dr. Brenton, a colleague and friend, died
at the age of 60 on May 8, 2013 after a
courageous but brief battle with cancer. Her passion for ideas,
for life, for serving, and difference making
continue to motivate me and other colleagues to engage in the

education setting. This passion finds its way
into this book. In revision, I sought to maintain our shared
voice through the use of “we” with the belief
that Angi’s ideas and passion and presence continue to be part
of this book. As a way to honor her
dedication, former students and colleagues established the
Angie Laird Brenton Memorial Scholarship.
Students continue to comment on the practical and powerful
nature of the approach outlined in this
workbook. In this third edition, I have maintained the original
hands-on approach to learning to “read”
organizational cultures, and using that cultural knowledge in
change leadership, training, supporting diversity,
improving ethics, and unleashing creativity. It also serves as an
introduction to qualitative research methods,
introducing students to field observation, interviewing,
qualitative surveys, content analysis, and other methods of
textual analysis. This third edition also provides guides and
examples for developing quantitative surveys.
What has changed? One primary change along with additional
responses to students, reviewers, and trends
in the field.
• A shift to focus on a constitutive model for analysis. Why this
shift? A greater focus on communication and
ethics is the short answer. The long answer is that over the
years I have increasingly integrated constructivist
theories into my class on cultural analysis, as well as in my
research. Then, in a serendipity, Dr. Ryan Bisel,
pointed me to the phrase “grounded in action” as referenced by
Dr. Linda Putnam in an article on
organizations constituted in communication. Dr. Putnam then
provided further guidance to make this shift.
Prior editions introduced two widely held perspectives on

culture and organization—“culture as a variable”
and “culture as a root metaphor”. In this edition, a third
perspective, “culture as a discursive construction”, is
introduced due to its focus on communication processes and
ethics.
• Revision to the model. A minor change was made to include
“articulating the value of the cultural analysis
process” as a first step. We find that in practice, anyone
engaged in an analysis will need to explain the
benefit.
• Beyond this added step, and based on the above change, the
model in the book is now affectionately labeled
as the “Organizational Culture in Action” (OCA) model for
cultural analysis. As such, you will notice efforts,
though at times incomplete, to encourage the study of culture
from a constitutive framework. For instance,
rather than maintain static language more fitting for “culture as
root metaphor,” changes were made to reflect
a more dynamic, process focus (e.g., from elements to enacted
elements, from themes to thematic action).
These changes answer two central questions heard most often
from students and professionals: “How can I
understand the intangible culture that is so important to working
in an organization?” and “How can I use
this cultural information once I understand it?”
• Dr. Bisel’s model of “Organizational Moral Learning” in
integrated ethics is now treated in a more
substantive way from the opening chapter, where ethics is part
of the definition of organizational
communication, to the closing chapter. Bisel’s model not only

foregrounds ethics but provides practical
insights for countering the findings from research that indicate
the failure of training and education to
have a significant, positive impact on ethical decision making.
• Framing the process in three practical questions (inspir ed by
Barnett and Kim Pearce). These three questions
are carried throughout the book a way to foreground
communication in terms of guiding questions: (a) What
are we co-creating here? (b) What do we want to co-create? (c)
What forms of communication will co-create
the culture we want? Students have found these questions
practical and meaningful not only for moving
through the analysis process but also for professional and
personal application.
• A positive communication focus. We refer to trends in and
outside of the communication field on
positive organization scholarship. Thus, for instance, based on
Dr. Mirivel’s model of positive commu-
nication and Dr. Lyon’s work on courageous communication, I
suggest ways to integrate these practices
at appropriate times in the application process.
• Updated research, examples, and activities, on such topics as:
virtual organizations, work-life balance,
engagement, external communication (public relations), and
crisis communication, including readiness
for renewal.
We are convinced that the application of this text can help
leaders shorten their learning curves and avoid
costly mistakes, while understanding the power of co-creating
engagement, and identification through
positive and ethical communicative practices. It could help the
new graduate choose a company consistent

with her values rather than realizing after 6 months she “just
doesn’t fit there.” It will reinforce, to the
training and development director, the role of storytelling and
ritual in organizational socialization and
engagement. It will equip those seeking organizational change
to understand ways in which change is
actually constituted in communicative practices. For those with
an interest in public relations, including crisis
communication, the insights can improve the connection
between ethical internal practices with external
communication, with the goal of organizational learning.
We all participate in multiple organizations, and that
participation demands the art and skill of determining
the communicative practices that shape more ethical and
effective organizations and organizing practices.
May you find yourself reading, interacting with others, and
completing various activities designed to equip
you to lead with confidence, purpose, and to see yourself as co-
creating not only better organizations but
communities and social worlds.
x Preface to the Third Edition
Acknowledgments
Those who made this workbook a reality easily come to mind.
For any names we omitted, we accept the
blame and ask your forgiveness.
• To our common mentor, colleague, and friend for his support
during our KU days and beyond, Cal Downs.
• To you, the colleague, student, and/or practitioner, for what
you will contribute to your organizations

you serve, and to the dialogue over improving life in
organizations.
• A special thanks to Drs. Linda Putnam and Ryan Bisel, whose
detailed feedback on the theory
framework and treatments on the change and ethics chapters
were meaningful and significant.
• Reviewers of various drafts who developed this project: John
Gribas, John Myer, Jon Camp, Vincent
Manzie, and Phil Clampitt.
• Applause to 30 years of graduate program alumni who
provided rich feedback that shaped this workbook.
Extra thanks to those who shaped the first edition of the book:
Debbie West, Robert Mock, Michelle
Young, Pat Sweeden, Patricia Hawkins-Sweeden, Jane Martin,
Sherrie Sandor, Cheryl Johnston, Elaine
Wooten, Martha Lowry, Tracy Pleasants, Wanda Culbreath,
Hope Coleman, Brenda Winston, Lisa Rawn,
and Michael Strobel; and to recent students who patiently
worked with Dr. Driskill on new ideas in the third
edition-Rosa Boast, Amare-Brianna Beuch, Chris Elsworth,
Rania Elbahey, Frankye Jimenez, Michael
(Jacob) Nesbit, Michelle Scroggins, Bonnie Ward, and Karen
Willson.
• Current, former, and emeritus faculty in the Applied
Communication Department who motivate
excellence in the scholarship of integrating teaching, research,
and service: Mike Hemphill, Linda
Pledger, Carol Thompson, Rob Ulmer, Alex Lyon, Kristin
McIntyre, Julien Mirivel, Avinash Thombre,
Ryan Fuller, April Chatham-Carpenter, Vincent Manzie, Alan
Ward, Jerry Butler, John Gray, and

Ralph Eubanks.
• Dr. Vincent Manzie, for his collaboration in integrating his
recent groundbreaking work in crisis
communication as a way to extend the Discourse of Renewal by
attending to the multinational context
with a focus on ethics, and the need to give voice and agency to
communities.
• Writers and colleagues who have shaped and enriched our
thinking with their contributions to the study
of organizational communication: Chuck Bantz, Kevin Barge,
Ryan Bisel, Lee Bolman, George Cheney,
Charles Conrad, Francois Cooren, Terry Deal, Stan Deetz, Eric
Eisenberg, Buddy Goodall, Evangelina
Holvino Allan Kennedy, Joanne Keyton, Joann Martin, Bob
McPhee, Robert D. McPhee, Gareth
Morgan, Nick O’Donnell-Trujillo, Barbara O’Keefe, Gerald
Pepper, Mike Pacanowsky, Barnett and
Kim Pearce, Linda Putnam, M. Scott Poole, Patti Riley, Linda
Smircich, Karl Weick, and Pamela Zaug.
Part I
Cultural Analysis Planning

Chapter 1
Introduction
Setting the Stage
Organizations are more than the places we work. They include
places that carry humans from the cradle to
the grave. The “Organizational Culture in Action” (OCA) model
is introduced as a valuable tool grounded
in constitutive theories of communication. As such it promises
to provide insight of significance to
organizations such as diversity, change, engagement,
leadership, and ethics. Frequently asked questions are
covered in relation to the value and goals of the cultural
analysis process, the significance of how we define
organizational communication and culture, the continued
relevance and value of using a drama/theater
metaphor, as well as criteria for selecting an organization for
analysis.
I was backstage. Not as an actor, but as an observer. I looked up
in awe at the myriad of lights and ropes.
I glanced at the various props and backdrops anticipating a
performance. All was silent. I looked at the
deep purple folds of the still drawn curtain. A single unbidden
thought entered my mind. A sense of
panic grew as this thought took hold of my imagination: What if
the curtains were opened and I was
really on stage? Right now, this instant! What if I were on stage
for real?
Gerald Driskill
Objectives

• Reflect on the pervasiveness of organizations in our lives.
• State the goal of cultural analysis.
• Apply guides for selecting an organization for analysis.
Stage Terms
• Organizations.
• Organizational communication.
• Organizational culture.
• Cultural analysis.
• Dramatism.
• Organizational performance.
Cradle to Grave
When asked to name and describe an organization, like us you
may often first think of a workplace.
However, by focusing on workplaces we miss the shaping force
of other organizations. Our first experiences
in organizations were like many of yours: bright lights and
masked strangers welcomed us into a hospital
birthing room. Since that time, we have lived, breathed, laughed
and cried, worked or consulted with, and
dreamed and been bored in a wide array of organizations
including daycares, schools, businesses, non-profits,
prisons, churches, universities, and nursing homes. These varied
experiences have inspired us, and at times
left us broken by the dysfunction and unethical practices
experienced. These highs and lows have created
expectations and perceptions that follow us throughout life.
Beyond the myriad examples of tragic and comic
tales we could each tell from our experiences as employees, we

also have countless stories from our
experiences as customers, volunteers, members, and patients.
The point is clear—we cannot escape an
inextricable connection with organizations. Yet we easily take
for granted the impact of organizations, the
very stages on which we live out our lives.
Like you, we know something of the moments of panic when
called on to perform: lead a meeting,
confront or admit to an ethical failure, make a presentation,
have a difficult conversation; yet, in such
moments we may not be aware of the way the lights, the props,
and our assumptions about our audience
shape and constrain our performances. We know when to show
up, we may or may not notice when know
when something goes right or wrong with a piece of equipment
or a relationship, but we rarely see the big
picture of how all the various aspects of the stage impact us. We
continue to develop ideas in this book with
students and colleagues as a way to equip us to create more
competent, more meaningful, purposeful, and
ethical organizational performances. Such performances are
grounded in learning the way our communica-
tion shapes and is shaped by the culture of the organization as
well.
Organizations are places that carry us from cradle to grave by
shaping our sense of ethics, identity, role, and
meaning in life.
In the years that have passed since the startling birth
experience, we have come to believe that
organizations are no more and no less than a significant stage
for human drama. Our research on cultures
in hospitals, engineering firms, churches, banks, airlines, phone
companies, schools, and day care centers and

our service experiences in hospitals, prisons, multinationals,
and nursing homes have all underscored our
conviction that organizations are far more than the places where
we work and make money. They are places
that carry us from “the cradle to the grave” by shaping our
sense of ethics, identity, role, and meaning in life.
Thus, while our motivation to study organizations began with a
pragmatic sense that our livelihoods
depended on being able to work in organizations, a deeper, more
fundamental concern has emerged. We
want to improve our ability to shape and direct organizations in
ways that are more humane and ethical.
We believe such an effort to be fundamental to practitioners,
scholars, teachers, and students, but more
importantly as participants in the human drama. The goal of this
workbook, therefore, is not simply to
teach you how to conduct a cultural analysis, but it has
implications for your role as a leader within an
organization and within your community. In short, the
workbook is designed to help you do better what
you do almost every day—make decisions about the best ways
to lead ethically, to create meaning, value
and purpose along with others in your organization(s). Our
approach is inherently concerned with ethics.
Rather than relegating ethics to an individual chapter or side bar
as Dr. Meisenbach (2017), an
organizational scholar and professor, laments is often the case,
ethics is a thread woven into our thinking
about communication and each stage of the analysis process
outlined in the coming chapters. The
assumption is that ethics are embedded in our individual
intentional and unintentional decision-making as
well as the organizing practices in organizations. The process of
conducting a cultural analysis holds
promise for surfacing practices that may clarify or distort,

accurately represent or misrepresent, fully
involve or marginalize interests of various groups.
In this first section, “Cultural Analysis Planning”, we offer two
chapters. This opening chapter is focused
on FAQs aimed at introducing you to terms, concepts, and the
overall process of cultural analysis. The
second chapter moves us into the first of six cultural analysis
steps, articulating the value of the cultural
analysis process.
4 Cultural Analysis Planning
FAQs on Cultural Analysis
This chapter sets the stage by clarifying our approach. While
the remaining chapters provide greater depth on
the “how to” of conducting an analysis, our goal here is to
respond to common questions. As you review
our responses to these questions you should gain a clearer sense
of our approach, as well as options for
purposes for conducting an analysis and criteria to consider in
selecting an organization.
1. What Is the Value of the Cultural Analysis Process?
Chapter 2 focuses on the first formal phase or step of the
cultural analysis process, developing your
ability to articulate the value of this process. Still, a prelude is
merited before exploring this question in
depth. While the focus on culture” first emerged in the early
1980’s it continues to surface not only
academic disciplines, but in the media and popular press. Even
new trends or focus areas, such as

“employee engagement” ultimately are about attending to
culture. Comments from students and
practitioners capture the value of this process at both the formal
level and informal. The following are
a few statements made by those who found value in conducting
a formal analysis using the process
outlined in this book.
• I now see the connections between culture and employee
engagement.
• My analysis helped guide me to create a communication plan
related to diversity.
• I used this process to improve recruitment and retention
practices.
• I can now use cultural data to gain insight for change
leadership and overall effectiveness.
• The cultural data helped me reflect on organizational ethics
and leadership.
At the informal level, example comments included the
following.
• I have learned that in any organization, change must start with
me.
• I now have the ability to see situations from different
perspectives.
• I got my last job because the interviewer was intrigued by my
answers about organizational culture and
how quickly I could “read” the organization.
• I have improved my ability to apply theory to the real world.
• I saved myself a lot of time and energy by deciding during an
interview process that I didn’t fit the
culture. Even though the salary was great, I would have become
frustrated quickly.

While you may not experience all of these specific learning
insights, we are confident that anyone
completing this process, either at a formal or informal level,
will benefit. Regardless of your goals, we
are confident that as a result of learning this process, you can
become a more competent and assured
actor in your organization, better able to understand and
question, and improve basic organizational
assumptions and practices. Furthermore, as we will stress again
in the final chapters, this process is not
about finding problems, but describing the culture and then
discerning positive communication applica-
tions. We have found again and again that this process is a way
of seeing our organizational
communication and our own communication in a different light.
While other cultural analysis tools
(e.g., Dennison and Gallop) are available and discussed in the
Introduction to Part III on “Cultural Data
Collection and Interpretation”, we maintain the value of the
OCA model introduced here rests in the
focus on the way organizations are created and recreated or
constituted in communicative practices. This
interdisciplinary application of established communication
theories, discussed further in Chapters 2 and 3,
promises insight to communicative practices relevant to such
topics as organizational engagement, leader-
ship, diversity, ethics, and change. This communication
perspective is explored further in our response to
the next question.
Introduction 5
2. What Is an Organization (and Organizational

Communication)?
We all know what organizations are, right? Textbooks tend to
introduce definitions and then move on,
leaving them buried in the opening chapter. We contend that
more is at stake with definitions than an
academic exercise. Definitions involve our thinking and
assumptions about the nature of organizations and
communication. Therefore, before you review the definitions of
organization found below, take a minute to
write your own. Pause now. Write your own. Ok, continue
reading. As you read the following definitions
of organization and organizational communication, see what
they share in common with and/or how they
differ with your own. First, organizations, as you might
anticipate, have been defined in various ways:
• They involve “. . . five critical features—namely, the
existence of a social collectivity, organizational and
individual goals, coordinating activity, organizational structure,
and the embedding of the organization
with an environment of other organizations” (Miller & Barbour,
2015, p. 11).
• a “dynamic system of organizational members, influenced by
external stakeholders, who communicate within
and across organizational structures in a purposeful and ordered
way to achieve a superordinate goal” (Keyton,
2005, p. 10).
• “a social interaction system, influenced by prevailing
economic and legal institutional practices, and
including coordinated action and interaction within and across a
socially constructed system boundary,
manifestly directed toward a privileged set of outcomes”
(McPhee & Zaug, 2009, p. 28)

As you review these definitions of organization in light of your
own, what emerges? The natural tendency is
to carry an image of some group of people, perhaps working in
a building toward some shared goals. This
image does aid our thinking about a particular group and
perhaps the role of communication in helping us
reach shared goals. Yet, the building or container image misses
key ideas that we will explore throughout the
analysis process. Consider the extent to which your definition
was inclusive of a few key ideas found in those
given definitions with a focus on the final definition from
McPhee and Zaug (2009): (a) communication and
coordination-organizations or organizing processes are created
or constituted in communication; (b) inter-
connectedness and boundaries–organizations or organizing
processes are not limited to a building or place, thus
a focus on intertwined networks is important; (c) goals and
outcomes vary at individual and group levels, but
are never neutral, that is, decisions are influenced by certain
goals being honored over others. We return in
Chapter 8 to McPhee and Zaug’s (2009) “Four Flows” model,
which can be helpful in interpreting your data.
The three major components of their definition undergird our
cultural analysis model, OCA. This model flows
from an interdisciplinary, widely held perspective known as
social constructivism. This perspective holds that
organizations are created in and through our interactions
(Berger & Luckmann, 1966). Since the first version of the
OCA model in 2005, the process underlying this model
continues to be developed as organizational communica-
tion theories evolve to focus more on the way organizations are
constituted in communication. For instance, a
major theoretic lens that informs our current analytic model,
“Communicative Constitutive of Organization”

(CCO), will be explained further in Chapter 2. This theory is
finding increased application internationally and across
disciplines as a way of “understanding how organizations are
produced in communication” (Boivin, Brummans, &
Barker, 2017, p. 332). Our thinking about the centrality of
communication held by this and other theories influence
how we define and think not only about organizations, but also
about organizational communication.
In same way as above, take time now to …
Unit 2 Theoretical and Methodological Issues
Subunit 1 Conceptual Issues in Psychology and Culture
Article 8
12-1-2011
Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model
in Context
Geert Hofstede
Universities of Maastricht and Tilburg , The Netherlands,
[email protected]
This Online Readings in Psychology and Culture Article is
brought to you for free and open access (provided uses are
educational in nature)by IACCP
and [email protected] Copyright © 2011 International
Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology. All Rights
Reserved. ISBN
978-0-9845627-0-1
Recommended Citation
Hofstede, G. (2011). Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede
Model in Context. Online Readings in
Psychology and Culture, 2(1). https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-

0919.1014
http://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/orpc/
https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/orpc/vol2
https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/orpc/vol2/iss1
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https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1014
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mailto:[email protected]
Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model in Context
AbstractAbstract
This article describes briefly the Hofstede model of six
dimensions of national
cultures: Power Distance, Uncertainty Avoidance,
Individualism/Collectivism,
Masculinity/Femininity, Long/Short Term Orientation, and
Indulgence/Restraint. It
shows the conceptual and research efforts that preceded it and
led up to it, and once
it had become a paradigm for comparing cultures, research
efforts that followed and
built on it. The article stresses that dimensions depend on the
level of aggregation;
it describes the six entirely different dimensions found in the
Hofstede et al.
(2010) research into organizational cultures. It warns against
confusion with value
differences at the individual level. It concludes with a look
ahead in what the study
of dimensions of national cultures and the position of countries
on them may still

bring.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-
Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0
License.
This article is available in Online Readings in Psychology and
Culture: https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/orpc/vol2/iss1/8
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Introduction
Culture has been defined in many ways; this author’s shorthand
definition is: "Culture is
the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the
members of one group or
category of people from others". It is always a collective
phenomenon, but it can be
connected to different collectives. Within each collective there
is a variety of individuals. If
characteristics of individuals are imagined as varying according
to some bell curve; the
variation between cultures is the shift of the bell curve when

one moves from one society
to the other. Most commonly the term culture is used for tribes
or ethnic groups (in
anthropology), for nations (in political science, sociology and
management), and for
organizations (in sociology and management). A relatively
unexplored field is the culture of
occupations (for instance, of engineers versus accountants, or of
academics from different
disciplines). The term can also be applied to the genders, to
generations, or to social
classes. However, changing the level of aggregation studied
changes the nature of the
concept of ‘culture’. Societal, national and gender cultures,
which children acquire from
their earliest youth onwards, are much deeper rooted in the
human mind than occupational
cultures acquired at school, or than organizational cultures
acquired on the job. The latter
are exchangeable when people take a new job. Societal cultures
reside in (often
unconscious) values, in the sense of broad tendencies to prefer
certain states of affairs
over others (Hofstede, 2001, p. 5). Organizational cultures

reside rather in (visible and
conscious) practices: the way people perceive what goes on in
their organizational
environment.
Classifying Cultures: Conceptual Dimensions
In an article first published in 1952, U.S. anthropologist Clyde
Kluckhohn (1962) argued
that there should be universal categories of culture:
In principle ... there is a generalized framework that underlies
the more apparent
and striking facts of cultural relativity. All cultures constitute
so many somewhat
distinct answers to essentially the same questions posed by
human biology and
by the generalities of the human situation. ... Every society' s
patterns for living
must provide approved and sanctioned ways for dealing with
such universal
circumstances as the existence of two sexes; the helplessness of
infants; the
need for satisfaction of the elementary biological requirements
such as food,
warmth, and sex; the presence of individuals of different ages

and of differing
physical and other capacities. (pp. 317-18).
Many authors in the second half of the twentieth century have
speculated about the nature
of the basic problems of societies that would present distinct
dimensions of culture (for a
review see Hofstede, 2001, pp. 29-31). The most common
dimension used for ordering
societies is their degree of economic evolution or modernity. A
one-dimensional ordering
of societies from traditional to modern fitted well with the
nineteenth- and twentieth-century
3
Hofstede: Dimensionalizing Cultures: The Hofstede Model in
Context
Produced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 2011
belief in progress. Economic evolution is bound to be reflected
in people’s collective
mental programming, but there is no reason why economic and
technological evolution
should suppress other cultural variety. There exist dimensions

of culture unrelated to
economic evolution.
U.S. anthropologist Edward T. Hall (1976) divided cultures
according to their ways of
communicating, into high-context (much of the information is
implicit) and low-context
cultures (nearly everything is explicit). In practice this
distinction overlaps largely with the
traditional versus modern distinction.
U.S. sociologists Talcott Parsons and Edward Shils (1951, p.
77) suggested that all
human action is determined by five pattern variables, choices
between pairs of
alternatives:
1. Affectivity (need gratification) versus affective neutrality
(restraint of impulses);
2. Self-orientation versus collectivity-orientation;
3. Universalism (applying general standards) versus
particularism (taking particular
relationships into account);
4. Ascription (judging others by who they are) versus
achievement (judging them by

what they do);
5. Specificity (limiting relations to others to specific spheres)
versus diffuseness (no
prior limitations to nature of relations).
Parsons and Shils (1951) claimed that these choices are present
at the individual
(personality) level, at the social system (group or organization)
level, and at the cultural
(normative) level. They did not take into account that different
variables could operate at
different aggregation levels.
U.S. anthropologists Florence Kluckhohn and Fred Strodtbeck
(1961, p. 12) ran a
field study in five geographically close, small communities in
the Southwestern United
States: Mormons, Spanish Americans, Texans, Navaho Indians,
and Zuni Indians. They
distinguished these communities on the following value
orientations:
1. An evaluation of human nature (evil - mixed - good);
2. The relationship of man to the surrounding natural

environment (subjugation -
harmony - mastery);
3. The orientation in time (toward past - present - future);
4. The orientation toward activity (being - being in becoming -
doing); and
5. Relationships among people (linearity, i.e., hierarchically
ordered positions –
collaterality, i.e., group relationships – individualism).
Others have extrapolated Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck’s (1961)
classification to all kind of
social comparisons, without concern for their geographic
limitations without considering
the effect of levels of aggregation, and without empirical
support.
4
Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, Unit 2, Subunit 1,
Chapter 8
British anthropologist Mary Douglas (1973) proposed a two-

dimensional ordering of
ways of looking at the world:
1. ‘Group’ or inclusion - the claim of groups over members, and
2. ‘Grid’ or classification - the degree to which interaction is
subject to rules.
Douglas saw these categories as relating to a wide variety of
beliefs and social actions:
Views of nature, traveling, spatial arrangements, gardening,
cookery, medicine, the
meaning of time, age, history, sickness, and justice. She seemed
to imply that these
dimensions are applicable to any level of aggregation.
The one- or more-dimensional classifications above represent
subjective reflective
attempts to order a complex reality. Each of them is strongly
colored by the subjective
choices of its author(s). They show some overlap, but their lack
of clarity about and mixing
of levels of analysis (individual-group-culture) are severe
methodological weaknesses.
These weaknesses were avoided in an extensive review article
by U.S. sociologist

Alex Inkeles and psychologist Daniel Levinson (1969, first
published 1954). The authors
limited themselves to culture at the level of nations, and they
summarized all available
sociological and anthropological studies dealing with what was
then called national
character, which they interpreted as a kind of modal (most
common) personality type in a
national society. What I have labelled dimensions they called
standard analytic issues.
From their survey of the literature Inkeles and Levinson (1969)
distilled three standard
analytic issues that met these criteria:
1. Relation to authority;
2. Conception of self, including the individual's concepts of
masculinity and femininity;
3. Primary dilemmas or conflicts, and ways of dealing with
them, including the control
of aggression and the expression versus inhibition of affect.
As will be shown below, Inkeles and Levinson's (1969) standard
analytic issues were

empirically supported in a study by this author more than 20
years later.
Empirical Approaches and the Hofstede Dimensions
In 1949 U.S. psychologist Raymond Cattell published an
application of the new statistical
technique of factor analysis to the comparison of nations.
Cattell had earlier used factor
analysis for studying aspects of intelligence from test scores of
individual students. This
time he took a matrix of nation-level variables for a large
number of countries, borrowing
from geography, demographics, history, politics, economics,
sociology, law, religion and
medicine. The resulting factors were difficult to interpret,
except for the important role of
economic development. Replications of his method by others
produced trivial results (for a
review see Hofstede, 2001, pp. 32-33). More meaningful were
applications to restricted
facets of societies. U.S. political scientists Phillip Gregg and
Arthur Banks (1965) studied
aspects of political systems; U.S. economists Irma Adelman and
Cynthia Taft Morris
5

Context
(1967) studied factors influencing the development of poor
countries, and Irish
psychologist Richard Lynn (1971; Lynn & Hampson, 1975)
studied aspects of mental
health.
In the 1970s this author – more or less by accident – got access
to a large survey
database about values and related sentiments of people in over
50 countries around the
world (Hofstede, 1980). These people worked in the local
subsidiaries of one large
multinational corporation: IBM. Most parts of the organization
had been surveyed twice
over a four-year interval, and the database contained more than
100,000 questionnaires.
Initial analyses of the database at the level of individual
respondents proved confusing, but
a breakthrough occurred when the focus was directed at

correlations between mean
scores of survey items at the level of countries. Patterns of
correlation at the country level
could be strikingly different from what was found at the
individual level, and needed an
entirely different interpretation. One of the weaknesses of much
cross-cultural research is
not recognizing the difference between analysis at the societal
level and at the individual
level; this amounts to confusing anthropology and psychology.
From 180 studies using my
work reviewed by Kirkman, Lowe, and Gibson (2006), more
than half failed to distinguish
between societal culture level and individual level differences,
which led to numerous
errors of interpretation and application.
My hunch that the IBM data might have implications beyond
this particular
corporation was supported when I got the opportunity to
administer a number of the same
questions to nearly 400 management trainees from some 30
countries in an international
program unrelated to IBM. Their mean scores by country
correlated significantly with the

country scores obtained from the IBM database. So it seemed
that employees of this
multinational enterprises – a very special kind of people – could
serve for identifying
differences in national value systems. The reason is that from
one country to another they
represented almost perfectly matched samples: they were
similar in all respects except
nationality, which made the effect of national differences in
their answers stand out
unusually clearly.
Encouraged by the results of the country-level correlation
analysis I then tried
country-level factor analysis. The latter was similar to the
approach used earlier by Cattell
and others, except that now the variables in the matrix were not
indices for the country as
a whole, but mean scores and sometimes percentages of survey
answers collected from
individuals in those countries. Analyses of data at higher levels
of aggregation are called
ecological. Ecological factor analysis differs from the factor
analysis of individual scores in

that a usual caution no longer applies: the number of cases does
not need to be (much)
larger than the number of variables. The stability of the results
of an ecological factor
analysis does not depend on the number of cases, but on the
number of individuals whose
scores were aggregated into these cases. Ecological factor
analysis may even be
performed on matrices with fewer cases than variables.
Factor analyzing a matrix of 32 values questions for initially 40
countries, I found
these values to cluster very differently from what was found at
the individual level. The
new factors revealed common problems with which IBM
employees in all these societies
6
Chapter 8
had to cope, but for which their upbringing in their country
presented its own profile of

solutions. These problems were:
1. Dependence on superiors;
2. Need for rules and predictability, also associated with
nervous stress;
3. The balance between individual goals and dependence on the
company;
4. The balance between ego values (like the need for money and
careers) and social
values (like cooperation and a good living environment); the
former were more
frequently chosen by men, the latter by women, but there were
also country
differences.
These empirical results were strikingly similar to the standard
analytical issues described
in Inkeles and Levinson’s 1969 article. Dependence on
superiors relates to the first, need
for predictability to the third, the balance between the
individual and the company to the
conception of self, and the balance between ego and social
values to concepts of
masculinity and femininity, which were also classified under the

second standard analytic
issue.
The four basic problem areas defined by Inkeles and Levinson
(1969) and
empirically supported in the IBM data represent dimensions of
national cultures. A
dimension is an aspect of a culture that can be measured relati ve
to other cultures. The
four dimensions formed the basis for my book Culture’s
Consequences (Hofstede, 1980).
The main message of the 1980 book was that scores on the
dimensions correlated
significantly with conceptually related external data. Thus
Power Distance scores
correlated with a dimension from Gregg and Banks’ (1965)
analysis of political systems
and also with a dimension from Adelman and Morris’ (1967)
study of economic
development; Uncertainty Avoidance correlated with a
dimension from Lynn and
Hampson’s (1975) study of mental health; Individualism
correlated strongly with national
wealth (Gross National Product per capita) and Femininity with
the percentage of national

income spent on development aid. The number of external
validations kept expanding, and
the second edition of Culture’s Consequences (Hofstede, 2001,
Appendix 6, pp. 503-520)
lists more than 400 significant correlations between the IBM-
based scores and results of
other studies. Recent validations show no loss of validity,
indicating that the country
differences these dimensions describe are, indeed, basic and
enduring.
In the 1980s, on the basis of research by Canadian psychologist
Michael Harris
Bond centered in the Far East, a fifth dimension ‘Long-Term
versus Short-Term
Orientation’ was added (Hofstede & Bond, 1988; see also
Hofstede, 1991; Hofstede,
2001).
In the 2000s, research by Bulgarian scholar Michael Minkov
using data from the
World Values Survey (Minkov, 2007) allowed a new calculati on
of the fifth, and the
addition of a sixth dimension (Hofstede, Hofstede & Minkov,
2010). The six dimensions are

labelled:
7
Context
1. Power Distance, related to the different solutions to the basic
problem of human
inequality;
2. Uncertainty Avoidance, related to the level of stress in a
society in the face of an
unknown future;
3. Individualism versus Collectivism, related to the integration
of individuals into
primary groups;
4. Masculinity versus Femininity, related to the division of
emotional roles between
women and men;
5. Long Term versus Short Term Orientation, related to the
choice of focus for

people's efforts: the future or the present and past.
6. Indulgence versus Restraint, related to the gratification
versus control of basic
human desires related to enjoying life.
Each country has been positioned relative to other countries
through a score on each
dimension. The dimensions are statistically distinct and do
occur in all possible
combinations, although some combinations are more frequent
than others.
After the initial confirmation of the country differences in IBM
in data from
management trainees elsewhere, the Hofstede dimensions and
country scores were
validated through replications by others, using the same or
similar questions with other
cross-national populations. Between 1990 and 2002 six major
replications (14 or more
countries) used populations of country elites, employees and
managers of other
corporations and organizations, airline pilots, consumers and
civil servants (see Hofstede
et al., 2010, p. 35).

In correlating the dimensions with other data, the influence of
national wealth (Gross
National Product per capita) should always be taken into
account. Two of the dimensions,
Individualism and small Power Distance, are significantly
correlated with wealth. This
means that all wealth-related phenomena tend to correlate with
both these dimensions.
Differences in national wealth can be considered a more
parsimonious explanation of
these other phenomena than differences in culture. In
correlating with the culture
dimensions, it is therefore advisable to always include the
wealth variable. After controlling
for national wealth correlations with culture usually disappear.
Of particular interest is a link that was found between culture
according to the
Hofstede dimensions and personality dimensions according to
the empirically based Big
Five personality test (Costa & McCrae, 1992). After this test
had been used in over 30
countries, significant correlations were found between country
norms on the five

personality dimensions (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to
experience,
Agreeableness and Conscientiousness) and national culture
dimension scores. For
example, 55% of country differences on Neuroticism can be
explained by a combination of
Uncertainty Avoidance and Masculinity, and 39% of country
differences on Extraversion by
Individualism alone (Hofstede & McCrae, 2004). So culture and
personality are linked but
the link is statistical; there is a wide variety of individual
personalities within each national
culture, and national culture scores should not be used for
stereotyping individuals.
8
Chapter 8
Validating the dimensions is of course not only and not even
mainly a quantitative
issue. Equally important is the qualitative interpretation of what
differences on the

dimensions mean for each of the societies studied, which calls
for an emic approach to
each society, supporting the etic of the dimensional data.
The Hofstede Dimensions in a nutshell
In this section I will summarize the content of each dimension
opposing cultures with
low and high scores. These oppositions are based on
correlations with studies by others,
and because the relationship is statistical, not every line applies
equally strongly to every
country.
Power Distance
Power Distance has been defined as the extent to which the less
powerful members of
organizations and institutions (like the family) accept and
expect that power is distributed
unequally. This represents inequality (more versus less), but
defined from below, not from
above. It suggests that a society's level of inequality is endorsed
by the followers as much
as by the leaders. Power and inequality, of course, are
extremely fundamental facts of any

society. All societies are unequal, but some are more unequal
than others.
Table 1
Ten Differences Between Small- and Large- Power Distance
Societies
Small Power Distance Large Power Distance
Use of power should be legitimate and is
subject to criteria of good and evil
Power is a basic fact of society antedating good or
evil: its legitimacy is irrelevant
Parents treat children as equals Parents teach children
obedience
Older people are neither respected nor feared Older people are
both respected and feared
Student-centered education Teacher-centered education
Hierarchy means inequality of roles,
established for convenience
Hierarchy means existential inequality
Subordinates expect to be consulted Subordinates expect to be
told what to do

Pluralist governments based on majority vote
and changed peacefully
Autocratic governments based on co-optation and
changed by revolution
Corruption rare; scandals end political careers Corruption
frequent; scandals are covered up
Income distribution in society rather even Income distribution
in society very uneven
Religions stressing equality of believers Religions with a
hierarchy of priests
9
Context
Table 1 lists a selection of differences between national
societies that validation research
showed to be associated with the Power Distance dimension.
For a more complete review
the reader is referred to Hofstede (2001) and Hofstede et al.

(2010). The statements refer
to extremes; actual situations may be found anywhere in
between the extremes, and the
association of a statement with a dimension is always statistical,
never absolute.
In Hofstede et al. (2010) Power Distance Index scores are listed
for 76 countries;
they tend to be higher for East European, Latin, Asian and
African countries and lower for
Germanic and English-speaking Western countries.
Uncertainty Avoidance
Uncertainty Avoidance is not the same as risk avoidance; it
deals with a society's tolerance
for ambiguity. It indicates to what extent a culture programs its
members to feel either
uncomfortable or comfortable in unstructured situations.
Unstructured situations are novel,
unknown, surprising, and different from usual. Uncertainty
avoiding cultures try to minimize
the possibility of such situations by strict behavioral codes,
laws and rules, disapproval of
deviant opinions, and a belief in absolute Truth; 'there can only
be one Truth and we have

it'.
Table 2
Ten Differences Between Weak- and Strong- Uncertainty
Avoidance Societies
Weak Uncertainty Avoidance Strong Uncertainty Avoidance
The uncertainty inherent in life is accepted and
each day is taken as it comes
The uncertainty inherent in life is felt as a
continuous threat that must be fought
Ease, lower stress, self-control, low anxiety Higher stress,
emotionality, anxiety, neuroticism
Higher scores on subjective health and well-
being
Lower scores on subjective health and well-being
Tolerance of deviant persons and ideas: what is
different is curious
Intolerance of deviant persons and ideas: what is
different is dangerous
Comfortable with ambiguity and chaos Need for clarity and

structure
Teachers may say ‘I don’t know’ Teachers supposed to have all
the answers
Changing jobs no problem Staying in jobs even if disliked
Dislike of rules - written or unwritten Emotional need for rules
– even if not obeyed
In politics, citizens feel and are seen as
competent towards authorities
In politics, citizens feel and are seen as
incompetent towards authorities
In religion, philosophy and science: relativism
and empiricism
In religion, philosophy and science: belief in
ultimate truths and grand theories
10
Chapter 8

Research has shown that people in uncertainty avoiding
countries are also more
emotional, and motivated by inner nervous energy. The opposite
type, uncertainty
accepting cultures, are more tolerant of opinions different from
what they are used to; they
try to have fewer rules, and on the philosophical and religious
level they are empiricist,
relativist and allow different currents to flow side by side.
People within these cultures are
more phlegmatic and contemplative, and not expected by their
environment to express
emotions. Table 2 lists a selection of differences betw een
societies that validation research
showed to be associated with the Uncertainty Avoidance
dimension.
In Hofstede et al. (2010) Uncertainty Avoidance Index scores
are listed for 76
countries; they tend to be higher in East and Central European
countries, in Latin
countries, in Japan and in German speaking countries, lower in
English speaking, Nordic
and Chinese culture countries.

Individualism
Individualism on the one side versus its opposite, Collectivism,
as a societal, not an
individual characteristic, is the degree to which people in a
society are integrated into
groups. On the individualist side we find cultures in which the
ties between individuals are
loose: everyone is expected to look after him/herself and his/her
immediate family. On the
collectivist side we find cultures in which people from birth
onwards are integrated into
strong, cohesive in-groups, often extended families (with
uncles, aunts and grandparents)
that continue protecting them in exchange for unquestioni ng
loyalty, and oppose other in-
groups. Again, the issue addressed by this dimension is an
extremely fundamental one,
regarding all societies in the world. Table 3 lists a selection of
differences between
societies that validation research showed to be associated with
this dimension.
Table 3

Ten Differences Between Collectivist and Individualist
Societies
Individualism Collectivism
Everyone is supposed to take care of him- or
herself and his or her immediate family only
People are born into extended families or clans
which protect them in exchange for loyalty
"I" – consciousness "We" –consciousness
Right of privacy Stress on belonging
Speaking one's mind is healthy Harmony should always be
maintained
Others classified as individuals Others classified as in-group or
out-group
Personal opinion expected: one person one vote Opinions and
votes predetermined by in-group
Transgression of norms leads to guilt feelings Transgression of
norms leads to shame feelings
Languages in which the word "I" is indispensable Languages in
which the word "I" is avoided
Purpose of education is learning how to learn Purpose of
education is learning how to do

Task prevails over relationship Relationship prevails over task
11
…
Ricardo Semler:
A Revolutionary Model of
Leadership
02/2016-5982
This case was written by William W. Maddux, Associate
Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD, and
Roderick I. Swaab, Assistant Professor of Organisational
Behaviour at INSEAD, in conjunction with Betania Tanure,
Professor of Organisational Behaviour at PUC/BTA, and case
writer Elin Williams. It is intended to be used as a basis
for class discussion rather than to illustrate either effective or
ineffective handling of an administrative situation.
Financial support from INSEAD Alumni Fund is gratefully
acknowledged.
Additional material about INSEAD case studies (e.g., videos,
spreadsheets, links) can be accessed at
cases.insead.edu.
Copyright © 2014 INSEAD
COPIES MAY NOT BE MADE WITHOUT PERMISSION. NO

PART OF THIS PUBLICATION MAY BE COPIED, STORED,
TRANSMITTED, REPRODUCED OR DISTRIBUTED IN
ANY FORM OR MEDIUM WHATSOEVER WITHOUT THE
PERMISSION OF THE COPYRIGHT OWNER.
• 2016 - Winner of The Case Centre Awards in the category
“Human Resource Management/ Organisational Behaviour”
This document is authorized for use by , in the course: ,
, from to . Any unauthorized use or reproduction of this
document is strictly prohibited.
http://cases.insead.edu/
The Present: 2014
Ricardo Semler lets out a sigh of frustration. Leaning over his
favourite Les Paul guitar in the
basement of his house in the mountains near São Paulo,
surrounded by a pile of musical
equipment that would be the envy of any rock star – drum sets
and keyboards and sound
mixers, Fenders and Gibsons lined up like soldiers at attention
in racks around the room. He
frowns as he works through the Led Zeppelin song for the tenth
or twentieth or hundredth
time. How does Jimmy Page make the music sound so effortless,
so powerful, so true? he
wonders. But then he smiles to himself, because the kind of
skill and passion that he hears in
the rock legend’s guitar work is exactly what Ricardo Semler
has been getting from the

thousands of colleagues and employees he has worked with over
the years. And despite the
naysayers who have always scoffed at his trying to run a
business like a rock band, he has
ended up succeeding more often than not.
Ricardo smiles because he’s come so far and yet has ended up
exactly where he started: in his
basement playing his guitar. Today it is 2014, and his home
country of Brazil is busy
preparing for its long-awaited time on the world stage: the
World Cup in a few months and
the (summer) Olympics in 2016. The Brazilian economy,
cooling a bit after years of torrid
growth, is still the envy of much of the rest of the world. In
Brazil, things are happening. The
world is arriving soon.
And even though Ricardo Semler is tucked away in his own
little world, trying to unlock the
mysteries of an enigmatic guitar genius, you could say that he,
too, is working, working in
much the same way he has been for decades at the head of some
of the world’s most
innovative and profitable organizations: a multinational
company called Semco that he
reluctantly took over from his father, a hugely profitable NGO,
a Brazilian business
association, a luxury eco-resort, and a set of successful charter
schools.
The one thing common to all these organizations is that they are
run using Ricardo’s
overarching leadership philosophy, a philosophy that has
ignited controversy and acclaim in
roughly equal measure – but one that has proven successful by

any standard, whenever and
wherever he has tried it. The philosophy could be summed up
as follows: that leadership is
often most effective when the boss is hunched over his guitar on
a Wednesday afternoon; or
feeding the ducks with his kids during the visit of an important
client; or hiking in the
mountains in Africa during a shareholders’ meeting, or off
somewhere else that is nowhere
near the office, nowhere near his employees, not doing any
special thinking about contracts or
investments or strategic planning or the future of global
business. In a word – gone.
The Past: The Origins of Semco
Antonio Curt Semler left Austria just before World War II to
make a new life in South
America. He took advantage of Brazil’s first ‘economic miracle’
in the 1950s and 60s to build
his company, a major supplier of marine pumps for the shipping
industry. But he wanted to do
more. He wanted to build a family business, a lasting legacy.
His young son Ricardo was not, however, a natural successor.
He did not do well in school
and preferred strumming his guitar to poring over his books
(though he did manage to wind
Copyright © INSEAD 1

up as class president and captain of the track team.) But he
started to show some
entrepreneurial flair in high school, where he took on the
responsibility of running the
school’s snack shop. By altering the existing price structure,
extending operating hours, and
re-negotiating supplier contracts, he increased profits and
invested them in the stock market,
eventually earning enough to fly his entire class to a resort for
the weekend.
A few years on, at São Paulo’s prestigious law school (and
centre of a political movement
against the military dictatorship), Ricardo’s grades were still
mediocre. However, once he
realized his guitar skills were similarly undistinguished, he
decided to give the family
business a shot.
Things did not start well. The father did not like the son’s
habits of sleeping late, putting his
feet on the desk or working from home. And the son did not like
the father’s overly rigid
schedule, excessive punctuality and tendency to barge in on his
client meetings. To make
matters worse, by 1980 the Brazilian miracle had gone into
reverse and the shipbuilding
industry that Semco supplied with its marine pumps was
particularly hard hit. Twenty-year-
old Ricardo was convinced diversification was the only
solution; 68-year-old Antonio was
adamant that Semco’s specialist focus was its best asset.
Eventually, Antonio realized that father and son could no longer

co-exist in the same
company and made a leap of faith. He simply handed over the
entire operation to his son and
walked away: “Better make your mistakes while I’m still alive,”
he said somewhat ominously
to his son.
Ricardo wasted no time in setting out to transform Semco. One
Friday afternoon in 1980, he
cleaned house, firing 60% of his father’s top executives. He
hired his own people and began
modernizing the company, making it more efficient and
productive. Ricardo recalled:
(We) installed dozens of new procedures and invented new
forms almost daily.
(…) persuaded salespeople to fill out customer-visit reports and
keep statistics on
orders closed versus quotes offered. Files were rigorously
organized all over the
company. (…) Everyone was issued a plastic ID card and
compelled to wear it.
Production schedules were displayed on boards in our new
planning and control
department. Members of our new time and methods department
were dispatched
around the plant, searching for ways to speed our workers up.
By 1982, Ricardo and the other new blood had turned the
company around. They were
manufacturing a wider range of products and secured some
major contracts and new
acquisitions. They had nearly doubled the workforce and tripled
the number of plants, where
they set about applying the new systems and financial controls.

However, there was a great deal of tension just below the
surface about to make itself felt. “I
knew our new tough-minded, statistical approach, along with
our acquisitions and all the new
employees, had created a lot of stress,” he admits. “Semco
appeared highly organized and
disciplined, but we still could not get our people to perform as
well as we wanted.” People
were working long hours and families were complaining.
Deliveries were always late.
Most of our managers were proponents of classic authoritarian
solutions such as
rigid controls and long, gruelling hours. But a few of us were
starting to doubt the
Copyright © INSEAD 2
effectiveness of this approach. I was particularly distressed by
the malaise that
was all too apparent in our factories. Workers just didn’t seem
to care.
Then, at the annual corporate retreat, things came to a head.
During a lunch break, someone
snuck into the conference room and drew a cartoonish Grim
Reaper on one of the flip charts,
holding a scythe and surrounded by bleeding stick figures. The
message was clear: Ricardo’s

autocratic leadership style was wreaking havoc on his
employees and the company. Ricardo
hastily convened a group session which cleared the air but also
revealed two very different
philosophical camps had formed: those who felt the controlling
culture was necessary to get
people to do their work; and those who found Semco’s
environment suffocating.
The final straw was Ricardo’s realization that Semco’s malaise
was also having an effect on
him physically. During a visit to a pump factory in the U.S., he
collapsed on the factory floor.
He went to the Mayo Clinic where doctors put him through a
battery of tests, all of which
came back negative. The final diagnosis? “The most advanced
case of stress I have ever seen
in a person of 25.” As one doctor put it, “Either you continue
your current life, in which case
you will be back with us, or else you change.” Ricardo asked
for advice. “That’s not for me to
say,” the doctor answered. “All I will say is that everything
about your life has to change.”
Botanique Hotel, 2014:
The man lies on a massage table, face down, a towel around his
waist, eyes closed, the sun
streaming in the floor-to-ceiling windows, warming his tired
body. As the masseuse works
over his shoulders and back muscles, he feels the tension built
up from years of 12-hour days
at the office begin to drain out of him. He hasn’t allowed
himself time away from work in a
long time. In fact, he wouldn’t even be here had his doctor not
insisted he take a vacation and

start looking after his health. And so he’s here, miles away from
the office and the noise and
the stress and all the decisions that he needs to be making.
Right now.
Out in the hotel lobby, Ricardo stands with his wife Fernanda,
smiling and greeting guests,
talking to employees, looking around with a critical but
satisfied eye. Botanique Hotel, a new
luxury eco-resort two hours outside Sao Paulo, and Fernanda’s
and Ricardo’s brainchild,
opened just a few months prior. Although on the surface it looks
just like a classic luxury
resort, closer inspection reveals that this is a different sort of
operation altogether.
Ricardo explains:
The hotel has no departments and no fixed positions... All
employees are skilled
waiters, many are barmen, all know how to operate the high-end
cappuccino
machine, all make beds fast, some play tennis, others play the
piano and many are
hikers, wildlife monitors or capoeira (Brazilian martial art of
sorts) masters.
Guests’ smartphones receive an app and they can touch one icon
to talk to their
“Anchor” who solves everything.
Staff have a low fixed salary, but receive some 50% added
remuneration at 30%
occupancy. No tips are allowed, and this permits the hotel to
function at 18.5%
breakeven, a level that no hotel has seen (average breakeven in
hotels is 39%

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