Hofstede's Seven Dimensions Of Organizational Culture

Everyone fits to certain groups or categories, and unavoidably we carry various mental programming that are different based on levels of culture such as national level regarding one’s country, regional and ethnic or religious level, genders, social class and generation level play a role in our culture. Moreover, employment and organizational, departmental or corporate level or how employees are categorized by the work organization influences our mental programming. Nevertheless, culture of each level can be in conflict, for instance, religious beliefs could confront with generation ideals. Hence, mental programs or culture of different people might create a disagreement when they try to anticipate in a new situation.

2.1.1. Organizational Culture

System of government, socioeconomic growths convey general and important values to the culture. For instance, democratic societies carry wider range of values and nondemocratic ones have limited set of values. On the other hand, from a research conducted by Trompenaar (1992), from results the researcher formulated seven dimensions of culture. The first one is individualism and collectivism, which is similar to Hofstede’s defiition, another dimension is universalism and particularism. If people believe that something is good and true, it can be applied anywhere, and then the society practice universalism by relying on legal policies and contracts. If society emphasizes more on trust, relationship and actions depend on certain circumstances; the society is based on particularism. Neutral and affective relationships is the third dimension and it describes to which extend the society expresses emotions. For instance, Japanese are neutral societies when emotions are not openly expressed in the public. Another dimension that focuses on relationship is named specific versus diffuse relationships. This dimension shows in which degree people are comfortable with dealing with other people. Silverthorne (2004, pp. 34-37) mentioned that German individuals tend to be in diffuse culture, when a part of their private life is larger than public one, and Germans are more likely to maintain formal relationships. Hence, Germans might perceive Americans as indiscreet when they ask questions that are considered too direct according to Germans. In contrast, Americans might consider Germans as too reserved or hard to get to know. The last dimension achievement versus ascription takes into consideration importance of power and status. For instance, in achievement-oriented