Culturally Savvy Leaders
Boost Strategy Implementation
Business culture is a reflection of societal culture. Understanding its complexity is essential for those leading diverse, multicultural groups and implementing strategic change.
Societal
culture and its complexities and sensitivities are directly reflected
in employee behaviour in organisations. Successful implementation of
corporate and branding strategies requires a complete on-boarding of
the individuals within an organisation who would be driving this
change in a culturally sensitive manner.
In
Asia, a region typified as a melting pot of cultures and
sub-cultures, implementing an effective strategic change within an
organisation requires an in-depth understanding of the prevailing
culture.
Earlier
I talked about how boards should influence and implement a culture of
branding in organisations. One of the key success factors behind an
efficient and competitive brand strategy is the involvement and
training of every individual in the organisation in the branding
process. This is where the understanding can be achieved, but also
where complexity and the nature of the organisational culture start
playing a crucial role.
Organisations as cultural mirrors
Asian
organisations, historically and even today, are characterised
primarily by strong hierarchical structures. This in turn leads to a
very linear form of decision-making and influencing. But, the concept
of collectivism is also important. This is reflected in the
phenomenon of placing more importance on the connections people have
with other people around them. The combination of both these aspects
leads to an environment where disseminating and implementing change
becomes challenging.
The
uniqueness and also the relative commonality of Asian cultures around
themes of prestige, status and power are reflected within
organisational structures too. The hierarchical decision-making
structures in Asian organisations can be directly linked to
Hofstede’s concept of “power distance”. In short, cultures with
high power distance believe that more powerful people must be
deferred to and not argued with. China has a high power distance
level of 80, compared to 60 for some South East Asian countries and
the world average of 55.
In
addition to the cultural factors that inhibit change, it is also
important to keep in mind that many successful Asian organisations
initially started off as family-owned businesses. Although there has
been an evolution in the mindset of running family-owned
organisations in Asia, it is still a long journey before there is a
complete overhaul of the thinking towards change management and
strategy implementation. Younger generations at the helm of these
kinds of businesses are doing better in terms of bringing in fresh
perspectives, fresh thinking and new visions for future growth.
Understand
culture for effective change
To
ensure the success of a corporate or branding strategy in Asian
organisations, it is imperative that the organisational culture is
deeply understood, assessed and integrated into the implementation
plan for the strategy. Some key factors to be mindful of are:
Organisational
structure:
This
should include a mapping of the structure at a global, regional and
country level. The drill-down is important because structures at
individual country levels can significantly impact the effectiveness
and implementation of strategy.
Careful
selection of those responsible for implementation:
Corporate
culture in Asia still endows a high level of importance to the
individual stature and position of individuals responsible for
driving change in an organisation. Thereby, it is critical that
boards select individuals within the organisation who have the
visibility, personality, command and respect of employees across the
region. Hierarchical decision-making increases the importance of
power by multiple times, so it is important that the individuals
selected have a reasonably senior position in the management and
leadership teams.
Communicate
with care:
Asian
cultures are primarily collectivist, conversationalist and
shared-valued driven. These aspects are prevalent and strongly
visible within organisations. Elements of the communication programme
to be utilised for informing and educating employees about a
strategic change should be carefully selected and drafted. This
essentially means using formal forms of communication that have
clarity, have objectives, can touch the emotional bonds that
employees have with the organisation and can reinforce the importance
of their participation in the process.
Local
belief systems:
It
is not uncommon for local business units of regional and global
organisations to operate with separate business objectives, policy
and future targets. Some organisations deliberately allow this to
happen and for some organisations this happens due to poor control
over local market operations. So, when an organisational level
strategy is being implemented, it is important to assess and measure
how the strategy is going to impact a specific country operation.
This is where a “bottoms-up” approach is required while drafting
the strategy. In short, a situation where a local market completely
ignores a strategic plan because their considerations were not taken
on board needs to be avoided.
Step-by-step
implementation:
Any
form of strategy implementation takes time and patience. In Asia, it
may take longer because of all the factors discussed earlier. So, it
is vital that the implementation plan is pursued with discipline and
with focus. Again, the importance of keeping the key individuals
invigorated and driven throughout the process is critical.
Conclusion
It
is only through a rigorous process of understanding and respecting
organisational cultures, that strategic change can be implemented
successfully in places like Asia. Expanding globally and exposure to
Western management styles and organisational structures is opening up
Asian thinking but the influence of culture in organisational
decision-making will continue to be a critical factor.
Martin Roll, Business and Brand Strategist, Founder of Martin Roll Company (INSEAD MBA ‘99D) http://knowledge.insead.edu/blog/insead-blog/culturally-savvy-leaders-boost-strategy-implementation-3695#swelbOKJMDZJa0Zf.99
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