Examples Of Long Term Orientation

by: Chris Smit - December 11th, 2012   Add Comment

tamagotchiMy previous post on the cultural dimension Long Term Orientation had a lot of comments. Mainly on Social media. Since the concept of this dimension is often quite confusing for Westerns, I’d like to share a couple of examples of Long Term Orientation in this article.

Coming Up With Examples Of Long Term Orientation Is Difficult

Why is this so? In the discussions going on, on different Social Media Platforms, there were a lot of comments about the US being long term oriented (which they are not, compared to Indians, Chinese, Japanese etc; All of the discussion were from the US).

The Anglo Saxon reaction is typical for low scoring countries like the US (in other words being short term oriented): wanting to get to the “absolute answer” of this discussion. Read More

What Is Long Term Orientation?

by: Chris Smit - December 3rd, 2012   5 Comments

Lets start with a definition of Long Term Orientation, so we’re all on the same page:

“A national culture attribute that emphasises the future, thrift and persistence.”

It’s likely that you can find more definition, but this one makes sense and is compact. The way this definition is phrased is from a relative high score on this dimension.

Why Is LTO So Difficult To Understand?

During a cultural awareness training, I hardly ever go over this dimension. Read More

International Management and Managing Expectations

by: Chris Smit - April 17th, 2012   Add Comment

What is International Management?International Management and Managing Expectations

Checking the online encyclopedia Wikipedia does not give an answer (the page does not exist!). Still in Cultural Awareness Training, it is a real important issue. How do you manage internationally and/or how do you manage expectations of other people when working Internationally? Read More

Why are men better than women?

by: Chris Smit - September 24th, 2011   Add Comment
Why men are better than women

This is of course not the opinion of the writer.

So, let me be more specific and approach this title from an cultural perspective

In certain countries people prefer to have a son over a daughter. In two of these countries, India & China, the men out-number the women by 12 to 15 percent. These figures come from the magazine Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The authors are, Therese Hesketh (University College, London) and Zhu Wei Xing (Zhejiang University China).

Selective abortion and negelect of young girls have led to these figures, according to the above mentioned study.

However, this is nothing new. Throughout the centuries boys have always been preferred over girls.

Read More

Diamonds are for the… Chinese!

by: Chris Smit - September 3rd, 2009   Add Comment
Diamonds for the Chinese

Amsterdam (NL) has been known as the Diamond capital of the world.

Well, at least it used to be an important trading center for diamonds. Until a couple of years back. The market slumped: fewer and fewer people bought.

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BUSH in BEJING Political Rhetoric and Cultural Muscle-Flexing

by: Chris Smit - April 24th, 2009   Add Comment
Olympic rings

Along the way to Beijing to attend the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony this past week, President Bush made a stop in Bangkok.

His purpose was to commemorate the 175th anniversary of the alliance between Thailand (Siam when the alliance was formed) and the United States.

In his Bangkok address, Bush paid allegiance to Thailand as a significant leader in Asia and applauded the Thai government for the restoration of democracy for its citizens as well as being one of the driving forces that has helped to transform post-WWII Asia into a thriving and dynamic region.

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Trouble in Tibet

by: Chris Smit - April 24th, 2009   Add Comment
Trouble in Tibet

There is trouble in Tibet. Or rather, there was trouble in Tibet. The protesters have surrendered as per this writing date.
The Chinese authorities, once again, used force to crush this opposition.

Why is the Western world so concerned about this? Why does the Chinese government use crude power to end opposition?
I’ll attempt to explain this from a cultural perspective, using Hofstede’s 5D-model of cultural dimensions.

First some numbers; China scores high on power distance (hierarchy): 80; in comparison UK/US score 35/40, so significantly lower. A characteristic of power distance is, when it comes to change: “evolution (low score) versus revolution (high score)”.

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