OLEAD 410: Leadership in a Global Context

Cultural Leadership blog

The Cold War Connection of ‘The Americans’

by 3 Comments

The Cold War was a fascinating time in history because it pitted the superpowers of the United States and other allied nations against those of the Soviet Union and other communist countries. The governments spent decades trying to outdo one another regarding foreign policies, military force, science, and space. Although this is a straightforward explanation of the war’s impact, the Editors of History.com explain that after World War II, there was such a hostile atmosphere that no one nation was to blame and that even historians believe the period was inevitable (2009). It’s no wonder that television producers thought to create a dramatic program that fictionally focused on two Russian spies and their time in the United States. They completed dangerous assignments for their native country Russia. “The Americans” television program uses a mix of factual and fictional events to depict The Cold War connections between the superpower nations of that time.

 

“The Americans” was a period spy drama that focused on the later years of The Cold War, with Ronald Regan being President in the United States and Mikhail Gorbachev being part of the leadership of the Soviet Union for a large portion of the series. Although the show is fictional, it does provide some context on the misconceptions of the power dynamics between the United States and the U.S.S.R. As Edward Cohn explained in his The Washington Post article “What ‘The Americans’ gets wrong about the Cold War” “the show’s representation of Soviet espionage promotes a distinctly conservative narrative of the Cold War – one in which the Russian enemy is truly the “Evil Empire” engaged in the sabotage of American institutions” (2019). This is an interesting summation because it almost entirely ignores Hofstede’s cultural dynamics about both nations. (Although it should be noted that since the U.S.S.R no longer exist, this comparison is solely based on Russia and the United States).

 

According to Hofstede, “a high score in the masculine dimension indicates that the society will be driven by competition, achievement, and success, with success being defined by the winner/best in field” (2020). By comparing the U.S. and Russia, the U.S. outranks Russia 62 to 36. In this case, Russia’s low score pegs them as a more feminine society that does not want its members to stand out too much and expects that their achievements will be modest. Although this point can be debated, it can also be thought that the primary goals and values within Russian culture are for certain people to win big. At the same time, the majority of society is expected to be successful within their ranks. The higher score received by the United States determines that the U.S. is more concerned with any individual securing a win. This also relates to the power distance and individualism comparisons of the nations. While Russia has a higher power distance that distinguishes the country as one where few have power over the many, the United States considers itself more individualist. These themes repeat themselves on “The Americans” because time and time again, the audience witnesses how the show’s protagonists expect modest lives for themselves and consider their superiors as status symbols that do not necessarily have to categorize themselves with other Russians. Despite these cultural differences, the Cold War depiction in “The Americans” reveals that both the U.S. and the U.S.S.R were determined in their evolvement to advance their nations.

 

As Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) explain, “the U.S.S.R. did survive World War II, becoming a superpower that achieved some impressive accomplishments” (p. 494). The same occurred in the U.S. Both nations implemented and developed rigorous space programs. The editors of History.com state that the Soviets launched the world’s first artificial satellite, while the U.S. also did the same and created NASA.  Also, the nations made accomplishments in healthcare, education, and other innovations. “The Americans” details all of this through a lens that is critical of both the Cold War and the actions of spies and government operatives.

 

Despite the cultural differences, the Cold War did come to an end in the early 1990s. Through various actions, the nations’ leaders eventually secured their administrations’ necessary support to bring the hostile actions of their countries to a stop. For “The Americans,” this meant getting caught and having to return home to a country that was all but foreign. In his article “Peace, Yes, but World Freedom as Well”: Principle, Pragmatism, and the End of the Cold War, Travis Cram suggests that President Ronald Reagan used his skills, diligence, and the rhetorical context of the situation to manipulate the war to a close. Although this generalizes the role that the President played, by analyzing Hofstede’s cultural country comparisons, can anyone doubt that the United States’ masculinity and individualism would lead to the end of a hostile political rivalry?

 

 

References:

Cohn, E. (2019, April 01). Perspective | What ‘The Americans’ gets wrong about the Cold War. Retrieved November 20, 2020, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2018/03/28/what-the-americans-gets-wrong-about-the-cold-war/

Compare countries. (2020, June 08). Retrieved November 21, 2020, from https://www.hofstede-insights.com/product/compare-countries/

Cram, T. J. (2015). “Peace, Yes, but World Freedom as Well”: Principle, Pragmatism, and the End of the Cold War. Western Journal of Communication, 79(3), 367–386. https://doi-org.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/10.1080/10570314.2015.1035747

History.com Editors. (2009, October 27). Cold War History. Retrieved November 22, 2020, from https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/cold-war-history

Moran, R. T., Abramson, N. R., & Moran, S. V. (2014). Managing cultural differences. Abingdon:   Routledge.

Pennsylvania State University (2020). Lesson 13: Eastern Europe and Russia. OLEAD 410: Leadership in     Global Context. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2075490/modules/items/29697221

The Value of Corporate Social Responsibility in Mexico

by 2 Comments

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) creates international initiatives for organizations through today’s business world’s global nature. At most organizations, company operations function on a scope that affects an organizations’ internal and external stakeholders. As Treviño & Nelson (2017) explain in their text Managing Business Ethics “in today’s highly interconnected global and transparent world, corporations are finding that social responsibility is essential to fundamental business strategy” (p. 326). Although a country’s culture shapes and influences the extent to which CSR is implemented and applied, CSR is a staple value at organizations throughout Mexico. Jeanne Logsdon, Douglas Thomas, and Harry Van Buren explain in their article “Corporate Social Responsibility in Large Mexican Firms” that “corporate citizenship in Mexican firms has distinctive attributes that arise from Mexico’s history, culture, and values” (p. 54). CSR plays a vital role in Mexico as Mexican firms and organizations are dedicated to demonstrating to their stakeholders that their relationships with the global economy are important and valued.

 

CSR has developed into an expectation for organization stakeholders because, through CSR practices, an organization demonstrates its economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities (Treviño & Nelson, 2017, p. 334). These responsibilities are respected and valued by stakeholders because they know that society can be severely affected by a company’s lack of CSR. Mexico has developed from its colonization in the 1500s through the Catholic Church’s influences and the advancement of both government democracies and private-sector business. By opening its borders to trade and other investments, organizations in Mexico have aggressively participated in the global economy since the 1980s (Logsdon et. all, 2006, p. 53). Treviño & Nelson (2017) state that “the stakeholder view provides a particular lens on the firm,” and that perception guides organizations to actively involve themselves in marketing and communicating how their business efforts support more than just profits. Karen Becker-Olsen, Charles Taylor, Ronald Hill, and Goksel Yalcinkaya describe in their article “A Cross-Cultural Examination of Corporate Social Responsibility Marketing Communications in Mexico and the United States: Strategies for Global Brands” that “Mexican consumers are responding positively to CSR efforts and that they are interested in having private enterprises support social programs” (p. 32). CSR provides value throughout Mexico because of its ability to satisfy Mexican communities’ needs and provide resources in areas of Mexico that are underdeveloped.

 

CSR practices in Mexico have not gone unnoticed by organizations that assess and evaluate the extent to which corporations’ actions have affected their communities. Logsdon et. all (2006) explain that “in Mexico corporations are literally treated by Mexican society as real citizens—with concomitant responsibilities that are more compulsory than voluntary in nature” (p. 54). Mexican culture expects organizations to play an active role that benefits society and does more than exists and make money. As the Lesson 9 Module explains, “the cultural norm in Mexico is to accept an unequal distribution of power,” and that custom requires organizations to accept the imbalance of power and provide CSR services to the country (2020). For those reasons, organizations such as the Mexican Center for Philanthropy and the Alliance for Corporate Social Responsibility honor companies with the ESR award (Socially Responsible Enterprise) when they exhibit exemplary social responsibility (Logsdon, et. All, 2006, p. 55). Companies such as Hewlett Packard Mexico, Deloitte Mexico, Shell Mexico, Inmobiliaria Parque Reforma, Grupo Bimbo, and Hipotecaria Credito y Casa have all received the ESR award on multiple occasions (Logsdon et. All, 2006, p. 55). These organizations have demonstrated a “fundamental social vision in both policies and programs that allows them to go beyond their legal obligations…achieving success in their businesses while at the same time having a positive impact on the communities in which they operate” (Logsdon et. All, 2006, p. 55). By annually recognizing organizations that surpass their CSR expectations, the ESR award drives organizations to be ambitious in their motives to use their influence and authority.

Becker-Olsen, et. all (2011) believe that “because of the political and economic climate in Mexico and other less developed countries, it is plausible that there are more opportunities for firms to engage in CSR programs that have an impact on the community” (p. 32). Since Mexico has more of a collectivist culture, Mexican society’s expectations promote ideas of socialism and working together. As the Lesson 9 Module states, “Mexicans prefer to work more in groups for the benefit of everyone rather than for each person to make his or her own way” (2020). Therefore, organizations that implement, develop, and cultivate CSR practices are likely to be amenable in Mexico because their culture encourages collective actions that support the community. Treviño & Nelson (2017) state that “business must use its power responsibly in society or risk losing it, (p. 327). In Mexico, where the balance of power is expected to be unequal, corporations are up against stricter standards for demonstrating to stakeholders that they want their organizations’ practices to sustain, benefit, and value the communities that they serve.

 

References:

Becker-Olsen, K., Taylor, C., Hill, R., & Yalcinkaya, G. (2011). A Cross-Cultural Examination

of Corporate Social Responsibility Marketing Communications in Mexico and the United States: Strategies for Global Brands. Journal of International Marketing, 19(2), 30-44. Retrieved            November 2, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/41304393

Logsdon, J., Thomas, D., & Van Buren, H. (2006). Corporate Social Responsibility in Large

Mexican Firms. The Journal of Corporate Citizenship, (21), 51-60. Retrieved November 2, 2020,    from http://www.jstor.org/stable/jcorpciti.21.51

Pennsylvania State University (2020). Lesson 09: Central America and Mexico. OLEAD 410: Leadership in Global Context. Retrieved from

https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2075490/modules/items/29697196

Treviño, L. K., & Nelson, K. A. (2017). Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do it right. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

A New Global Team

by 3 Comments

I used to be the admin for an IT Department based at a New York City non-profit. Most of the department had been with the organization for well over ten years when I joined in 2010. The department had a great dynamic because most of its members had known one another for so long. There were even members who were brought into the organization by a friend or an associate. Together, the department created a team. The Lesson 6 Module explains that “a team has a mission or goal to achieve, and all members of the team are involved in the process of achieving that goal,” and that could not have been truer for the IT team (2020). We all worked individually and together to achieve the organization’s goals and the goals of our department. Everyone understood what was expected of them and completed the tasks and assignments of their role. As the Lesson 6 Module states, “teamwork is the process of achieving the team’s mission,” and the department consistently demonstrated its success with teamwork (2020).

Our team had synergy. Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) define synergy as “a cooperative or combined action, and occurs when diverse or disparate individuals or groups collaborate for a common cause” (p. 266). The IT team was diverse because it included people of different genders, cultures, races, ages, attitudes, and beliefs. The team managed to have both surface-level and deep-level diversity within its ranks. The team also collaborated frequently on projects, tasks, and assignments that advanced the team’s mission and corresponded to the organization’s mission. The team’s dynamic was great because the group had cohesion and regularly exceeded the outlined goals. However, the team’s synergy came to a sudden halt when it was announced that certain IT support aspects were transferred to an outsourcing vendor.

The initial announcement that the IT team was going to be divided was not met with full support. Not only was the team going to have to incorporate new members, but those members were also going to be located overseas. Additionally, some current members would be transitioned to new roles at the organization. Although Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) explain that “the differences in the world’s people can lead to mutual growth and accomplishment that is more than the single contribution of each party,” it was hard to understand how the team was going to reach new achievements when it had been split apart and given new group members (p. 266). The Lesson 6 Module describes that “typically when we work with someone new we get frustrated, not because that person doesn’t know the job, but because that person isn’t a true member of the team yet,” and that is how the IT team felt about the four new support staff members (2020).

Luckily, all was not disoriented with the changes within the IT Team. Management knew that the new team needed to be just as successful as the previous team. Therefore, they quickly began getting the team together, virtually to rebuild the group’s synergy. One of the first group activities we did together was a half-day workshop where we got to learn and relearn about one another and our experiences. Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) state “the sharing of dissimilar perceptions and cultural backgrounds can be used to enhance problem-solving and improve decision-making,” and by participating in these activities and others, the new IT team began to understand and familiarize themselves with the new team members (p. 266).

Overall, the workshops, training classes, and regular status meetings slowly recreated the team’s dynamics once grown accustomed to. The Lesson 6 Module explains that new members will “become familiar with everyone else’s tendencies and end up fitting into the team and being able to contribute to the synergy” (2020). This tactic went both ways as the outsource team, and the New York City team built synergy together to achieve its goals once again. Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) state that “team interaction is an energy exchange,” and that was true for the new global IT team (p. 271). We energized each other by working together, valuing our differences, and finding common ground to achieve the department’s goals.

 

References:

Moran, R. T., Abramson, N. R., & Moran, S. V. (2014). Managing cultural differences. Abingdon: Routledge.

Pennsylvania State University (2020). Lesson 06: Cultural Synergy. OLEAD 410: Leadership in Global Context. Retrieved from

https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2075490/modules/items/29697171

 

 

The Communication Divide: How Going Back to In-Person School in NYC went Wrong

by 1 Comment

It has been quite a different year so far, and with a little more than three months left, 2020 is not exactly trying to promote normalcy. Work-life, school life, and gym life are all upside down and happening in unusual places. Although virtual education sounds extravagant and high-tech and impressive, the actual practice has been archaic and rough. I truly believed that having children focused on screens would be the easiest undertaking considering they always act like they cannot remove their eyes from them. The truth is that those were voluntary screen hours, and now that a teacher or classmate is on the screen, it feels forced and deliberate. (Or so I was told) However, now we are coming up on the fall season, and we were initially allowed to select how we wanted our children to learn this term. A blended learning experience seemed to balance our household’s needs and wants, and everyone was excited about the September 10th start date. That was until it was pushed back and pushed back again and now so much is up in the air because of a failure to communicate.

 

Communication plays a vital role in every component of our lives. From the time we are babies, we are communicating our needs, like crying loudly for a diaper change, to being toddlers and communicating our wants, think of the ‘No’ stage, to being older children and overly communicating our wants, such as negotiating terms when you were already given a direct answer. With all this communicating going on, I am forced to wonder how teams of adults and leaders were incapable of communicating the reality of school openings with hundreds of thousands of parents in New York City. Communication is something we do daily. Yet, relaying information from the Department of Education (DOE) to the families that rely on it demonstrated just how bad our authorities are at communicating.

 

As the Lesson Four Module explains, “at its most basic level, communication is about the exchange of information between individuals,” and summarizes a rudimentary notion of how communication works (2020). So, the DOE informed families that they offered three options for learning this fall, and families had to respond and let the DOE know which choice they were selecting. Sounds simple enough. This exchange proceeded through the Communication Process, which the Module illustrates as “an idea is generated by one person, shaped into a message, and sent by the person to another person, who then receives the message, interprets it, and then generates his or her own idea” (2020). This process usually continues repeatedly until an action of some sort is taken or the message is received as understood. We received details about our options, selected a choice, and relayed that info back to the DOE. However, there were more factors at stake than what had been communicated. Most people were aware that the situation could change if Covid-19 case numbers rose above a certain percentage in the city or if too many individuals tested positive who work within your school building. Parents were not informed about the issues with the Teacher’s Union, the problems with the building ventilation systems, and the utter lack of time that the city had to correct these issues. We were all learning more from the six o’clock news than from the DOE.

 

Our Module takes the understanding of communication further and describes how the process can be prone to errors. It will not matter if someone is communicating a message if noise and bias keep them from providing enough information or keeping the receiver from decoding that information (2020). Then, there is egocentrism, which the Module defines as “an inability to take on other people’s perspectives,” which also adds bias to the process and form of disconnect between senders and receivers (2020). When the DOE did not disclose the other dynamics that were factoring into their decisions for this school term, they essentially did not communicate enough with parents. The DOE’s assumptions did not consider what was happening in households all throughout NYC and did not consider how parents and students would be affected by several delays from the start to the school year.

 

In her text, Fundamentals of Organizational Communication, Shockley-Zalabak (2015) explains that “communication competency is the ability and willingness of an individual to participate responsibly in a transaction in such a way as to maximize the outcomes of shared meanings” (p. 6). The belief is that those that are communication competent will have the “motivation to engage in communication that results in mutual understanding,” and pursue their exchanges with an understanding that understood messages are reciprocal in the communication process (p.7). For the DOE, the lack of communication competency has led families all over New York City through several rounds of ‘When’s In-Person School Going to Start?’. The game show that families play nightly in September between rounds of Disney+ binges and household chores.

 

Needless to say, no one could have predicted the extent of the situations in our communities or that a Zoom classroom would become a thing. However, it is crucial for us not to forget the basic skills we have in our arsenal. Our ability to communicate. Perhaps if the DOE had engaged in some communication competence going back to in-person school in New York City would not feel like a dragged-out soap opera.

Actual Sign in Front of the Elementary School

 

References:

Pennsylvania State University (2020). Lesson 04: Global Communication. OLEAD 410: Leadership in Global Context. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2075490/modules/items/29697171

Shockley-Zalabak, P. (2015). Fundamentals of organizational communication: knowledge, sensitivity, skills, values. Boston: Pearson.

Introduction Post

by 2 Comments

Hello,

My name is Teresa Stewart and this is my second semester taking classes through Penn State World Campus. I finished up an AAS degree in the spring and I am excited to add to the completion of my Bachelor’s degree. I am from and live in New York City. The pandemic has enlarged and shed a bright light on so many issues in my community. I am interested in learning more about the context of this course. I am looking forward to a successful semester.

Skip to toolbar