This was an interesting read, written by Dina Denim, and I couldn't help but try and figure out where New Zealand fits in and what would be my cultural baggage?
I had never considered myself having a culture. I am a NZ European, with a little bit of Scottish ancestry, and have always considered those who have a Maori heritage or someone who immigrated here e.g. from Germany or Asia, to be the ones who had a culture. But I guess looking through their eyes, or from the eyes of anyone in a different country, at myself, I probably do have a culture. But I think it would be hard to put New Zealand, as a whole, into one culture because we have become such a multi cultural society that we would work in all different ways probably depending on factors such as who runs the company, who owns the company, what the company is etc. I would like to think that New Zealand is a very adaptable country.
The following is what categories I think New Zealand falls into:-
Environment: Harmony - Harmony cultures believe that people are an integral part of nature, and as such, their actions and thoughts should facilitate harmonious relations with nature and with others.
Time: This one I was unsure of but I would think that we would fall into more of the Polychchronic as Polychronic cultures tend to perform multiple tasks simultaneously with a higher commitment to relationship building than to task completion or meeting deadlines.
Action: This I also found hard as it probably depends on where you live in New Zealand. If you lived somewhere like Auckland or Wellington people may be more Doing as Doing cultures stress achieving goals and improving standards of living. But living in Motueka we tend to be more Being as Being cultures stress their affiliations and personal qualities and greater value is placed on quality of life and relationships than on task accomplishment.
Communication: High Context as High context cultures communicate meaning through words as well as through voice tone, body language, facial expressions, eye contact, speech patterns, use of silence, past interactions, and status and we are good at Saving face and avoiding shame are very important so conflict is dealt with indirectly through a mix of conflict avoidance and third party intervention.
I also think, based on the Maori culture we have, we would also be Formal as Formal cultures value social customs and rituals and respect rules and procedures and formal cultures have a strong sense of history and tradition.
Power: Equality as in my working experience managers are consultant figures more so than authority figures, often seek participative decision making among their employees, and give employees a substantial amount of leeway in implementing plans and performing tasks
Individualism: I found this one hard as New Zealanders seems to pride themselves on being individuals so I would have thought we would fall into the Individualistic culture as Individualistic cultures value individual identity and independence over groups or shared identity but then we also seem to be in the Collectivistic as they tend to conform to group standards, policies, and procedures is expected and motivation is affiliation and security based and relationships are more important than tasks.
Competitiveness: In this one I also think we could fit into both as when it comes to sports we are a very competive country, especially rugby and achievement, performance, and the acquisition of money and material goods are high motivators for us, which would mean we would fit into the Competitive cultures but we also value quality of life, sympathy, nurturing, and relationships like Cooperative cultures.
Structure: I would think we would be more of the Flexible culture as Flexible cultures are more tolerant of ambiguous situations, unknown people, and new ideas. Conflict and change are viewed as natural and inevitable rather than threatening. Although I am not sure that we actually like conflict. I think that conflict is something we try to avoid.
Thinking: I am really not sure where New Zealand fits in here but my guess would be that we are more Inductive as Inductive-oriented cultures prefer to derive principles and theories from amassing facts and analyzing data.
I must express that these are the cultures that I think New Zealand falls into but I would like to challenge you to read the article and debate my findings and tell me what you think?
I have copied and pasted text out of the article fromthe following webite: http://www.tuckerintl.com/general/readings/culturalvalue/CulturalValueP9.html
which was written by Dina Denim
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