Similarly, C-G grew up in the Swiss-German context and reflected many of the deep values and assumptions of that part of Switzerland: respect for authority, strong sense of responsibility and obligation to others who know more, loyalty to country and company, and individual autonomy (but combined with a deep belief in collaboration and teamwork). This belief in collaboration was revealed when I was helping to design a workshop for C-G managers and proposed the “NASA Moon Survival” exercise because it shows how much better a group can reason than even the most knowledgeable individual. My Swiss counterpart wondered why I had bothered to suggest this, since most Swiss would take that conclusion for granted. In their view, it was only Americans who needed to learn the lesson that group results can be better than even the best individual results.

To examine the implications (for organizations) of such national culture differences, it is helpful to use some of the dimensions used by anthropologists for comparing cultures.¹ These deeper dimensions are also reflected in the artifacts you observe in organizations, but they are sometimes not reflected in the espoused values. For example, a company espousing teamwork does not necessarily operate from a deep assumption that teams are better. In fact, the irony is that you often find that the espoused values reflect the areas in which the organization is particularly ineffective because it operates from contradictory tacit assumptions.

To get at the tacit assumptions at this level, you must see where the artifacts and values do not mesh and ask the deeper question of what is driving or determining the observed artifacts and daily behavior. For example, in the organization that espouses teamwork, if all of the incentive, reward, and control systems are based on individual accountability, then you can safely identify an operative tacit assumption that the individual really counts, not the team. In organizations that espouse employee empowerment and involvement, you sometimes discover that management assumes it has the right and obligation to issue commands as needed, to own all the financial information, to make all the decisions that affect the company, and to treat the employees as a replaceable resource. It is then no surprise to discover that the involvement programs are not working well in such an organization. Organizations that claim to be totally customer-oriented are sometimes found to develop marketing programs that border on lying and are willing to sell customers things that they don’t need because of a deeper assumption that only the owner-shareholder interests should drive financial decisions, based on a deep assumption about the nature of capitalism. These deeper assumptions are often difficult to decipher, yet they are the real drivers of how the culture works at the operational level.

In the organizational arena, these assumptions have their counterpart in that some organizations assume they will take a dominant market position and “define” the market, while others seek a niche and try to fit into it as best they can. Since business philosophy globally is to a large degree a reflection of modern Western society, the assumption has also grown up that it is advantageous to have a dominant position. There is research evidence supporting dominance assumptions, but this does not change the reality that in some other societies the so-called “correct” way to define a business is to find a niche and blend in.

On the other hand, managers who believed that employees could and would link their own goals to those of the organization would delegate more, function more as teachers and coaches, and help employees develop incentives and controls that they themselves would monitor. McGregor observed that Theory Y managers were more effective because they would bring out more motivation and creativity in employees, while, at the same time, having the flexibility to be autocratic and controlling if the task required it or they encountered employees who indeed could not be trusted. But again we must be cautious and note that not only may different cultural assumptions be appropriate to different kinds of tasks and circumstances, but also that overt managerial style may vary independent of whether the manager is Theory X or Theory Y. For example, there are numerous stories of American managers having trouble in French companies if they do not assert their authority forcefully at the outset. What an American employee might resent a French employee might expect.

A further important variation among cultures is the degree to which it is assumed that human nature is fixed or malleable. In most Western cultures, especially the United States, we endorse the view that we can be whatever we choose to be, as illustrated by the thousands of How to Improve Your . . . books that proliferate in airport bookstalls. In other cultures it is believed that human nature is fixed and that one must adapt as best one can to what one is.

Organizations mirror this dimension in the extent to which they emphasize company loyalty and commitment versus individual freedom and autonomy. In strongly paternalistic companies such as C-G, it was expected that the company would take care of you and in return you would be loyal to the company and make sacrifices when necessary. On the other hand, at Apple and in many other Silicon Valley companies the assumption evolved that the company does not guarantee employment security and does not expect the employee to be loyal. Hewlett-Packard stands out in sharp contrast in having from the beginning espoused and practiced a more groupist paternalistic philosophy, symbolized most clearly by the 1970s incident in which everyone took a pay cut instead of laying people off. At the same time, in many of its work domains the individualistic assumption dominates, in that rewards, incentive, and controls are all based on individual performance.

If one looks at U.S. organizations in general, the clearest indicator of individualism is the sacred cow of individual accountability. No matter how much teamwork is touted in theory, it does not exist in practice until accountability itself is assigned to the whole team and until group pay and reward systems are instituted.

But not all cultures are pragmatic in this sense. In many cultures, traditions, moral principles, religious doctrines, and other sources of ultimate authority define more clearly what is to be regarded as real and true. As we all know, even in Western society there are many arenas in which we take religious and moral authority to be more real than pragmatic experience. DEC reflected the ultimately pragmatic assumptions: everything had to be fought out, and only ideas that survived the debate could be true enough to be worthy of testing. The pragmatic test was further illustrated by DEC’s willingness to support parallel competing projects and to “let the market decide.” When DEC went into the personal computer market, it launched three different versions, but none of them survived. C-G, on the other hand, took it for granted that, since its evolution was based on chemistry and research, those with education and experience in this arena were qualified to define what was true. Whereas at DEC every idea was battled out—even if it came from founder Olsen or technical guru Gordon Bell—at C-G if a high-status senior researcher with a Ph.D. proposed an idea, then it was likely to be accepted.

Moral or religious principles come to dominate business decisions in some organizations, such as when, “on principle,” a company refuses to go into debt or when personnel policies are governed by religious or moral principles. Thus in one organization lying is accepted as an inevitable consequence of politics, but in another organization the same behavior is severely punished on moral grounds. In a highly moralistic society, reality is often defined by the common moral code, whereas in a highly pragmatic society one ends up with some equivalent of the rule of law. In other words, the more pragmatic the society, the more common law and historical precedent come to be the court of last resort for conflict-resolution and for determining what is true, what really happened, or what should be done next.

In this cultural domain it is also useful to differentiate two classes of knowledge. Science and pragmatism work best in the realm of physical reality, defined by whether or not an assertion can be immediately tested. If I believe that this glass table will break if someone sits on it, that is testable. Science and pragmatism work less well in the realm of social reality, where immediate tests are not available. If I believe that glass tables are more attractive than wooden tables, this is not physically testable. It is in this realm that we rely more on consensus, on moral authority, and on conflict resolution mechanism such as the law. And it is in this realm that culture plays a bigger role in that a history of consensus on an issue makes group members feel that something is valid and true if it has worked in the past.

Between physical and social reality there are many gray areas in which we rely on a mixture of experience and moral or even physical authority. In most organizations their strategy, their means of implementing it, and even their measurement mechanisms are based on judgment and past experience rather than on scientific evidence. In the realm of economics and finance, there are broad principles that have research backing, but such principles rarely tell an organization whether a given strategy will, in fact, work or not. It is for this reason that we must recognize that culture heavily influences the fundamental mission and strategy by which an organization operates.

Time can also be viewed as more cyclical and as a resource in which it is possible to do several things at once—what Hall called “polychronic time.” When a doctor or dentist simultaneously processes several patients who are sitting in adjacent offices or when a senior person or parent “holds court” and is able to process the needs of several subordinates or children simultaneously, he or she is using polychronic time.⁴

Organizations differ in the meaning they attach to being on time or late. In Latin countries, being late might be regarded as fashionable and appropriate, while in northern European countries it is regarded as insulting. Arriving at work early and leaving late can have different symbolic meaning in different contexts; it could be taken as high commitment or as inability to be efficient. In the organizational context, an important dimension of time is whether it is viewed as controllable or not. Planning time as used by most managers assumes that one can speed things up or slow them down according to the needs of the moment. If something needs to be done soon, we “work around the clock” to meet the deadline. On the other hand, the R&D department is more likely to be working on “development time,” especially in the field of biotech, implying that the development of certain processes cannot be speeded up.⁵ The planner may want the baby in five months, but the developer says, “Sorry, it will take nine months.” In some occupations, schedules and time planning are critical to meet windows of opportunity or to facilitate coordination. But in other occupations, such as biology or chemistry, time is measured more by how long things take.

Cultures and organizations differ in whether they live in the past, present, near future, or far future. Some organizations do their planning entirely in terms of their past history of success and failure, while others are highly tuned into the present opportunities and hazards, while still others think about the near or far future in deciding what to do next. Organizations also differ in what kinds of units of time are used for monitoring and assessment, or what Elliott Jaques called “discretionary time units”—the length of time an employee is left alone without being monitored.⁶ Production workers might be monitored hourly or daily, supervisors daily or weekly, middle managers monthly, and senior managers and board members only annually.

Finally, time is the key to teamwork and coordination. When individual employees or organizational units are sequentially or simultaneously interdependent, the success of the outcome depends very much on the degree to which they “synchronize their watches” and work at the same pace. Cultures and tasks vary in the temporal latitude that is granted. For example, Swiss trains are notorious for leaving on time and only staying in the station a certain length of time, no matter how many people are still hurrying to get to the train.

In summary, the key point is that if people have different assumptions about how time works there is a high probability that they will offend each other, make each other anxious, and precipitate task failures where coordination was required.

The normal distance that people stand apart from each other symbolizes the formality of the relationship: the closer, the more the implication of intimacy. If someone with whom we do not feel intimate stands too close, we find ourselves being uncomfortable and backing up; if someone lets us move in more closely, we interpret it as willingness to become more intimate (as when we literally whisper secrets into someone’s ear at very close range). Cultures differ in what is regarded as the normal distance for an ordinary conversation. When two people who have different assumptions about this distance try to converse, one will feel that his private space is being intruded into and will back up to normalize the distance, but the other person will move forward to normalize the distance from his or her point of view, leading to an uncomfortable ritual dance with neither party knowing exactly why he or she is uncomfortable. And worse, one will say that the other one is too aloof, while the other one will say that the first one is too pushy.

Assumptions about space reflect assumptions about individualism versus groupism. In Western individualistic society, we assume that the space in front of us is our own and we don’t like it when someone steps in front of us or is in our lane when we are walking (or driving). This feeling is often expressed as discomfort when someone is “in our face” and is rigidly enforced when we get into lines. If we have to move, we ask someone to “hold our place” and, if possible, we minimize physical contact. In societies that are more groupist, members learn early in life that space is shared and one must accommodate to other people, objects, vehicles, and animals. Waiting lines break down into loose conglomerations in which everyone jockeys for position and the inevitable physical contact is ignored as being impersonal and normal.

Where we place offices and desks symbolizes status and rank. Usually the higher the rank, the higher up in the building the office is located and the more it is surrounded by physical barriers to ensure privacy. The location and size of offices as well as the furnishings are in many organizations directly correlated with rank. We joke about status symbols such as wall-to-wall carpeting or having a window overlooking a nice view, but these jokes reflect serious cultural assumptions about the meaning of physical things in the environment.

On a more mundane level organizational culture elements evolve around things that are out of control in the daily work life. For example, in a study of the adoption of computerized tomography in several clinics, Steve Barley observed that operators developed what amounted to superstitious behavior whenever the computer went down.⁷ The rule was to call the engineer, but while waiting for him or her, the operators would try all sorts of things—even kicking the machine. As was typical in this technology, the computer would sometimes come back on, leading the technician to write down exactly what had been done just before the computer restarted. When the engineer arrived, the tech was told in no uncertain terms that he or she should have left things alone and that, in any case, what he or she did could not possibly have had anything to do with the restarting. Nevertheless the little notebooks of what techs did would be solemnly passed to new techs with the instructions: “When the computer goes down, you might try this . . . .”

As I have watched decision making at high levels in organizations, especially in the realm of marketing and finance, it often seems that the final decision is based on little more than experience, faith, and hope.

The question then arises, why do you need to analyze and assess culture in the first place? This is an important question not to be taken lightly. Understanding your culture is not automatically valuable, just as understanding your personality is not automatically valuable. It only becomes valuable and necessary if such understanding enables you to solve a problem, to make a change, to learn something new. Then you need to know how your culture would aid or hinder you, and then you need to assess some of the many dimensions that have been reviewed above. If things don’t go right, if your organization is not achieving goals, or if you think you can do better, then you do need to get in touch with the deeper cultural assumptions that are driving you.

In the next chapter we will examine: When and how do we assess culture? Can one determine culture with a well-designed questionnaire? And, if not, what practical alternatives are there?