New Tech Old Habits Despite

New Tech Old Habits

Despite the fact that the current global business environment implies an interconnected world and one where cultural differences occasionally disappear in favor of a common organizational culture, different management schools still imply wide differences in perceptions at the workplace, in the way employees are motivated and evaluated and in the general approach towards productivity. The classic example of work cultural differences is that between the U.S. And the Japanese models.

One of the foremost differences between the two models remains the way that employees are evaluated in the workplace. According to the Japanese work culture, evaluation is done according to time spent in the office, whether the respective employee is engaged in some producing activity or not. A direct impact of this fact is that flexibility is limited and that labor and administrative costs rise due to the related expenses of having the employee physically in the office.

In the U.S. culture, evaluation is done depending on the task completed and whether this was done or not. The actual location of the employee is irrelevant, which greatly increases the flexibility that American companies provide for their employees, allowing telecommuting, as well as part-time work from other locations, including from the employee's home. Costs tend to be diminished because of such flexibility. At the same time, it also increases one's loyalty towards a company, because the employee can accommodate more into his or her life due to this flexibility.

It is difficult to statistically evaluate how this impacts productivity, but the general logical conclusion would be that this increases with the American model. Employees will not necessarily work better and be more productive because they are in an environment where they can be supervised. Most likely, the fact that they are task-employed will motivate them to complete those tasks faster and more efficient in order to be able to move to the next ones, as well as so they can be positively evaluated by company management.

Another important element that may tend to favor productivity in a U.S. work culture as compared to the Japanese one is the hierarchical structure that is a distinct characteristic of the Japanese work culture. All business cultures include a hierarchical approach within the organizations, however, in the case of Japanese companies, this usually tends to influence human resource management and policies in this area, as well as issues related to motivating the personnel and feedback and control mechanisms. In the Japanese work culture, people tend to move ahead based on their time with the company rather than strictly related to their performance within the organization. With the American work culture, promotion is correlated to the employee's productivity and the value added he can bring to the company.