THE JAPANESE JOURNAL OF
ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCEJune, 2001 (Vol. 15, No. 1)
Edited by
THE JAPANESE ASSOCIATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE
President : Toshihiro Kanai, Kobe University
Editor : Kiyoshi Takahashi, Nanzan University
Associate Editors :
?v- Yasuo Hoshino, University of Tsukuba
Hiroyuki Noguchi, Nagoya University
Haruo Takagi, Keio University
Yutaka Toshima, Nihon University
Hiroshi Yamamoto, Aoyama Gakuin University
CONTENTS
REVIEW
Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Measurement Scales, Similar Concepts,Related Concepts, and Its Determinants 1
Ken'ichiro TANAKA
ARTICLES
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personalityand Sales Performance: An Empirical Study on a Japanese InformationSystem Company 29
Naoto TSURU, Yuichiro KANAZAWA, and Shinichiro WATANABE
Career Anchors of Female Temporary Employees: An Exploratory Study 47Shoko MATSUE
Applicants' Self-Presentation and Nonverbal Behaviors in Job Interviews 57Kazumi YAMAGUCHI
Expatriate Managers and Local Employees: Cases in Japanese Wholly-OwnedVentures in and around Shenzen, China 73
Aki NAKAMURA
CASE STUDY
Comparative Case-Study on the Global Marketing Activities of Acer Groupin Taiwan and Samsung Electronics Co. in South Korea 93
Takaharu OKUDA
THE JAPANESE ASSOCIATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE
Department of Business Administration, Aichi-Gakuin University, 12 Araike, Iwasaki,Nisshin 470-0131, Aichi, Japan (Phone: +81-5617-3-1111 (Ex.380) ; Fax: +81-5617-4-2420)
E-mail: [email protected] Page: http://www.aichi-gakuin.ac.jp/~matsu/JAAS/
Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 1 - 28.g«ff»f4^*15«* 1 ^, 2001, 1-28.
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Organizational Citizenship Behavior:Measurement Scales, Similar Concepts, Related Concepts, and Its Determinants
Ken'ichiro TANAKA
(Hiroshima Prefectural University)
The purpose of the present study was to review the studies on the measurementsof organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), determinants of them, the similarand the related concepts of OCB. Several major definitions of OCB were indicatedand compared with similar concept (i.e., prosocial organizational behavior,organizational spontaneity, extra-role behavior, contextual performance), andrelated concepts, i.e., whistle blowing, organizational retaliatory behavior. Theauthor commented on the various OCB scales used in the previous studies, e.g.,Smith et al. (1983) and Podsakoff, et al. (1990). Factors affected on OCB wereexamined: organizational justice (procedural justice, interactional justice,distributive justice), supervisor's leadership, job satisfaction, organizationalsupport, organizational commitment, mood in workplace, personality factors,and demographic factors, and the reasons people performed OCB wereexamined. Finally, the future direction of studies on OCB was discussed.
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Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 29 - 45.mnmn^mismmm, 2001, 29-45.
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationshipbetween Personality and Sales Performance:
An Empirical Study on a Japanese
Information System Company
Naoto TSURU, Yuichiro KANAZAWA,and Shinichiro WATANABE*
(University of Tsukuba)
The importance of continuous learning for achieving sales success inever-changing competitive environment is increasingly being recognized. In thepresent study, we hypothesized that the positive relationship between conscientiousness and sales performance, which had already been recognized in severalliteratures, would be mediated by continuous learning. We tested the hypothesisby the structural equation model with latent variable using the data gatheredfrom the 139 sales representatives working for a large Japanese informationsystem company listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, Part I. We found thatconscientiousness significantly affected on continuous learning, but thatcontinuous learning did not significantly influence sales performance. Thesefindings indicated that our hypothesis was not supported by the data. We alsofound that openness to experience and the degree of the sales representative'sperception of competitiveness in the market environment were positivelycorrelated with continuous learning. We discuss implications of the study andgive suggestions for future research.
SC
1 Introduction
The importance of continuous learning for
achieving sales success in ever-changing competi
tive environment is increasingly being recognized.
Especially in high-tech industries, new products
and services are unceasingly developed and put on
the market, and their paces of vicissitude are
becoming more rapid. Furthermore, new auto-
* Naoto Tsuru is Analyst, Tokyo Consulting Inc., Yuichiro
Kanazawa is Associate Professor of Statistics, and Shinichiro
Watanabe is Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior
at the Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences, the Univer
sity of Tsukuba.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed
to Yuichiro Kanazawa, Institute of Policy and Planning
Sciences, the University of Tsukuba, 1-1-1 Ten-noh-dai,
Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8573, Japan.
His e-mail address is [email protected].
matic channels such as the Internet have appeared
and become competing with sales representatives'
traditional channels. In order to survive in such
an environment, sales representatives must move
away from "selling" toward "serving" as cus
tomer consultants and business partners. This
means they must continuously acquire not only
up-to-the-minute knowledge about their products
and services but also must be continuously aware
of their customer's changing needs. That is to
say, they must "continuously learn." An exten
sive literature exists that establishes the direct
relationship between the sales performance and
some of the personality variables. The main
objective of this study is to investigate if this
relationship is mediated by continuous learning
behavior on the part of sales representatives work
ing for a large Japanese company that designs,
manufactures, and markets information systems.
•29-
mwnmn^msmm 1 ^
This article is organized as follows. Sections 2
and 3 are, respectively, devoted to the review of the
past research and the formulation of hypotheses
based on the literature review. Explained in
section 4 are the subjects and data used, and the
methodology employed in the present study. The
research results are presented in section 5. Fi
nally, section 6 is devoted for the discussion of
theoretical and practical implications of our
findings and suggestions for future research.
2 Determinants of sales performance
Over the past several decades, a considerable
number of studies have been conducted in the hope
of finding determinants of the sales performance.
According to the large-scale meta-analysis con
ducted by Vinchur, Schippmann, Switzer, and
Roth (1998), there exist eighty-two published and
sixteen unpublished studies dealing with determi
nants of sales performance from 1918 to 1996.
Some individual difference variables have been
shown to be valid predictors of sales performance.
Above all, direct relationships between sales
performance and some of the Big Five personali
ties were well documented.
Barrick and Mount (1991) in their large-scale
meta-analysis investigated the relation of the Big
Five personality dimensions to the three job per
formance criteria for five occupation groups.
Although there is some disagreement regarding
the names and content of the Big Five personality
dimensions (see Goldberg, 1993, for example), the
definition given by Barrick and Mount after
Digman (1990) has been used by many research
ers. They found that there were statistically
significant and positive correlations between sales
performance and two dimensions of the Big Five
personalities —conscientiousness and extraversion.
Their result was confirmed by the Vinchur,
Schippmann, Switzer, and Roth's (1998) meta
analysis focusing on the predictor of the sales
performance. In the 129 independent samples, they
selected 85 that were in accordance with their
framework and found that conscientiousness and
extraversion were significantly correlated with
sales performance.
Various hypotheses with more complex struc
tures have since been examined in several studies
to better understand the latent structures in the
relationship between the sales performance and
the two relevant dimensions of the Big Five per
sonality. McManus and Kelly (1999) examined the
effects of the Big Five personality and biodata
measures in predicting sales performance valid
ity. They found significant correlations between
the biodata and the task rating; as for the person
ality measures, however, extraversion, but not
conscientiousness, was significantly correlated to
the criterion. They reasoned that this is due to
their "weak measure of conscientiousness." They
also found that no dimensions of the Big Five
personality traits could significantly increase the
amounts of variance explained in the task rating
over or above that was explained by the biodata
alone. The results strongly indicated that the Big
Five personality could not be regarded as the
predictor of the sales performance in the presence
of the biodata.
Stewart (1996) examined a hypothesis that the
reward structure of management would moderate
the effects of extraversion and conscientiousness
on sales performance. He used a sample consist
ing of two groups. One was primarily rewarded
for obtaining new sales, and another primarily
for retaining customers. He found that
extraversion was positively associated with the
dimension of performance that was explicitly
rewarded but not with the nonrewarded dimen
sion. He also found that conscientiousness was
significantly and positively correlated with new
sales but not with customer retention, but the
moderating effect of the reward structure was not
observed in either case. His results implied that
the extraversion might be a stronger predictor of
sales performance when it was used together with
the reward structure.
Stewart (1999) also examined the relationships
between sales performance of employees at differ
ent stages of tenure (newly hired employees and
veteran employees) and two narrower subtraits of
conscientiousness (order and achievement). He
found that order was correlated more strongly
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Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
with sales performance of the newly hired employ
ees, while achievement was correlated more
strongly with that of the veteran employees. He
also found that "in the respected samples, order
and achievement also provided incremental valid
ity beyond conscientiousness."
Although each of the above three studies dealt
with more complex hypotheses between some
dimensions of the Big Five personality and derived
informative results, what seems to be lacking and
more interesting is a consideration of the outer
most layer structure, namely the structure consist
ing of the path from the personality to behavior
and the path from the behavior to the result or
outcomes. In fact, Mount, Barrick, and Strauss
(1993) already examined the mediating effects of
goal setting and goal commitment behaviors on
the relationship between conscientiousness and
sales performance. They concluded that these
behaviors could partially mediate the relationship
between conscientiousness and sales performance,
but not completely. There could be other behav
ioral factors that can mediate the relationship
between conscientiousness and sales performance.
3 Hypotheses
In this study, we entertain a possibility of "con
tinuous learning" as a mediator of the effect of
conscientiousness on sales performance. We de
fine continuous learning after London and Mone
(Ilgen & Pulakos Ed., 1999): "continuous learning
is the process by which one acquires knowledge,
skills, and abilities throughout one's career in
reaction to, and in anticipation of, changing
environment of performance requirements." To
establish the mediation, we hypothesize two
models—unmediated and mediated models, fol
lowing the steps recommended by Baron and
Kenny (1986) and Judd and Kenny (1981).
Unmediated Model (Model 1). First, we hypothe
size the unmediated model (Model 1) in order to
establish that there exists an effect that may be
mediated. As mentioned previously, Barrick,
Mount, and Strauss (1993) points out: "Research
has indicated that the Big Five personality dimen
sions are quite robust, as demonstrated by longi
tudinal and across-observer studies; in different
age, sex, race, and language groups; and across
different theoretical perspectives." In other words,
it has been widely recognized that there exists a
direct path from conscientiousness to sales per
formance. Thus we hypothesize that conscien
tiousness will be positively related to sales per-
Main Hypotheses
Figure 1 : Path diagram of the unmediated model (Model 1). The manifest variables are in boxes and thelatent variables are in ovals. All effects are hypothesized to be positive. Correlations amongconscientiousness and the three control variables are admitted.
-31-
IS » fe-gnmn^msmm 1 #
formance (H 1 : conscientiousness -* sales per
formance). The model 1 is shown in Figure. 1
We control the effects of several variables on
sales performance. First we accept a direct effect
of extraversion on sales performance for the same
reason of accepting the path from conscientious
ness to sales performance. We would have pre
ferred to use extraversion with reward structure as
moderating factor taking into consideration the
result of Stewart (1996). The taxonomy of the
reward structure, however, was not available in
the organization used in our study. Thus only the
direct effect of extraversion will be controlled (C 1
: extraversion -* sales performance).
We add a path from sales experience to sales
performance because an experienced sales repre
sentative may have higher levels of sales skill to
accomplish the higher performance (C 2 : sales
experience -* sales performance).
Also controlled is a variable measuring the
levels of consideration sales people have usually
exhibited to their supervisors. In this study, we
use as the performance ratings of the sales people
Control Variables
evaluations by their immediate supervisors,
which might not be objective enough. Inclusion of
the consideration factor would presumably be
able to control any biases shown by the supervi
sors in the ratings. We call this factor as "consid
eration to supervisor" for the rest of this article (C
3 : consideration to supervisor -* sales perform
ance) .
We also control the effects of gender and educa
tion levels on sales performance by concentrating
on male college-educated sales representatives —
an overwhelming (86%) majority in our data- as
the subjects of the study. Finally we admit the
existence of correlations among conscientious
ness, extraversion, and consideration to supervi
sor.
Mediated Model (Model 2). We next hypothesize
the mediated model (Model 2 ) including continu
ous learning as a variable transmitting the effect
of conscientiousness on sales performance (See
Figure 2). According to Barrick and Mount
(1991), traits frequently associated with conscien-
Main Hypotheses
Figure 2 : Path diagram of the mediated model (Model 2). The manifest variables are in boxes and thelatent variables are in ovals. All effects are hypothesized to be positive. Correlations amongconscientiousness and the five control variables are admitted.
•32-
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
tiousness include being careful, thorough, respon
sible, organized, hardworking, achievement-
oriented, and persevering. Therefore it is reason
able to hypothesize, on the exploratory basis, that
an organized, hardworking, and achievement-
oriented and thus conscientious sales representa
tive tends to "continuously learn" (H 2 : conscien
tiousness -* continuous learning).
As discussed previously, in high-tech industries
with rapid product turnovers and in a new com
petitive market environment where sales represen
tatives need to "serve" as customer consultants,
successful sales representatives must continuously
acquire up-to-the-minute knowledge on their
products and services, being aware of changing
customer's business needs. Therefore we hypothe
size that sales representatives who "continuously
learn" will perform better (H 3 : continuous learn
ing sales performance).
It is, however, not sufficient just to correlate
continuous learning with sales performance in
order to establish the mediation; continuous
learning and sales performance may be correlated
because they are both caused by conscientious
ness. Thus, conscientiousness must be controlled
in testing the mediating effect of continuous learn
ing on sales performance (HI': conscientiousness
-*• sales performance). If the path coefficient of
HI' is reduced in absolute size compared with that
of HI, but is still different from zero statistically,
continuous learning will be a "partial mediator."
On the other hand, if the path coefficient of HI' is
zero, then continuous learning will be a "complete
mediator."
We control the effect of other variables on con
tinuous learning. We control the effect of openness
to experience on continuous learning. According
to Barrick and Mount (1991), traits frequently
associated with openness to experience include
being imaginable, cultured, curious, original,
broad-minded, intelligent, and artistically sensi
tive. It seems quite likely that a sales representa
tive with high levels of these traits will have a
tendency to learn continuously (C 4 : openness to
experience continuous learning).
Also, a sales representative finding or
perceiving his market environment as very com
petitive will be more likely to be committed to
continuous learning to survive. We control the
degree of the sales representative's "perception of
market competitiveness" on continuous learning
(C 5 : perception of competitiveness continuous
learning). We also admit the existence of
correlations among conscientiousness and the five
control variables.
4 Method
Sample. The participants for this study were
sales representatives working for a large Japanese
company that designs, manufactures, and mar
kets information systems, power and industrial
systems as well as business systems. The com
pany is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, Part
I. We selected the study site, because their prod
ucts and services are continuously evolving and
requires customization. These features are more
likely to make its sales representatives committed
to continuously learn about their products and
services. We distributed 217 questionnaire sets
made up of two mutually exclusive parts, ones
designed to be filled out by sales representatives
and the other by their immediate supervisors. The
questionnaire for the sales representatives con
sists of a demographic-data form, a personality
test, a self-evaluation on two behavioral factors —
continuous learning and consideration to supervi
sor, while the questionnaire for supervisors asks
multi-dimensional as well as overall performance
ratings of the sales representatives under their
immediate supervision. Of the 217 sets distributed,
166 were completed and mailed back to us (76.5%
response rate). Of the 166 respondents, approxi
mately 91% were male; 93% had college degrees;
42% were either sectional chiefs or managers;
their ages distributed from 23 to 56, and the me
dian age was 32; their sales experiences ranged
from 6 months to 25 years, and the average was 9.8
years. Of the 143 male college-educated sales
representatives, we selected 139 whose records
were complete.
Measures. All measurement items composing
•33-
ec m gs?rfi**¥*i5«* i •
the questionnaire are translated into English in
Appendix A.
Sales Performance. We used overall ratings of
sales representatives on a three-point scale: the
high performer (3), the average performer (2),
and the low performer (1). These overall ratings
assess sales representatives' performance on
various aspects: (a) how much revenues was he
able to generate?; (b) how many products and
services was he able to sell?; (c) how much profits
was he able to generate?; (d) was he able to in
crease the market share of their products and
services?; (e) was he able to add new customers?;
(f) was he able to retain his regular customers?;
and (g) was he able to earn customer's trusts?; (h)
factors other than those listed above. The overall
ratings were strongly influenced by two of the
individual ratings, (a) revenue and (d) market
share. See appendix B for detail.
Personality. To measure conscientiousness,
extraversion, and openness to experience factors
of personality, we extracted 37 measures from
McCrae and Costa's (1985) eighty bipolar adjec
tive scales on the basis of the results of their factor
analytic study. The ten to thirteen trait descrip
tors with the highest factor loadings were selected
to represent each of the three personality factors.
Next, we converted those bipolar adjective scales
into five-point Likert scales, ranging from
strongly disagree (coded as 1) to strongly agree
(coded as 5). For example, a bipolar adjective
scale to assess the level of conscientiousness,
"hardworking vs. lazy" was modified to "I work
hard." Conscientiousness was measured with
thirteen items, extraversion with eleven items, and
openness to experience with ten. The Cronbach's
(1951) coefficient alphas are .90, .88, and .82 re
spectively. These all exceeded the .70 level recom
mended by Nunnally (1978).
Continuous Learning. As discussed previously,
continuous learning refers to the process by which
one acquires knowledge, skills, and abilities
throughout one's career to keep up with changing
performance requirements (see, London & Mone,
1999). In accordance with this conceptualization,
seven items were formulated to measure the levels
of sales representative's continuous learning (see
Appendix A). Each of the items included five
response alternatives ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 3 (neither) to 5 (strongly agree).
Sample items included "I spontaneously acquire
the knowledge and skill required in my job," and
"I continuously update the knowledge, throughout
the experience of working." It is important to note
that the items were written based on our inter
views with several sales representatives with over
20 years of sales experience on the research site..
The Cronbach's alpha for the scale was .83.
Consideration to Supervisor. We developed
three items to measure consideration to supervisor
(see Appendix A). Each of the items included five
response alternatives ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 3 (neither) to 5 (strongly agree). The
Cronbach's coefficient alpha was .73.
Perception of Competitiveness. Each of the sales
representatives evaluated competitiveness in his
market environment in five-point ordinal scale
ranging form very competitive (5) to almost no
competition (1).
Sales Experience. Each of the sales representa
tives was asked how many years he was involved
in sales activity in the demographic-data form.
We converted years into months.
5 Results
We tested Model 1 and Model 2 by using the
structural equation model with latent variables in
the LISREL 8.10 (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1993). We
simultaneously estimated both parameters for the
measurement models and the structural equation
models by maximum likelihood (ML) method
using correlation matrix of the manifest vari
ables.
Pre-analytical Procedure. The ML method needs
an assumption that a set of manifest variables
forms the multivariate normal samples. Sales
performance ratings were measured on three-
point ordinal scale. One way to analyze such data
is the weighted least square methods with the
polychoric or polyserial correlations and the
asymptotic covariance matrix (see Aish &
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Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
Joreskog, 1990; Joreskog, 1990 for reviews).
Estimating the asymptotic covariance matrix,
however, needs so large a sample that we could
not employ the method. Instead, we checked the
skewness and kurtosis for the variables using the
PRELIS 2.10 (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1992). When
some of the variables were found heavily skewed,
we transformed them so that we were able to meet
the assumption and avoid biased estimation. We
found that no variable registered kurtosis signifi
cantly different from that obtained from the nor
mal distribution after the transformation.
In this analysis, we set the variances of the
measurement errors for the sales performance, the
sales experience and the perception of competitive
ness to be zero, because they were manifest vari
ables.
Test of Model 1. We tested Model 1 (Unmediated
Model) as shown in Figure 1 in order to establish
that there exists an effect of conscientiousness on
sales performance that may be mediated. We first
set all covariances between the measurement
errors to be zero. We then modified the model by
relaxing the restrictions of no correlations on the
measurement errors according to the modifica
tion indices in LISREL for the following reason: If
the correlations among the measurement items
are induced by a set of latent variables, then when
all latent variables are accounted for, the meas
urement errors will be uncorrelated. Since we
assume one latent variable for a group of meas
urement items, it is expected that the measurement
errors are likely to be correlated.
We report the completely standardized esti
mates of loadings (A ), ^-values, and R2 for the
measurement models of latent variables shown in
Table 1. As shown in the table, all measurement
items were significant (p<0.01). We judged that
the three latent variables — conscientiousness,
extraversion, and consideration to supervisor —
were well measured.
Having checked the results of the measurement
models, we then focused on the result of the struc
tural equation model. We report the completely
standardized estimates of the path coefficients and
the overall goodness-of-fit statistics in Figure 3.
As shown in the figure, the path coefficient from
conscientiousness to sales performance (HI) was
.37 and significant (lvalue = 3.42 andp<.01). On
the other hand, none of the coefficients for the
three control paths —CI from extraversion, C 2
from sales experience, and C 3 from consideration
to supervisor —was significant (£-values = .17, -.18,
and -.60, respectively; and p>.10 for all). Only
one of the overall goodness-of-fit statistics, corn-
Table 1 : Completely standardized estimates of loadings (A), t-values, and R2 for the measurement model in the test of Model 1
Latent Variables Item A (t-value) R2
Conscientiousness c-i .75 (10.09)- .57
C-2 .67 (8.62)- .45
C-3 .46 (5.48)- .21
C-4 .58 (7.57)- .35
C-5 .52 (6.34)- .27
C-6 .58 (7.23)- .34
C-7 .74 (9.77)- .54
C-8 ,70 (9.29)- .49
C-9 .67 (8.64)- .45
C-10 .61 (7.81)- .38
C-ll .76 (10.19)- .58\ C-12 .65 (8.38)- .43
C-13 .46 (5.48)- .21
Nete. X.05. X.01
Latent Variables Item A (t-value) R2
Extraversion E- 1 .73 (9.60) - .53
E-2 .70 (9.03) - .47
E-3 .67 (8.63) - .45
E-4 .67 (8.62) - .44
E-5 .73 (9.66) - .54
E-6 .82 (11.40)- .68
E-7 .54 (6.51) - .29
E-8 .65 (8.17)- .42
E-9 .52 (6.61) - .28
E-10 .40 (4.61) - .16
E-ll .39 (4.59) - .16
Consideation cs-i .47 (5.44) - .22
to Supervisor CS-2 .92 (11.15)- .85
CS-3 .76 (9.04) - .58
-35-
mnmn^msmm 1 ^
Main Hypotheses
Figure 3
Overall Goodness-of-fit Statistics
Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = .058Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = .90Goodness of Fit Index (GFI) = .81
y2(361) =528.34 (p = .00)Note, *p<.05. "p<.01.
Completely standardized estimates of the path coefficients and the overall goodness-of-fitstatistics in the test of Model 1
parative fit index, significantly supported the
model (CFI = .90).
We found that sales experience did not affect
sales performance. This is probably due to the
fact that, when an immediate supervisors rated his
sales representatives, he took into consideration
their sale experiences. In other words, the supervi
sory expectation of his subordinates increased
with sales experience. We also found that consid
eration to supervisor was not significantly related
to sales performance. As seen in Appendix B, the
overall sales performance rating of a sales repre
sentative were significantly affected only by the
amount of revenue he was able to generate and by
the market share he was able to increase. Since
these figures —revenue and market share —are
easy to quantify, we could argue that the supervi
sory ratings were objectively given and thus were
not affected by the variables measuring considera
tion to supervisor.
We then modified Model 1 by removing the three
insignificant control paths —C 1, C 2, and C 3. We
call the modified model as Model 1'. We report the
completely standardized estimates of loadings A ,
^-values, and R2 in Table 2. As shown in the table,
there were no notable changes, and all measure
ment items were significant.
We report the completely standardized esti
mates of the path coefficients and the overall-of-fit
Table 2 : Completely standardized estimates of loadings ( A), lvalues, and R2 for the measurement model in the test of Model V
Latent Variables Item A (lvalue) R2
Conscientiousness c- 1 .76 (10.16)** .58
C-2 .67 (8.65)** .46
C-3 .45 (5.34)** .20
C-4 .61 (7.64)** .38
C-5 .52 (6.34)** .27
C-6 .58 (7.21)** .34
C-7 .74 (9.79)** .55
C-8 .70 (9.17)** .50
C-9 .68 (8.70)** .46
C-10 .62 (7.71)** .38
C-ll .76 (10.24)** .58
C-12 .64 (8.01)** .40
C-13 .41 (4.76)** .17
Nete. *p<.05. ~p<.01
36-
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
ConscientiousnessHI Sales
Performance.36"
Overall Goodness-of-fit Statistics
Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = .048Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = .97Goodness of Fit Index (GFI) = .91
X2(74) =97.57 (p = .035)Note, *p<.05. "p<.01.
Figure4 : Completely standardized estimates of the path coefficients and the overall goodness of fitstatistics in the test of Model 1'
Table 3 : Completely standardized estimates of loadings (A), lvalues, and R2 and coefficientalphas for the measurement model in the test of Model 2
Latent Variables Item A (i-value) R2
Conscientiousness c-i .75 (10.11)- .57
C-2 .66 (8.37)- .43
C-3 .44 (5.52)- .19
C-4 .62 (7.80)- .39
C-5 .54 (6.61)- .29
C-6 .57 (7.09)- .33
C-7 .73 (9.83)- .54
C-8 .69 (9.13)- .48
C-9 .67 (8.58)- .45
C-10 .63 (8.09)- .41
C-ll .77 (10.60)- .59
C-12 .66 (8.37)- .43
C-13 .44 (5.20)- .19
Nete. X.05. X.01
statistics in Figure 4. As shown in the figure, the
path coefficient of HI was .36 and significant (t
-value = 4.19 and p<.01). Chi-Square test sup
ported Model 1' (x2 (74) =97.57 and p=.035).
Goodness-of-Fit Index reached an adequate level
(GFI = .91). The Root Mean Square Error of
Approximation (RMSEA) was .048. According to
Browne and Cudeck (1993. p. 144), the RMSEA of
about .05 or less would indicate a close fit of the
model. Comparative Fit Index (CFI) was .97, an
adequate level in our judgment. We judged that
Model V reasonably supported by the data and
Latent Variables Item A (t-value) R2
Openness o- 1 .46 (5.29)- .21
to Experience 0-2 .65 (8.25)- .42
0-3 .19 (2.11)- .04
0-4 .64 (8.02)- .42
0-5 .67 (8.15)- .45
0-6 .72 (8.99)- .51
0-7 .64 (7.73)- .40
0-8 .58 (6.97)** .33
0-9 .49 (5.95)- .24
o-io .72 (9.29)- .50
Continuous CL-1 .74 (9.00)- .55
Learning CL-2 .57 (6.71)- .33
CL-3 .77 (9.35)- .59
CL-4 .68 (8.05)- .46
CL-2 .62 (7.39)- .38
CL-3 .47 (5.35)- .22
CL-4 .71 (8.56)- .51
that there existed a significant effect of conscien
tiousness on sales performance that may be medi
ated.
Test of Model 2. We next tested Model 2 (Medi
ated Model) as shown in Figure 2. We excluded
the three control paths to sales performance —C 1,
C 2, and C 3, because they were found insignificant
in Model 1\ We report the completely standard
ized estimates of loadings (A ), i-values, R2 for
the measurement models in Table 3. As shown in
the table, all measurement items were significant
•37-
^nnmn^mismm 1 ^
Main Hypotheses
Overall Goodness-of-fit StatisticsRoot Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = .048
Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = .92Goodness of Fit Index (GFI) = .81
X2(436) =573.88 (p = .00)Note, *p<.05. "p<.01.
Figure5 : Completely standardized estimates of the path coefficients and the overall goodness-of-fitstatistics in the test of Model 2
Main Hypotheses
Overall Goodness-of-fit Statistics
Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = .048Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = .92Goodness of Fit Index (GFI) = .81
X2(436) =573.88 (p= .00)Note, *p<.05. "p<.01.
Figure6 : Completely standardized estimates of the path coefficients and the overall goodness-of-fitstatistics in the test of Model 2
•38-
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
at thep<0.05 level. We judged that the three latent
variables - conscientiousness, continuous learn
ing, and openness to experience —were well meas
ured.
We report the completely standardized esti
mates of the path coefficients and the overall
goodness-of-fit statistics in Figure 5. As shown in
the figure, the path coefficient from conscientious
ness to continuous learning (H 2) was .33 and
significant (t-value = 3.52 and p<.01), while that
from continuous learning to sales performance (H
3) was .001 and not significant (i-value = .011 and
p>.10). The unmediated path coefficient from
conscientiousness to sales performance (HI') was
.37 (lvalues = 3.66 and p<.01) and was not re
duced in absolute size. These findings indicate
that continuous learning does not transmit the
effect of conscientiousness to sales performance.
The path coefficient from openness to experience
to continuous learning (C 4) was .33 (i-value =
3.42; p<.01), and that from perception of competi
tiveness to continuous learning (C5) was .23 (t
-value = 2.86;p<.01).
Two of the overall-of-fit statistics - RMSEA =
.048 and CFI = .92—supported Model 2, while the
other two- x 2(436) = 573.88 withp = .00 and GFI
= .81 —did not. In Model 2, however, we used
many manifest variables for the measurement
model and the degree of freedom was large. In
such a case, x 2 test and GFI might not always be
appropriate fit indices. We tentatively accept
Model 2.
Finally we show modified Model 2 by removing
the non-significant path from continuous learning
to sales performance in Figure 6. As shown in the
figure, there is no notable changes other than the
degree of freedom.
6 Discussion
As quoted in determinants of sales performance
section, some authors have argued that conscien
tiousness was a significant and positive direct
predictor of sales performance (Barrick & Mount,
1991; Vinchur, Schippmann, Switzer, and Roth,
1998). Our Model V supported their results. The
implication is that since conscientiousness is
relatively fixed and it is possible to identify people
who are high on this personality trait, the best
opportunity organizations have to increase the
sales performance of its employees can be pro
vided by the selection process. It would be a better
approach for organizations to select people who
are high on the levels of conscientiousness than
trying to change the levels of their conscientious
ness once they enter the organizations. Also, the
company should provide them with training
opportunities, seminars, and self-improving
educational opportunities on the regular basis in
order for it to stay competitive and to be able to
retain and continuously attract conscientious
sales forces.
Mount, Barrick, and Strauss (1993) found that
goal setting and goal commitment could partially
mediate the relationship between conscientious
ness and sales performance. In the present study,
we did not find, contrary to our expectation, that
continuous learning functioned as an additional
mediating behavioral factor. Instead, we found
that conscientiousness was significantly related to
continuous learning, but that the path from con
tinuous learning to sales performance was very
weak at most when the direct effect of conscien
tiousness on sales performance was controlled.
What happened is the following. Many of the
participants in this study did continuously learn
and those who continuously learn tended to be
evaluated as high performers in terms of sales
performance. It is just that their sales perform
ances correlated more with conscientiousness
scores than with their continuous learning behav
ior scores, rendering the latter to be insignificant
in the presence of the former. This is evidenced by
the fact that without HI' path or conscientious
ness -*• sales performance path, H3 path or con
tinuous learning -* sales performance would be
highly significant in Figure 5.
Another possible reason for our not finding a
mediating effect in continuous learning lies in the
fact that we measured the relationship at one point
in time rather than serially in this study. Continu
ous learning could affect sales performance but
with some time lag. Its effect on sales perform-
-39-
R «S7T»f45**15*» 1"%
ance could also be cumulative in the sense that
how long a sales representative has been commit
ted to continuous learning affects the sale per
formance. Some researchers already started
examining sales performance as dynamic crite
rion by time series analysis (Hofmann, Jacobs, &
Baratta, 1993; Harrison, Virick, & William, 1996;
Ployhart & Hakel, 1999). It is worth examining
the effect of continuous learning on sales perform
ance similarly in future research.
The present study extends the London and
Mone's theory by offering actual predictors of
continuous learning, which they have mentioned
but on whose existence they did not give empirical
evidences. As we expected, openness to experience
was significantly and positively related to con
tinuous learning. Barrick and Mount's (1991)
explained that, in finding a valid predictor of
training proficiency, "individuals who score high
on this dimension (e.g., intelligent, curious,
broad-minded, and cultured) are more likely to
have positive attitudes toward learning experi
ences in general." The same explanation may
also be adopted to the relationship between open
ness to experience and continuous learning. We
also revealed that perception of competitiveness
was positively related to continuous learning.
This indicates that sales representatives recogniz
ing their market environment as very competitive
will be more likely to acquire new knowledge and
skills by their continuous learning behavior.
In this study, we examined some control paths
to sales performance. Contrary to the results of
two meta-analyses (Barrick & Mount, 1991;
Vinchur, Schippmann, Switzer, & Roth, 1998), we
did not find significant direct effect of extraversion
on sales performance. There exist two possible
reasons for not finding a significant effect of
extraversion on sales performance. First, since
our study site designs, manufactures, and markets
information systems, its sales representatives are
required to have broad technical skills and knowl
edge in computer programming, system engineer
ing as well as familiarity with clients' business
needs. In these environments, traits frequently
associated with extraversion such as being socia
ble, gregarious, assertive, and talkative (Barrick
and Mount, 1991) may not be as important a factor
in generating sales as these technical skills and
knowledge. Second, our study site is a Japanese
company, while the above meta-analyses were on
American companies. The difference in the na
tional characters may account for this lack of
relationship between extraversion and sales per
formance on the part of the Japanese sales repre
sentative. More research is needed to examine the
differences across cultures. Research that ad
dresses the cultural differences will be also a
valuable addition to the literature.
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-42-
T
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
Appendix A Measurement Items Composing the Questionnaires
Items Evaluated by the Sales Representatives
The items for personality, continuous learning,
and consideration to supervisor are evaluated in
five-point Likert scales anchored: strongly agree
(5), agree (4), neither (3), disagree (2), and
strongly disagree (1). The item for perception of
competitiveness is evaluated in five-point Likert
scales anchored: very competitive (5), competitive
(4), undecided (3), a little competition (2), and
strongly disagree (1).
Conscientiousness
C-1. I make thorough preparations.
C-2. I do things methodically.
C-3. I am diligent.
C-4. Others would describe me as reliable and
dependable.
C-5. I am self-disciplined.
C-6. I never fail to organize my thoughts before
making a speech.
C-7. When struggling to do something, I pay
attention to the details.
C-8. Others would describe me as planful.
C-9. I tend to use a systematic approach to
guide thinking.
C-10. I tend to summarize the underlying rela
tionships among separate issues accord
ing to established rules and principles.
C-11. I put effort into ensuring that I do not miss
anything.
C-12. I tend to synthesize a variety of issues and
phenomena according to established rules
and principles.
C-13. When faced with a strange phenomenon, I
always try to evaluate it in relation to
existing frames of reference.
Extraversion
E-1. I am friendly with anyone even at the first
meeting.
E-2. I am very talkative.
E-3. I make people around me happy.
E-4. I like social functions such as parties very
much.
E-5. I am cheerful.
E-6. I am sociable.
E-7. I am relatively sympathetic with others.
E-8. I always interact with others in a friendly
manner.
E-9. I am said to be active.
E-10. I am more comfortable in others' com
pany than in solitude.
E-11. I spontaneously do things.
Openness to Experience
0-1. I have various interests, knowledge and
information on matters not directly con
nected to my job.
0-2. I am interested in many things.
0-3. I respect the others' opinion and values
that are consistent with mine.
0-4. I can see things from different perspec
tive.
0-5. I often come up with original ideas using
my imagination.
0-6. I always come up with creative and novel
ideas by disregarding generally accepted
norm.
0-7. I like an environment in which I can show
my creativeness.
0-8. I like variety.
0-9. I have great interests on novelties and
unknowns.
0-10. I am bold and adventurous.
Continuous Learning
CL-1. I tend to acquire job-related knowledge
and skills on a voluntary basis.
CL-2. I continuously improve my knowledge
through work experiences.
CL-3. I usually look ahead to see possible
performance requirements and make
effort to fill gaps, if any, between the
requirements and my present
-43-
m * m^nmn^mi^mm 1 *§•
knowledge, skills and abilities.
CL-4. I make effort regularly in order to be
well versed in new skills.
CL-5. I would like a generous self-investment
to enlighten myself.
C L-6. I always think about what I have learned
from both daily activities and peculiar
events and try to apply the knowledge to
my job.
CL-7. I endeavor to improve my job perform
ance by training and enlightening my
self.
Consideration to Supervisor
CS-1. I demonstrate compassion toward my
immediate supervisor.
CS-2. I behave with concerns for my supervi
sor's feelings and expectations.
CS-3. I speak with concerns for my supervi
sor's feelings and expectations.
Performance Ratings Evaluated by theSupervisors
The seven individual ratings
We asked the supervisors to evaluate the follow
ing seven aspects of sales performance for their
immediate subordinates on three-point ordinal
scale: the high performer (3), the average per
former (2), and the low performer (1). If an aspect
was not applicable, his supervisor checked unot
applicable."
(a) How much revenues were he able to gener
ate?
(b) How many products and services was he
able to sell?
(c) How much profits was he able to generate?
(d) Was he able to increase the market share of
the products and services?
(e) Was he able to add new customers?
(f) Was he able to retain his regular custom
ers?
(g) Was he able to cultivate customer's trusts?
The overall ratings
We also asked them to provide the overall rat
ings for their subordinates on three-point scale
considering the above aspects and factors other
than them.
•44-
Continuous Learning as a Mediator of the Relationship between Personality and Sales
Appendix B The Multiple Logistic Regression of the Overall
Performance Ratings on the Seven Individual Ratings
To understand how the seven individual ratings
affected the overall rating, we conducted the
multinomial logistic regression of the overall
rating on the individual ratings. Of the 143 cases
selected, we used 114 cases completed in both the
individual ratings and overall rating. The depend
ent variable or response Y (the overall perform
ance rating) is measured in three-point ordinal
scale. This eliminates the possibility of applying
ordinal least squares (OLS). The standard ap
proach (McCullagh and Nelder, 1989) is to trans
form the cumulative response probabilities
Tj = Pr(7 < j), where j = 1,...,/ is the number of
categories, rather than the category probabilities
7tj = Pr( Y = j) , by the logistic function
log{r;/(l —7,)} and regress them on the explanatory variables Xk-t k = 1,..., K (the individual
ratings), where in our case J = 3 and K = 7.
The model we employed is referred as the
proportional-odds model and involves parallel
regressions on the chosen ordinal scale
\og[rj(X)/{\-rj(X)n = 0,-/3% j = 1 /-I,
where 7j(X) = Pr( Y < j \X) is the cumulative
probability up to including category j, when the
independent variable vector is X. We reported the
estimates of the intercepts - 0 i and 6 2, and the
coefficients for the seven individual ratings and t
-values in Table 4. As shown in the table, the
overall rating was not a well-balanced sum
through the seven individual ratings but was so
strongly affected by the two individual ratings —
(a) revenue and (d) market share.
Table 4 : The result of the logistic regression. The estimates of the intercepts- 0 1 and 0 2, and thecoefficients for the seven individual ratings and the ^-values are reported.
Estimates
(t-values)
0i (a) (b) (c) (d) (e) (f) (g)13.37 19.87 -2.92 0.17 -1.15 -2.24 -1.04 -0.9 -0.47
(5.88)" (6.56)~ (-4.11)** (0.26) (-1.99)* (-3.27)- (-1.96)* (-1.58) (-0.75)
Note. *p<.05. **p<.01.
45-
Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 47 - 56.««ff»*4^*15#* 1 ^. 2001, 47-56.
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Career Anchors of Female Temporary Employees: An Exploratory Study
Shoko MATSUE
(Nanzan University)
This study investigates female temporary workers who have increased in thelabor market. Focusing on variables such as family status and career anchors,this study analyzes their relationships to the reasons of quitting full-timeemployment, reasons of choosing temporary employment, and the selectionstandards of temporary service agencies. Result showed the following threefindings: 1) necessity of child-rearing is relation to different reasons of quittingfull-time employment and of choosing temporary employment, yet has norelation to the choice of service agencies; 2) reasons of quitting full-timeemployment, reasons of choosing temporary employment, and selectionstandards of service agencies varied among career anchors such as technical/functional competence, security, and autonomy; and 3) the length of service as atemporary worker did not affect types of career anchors.
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•47-
Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 57 - 71.mnnmn^mibmmm, 2001, 57-71.
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Applicants' Self-Presentation and Nonverbal Behaviors in Job Interviews
Kazumi YAMAGUCHI
(Rikkyo University)
This paper reviews literature concerning an applicant's self-presentation(ingratiation, self-promotion, exemplification) and nonverbal behaviors, e.g.,eye contact, smiling behavior, and head nodding, and discusses the significanceof these behaviors in job interviews. The extent to which a person engages inthese nonverbal behaviors is influenced by gender, status, and personality. In thecontext of a job interview, these behaviors affect person perception, interpersonal attraction, and perceived job aptitude. These attributes of nonverbalbehavior were associated with specific functions: there are an intimacy-expressing function of eye contact and smiling behavior, a reaction-feedbackfunction of eye contact, an impression management function of smilingbehavior, and a reinforcing function of head nodding. I propose that thesenonverbal behaviors affected the interview as follows: these could be used for
ingratiation, which provided a positive feeling to interviewers, self-promotion,which emphasized the competence of the applicants, or exemplification, whichindicated the integrity of the applicants. Consequently, these results suggestedthat eye contact, smiling behavior, and head nodding by an applicant couldaffect the hiring decision.
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-57-
Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 73 - 91.mnfi*4^iii5g!g i •*§•, 2ooi, 73-91. m
Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
Cases in Japanese Wholly-Owned Ventures in and around Shenzen, China
Aki NAKAMURA(Nagoya University)
This paper investigates problems and conflicts which managers andemployees of Japanese wholly owned ventures in the PRC face. Four type ofgaps which seem to be causing the conflicts are discussed, which are: 1)Behavioral gaps, 2) Cross-cultural gaps, 3) Core value gaps, and 4) Ethnocentricgaps. From the interview data, the author concludes that in order to narrowthese gaps, there needs to be efforts from both Japanese managers and Chineseemployees to study and analyze the differences in their core values. Referring toone of the cases reported by interviewees, the author further suggests thatintegration of Third Culture or Charismatic Corporate Culture to existing "Two-Cultures" environment may be alternative solutions to the on-goingproblems which threaten effective operations of the wholly owned ventures.
Introduction
Despite claims by the PRC government that
China will hold onto a Communist one party
system, almost two decades of continuous libera
tion and reform of economic policies which re
mained unaffected even after the Tienanmen crack
down in 1989, have provided foreign corporations
with many opportunities to invest in China. After
China's Joint Venture Law was established in
1979, the total number of foreign invested projects
approved by the PRC government amounted to
over 200,000 by the end of fiscal year 1994, and
these investments contributed a total contractual
capital of a little over 300 billion U.S. dollars (Lu,
Child, and Yan, 1997). It is evident that one of the
challenges that foreign companies must face once
they launched operations in China is cultural
differences. Since China began implementing its
Four Modernization Program in 1979, possible
conflicts caused by cultural differences have been
frequently discussed.
Copeland (1985) warns that those who have no
experience doing business in China may be devas
tated by the enormous expense and obstacles
involved in launching a business there. He further
states that successful enterprises must develop
China-specific criteria and efficient personnel
functions that closely correspond to the expecta
tions and needs of the Chinese workforce and
government officials. John Child asserts that
differences in cultures and management styles of
different business systems are one of the prime
causes of foreign managers having difficulty in
managing their enterprises (Child, 1994).
Japanese companies are no exception. Japan is
one of the leading countries which have invested
most heavily in China over the years. By 1993, the
amount of investment exceeded 10 billion dollars.
In 1994, Japan, investing in excess of 7 billion U.S.
dollars, ranked fourth in terms of the amount of
direct investment that foreign countries had made
in the PRC (Imai, 1995). Despite ongoing in
creases in the number of wholly owned Japanese
ventures operating in mainland China, the reputa
tions of Japanese companies are generally poor.
Recent studies suggest that Chinese employees
working for Japanese companies generally con
sider Japanese managers to be too rigorous, too
arrogant, too emotional, and concerned only
about themselves (Imai, 1995). From the Japanese
side, there would be counter-views raised by
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IS mrfmm^mism 1 ^
practitioners who have dealt directly with a large
number of Chinese employees over the years.
Japanese scholars and business experts specializ
ing in studying foreign ventures operating in the
PRC, list cultural and behavioral differences
between the Japanese and Chinese as major prob
lems in Japanese companies operating in China.
Imai states that many of the issues seem to be
closely related to the disputes between the Japa
nese and the Chinese regarding how to operate
production facilities (Imai, 1995). Sonoda also
points out that differences in perceptions regard
ing business management are one of the major
problems in Japanese-Chinese joint ventures
(Sonoda, 1994). He explains that Chinese employ
ees expect managers to be benevolent, impartial
and sometimes to play a role of counselors in the
family-like atomosphere by taking care of private
issues for each employee, while the Japanese do
not consider such attributes important for being
effective managers.
Another problem is the importance of guanxi
(relations) with Chinese government bureaucrats
in doing business. Exchanging favors with Chi
nese bureaucrats in public offices must be consid
ered one of the important variables for doing
business in China. Many Japanese managers,
however, are opposed to such social behaviors.
Another problem originates from differences in
expectations held by Chinese workers before being
hired and reactions afer experiencing the work.
When expectations are not met due to poor work
ing conditions and low benefits, Chinese workers
are overwhelmed with despair. Many Chinese
workers, therefore, come to believe that Japanese
managers are cunning and greedy and that they
treat Chinese workers badly (Sonoda, 1994).
Satow and Wang (1994) assert that the two keys to
achieving successful Japanese-Chinese business
relations are to promote understanding of cultural
differences between the Chinese and Japanese, and
to improve coordination between Chinese and
Japanese managers or employees.
For this study, wholly owned Japanese ventures
in mainland China are explored with three specific
objectives: 1) to learn how the difference in culture
between Japanese and Chinese affects attitudes,
commitment and motivation of Japanese manag
ers and Chinese employees; 2) to find out if there is
any conflict in expectations between Japanese
managers and Chinese employees, and whether or
not the observed conflict is due to cultural differ
ences; and 3) to propose suggestions that will help
the wholly owned Japanese ventures establish a
cooperative management-employee partnership in
their facilities.
In establishing the hypotheses for this study, a
theoretical framework for analyzing the differ
ences between Japanese and Chinese in culture and
ways of thinking as discussed above must first be
explored in depth first.
The Definition of Culture
In order to analyze the cultural differences
between China and the Japan, discussions on what
'culture' is must be re-visited. Researchers, repre
senting different disciplines have defined 'culture'
in different ways. However, for the initial step, it
is important for the present study to understand
the meaning of culture by studying how culture
emerged and developed in various societies around
the world, especially in the PRC and Japan. For
studying the origin of culture, one must go back to
Sumner's theory on folkways. Sumner argues that
the most fundamental drive of humankind is
survival (Sumner, 1906). He further states that
human beings, through numerous instances of
trial and error, try to pass down only the best
ways to survive in a given external environment to
a succeeding generation. Then, such struggle to
maintain one's existence is carried on as a coop
erative effort with others who have the same
objectives in their lives. Thus, groups are organ
ized
Each member of the group, subsequently, prof
its from the other members' experiences, and
eventually adopts what seem to be the most effi
cient ways to cope with the external environment.
In time, all members in the group tend to "adopt
the same way for the same purpose" (Sumner,
1906). When these ways evolve and become uni
form and universal patterns of behaviors which
•74-
Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
Source: Black S,H. GregersenandM. Mendenhall. Global
Assignments: Successfullyexpatrating andrepatratinginternational managers.San Francisco: Jossey-BassPublishers. 1992, p. 34.
Artifacts
These are visible
behaviors, clothings,arts, building and so on.
Figure 1 The Iceberg of Culture
distinguish the members of the group from the
people in other groups, what Sumner calls 'folk
ways' arise. Because folkways, in general, are
like products of natural forces which men uncon
sciously set in operation, they are one of the major
forces by which a society is made to be what it is
(Sumner, 1906). In short, folkways are a set of
habitual patterns of behaviors created for coping
with the uncertainties of the external environment
at a subconscious level. Since folkways are seldom
developed within a short period of time, they are
generally taken for granted by member of the
group. Folkways, therefore, are sets of values,
modes of thinking and patterns of behaviors which
are taken for granted, but are also the central
elements by which people are judged and meas
ured.
Development of folkways plays a crucial role in
the development of culture. Despite their invisibil
ity as intangible elements of culture, folkways
have a strong influence over the minds of people.
Virtually all tangible elements of a culture, in
cluding religious or philosophical teachings
which are indigenous to the groups of a particular
region, are strongly influenced and shaped by
folkways. Values or teachings which are absorbed
from outside group are gradually modified and
adopted to be compatible and more closely corre
spond to the modes of thinking and standard of
behavior set by existing folkways. In a sense,
folkways are the core of the culture which influ
ence virtually all of the cultural elements which
emerge from a group.
The middle layer is composed of elements that
are neither visible nor audible; however, they are
decipherable by people from both inside and
outside of given culture. These include traditional
values, mottoes, and credos. At the most superfi
cial level, there are visible or audible cultural
elements such as language, architecture, music,
etc. Culture, then, consists of three elements: core
elements (folkways), intangible but decipherable
elements, and tangible but superficial elements.
Black, Gregersen, and Mendenhall assert that the
structure of these three elements of culture can be
compared to that of an iceberg (Black, Gregersen
& Mendenhall, 1992). As shown in Figure 1,
although the most visible elements of a culture are
more obvious to others, they are only the tip of the
iceberg. The important core dimensions lie be
neath the surface beyond what is directly visible.
In other words, intangible dimensions, especially
core values of culture, are more important than
the visible dimensions of culture, in the sense that
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m m-ga-wm^mismm 1 *%
Intertribal Sector
Source : Sahlins, Stone age economic.New York: A. E. Sharp. 1969.
NegativeReciprocity
Figure 2 Relationships between Reciprocity Types and Kinship Residential Sectors
they are more deeply held and shared among
people in a particular cultural realm.
Chinese and Japanese Culture: Similarities and
Differences
Since culture consists of three elements in which
the core exerts stronger influence than any other
element, having similar religious, philosophical,
or socio-political backgrounds, values, and ide
ologies may not necessarily lead to having the
same folkway among the people. This is more so
where groups of people coming from different
external environments interact and try to find
some commonalties among them. Thus, despite
the fact that Chinese and Japanese share similar
religious and philosophical influences as well as
similar socio-political origins, their sets of values
or modes of thinking can be, in fact, very different.
First, the similarities between Japanese and
Chinese will be discussed followed by the differ
ences.
Chinese and Japanese share similar socio
political origins as they both originated from
mainly agrarian societies. Their rural farming
communities developed extensive reciprocity
based on residential and lineage relationships as
they considered reciprocity as "the classic vehicle
of the peace and alliance contract." (Shalins, 1972)
These relationships form hierarchical levels of
integration. Figure 2 displays "a series of concen
tric circles" (Shalins, 1972) that keeps a household
as the most important central sector. The inner
circle represents more genuinely reciprocity-
based relationships. Moving outward, this circle
denotes neutral relationships where giving and
taking must be completely balanced and then
become more opportunistic or negative. Both in
China and Japan, rural villages were tradition
ally composed of small farmers; therefore, it was
virtually impossible for them to sustain their lives
without closely cooperating with each other.
Farmhouses were clustered together in hamlets
and members of each household in the hamlet
usually participated in extensive reciprocity -
based relationships (Fukutake, 1968). One ele
ment that united the members of the hamlet to
gether was their staple food. In both societies, rice
was one of the vital sources of nutrition. The
efforts of one household were not sufficient for
adequate maintenance, because rice paddies re
quired such extensive irrigation, systems. The
people, therefore, had to join their efforts to
ensure that these elaborate systems were always
operational. Furthermore, during planting and
76-
Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
Table 1 Reciprocity Based Relationships in China and Japan
China Japan
Generalized Reciprocity House House
Extended family Immediate family living in a close area
Sibling groups Neighboring groups
Clan and kinships Organizational Unit (i.e. Buraku)
Balanced Reciprocity Federation of lineage group Village sectorLineage groups living in distance
Alliance among the same surnames Regional based sector
Negative Reciprocity The people with no connection Outsiders
Created by the author based on the model conceived by Sahlins (1969)
harvesting seasons, interdependency and coopera
tion on a reciprocal basis were absolutely neces
sary for increasing the productivity to the required
level.
A family structure in both societies was patriar
chal and patrilineal with the father as a head of
the household. In most cases, relationships of
genuine reciprocity were practiced among the
members of the family, as well as their close
relatives. Different living environments, however,
gradually changed to emphasize aspects of
reciprocity-based relationships in which they
interact.
Chinese vs. Japanese Collectivism
Although initially, the family-kinship network
formed as a small system, the large amount of
cultivable land in China and mobility of people
allowed these networks to expand greatly over the
years. Family and kinship systems, particularly
in the southern part of China, eventually became a
large intricate human network. These reciprocity-
based relationships with an emphasis on such an
extended family network led Chinese to embrace
collectivism based on family and lineage groups.
Having such a concept, an individual was per
ceived to exist only in terms of his/her immediate
family network. The definition of family, thus,
encompassed its property, reputation, tradition,
ancestors, and future posterity (Redding, 1990). In
short, individuality exists only with the family; if
the family line is cut, the individual will lose his/
her identity without an individual.
As shown in Table 1, a lack of tight control by
the state authority, such as by the Imperial Gov
ernment in Japan further.strengthened family and
lineage relationships among Chinese. Particularly
among larger lineage groups, the organizations
were so extensive and influential that the members
neither feared nor felt dependent upon the govern
ment for work or securities. The first organization
from which they would seek assistance in time of
trouble was, therefore, their own lineage group,
because the Chinese trusted their family and
lineage groups absolutely (Redding, 1990). Conse
quently, a sub-culture was formed and developed
among particular lineage groups, resulting in
strong social and moral bonds among each mem
ber in the lineage as a collective whole, but weak
bonds in relations with non-lineage group mem
bers.
Unlike Chinese whose collectivism has been
mostly based upon family and lineage relation
ships, Japanese instead tended to stress the impor
tance of collectivism based on loyalty and spatial
closeness in the organizational context. Living on
a small chain of islands, the Japanese were unable
to develop strong territorial divisions solely on the
basis of family and blood lines. Instead, the
Japanese had to share limited cultivable areas
with their neighbors and to work cooperatively in
order to receive maximum output from their
collaborative group organizations. Under such
circumstances, cooperation and maintaining
harmonious relationships with members of the
organization (village, corporation, company and
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mwrfmn^msmm 1 •
CHINESE
THIRD CULTURE/
CHARISMATIC
ORGANIZATIONAL CULTUREJAPANESE
Opinion about own (Chinese) behavior (CI) and others' (Japanese) behavior (C2)
Behavior of
JapaneseBased on their core
values
Opinion about own (Japanese) behavior (Jl) and others' (Chinese) behavior (J2)
0 Behavioral Gap : •Cross-cultural Gap: -
Cross-cultural Gap:
Core Value Gap : —
Ethnocentric Behavioral Gap : •
BJ x BC Gap (Surface Conflict)
Jl x C2 Gap (Cross-cultural Conflict)CI x J2 Gap (Cross-cultural Conflict)
Jl x CI Gap (Deeply rooted Conflict)
J2 xC2 Gap (Cross-cultural Conflict)
Figure 3 Values and Behavioral Level Conflicts Emerging from Ethnocentric Perception BetweenChinese Employees and Japanese Managers
etc) was important. The Japanese emphasis on
collectivism was even more firmly established
during the Tokugawa era. After the katanagari
(Sword Hunt) policy in which the samurai col
lected all weaponry items from the non-samurai
classes, non-samurai people became defenseless
when facing the ruling class. Realizing it would
be useless to resist orders issued by the govern
ment, the Japanese people decided to become
mutually dependent upon each other, rather than
resist the government and perish in vain. Thus, the
principal belief in the virtue of enduring and
following the consensus of the group gradually
emerged. Simultaneously, finding personal bene
fit and individual satisfaction in the prosperity of
the organization and the importance of self-
sacrifice for the sake of it became highly valued
The creation of these values eventually bound a set
of individuals into one group based on mutual
interests or attributes rather than based on family
and lineage relationships. (Nakane, 1972). Fur
thermore, in an attempt to prevent the non-ruling
classes from increasing the power of lineage and
kinship groups, the ruling class prohibited com
moners to take a surname until the Meiji Restora
tion. Because of the lack of this important compo
nent, most of the Japanese had no way to keep
track of everyone in their lineage groups, particu
larly those who lived far apart or who were dis
tant cousins. Thus, the ability to develop extensive
reciprocity relationships based on lineage groups
was diluted, except for a small portion of the elite,
the nobility and the ruling classes. As a result,
reciprocity based on the organizational, not the
lineage, environment became the customary prac
tices observable throughout Japan.
Although both societies developed from
reciprocity-based social relationships, differences
in the external environment, in particular in the
living and political environments, molded and
changed the fundamental values of respective
groups: one strongly emphasized the importance
of family and lineage relationships while the other
spatial and organizational closeness within a
given human network. Such core values, in spite
of dramatic changes in various aspects of their
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Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
living environments, still exist within the minds of
both Chinese and Japanese today.
Processes of Cross-Cultural Conflict and Mecha
nisms to Solve Them
In the previous section, an attempt was made to
demonstrate that there exist fundamental differ
ences between Chinese and Japanese in terms of
core values and assumptions that each of them
embrace. The present study expects that these
differences will affect motivation, attitudes and
behavior of Chinese employees and Japanese
managers when they are assigned to the collective
work in the organization. Since people tend to
become highly ethnocentric about their own core
values and assumptions, Chinese employees and
Japanese managers may have a difficult time
understanding such core values and behaviors
originating from these ethnocentric elements.
Their difficulties in understanding each other may
lead them to either isolate themselves from each
other or ignore the needs and requests from others
whom they perceive do not 'belong to' their group.
Thus, there may be a gap and a conflict between
Japanese managers and Chinese employees in
understanding the cause, and thus meanings, of
behaviors in the work setting as shown in Figure
3. Such gaps can be categorized into several types
as follows. 1) Behavioral Gap: Gaps in this cate
gory are caused by differences in behavior between
two parties. Such differences are generally quite
obvious as they usually occur at the surface level.
This category of gaps covers a wide range of
conflicts from different manners and habits, to
work ethics and negotiation strategies. 2) Cross-
cultural Gap: Gaps in this category are caused by
differences between the motive of behaviors of one
party and what the other party perceives as the
motive of such behaviors. For the present study,
both (1) misinterpretation by Chinese employees
of the motive of Japanese managers' behaviors
and (2) erroneous assumptions of Japanese man
agers regarding the motive of Chinese employees'
behaviors may fall under this category. 3) Core
Value Gap: Gaps falling into this category are
caused by the differences between core values
embraced by these parties. Such deep-rooted
conflicts may be extremely difficult to discern
especially for members within the organization to
which they belong, because in general they do not
even know such differences actually exist between
them. The gaps may initially be detected as simple
misunderstanding of other parties or as misinter
pretation of other party's feelings. However, they
may eventually evolve into unknown feelings of
anxiety and frustration, then to feelings of mutual
distrust between them. Those gaps, which evolve
into feelings of distrust are considered going
beyond the present category, because such
evolvement is not possible unless each party are
very ethnocentric about its own point of view.
Thus, the final category would be as follows. 4)
Ethnocentric Behavioral Gap: Finally and most
important, there is a category called ethnocentric
behavioral gap. Gaps falling into this category
are prevalent in cross-cultural relations in many
Japanese wholly owned ventures as well as joint
ventures. Additionally, they are usually consid
ered by members within these organizations as
major problems. One clear example of a gap
falling under this category is the overt and ex
pressed feeling of mutual distrust between the two
parties. As was noted earlier in this section, such
a gap is a final output derived from all other gaps
between the two parties. In other words, observing
the feelings of mutual distrust should imply that
there would be many more gaps between them.
In order to narrow these gaps, successfully
integrating core values embraced by each party is
mandatory. In other words, creating either 'Third
Culture' or 'Charismatic Corporate Culture' may
be urgently needed for these organizations with
problems derived from the limit in gap structure
involving values and behaviors. "Third Culture"
can be conceived through creating a new value
system by which two sets of core values may be
integrated and merged within the organization
(Graen and Wakabayashi, 1994). As a result of
this merger, having a 'Third Culture' may lead the
organization to have a set of standards which
everyone can agree on and can use as a benchmark
of organizational behavior.
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13 * S^T»*45**15S* 1 -t
'Charismatic Organizational Culture' on the
other hand, may likely replace the importance of
existing core values with a new set of values within
the organization to which both parties belong. In
each organization, there exists a unique set of
folkways, which is usually explained with the
term "organizational culture" ( Schein, 1985). In
general, such organizational cultures are strongly
influenced by the national culture in which organi
zations are established. Since, core values of the
national culture would be completely merged as a
part of organizational culture, it is quite likely
that the foreign subsidiaries would embrace "two
cultures" within their corporation (Graen,
Wakabayashi, & Hui 1999), then these two cultures
become standards by which behaviors of two
different cultural groups get energized and evalu
ated within the organization. However, since most
of taken-for-granted core values hide behind any
of visible phenomena, the two-value business
ventures tend to create all sorts of cross-cultural
problems. Charismatic Organizational Culture
may come into reality when a charismatic leader
or a group of such key people within the organiza
tion strongly believe that solely relying on values
of their national origin may eventually lead to a
break down of communication. Charismatic
leaders can be defined as those whose attributes
are highly respected by members of the group.
They are risk takers and consistent in their do
ings, having higher standards in most of the
essential variables which enable the growth of
organizations such as total quality management,
cost reduction, innovating products development,
and etc (Burns, 1979; Bass, 1985). Thus, for these
leaders, creating an overwhelming, stronger value
system is indispensable in order to merge two core
values within their foreign subsidiary for generat
ing collaborate work relations and a cohesive
organizational system, producing high quality
products, and achieving cost reductions. As they
continue to accomplish various tasks successfully
and more people are convinced that new values
created by the value-integrating leaders actually
are effective, the new values, regardless of the
degree of their correlations with national values
will become an integral part of the organizations.
In other words, so long as members of organiza
tions have strong convictions that newly created
values are the only ways by which they could
survive and prosper, members of organization
will be likely to neglect whatever values they used
to embrace in national settings and try to educate
themselves to fit into the new 'organizational'
values. It is especially so if such values are
strongly associated with task behavior and per
formance in workers' jobs but not necessary
applied to regular personal living situations. Such
issues include quality management, cost reduc
tion thinking, and injections of creative thinking
into new product developments, etc. The existence
of charismatic organizational culture preached
and sustained by strong leaders may allow both
Japanese managers and Chinese employees to go
beyond their differences and work cooperatively,
with support of newly learned core values as
standards for their judgement and behavior.
Although Third Culture and Charismatic Organ
izational Culture may have different kinds of
impact on employees, the implementation of such
strategies may assist both Japanese expatriates
and local managers and employees in maintain
ing better business relationships as they will avoid
relying solely on old core values of their native
origins.
Hypothesis
Based on the cross-cultural conflict model
shown in Figure 3, hypotheses to be examined for
this study are stated as follows,
Hypothesis 1 (HI): Japanese managers with
little or no understanding of Chinese core values
may tend to isolate Chinese from the decision
making process (BJxBCgap).
Hypothesis 2 (H2): Chinese employees (middle-
class local managers in particular) may have the
opinion that Japanese managers do not allow
Chinese to participate in crucial business deci
sions (BJ) as they perceive that the Japanesemanagement team does not trust Chinese (C2),
(BJxC2gap).
Hypothesis 3 (H3): Japanese managers with
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Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
Table 2 Brief Background on the Companies Being Investigated
Main Prorducts
Sales Revenue in their
head quarters(as of 1995) in Yen
Establishement Date
of Plants in ChinaRemarks
AMicro- motors
DC Brushless motors
34.4 Billion 1991 Company originally established in 1918
BTerminal Printers
Stepping motorsNot diclosed
1985One of the major manuracturers of colorlaser printers
C Micro-motors Not diclosed 1994A child company of one of the major homeelectroinc appliances companies in Japan
D Screws for electronic devices 24 Billion 1994
E
Razors Not disclosed 1990 Including OEM products line, the companycontrols 25 % of blades and elctronic andconventioal razors market in the US.
little or no understanding of Chinese value-
behavioral linkage tend to erroneously judge
Chinese employees due to their behaviors, atti
tudes and business practices (BC) which are
different from those of Japanese (J2), (BC x J2
gap).
Hypothesis 4 (H4): Japanese managers with
little or no understanding of Chinese culture may
tend to be ethnocentric with regard to their own
perspectives (J2) and reject opinions of Chinese
employees which may be influenced by the core
values of Chinese people (CI), (J2 x Clgap).
Hypothesis 5 (H5): Chinese employees with little
or no understanding of Japanese culture may tend
to mis-interpret behaviors, attitudes, and motives
of Japanese managers toward Chinese employees
(C2), leading them to widen the gap between their
interpretations and Japanese managers' behav
iors (BJ), (C2xBJgap)
Hypothesis 6 (H6): Corporate culture that may
work to modify and merge behaviors and percep
tions of two cultural groups by creating 'Third
Culture' or replace two cultural values with a
series of values conceived as 'Charismatic Organ
izational Culture' within the organization will be
more acceptable by both parties than the "Two
Culture" situations where each party stresses the
values derived from its own home culture (Graen,
etal.,99).
Method
Five Japanese wholly owned ventures located in
and around Shenzhen City, China were selected as
subjects of the present research. The businesses
were different from one company to another with
regard to products and industrial fields. There
fore, in order to limit comparison to the relation
ships between Japanese expatriate managers and
Chinese employees, efforts were made to eliminate
all possible variables which might inhibit this
comparative analysis. With this aim, all of the
companies selected for this study were in manu
facturing. The business strategies were also found
to be smiliar; the goods were manufactured there
and exported to adavanced nations such as Japan,
the United States or Europe. No company names
are disclosed due to the pledge of confidentiality.
Only a set of key variables illustrated in Table 1
were analyzed intensively with less attention paid
to other vraibles. The brief background on these
companies is discribed in Table 2. For conven
ience, these five companies are called Company A,
B, C, D, and E.
A total of 32 Chinese employees and 10 Japanese
managers were interviewed in these 5 companies.
At Company A, interviewees were a factory man
ager, a general manager, and two technical assis
tant engineers for the Japanese side, and for the
Chinese side, an assistant subsection leader of
quality control management, two supervisors, a
line leader and two workers. At the Hong Kong
office, a general manager from the Japanese, and
a personnel section manager, an accounting
section manager, and two secretaries from Hong
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IS mnmn^mibmm 1 •
Kong Chinese were also interviewed.
As for the remaining four companies, a Japanese general manager and several Chinese em
ployees were interviewed in Shenzhenrespectively.At the Hong Kong branches of these companies,only one or two Japanese general managers wereto be interviewedin each company. Beforevisitingthe factories in China and Hong Kong,headquarter visits to each company in Japan were
made, and interviews with personnel managerswere condcuted. In interview sessions, interviews
were semi-structured with some variations in
questions.'A structured inverviews were conducted
with personnel or administrative managers asrepresentatives of each company in order to deter
mine the precise personnel and administrative
policies of each company.
Results
This study was designed to reveal various inci
dents and conflicts which seemed to be caused bythe gaps created between the two parties in inter
national cooperation. In this section, an attemptwill be made to list some of the incidents described
by Japanese and Chinese interviewees as evidence
to examine a series of hypothesis for this study
1) H1: BJ x BC Gap, Japanese Managers' Behaviors Conflicting with Those of Chinese Employees
Several Chinese employees, especially higherranked employees, mentioned that Japaneseexpatriates tend to isolate themselves from Chi
nese employees. The following comments represent their feelings.
The Japanese seems to isolate themselves from Chinese.There are quite a lot of Japanese people workinghere. Sothey are always together ... By beingalways together, theJapanese isolate themselves from other Chinese. (A,Employee 1)
I cannot feel anything from them so I have no ideawhether or not they trust us or not. There are somecommunications between Japanese managers and us butother than business related matters, communicating withJapanese is rare (B, Employee 2).
Such social separation and avoidence of commu
nication efforts in the eyes of Chinese was found
prevalent throughout most of the companies
visited. Interviews with lower ranking employeesfurther confirmed this hypothesis.
It is difficult to determine [the weaknesses of the Japanesemanagers] because usually we do not deal with them alall." (A, Employee 4 )
I do not know what to say about [ Japanese managers]But I have heard that they are very systematic."( BEmployee 1).
As indicated by Chinese employees commments,the result of ther interview study not only confirmed Japanese separation to Chinese employees, it also revealed the unity among Japaneseexpatriate managers and employees regardless oi
their ranks to the exclusion of Chinese employees.This is most apparent during the lunchtime. In
most of the companies visited, the lunch menus as
well as the dining areas were separated accordingto the employee for Chinese employees. However,
the Japanese, regardless of their ranks or status
sat together at the same table and all ate Japanese
food. Other examples were indicated by Japaneseinterviewees in regards to their off-hours recrea
tional activities.
This could be one of the clear indications that
social behaviors among Japanese expatriates
were formed based on nationality, loyalty and
spatial closeness, i.e. elements associated with
their core values. In this case, loyalty indicates
their loyalty to parent companies rather than to
local operations to which their Chinese employeesalso belong. In other words, they would consider
those who have loyalties to their parent companiesas insiders while those who have little or no at
tachment to them are outsiders. This interpretation of loyalty was further strengthened by the factthat lower ranking Chinese employees who
seemed to share nothing with parent companieshad little or no association with Japanese expatriates. Furthermore, an extreme lack of interactions
between Japanese managers and Chinese employees with lower ranks as revealed by interviews
creates all sort of gaps between Japanese managers and Chinese employees. Such behaviors of
Japanese expatriates found in Chinese affliates
signifanctly contradicts Japanese norms ex
pounded by much literature in which Japanese
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Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
managers' frequent interactions with lower rank
ing employees are reported (Abegglen, 1958;
Yoshino, 1968; Nakane, 1970; Rohlen, 1974; Dore,
1975; Ouchi & Jaeger, 1978; Itami, 1987; Durlabhji
& Marks, 1993). They may not interact with each
other all the time, but Japanese leaders usually
manage to get to know their subordinates in
Japan. In many cases, even president of company
in Japan visits the shop floor all by himself and
interacts with the lowest ranking employees,
trying to close the communication gap between
them. Such behaviors of Japanese leaders are
often mentioned as indicative of the collectivist
tendency found in Japanese organizations based
on loyalty and spatial closeness. But Chinese
employees commented during interviews that
Japanese managers only exhibit concerns about
fellow Japanese expatriates and about the com
pany profit that the Chinese factory generates, but
no concern about Chinese employees working for
their factory. From the eyes of Chinese employees,
they seemed mostly concerned about the members
of 'their' group (fellow Japanese expatriates) and
contributions to 'their' parent companies by
profit.
2) H2: BJ x C2 Gap, Japanese Dominance in
Decision-Making Processes and Chinese Interpre
tations
For the Chinese employees who were positioned
as middle managers and, therefore had more
chances to interact with Japanese managers, their
negative feelings toward Japanese managers were
even more evident. Their frustrations in interact
ing with Japanese managers were seen in their
confessions that Japanese managers completely
dominated decision-making processes.
One of the supervisors stated the following:
"As for management, the Japanese side and the Chineseside are totally separated. They rarely exchange their ideaswith us. Additionally, they do not let us know exactlywhat they are doing. I know little about current businessstrategies, particularly in the management aspect." (A,Employee 2)
In many Japanese wholly owned ventures sam
pled for the study, Japanese managers tended to
make crucial decisions without including Chinese
employees in their decision-making processes.
Japanese managers expect the Chinese employees
to simply follow directions given to them by their
Japanese superiors without any questions. Such a
trend was most apparent in Company A.
"As for the Japanese management, they have a meetingevery Friday morning. After these discussions, things aredecided and are transferred to appropriate functions forimplementation A few Japanese people make alldecisions." (A, Employee 2)
The lower-middle managers of Company A
seemed to substantiate the above statements by
commenting as follows:
"There has been less communication between Japanese andChinese employees. It seems that the Japanese are the onesto make decisions and we [the Chinese employees] aresupposed to follow what they tell us. Such a relationshipis very monotonous When important issues come up,they dscuss the issues together. The Chinese employees,however, are excluded from the discussion. The importantdecisions are always made by the Japanese. These decisionsare then handed down to us. So we are expected to obeywhat they tell us. If they do things like that all the time,there will always be some errors in their directions viewedfrom the Chinese cultural context. Some of their decisions
are rooted in Japanese culture so deeply that there is noway that their decisions can be put into practice hereeffectively." (A, Employee 1).
The employees of Company A in the Hong Kong
branch office made similar comments. During the
interview, one of the Chinese managers made the
following statements, illustrating gaps between
Japanese managers' behaviors and how he inter
prets them:
"We do not know much about this company. It seems thatmany things are strictly confidential and are not exposedto Hong Kong employees. We do not dare to ask aboutsuch issues and data ... We only work here. We are not toallowed to make any decisions about our work. Decisionsare made by the Japanese directors. There is no suchperson as a general manager in this branch. The realmanagers reside in Japan. The general manager as suchexists in names only here, because ultimate decisions aremade by managers in Japan" (A, Hong Kong Employee1).
The Japanese dominance in decision-making
processes was also prevalent among the other
Japanese companies. However it was evident from
this research that a company which had been
operating in China for a longer period like Com
pany C was found to be more flexible and provided
83-
* ^nmn^mbmm 1 -*§-
the Chinese personnel with more authority. In
Company C, Chinese personnel seemed to be
somewhat more involved than those in Company
A which has been in China only for a few years. In
Company C, the factory manager and the vice
factory manager who were both Chinese nation
als, and attended executive meetings regularly.
Likewise in Company B, the vice factory manager
who was a Chinese national and was also fluent in
Japanese, had been placed in the position of
second in command. The same situation was
found in Company D. An assistant to the general
manager was a Chinese national who had ob
tained a Ph D in Engineering from one of the most
prestigious universities in Japan. In Company E,
the general manager was a Hong Kong Chinese,
and was also a graduate of Hong Kong University
and a Graduate School in Nagoya Japan.
This evidence seems to indicate that substantial
localization efforts in China have been attempted
in many of the Japanese wholly owned ventures.
In reality, however, the interviews by the present
author in these companies revealed otherwise;
localization had taken place only at a superficial
level. Even in those companies which appeared to
be more localized, the Japanese were still the ones
who were making all of the strategic decisions,
while the Chinese were essentially placed in little
more than supportive roles. Exemplifying this
situation is a remark made by one of employees
working for Company C,
"There are some problems with the Japanese leadershipstyle. In order to do everything in their own way, [theJapanese managers] do not care about local regulationsand sometimes they disregard regulations in order to getthings done. They only care about their ways." (C,Employee 6).
When the interviewee was asked about the differ
ences between Japanese and Chinese ways of
management, he quickly responded with the
following,
"The Japanese way focuses on efficiency and subordinateobedience The Japanese require us to do whatever theytell us to do. In Chinese companies, subordinates candisobey orders from superiors if they think that theseorders are unreasonable. In Japanese companies, ifsubordinates do not obey orders from their superiors,subordinates will have problems. They should never
question orders given by their Japanese superiors." (C,Employee 6)
The above comments indicate that Japanese ways
of behaving are seen to be following "the Japanese
ways" by Chinese managers, suggesting a deep BJ
x C2 gap between Japanese and Chinese manag
ers. The following remarks by another Chinese
manager further indicate the same gap problem.
He said,
"In Company D, although the assistant to the generalmanagers is Chinese, all authority is concentrated in theJapanese general manager. The power is more equallyallocated among managers. But in this company, allauthority is in the general manager's hands, in Bucho's."(D, Employee 3).
Another employee in Company D supported the
above statement. He said that one of the Japanese
influences that can be seen in his company is the
mode of allocating power and decision making
authority. With regard to this matter, he made the
following remark:
"There are some Japanese influences in this company. Inmany cases, we just do what the Japanese managers tell usto do, and we must obey what they say. That's howthings work around here" (D, Employee 4).
When the interviewee was further asked how he
felt about the Chinese collegve managers in Com
pany D, his response was surprising. He immedi
ately responded by saying,
"No. we have only Japanese managers. That's all!!"
This comment seemed to indicate that virtually all
authority is seen to reside in the hands of the
Japanese managers.
Even in Company E, where the general manager
is a Chinese Hong Kong, one of the employees
admitted that the Japanese ultimately made most
of the decisions. He stated as follows.
"I think there are problems in our company's management.The decision- making processes are too complicated.Before, when we had a Japanese as a general manager, hewas allowed to make decisions without consensus from the
headquarters. But after a Chinese manager was promotedto the general manager position, we had to report everything to the headquarters through him and then wait fora response." ( E, Employee 1)
Many Japanese managers during interview
sessions revealed that they intended to localize the
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Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
operations in China as soon as possible. However,
the fact that Japanese expatriate managers who
seem to remaining consistent with Japanese-style
management practices are perceived to be quite
ethnocentric by Chinese managers and employees.
Based on this evidence, it is concluded that these
findings from the present interview study basi
cally support Hypothesis 2, stating the BJ x C2
gap.
3) H3: BC x J2 Gap: Difficulties of Japanese
Managers in Understanding Behaviors of Chinese
One of the most obvious problems that emerged
from this study , which seemed to support the 3rd
hypothesis was that many Japanese managers
lack even a fundamental understanding of Chinese
culture. It was known that little or no cultural
training was provided to Japanese expatriates
interviewed for the present study prior to their
assignments to China. Surely, lack of this invest
ment in cross-cultural training for expatriate
personnel significantly contributed to their defi
cient understanding of Chinese employees and
their behaviors in all companies visited.
Many Chinese interviewees agreed that most of
their Japanese managers knew very little about
them or their national culture. They further in
sisted that the Japanese managers' lack of under
standing of the Chinese people caused serious
miscommunication between them. The following
comments made by the Chinese employees exem
plify this view point, supporting the existence of a
BC x J2 Gap:
"The Japanese managers do not understand us very well.Most of them do not speak Chinese ... They do notunderstand our culture, the Chinese way of thinking, andmany traditions and customs. Under such circumstances, itis very difficult for the Japanese to determine exactly howthey could manage the factory here. Most of the Japanesepeople go back to Japan in three years. Some of them evencome and go within one or two years ... So, when they tryto manage us [the Chinese employees], certainly there arecommunication problems" (A, Employee 1).
The vice factory manager of Company B stated
that one of the reasons that Japanese managers
cannot fully comprehend the Chinese people is that
they do not stay in China long enough. Her com
ments are the following,
"Mostly, the Japanese managers stay here for only a shortperiod of time. There was one Japanese manager whostayed here for five years. During his stay, he studiedsocial and political issues in the PRC. He understood a lotabout us. I personally think that it. would take at leastfive years in order to understand the Chinese people. Butunfortunately, most of the Japanese managers stay herefor a period of two to three years."
With regard to this matter, the vice factory man
ager in Company C made a similar statement.
"Most of [the Japanese managers] stay here for only afew years and then they leave. By the time they get used tothe new environment and understand the people, they haveto go back to their home country. When a new managercomes, they have to go through the process of culturalreadjustment all over again ... From the Chinese perspective, by the time the Chinese personnel become used to onemanager's leadership style, it is about time for the manager to leave. So, we have to make a quick adjustment toa new manager again. It is very difficult for us to gothrough frequent adjustment processes. In a way, we haveto take care of [newly arrived Japanese managers] untilthey get used to the new environment. But new managerscontinuously come from the Japanese headquarter, so ithas become too much of a burden for Chinese employees to
entertain them."
The same situation was reported by an em
ployee from Company D. He stated that adjusting
to a leadership style of the new manager is a
painful process, because the Japanese managerial
structure is extremely hierarchical, and all of the
burden for adjustment and adaptation falls upon
shoulders of the local Chinese. These comments
seemed to indicate that although there were some
Japanese managers who were willing to learn
about China and its people, the majority of the
Japanese managers had little or no understanding
of Chinese culture, thus creating a perpetuating
BC x J2 gap.. Interviews with the Japanese man
agers seemed to further reveal that their serious
lack of understanding of culture and behavior of
Chinese people led them to have erroneous as
sumptions about Chinese employees, which led
them to behave offensively to their Chinese subor
dinates.
4) H4: C1XJ1 Gap, Part 1: Chinese Collectivism
Based on Family and Lineage Group vs. Japanese
Managers' Loyalty to Their Organization
The existence of BC x Jl gap further revealed
that there also exists CI x Jl gap. The following
85-
mnmn^mismm 1 -*§•
are some Chinese cultural aspects that Japanese
expatriates are most likely to fail to understand.
These aspects reveal the evidence of the existence of
a CI x Jl gap. Interview results revealed that the
Chinese concept of teamwork was substantially
different from that of Japanese. Because of this
difference, the Japanese managers came to believe
strongly that the Chinese were not trustworthy as
team members. This constitutes a problematic CI
x Jl gap situation. In fact, many Japanese man
agers interviewed strongly believed that the Chi
nese are generally individualistic. This was one of
the evidences that the concept of collectivism from
the Japanese perspective was quite different from
the meaning of "collectivism" understood by most
Chinese people. The Chinese people's tendency not
to trust unconditionally people other than mem
bers of their own lineage group was erroneously
interpreted by the Japanese as an indication of
individualism. For example, the Japanese regard
the Chinese employee's unwillingness to share
vital information with others as a sign of the
Chinese being individualists. One of the Japanese
general managers stated like the following,
"The problems with Chinese engineers is that they do notwant to share their knowledge with others. Once theymaster how to maintain machinery etc., they do not wantto tell their subordinates how to do so. Thus, their
subordinates will not improve the skills and knowledge inclose proximity to the level of their supervisors, becausethe supervisors are not willing to teach anything to theirsubordinates."(C, the general manager).
From the perspective of the Chinese employees,
however, it is not necessary to share all of the
information they have obtained through their own
endeavors, because their first priority is to secure
their job position not for their own sake but for the
sake of their families. Furthermore, because there
is no guarantee that Chinese employees will be
employed for their lifetime, then there is always
the possibility of being laid off, once the company
finds someone who has more skills than them
selves. Thus, fearing that others might get ahead,
Chinese employees tend to conceal valuable ideas
and protect skills and know-how they learned as
their personal property. For Japanese, on the
other hand, cooperation within the group is vital
not only for making operations more productive,
but also for increasing future potentials, because
the capacities of managers are often judged ac
cording to their capabilities to train subordinates.
In other words, for Japanese managers, informa
tion sharing and cooperation are important
credits for advancement along one's career path,
because they are employed under the premise oi
lifetime employment. Thus, any behavior that
hinders smooth operations of their firm's business
is considered to be contributing to incompetence
from the Japanese managers' perspective. Thus,
failing to share vital information with others is
naturally considered to be a sign of individualism
and incompentence. The Japanese understanding
of collectism as illustrated above is indeed quite
different from the Chinese mode of thinking in
which the knowledge discovered by oneself is
considered to be one's own personal property and,
therefore, to be kept strictly for the benefit of
oneself. This behavior has nothing to do with
collectism from the Chinese point of view.
The lack of a flow of information resulting from
the unique mode of the Chinese ways of informa
tion sharing seems to be quite annoying for Japa
nese managers who believe that such a behavior
causes the products manufactured in Chinese
factories likely to be less than high-quality rela
tive to those manufactured by their Japanese
counterparts.
C1XJ1 Gap, Part 2, Chinese Collectivism and
Sense of Loyalty from a Japanese Managers'
Perspective
Many Japanese stated during interviews with
the author that most of their Chinese employees
pretended to obey what they were told by the
Japanese superiors, but in actuality they hardly
ever put the directives and instructions they re
ceived into practice. To Japanese managers, it
appeared that Chinese employees in general were
neither loyal to their general managers nor to the
company which they work for. For example, when
the author mentioned to one of the Japanese
managers in Company A that many Chinese had
expressed the desire to contribute to Company A
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Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
during the interview session, he responded with
the following remarks,
"You just mentioned that many Chinese employees statedthat they wanted to contribute to the company, but theyare just saying that because it sounds nice. In reality, atleast from my perspective, none of them act that way. Iguess this is because they want to save face by saying so.That's how the entire Chinese society is structured".
Another Japanese employee at company A agreed
with this statement. He said the following,
"When I asked some of the employees to do certain tasks,they told me that they could do it. But when I asked thema few days later whether or not tasks were done, theysaid, "No." I always got confused because they wouldalways say they could do it regardless of whether or notthey could actually accomplish what was requested".
Such disparities in expectation between Japanese
and Chinese in their work performance may
pertain to the differences in the awareness of
loyalty to their companies. From a Japanese
perspective, core values themselves are based on
loyalty to a company. The example of deep loy
alty for Japanese employees to companies can be
observed from the way by which Japanese manag
ers put the companies orders first. Many of them
said that they were assigned to the Chinese office
on a few weeks notice. Also, they said that one
should never expect Chinese people to be loyal to
their company to the extent of sacrificing their
personal interests or those of their families to the
company as Japanese are doing. They will do so
only when they believe that such actions may
ultimately honor the names of families and blood
lineage, because from a Chinese perspective,
loyalty goes first to the family and lineage group.
The fact that the Japanese manager in Company A
did not believe in the loyalty of Chinese employees
implies that he judged and evaluated the level of
Chinese employees' loyalty based only on his
ethnocentric orientation. This incidence may
illustrate a tendency of Japanese with little or no
understanding of Chinese culture to be ethnocen
tric. This also seemed to imply that the Japanese
managers with little or no understanding of Chi
nese culture were self-centered in evaluating Chi
nese employees and their behaviors. In addition,
Japanese managers' inability to mis understand
Chinese culture often led them to understand
certain behaviors of Chinese employees originat
ing from core values of Chinese culture. Likewise,
for Chinese employees, the deep sense of companyloyalty felt by Japanese managers may be beyond
their imagination; thus, a gap in core values
(C1XJ1 gap) is very likely to prevail.
5) H5: C2 x J2 Gap: Misunderstanding That
Causes a Lack of Trust Between Chinese Employ
ees and Japanese Managers
Considering responses from Chinese employees
and Japanese managers, a fundamental problem
became salient; there exists a lack of trust between
them as a general tendency due to misunderstand
ing of mutual behaviors. Indeed, many Chinese
employees reported that they cannot help but to
believe Japanese managers do not trust their
Chinese employees truly. They further main
tained that the Japanese inability to fully trust
their Chinese partners is leading Japanese to
dominate the decision-making process. The fun
damental reason for distrust lies in the biased way
to interpret the other party's behaviors. Although
the degree of distrust probably varies from com
pany to company, a general trend of a perception
gap due to biased views of other's behaviors seems
to prevail in all companies interviewed for the
present study.
During the course of interviews conducted at
Company A, some practical causes of mutual
distrust were presented as shown below,
"When the Japanese ask us to accomplish certain tasks,they only have 50 percent confidence that we will be ableto accomplish them. So when the Japanese ask us to dosomething, they worry that we might fail. I believe,however, mutual trust between the Japanese and theChinese can be developed only through a certain process.It is natural that the Japanese look at our ability withskepticism in the beginning. If we were truly able toaccomplish what they tell us to do every time, then, theywould eventually trust us. This type of gradual development, I believe is necessary, particularly at a newlyestablished factory like ours. Right now our factory is inthe developing stage. So being a little skeptical of ourability is acceptable." (A, Employee 1)
Then, responding to my question regarding
whether mutual trusts exists between Japanese
and Chinese employees in this workplace,
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mnnmn^mimm 1
"This, I do not know. It seems that the Japanese do not
trust Chinese employees in some aspects. Possibly they donot believe in our ability to do things right. The Japanesemanagers probably do not believe that the Chinese havethe capacity to solve complex problems. One of the reasonsmay be because of their national characteristic of living ina homogeneous society where everybody can do the samework. Another major reason might be that our companystarted just a few years ago; therefore, it is difficult for usto cultivate mutual trust relations. Our company is at astage where mutual trust is not fully developed. Afterworking together for a while, we will get to know eachother. Only then, will we be able to feel mutual trust.Right now we have not earned their trust." (A, Employee4)
Thus, although some Chinese employees felt
there is not enough mutual trust existing in be
tween Japanese managers and the Chinese em
ployees due to different views on work behaviors
of Chinese people, they tended to be optimistic
about the future courses of events, since they
seemed to believe that the both parties would
eventually develop more trusting relations
through conscious endeavors.
Similar results were found through interviews
conducted in Company B. One of the interviewees
confirmed that mutual trust relationships between
Chinese employees and Japanese managers have
been developed and enhanced over the past years of
cooperative efforts.
"In the past, the majority of top managers at Company Bwere native Hong Kong Chinese. But after 1992, thenumber of Hong Kong Chinese working in Shenzhenfactories was reduced and mainland Chinese employeesbegan to take over these positions. So it seems that theintent of the Japanese headquarter is to gradually localizethe factory in Shenzhen. I think it will take five more yearsfor localization. But it is possible" (C, Employee 4).
These comments indicate that the relationship
between the Chinese and the Japanese seems to be
moving in a positive direction as the Chinese
employees were allowed to have more authority
over time. Some Japanese managers in Company
B even seemed eager to learn more about the
Chinese people. However, interestingly, many
Chinese employees who have been working in the
Japanese wholly owned ventures for substantially
longer periods, are not so optimistic about the
development of better relationships between Chi
nese employees and Japanese managers. The
following comment made by a Chinese vice
factory manager in Company C still indicated
there were improvements yet to be made for the
increased trust relationship between Japanese
managers and Chinese people.
"One thing that the Japanese managers should do is tolearn how to trust Chinese managers. By learning how totrust us and delegating more responsibilities to us, we willbe able to develop our talents and, thus, become moreeffective managers. When I talked to Chinese managers inother Japanese companies, they agreed with my ideas.Many believe that Japanese managers do not trust us.They let us do something, but they do not believe in ourabilities. It hurts. I am not the only one who is thinkingthis way. Many friends in other companies believe thatJapanese managers do not trust us. They should let ushave responsibilities and see how we handle the situations.The Japanese are the ones who made the decision to investin China in the first place. But, all employees here areChinese, so unless you understand Chinese people, it isdifficult to manage them. After all, having Chinesemanage Chinese is the most effective way. So, believe in us.If the Japanese can believe in our abilities, we will be ableto contribute."
Conclusions
Interviews conducted with Japanese managers
and Chinese employees working for the five Japa
nese wholly-owned ventures in and around
Shenzhen revealed that there are in fact various
types of gaps between Japanese managers and
Chinese employees in understanding causes and
meanings of behaviors in the work settings. In
order to test the hypotheses for the present study,
interview data were subjected to critical analyses.
Summaries of results are found in Table 3. Find
ings based on interview -surveys seemed to con
firm there exist all types of gaps involving values,
opinions and behaviors between Japanese manag
ers and Chinese employees, affirming the validity
of the stated hypotheses. However, the most
important fact found in this study is that for all of
companies investigated, there exists a fundamen
tal problem which seems to be the root cause of all
other problems. Namely, there exist two different
core values within the single organization. One
core is what Japanese managers embraced re
garding collectivism leading to the loyalty based
on organizational belonging, while another core
value is the one embraced by Chinese regarding
collectivism based on the family and lineage
groups. The analyses of interview data and
Expatriate Managers and Local Employees:
Table 3 A Summary of Research Results
HypothesisJapanese "correct" Japanese view of
IssueChinese view of Chinese "correct"
ways to Respond Chinese attittde Japanese attitude ways to Respond
Hl-.BJxBCGap Treat fellow expatriate No hesitation in treating Japanese Japanese isolate them Treat all workers imparJapanese like a family Chinese like outsiders Isolation selves from Chinese tially as colleagues
H2: BJ x C2 Gap Decisions should be madeAs outsiders, Chinese have
not earned the right toJapanese Only Japanese have rights Decisions should be made
among insiders Dominance to make decisions among those who areIn Decision
Makingqualified by rank
H3: BC x J2 Gap As a part of the collective Chinese are too individual Chinese are too Japanese work very hard Experience is for ownsharing of resource is istic from Japanese per selfish- They work as a team benefit, not the collective's
needed spective. They keep the rather than trying to resource
Chinese do not share know-how only Stand out.
know-how to their fellow to themselves
workers
H4: J2 x C2 Gap As a part of collective, be Even if Chinese verbally Loyalty Japanese are extremely We dedicate ourselves so
ing loyal requires strict express their willingness to diligent and it is some that we can make career
obedience and often self- contribute, they would do thing we should learn advancement to bring ansacrifice nothing actually. from them.
Japanese are sometimes
too emotional about the
organization.
honor for ourselves and
family
H5: C2 x C2 Gap Being trust-worthy re Chinese employees cannot Trust Trnsting Chinese is crucial Trust should be earned
quires dedication, self- be trusted unless they for operating in China. through accumulatedsacrifice and time learn Japanese ways thor Thus Japanese should give achievement of given
oughly Chinese a try. tasks. Thus, it must be
tested first.
various secondary data collected further revealed
that the mode of thinking and values by which
Japanese managers and Chinese employees
judged behaviors of the other party as well as their
own behaviors seemed to originate from these core
values. Results of hypothesis testing involving H3
and H4 as listed in Table 3 are particularly rele
vant to this notion. Summary results shown in
Table 3 seem to further clarify the differences in
motivations and behaviors to respond to various
issues between Japanese and Chinese.
The problem lies with the fact that the exchange
of information regarding these differences rarely
take place, allowing very different values and
ideas ("two-value" situations) to co-exist within
the same organization. This leads both Japanese
managers and Chinese employees to unintention
ally hold onto different expectations regarding
each others. Interview data used to validate hy
pothesis 3 and 4 can be considered as addressing
significant differences in definitions of being
"loyal" and in the meaning of being "coopera
tive". Widening gaps and the inability of both
parties to decipher the differences further
complicate the situations, allowing the feeling of
distrust to emerge. Such distrust continue to swell
to the degree that Japanese would rarely consider
to allow Chinese employees to participate as
members of their collective, not to mention the
possibility of letting Chinese employees join the
decision making processes.
Solutions to the problems mentioned above may
be found in implementation of ideas provided in
hypothesis 6. However, none of the companies
investigated in the present study shop to be suc
cessful in establishing third culture or charismatic
culture. Although it was impossible to verify its
validity, some evidence exists to allow a preview
of what would be to come if H6 were to operate.
At company B, both Japanese expatriates and
local managers and employees have made con
tinuous efforts to educate their employees on
implementing Genba-ism (Seems floor-ism). As
employees explain it, *3G principles' are prevalent
among all organizational ranks at Company B,
emphasizing the importance of constantly check
ing and examining Genba (shop floor), Genjibuts
(On-going Products), and Genjitsu (Real Situa-
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&sffwm^mimm 1 -t
tions) all the times. All employees at Company B
are thoroughly trained to focus their attentions on
if any problem involving 3Gs which occurs. Every
employee, both Japanese expatriates and Chinese
employees indicated how impressed they were
with the effectiveness and efficiency that the imple
mentation of the 3G principles brought. Some of
the employees stated as follows:
The Japanese management process, particularly the 3Gprinciple is extremely practical... The Japanese haveeffective concepts on how to produce products...I havelearned a lot from their production process...the quality isthe prime objective of our company (B, Employee 2)
I was most attracted to Japanese ways of controlling theproduction management process (B, Employee 3).
The Japanese are more prompt in their actions. Using the3G principle, they can quickly solve various problems theyface in production processes. Because of the 3G principle,our factory workers can quickly respond to any defectswhen such things occur. (B, Employees 4)
These are excerpts from comments by three em
ployees, each being a part of significantly differ
ent levels of Company B's hierarchy from the
lowest to the vice factory manager. The fact that
they had training on the 3G principles from the
first day of their employment helped them greatly
in quickly capturing the essence of these principles
and adopting them to get jobs done properly.
Although no conclusive statement can be made
from this example, it may be suffice to say that
there might be a way for Japanese companies
sampled for this study to improve better business
relationships between Japanese expatriate and
local managers and employees, if they further
develop and nurture umbrella values embracing
them together like the 3G principles at Company B
did.
As shown in Figure 3, 3G principles, as a third
corporate culture in this case, could substituted all
core values and assumptions held by Japanese and
Chinese, since neither side initially embraces such
concepts. Repeated training and education could
eventually succeed in eliminating ethnocentric
views of the both sides and allow them to adopt the
third way to prioritize what actions to take, given
the importance of quality products for Company
B. Thus, by providing employees with alternative
values in regard to quality excellence that would
go beyond either Japanese or Chinese ones, both
parties succeeded in using a similar frame of
reference, jargon, and priorities to attack the
same issues and narrow gaps in perceptions
toward each other. In this case, the alternative
values, 3G principles, along with appropriate
behaviors and standards of judgement on quality
issues seemed to have been integrated into the
value systems of both Japanese managers and
Chinese employees at Company B. By using newly
integrated values and trying to put old practices
aside for the sake of quality productions, mem
bers of Company B regardless of ranks or na
tional origins, were able to effectively carry out
various strategies which allow them to detect and
resolve production problems in a swift manner.
However for this study, no evidence was available
whether or not a charismatic leader had actually
been working for generating integrated new values
set, asin the case as Wakabayashi and Graen
(1993) observed in one Japanese venture in the
U.S.A.. Further studies are required to under
stand the emerging process of third culture in
Japanese ventures in China. Nonetheless, as this
case indicates, continuous efforts to fill the gaps
between them by the creation of new values such as
3G principles may be crucial in order for Japanese
wholly owned ventures in China to increase their
efficiency and effectiveness. In this endeavor,
however, the Japanese side alone cannot work by
itself: working things out together through mutual
trust is the one and only way to establish better
and more cooperative business relationships.
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Acknowledgement
This research was made possible by the funding
from David M. Kennedy Center at Brigham Young
University.
The author wishes to thank Mitsuru
Wakabayashi, Graduate School of International
Development at Nagoya University for his con
tinuous encouragement and various suggestions
which contributed substantially in building theo
retical frameworks for this study. Thanks, too, to
Christopher B. Meek, Department of Organiza
tional Strategy and Leadership at Marriott School
of Management at Brigham Young University for
his suggestions and comments while I was con
ducting the field study in the People's Republic of
China.
Correspondence concerning this article should
be addressed to Aki Nakamura at No. 5 Oh-nishi
Apartment, Kiyosumi 17, Chikusa-Ku, Nagoya-
City Nagoya 464-0034. Electronic mail should be
sent to [email protected]
Received May 21, 2001
Accepted June 10, 2001
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Japanese Journal of Administrative ScienceVolume 15, No. 1, 2001, 93 - 107.&^T»*4¥SI15#!& 1 *%, 2001, 93 - 107.
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Comparative Case-Study on the Global Marketing Activitiesof Acer Group in Taiwan and Samsung Electronics Co. in South Korea
Takaharu OKUDA
(Bunkyo University)
This paper analyzes the global marketing activities of electronics industryenterprises in Asian Newly Industrializing Economies (A-NIES), by comparingcase-study of Acer Group in Taiwan and Samsung Electronics in South Korea,both of which have been successfully catching up with Japanese and UScorporations and developing into the global players. The prevalence ofinformation technologies due to the IT revolution has enabled some of theA-NIES' enterprises to react promptly to diversifying and fluctuating consumersdemands in the global market. Acer Group has achieved to establish the flexibleand decentralized marketing model by restructuring its organizations enough tocope with these new demands. Samsung Electronics is seeking to be the biggestDRAM producer in coordination with the trend of establishing worldwidesupply chain among the leading corporations by developing open-architecturedproduction system. Concentrating its management resources on DRAMproduction, Samsung can become one of the most influential enterprises in theglobal semiconductor market. This study shows the importance of corporatereorganization to meet consumers needs and productive specialization. At thesame time, however, both enterprises face some technological or financialdifficulties. They need to renovate their marketing strategies in order to becomemore sophisticated or profitable players in the contemporary global market.
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