Leadership and doing business in Scandinavian countries
1
HRM 5000-8 HR in the Global Environment Week 8 Analyze Personnel Needs to Support Globalization
Efforts
Due to the globalization of business operations, management teams have become very serious in retaining and
promoting the right person for overseas positions. You have just been told to hire a new manager for your
company’s Scandinavian division. Describe in detail the most important skills and qualifications considered
essential for overseas assignments, particularly in these countries. Also explain in detail some of the
challenging issues and prospects of doing business abroad. Hypothesize the most important information you
would be sure to communicate to HR managers as well as the senior leadership team. Provide specific
examples where possible to detail your plan for this initial hiring for the Scandinavian division. Support your
paper with a minimum of five (5) resources, which may include your required text. In addition to these specified
resources, other appropriate scholarly resources, including older articles, may be included.
Introduction:
Human resources and leadership has been a very critical issue when firms expand into other
countries. Understanding the native culture and the very important way of doing business in the
foreign country is very critical for success of the firm in its expansion motives. Leaders and
personnel who are deployed to take care of overseas assignment should not only have the
cultural orientation but should also look at playing the perfect card in terms of accepting the
business conditions of the foreign country in this case Scandinavia. The economies around the
globe are characterized by different cultures and each culture cluster has its own unique set of
ideologies, values, beliefs, thought patterns etc. The individuals in the society acquire these
cultural attributes through the process of socialization and these play a major role in shaping
their behavior and personality as a whole. As companies globalize, the workforce gets diversified
geographically and culturally and managing diversity has always been a challenging issue on

Leadership and doing business in Scandinavian countries
2
account of varied perceptions and ideologies. The problem gets even further accentuated when
the labor laws differ across economies. Hence Leaders who are sent on foreign assignments
need to be very careful about the way they manage cultural differences and understand
multicultural diversity.
Skills needed for doing business in Scandinavia:
1.Understanding the culture:
Scandinavian countries are also called the Nordic countries. The general business environment
in these countries is heavily tilted towards planning; strategy and communication. Personnel who
are in Scandinavian countries need to know the Nordic culture very well in order to successfully
manage business units here. Though the culture of each of the Scandinavian countries are
different, the countries are exposed to being global and focus in common values Their mission
being long term thinking and creation of common good , human resources deployed to work
here need to understand this culture in order to make a successful stint as not only a good leader
but also a good corporate citizen .These cultures are heavily tilted towards innovation and
management styles are very different . In order to be successful in the Scandinavian country the
person who leads the business units needs to understand the five forces of culture interpretation
as discussed by Geert Hofstede. Hofstede cultural dimensions play a very important role in
understanding the implications of doing business in south Africa .The four dimensions of culture
proposed by Hofstede are Power Distance, Collectivism vs. Individualism, Femininity vs.
Masculinity, Uncertainty Avoidance. Hofstede’s dimensions of culture explain structuring
organizations in a different way where people within the organizations have different

Leadership and doing business in Scandinavian countries
3
motivations, and where different issues are being faced within the society by people and
organizations.
Power distance is defined as the degree to which the organizational power of a society or
organization should be distributed unequally or equally and also how the power holders’
decisions should be viewed or accepted.
Collectivism vs. Individualism is defined as the degree to which people or culture which relies to
the self and their immediate families, by remaining independent from groups and organizations.
Femininity vs. Masculinity is defined as the degree which basically refers to expected gender
roles in a culture to which gender roles vary from one society to another, social supports and the
quality of life. Common masculine values include assertiveness, performance, ambition,
achievement, material possessions, and progress whereas Common feminine values include
people and warm relationships, quality of life, sensitivity, nurturance, concern, and modesty.
Uncertainty Avoidance refers to the extent to which members of a culture feel uncomfortable by
dealing with uncertain situations trying to avoid them by establishing more structure. These
cultures prefer to avoid uncertainty as a cultural value and desire consensus.
In order to retain and hire good mangers for leading a business unit in a Scandinavian country it
is very important to look at these dimensions very carefully so that performing the very sensitive
task of leading successfully can be ascribed to an organization .
2. Managing differently:
Management in most of Scandinavian countries is a role paradigm different from other countries.
The leader who is deployed to take care of the Scandinavian branch should understand that the
workers have to be consulted. The workers are said to be much disciplined, very hardworking
and take initiative for collective good. The leader should be not only participative but tap the

HRM 5000-8 HR in the Global Environment Week 8 Analyze Personnel Needs to Support Globalization Efforts

Study Now!

Document Details

Related Documents

Unit VII Case Study Sleeping on the Job

Parks Corporate Video

HUMAN RESOURCE GROUP CASE ANALYSIS 1

Walmart HRM Practices Assignment

Compensation analysis for HR managers

Walmart Human Resource Practices

Personal Leadership Ethics Statement

Motivating Employees � Case Analysis

Assignment 3 Performance Management

Cultural Diversity Training Course

Company

Explore

Study Tools