What we Think about Culture

INTRODUCTION

Groups of people see the world through their own set of assumptions, attitudes, beliefs, and values. Learn about their culture and how it formed them, and aim to understand how other culture work so that everyone can be an effective global manager.

Organization from every part of the world is reaching out beyond their domestic markets to become international players. Not only is this very challenging on the business them, but it also creates a challenge for individual managers who must cope with working across geographic and cultural borders. Managing globally provides clear systems and approaches to help manage global networks and teams, and it examines the skills needed for dealing with different cultures. It teaches how to succeed in this new world.

This is widely recognised that an organisational diversity is obvious and necessary nowadays because of increasing pace of economic and technological development. Organisations need to be flexible if they seek to remain competitive and want to survive in a long run. This research explores the phenomenon of diversity in one of UK's leading super market named Sainsbury's (London Colney). The researcher intends to examine what the policy to work with different culture people and how management manage working with diversity people in workplace in the store in last two years I have seen.

1.1 What we think about culture:

Culture refers to the systems of meaning-values, beliefs, expectations and goals-shared by members of a particular group of people and differentiate them from members of other groups. It is a product of ‘the collective programming of the mind' (Hofstede, 1991), that is, it is acquired through regular interaction with other members of the group. Cultural differences can be found at many different levels, professional, class and regional, but it is particularly persuasive at the national level because of generations of socialization into the national community, as individuals, we generally only become aware of our own culture when confronted by others. The core differences in values between cultures go back to questions of what works for ensuring survival in relations to the natural environment.

1.2 Why culture consider in a multinational company:

Multinational companies are completely different from export-based firms not least because of their foreign subsidiaries. Not only does physical distance pose a challenge for effective communication, but also there is the challenge represented by cultural differences. Some MNCs have regarded cultural differences as so important that they have chosen to operate as multi-domestics with decision-making, management style and product development. The attitude is that people in the subsidiaries know best and should be allowed to go their own ways. For example, the attitudes in the Dutch electronics firm Philips for most of the previous century. The downside of this approach is the fiefdom and ‘not-invented-here' mentality, which resulted in Philips' North American subsidiary refusing to adopt the Philips video recorder (V2000) and opting instead for the rival Japanese model. However, many MNCs, including Philips since 1987, require a much greater degree of coordination, particularly in regard to learning. To do so, these firms must develop common practices and common values. If foreign subsidiaries are to be integrated for knowledge-sharing purposes, a starting point is an understanding of the mindsets of subsidiary management and employees in terms of their work-related values. The management challenge for many MNCs is to be able to adapt their organizations to culturally distinct environments without losing organizational stability.

1.3 About an organisation:

Sainsbury's is one of the leading retail super markets with approximately 792 stores all over the UK. There are some others supermarkets (Tesco, ASDA, Iceland and Somerfield) in UK which are the competitors of Sainsbury's. All of them are trying their best to provide good services to their customers and working under diversity workplace. For the present research the researcher has taken Sainsbury's London Colney to study about diversity. There were many reasons to select Sainsbury's London Colney for this research. One of the reasons was that this is a big store with 350 employees working in different shifts (morning, evening, day, night and some are working as seasonal employees). The management of this store comprises on around 20 to 30 people. This is a 24 hours store, located in the retail park and is very busy because of its location and also because this is close to M25 and people can get everything from the same store and also there is some other shop near to Sainsbury's like M & S, Next, Boots and so on. The second reason to select this store as a case study was that the researcher is working in this store in its customer services and checkouts department so the researcher as a participant has enough experience to work with different culture people in the store in the last two years. The sample size of this research (which includes on management and employees) was also easily approachable to get the relevant data. The researcher was quite hopeful that management and employees will cooperate with him for collecting data.

1.3.1 Company policy and commitment to colleagues:

There is much legislation surrounding the area of diversity and at the same time this provides a minimum standard for this policy, it is the company's intention to move beyond simple legal compliance where appropriate. This policy exists to enable a working environment in which everyone feels valued and respected in everything that they do. Innovative thinking and different ideas are critical to Sainsbury's success and their ability to develop new ways of adding value for their customers will be greatly enhanced by the diversity of experiences and perspectives amongst their colleagues.

Their ability to attract and retain the highest ability of colleagues from the widest community is essential in sustaining a leadership position.

Their aim is that all colleagues are able to work in an environment that is free from discrimination, harassment or bullying. The principles of fairness and objectivity will be integrated into all of the ways in which they manage their colleagues.

According to Sainsbury's policy, they will not accept or ignore unfair decisions, practices or requirements that qualify or exclude an individual from meeting essential employment requirements. They include, but are not limited to, a person's age, race, colour, nationality, ethnic origin, gender, sexual orientation, religion.

The equal of men and women are monitored and action taken where necessary and appropriate to ensure parity. In line with their flexible working policy, they will make it possible for colleagues to achieve a balance between their work and home commitments. They will ensure that the opportunities presented through diversity will be integrated into the development of new products and services that add value for their customers. The performance and effectiveness of Sainsbury's diversity commitment and demographic colleague make-up of their stores are continuously reviewed and where improvement is identified, action has been taken. Any breaches of this policy have been treated seriously and also dealt with under their disciplinary policy.

1.4 Background/Current situation:

As we know, now a day's diversity is a one of the inclusive concepts and based on valuing everyone as a unique individual and celebrating this difference.

The management of diversity goes beyond equal opportunity, instead of simply allowing a greater range of people getting more opportunity. The concept of diversity embodies the belief that people should be valued for their difference and variety. Diversity is supposed to enrich an organization's human capital, whereas equal opportunity focuses on various ethnic groups. The management of diversity is about individuals. It entails a minimization of cloning in selection and promotion procedures and a model of resourcing aimed at finding flexible employees.

As I said before that researcher is working in Sainsbury's (London Colney) and have seen lots of differences about diversity. There are most of the people from Asian ethnic. But we have some Irish, African, Chinese and British as well. As I work in this store I have found some favour for same ethnic group. And for that other ethnic became sometime very aggressive. And from management level, there is also some gender valuing problem. We have seen lots of female managers rather then males. But other, like they don't differentiate between ages, disabilities, colours and so on. So far you can say, they follow the procedures and that's why they are success in business now a days. My research is about how they manage, and do they really follow the diversity policies?

So, I intend to demonstrate, how a human resource manager can manage all those area and successfully complete company's mission with different people.

All overall, a self assessment for international human resource managers to evaluate and improve their global management skills.

1.5 Aims/Objectives:

The primary aim of the research is therefore:

-To examine diversity, equality and discrimination issues in a multinational company, in particular, the way of HR managers to manage work with different culture people.

The research objectives are:

-To determine what's the company policy about diversity to manage work with different culture people and to become a successful global manager, aim to develop a global outlook.

- To outline the development of approaches to organizational analysis.

- To explore a multicultural company from the perspectives of diverse social groups.

-An international human resource manager needs to know the way of managing people in twenty first century. We are going to take an overview of what a manager needs to do in relations to managing people in a changing environment. I will be looking at:

*Diversity issues.

*International Human Resource Management policies.

*Managing people in a practical way.

-To examine the way of recruiting, and selecting the right people.

-As a human resource manager, we are likely to manage other people on a one- to-one basis. This involves understanding people as individuals and recognizing their differences as well as drawing up some general principles for managing them like motivates them, job satisfaction, and job design.

-Having accepted that there is a range of reasons why people behave differently in a work situation and that cannot make wild and generalized assumptions about any individual's reasons for performing better or worse than average, we will recognize that when we put individuals together into a group, the behavior of that group is likely to be unpredictable. So it is important that they understand about the behavior of groups.

So, all overall I will be going through with literature review to practical experiences to find my research project.

SECOND CHAPTER

LITERATURE REVIEW

Everyone is different in age, gender, nationality, and ways of thinking. These differences are a source of strength. The concept of diversity means respect and acceptance. It means understanding each individual is unique and recognizing our individual's differences. It can be the aspects of race, ethnicity, gender, age, sexual orientation, physical abilities, religious beliefs, political views and so on. It is investigation of these differences in a safe positive and development environment.

Diversity is about creating an all-inclusive work environment that values and benefits from different human attributes, experiences, and skills at all levels and enables all employees to develop and contribute to their full potential.

It is about understanding each other and moving beyond simple acceptance to implementation and celebrating the rich dimensions of diversity contained within each individual.

Diversity and equality has become a key driving force in government policies. The concepts of diversity and equality are common but still there are some differences. Diversity is the acknowledgement and respect of differences within and between groups of people. And equality is the framework that enables access, participation, opportunities and contribution that is fair and inclusive.

According to Lew Platt (1993-1995) “I believe the word “diverse” includes not only different genders and races, but also different cultures, lifestyle and ways of thinking”.

2.1 Diversity Management at work:

The concepts of workplace diversity include the principles of equal employment opportunity. Equal employment opportunity policies address continued disadvantages experienced by particular groups of people in the workplace, including people with disabilities and those who mistreated by co-workers on the basis of race or ethnicity. These policies remain an important foundation for workplace diversity policy.

Diversity management involves systematic and planned programs or procedures that are considered to improve interaction among diverse people, especially people of different ethnicities, sexes, or cultures and to make this diversity a source of inspiration, complementarity's, and greater organizational effectiveness, rather than a source of tension, conflict, miscommunication, or limitation on the effectiveness, progress, and satisfaction of employees.

2.2 Diversity Approaches:

The issues that diversity representatives focus on vary by country. In some countries, the question of language is important, some countries depends on ethnic group, or may be depend on ages. ‘Managing Diversity' is a term that entered UK debates on equality approaches in the mid-1990s. While it is becoming increasingly common in the UK, there is still disagreement about its meaning and the extent to which it differs from previous approaches.

One of the things which do seem to be distinct is the way these approaches deal with differences between employees. The traditional approach to equal opportunities seeks to treat everyone the same. Managing diversity approaches recognises that employees are different and suggest that workplace can get benefit from those differences. What this means for organizations is that they need to adapt to employee characteristics rather than simply expecting employees to fit with pre-existing policies. The more fundamental alternative would be to restructure the way work is carried out so that everyone can be flexible for that. Another example would be the approach taken to ensuring that appraisal was carried out in a fair manner. A diversity approach would take a more radical look at what types of behaviour and activity are valued by the organization to see whether these are more commonly practised by members of one group rather than another.

Business case arguments for diversity share many elements with equal opportunities approaches but they tend to stress additional arguments. These have included claims that diverse teams are more innovative than ones composed of homogeneous individuals and that non-traditional workers can reflect the needs of a wider customer base.

Diversity approaches also place a strong emphasis on creating a culture within which everyone feels they belong and are empowered to reach their full potential. One aspect of this inclusiveness is an attempt to find policies which seem equally relevant to all employees.

The second alternative is seen as the more radical approach. It argues that there are multiple sources of difference which are as important as those based on gender or ethnicity. People are not defined by whether they are from European or Asian background but instead vary along a numerous of dimensions including personalities and tastes. This approach to managing diversity is strongly focused on individuals as the objects of equality policy and as such is in line with wider trends to individualise employee relations.

2.3 Managing people:

Management is often defining as “getting things done through people”. By definition, managers cannot do everything themselves. They have to rely on other people.

Managers are sometimes said to spend their time planning, organizing, motivating, and controlling. In practice, the work of managers is quite fragmented. It depends demand on the situation and on the people concerned than on any academic division of the task into clearly differentiated elements.

Managers dealing with people: internally with their bosses, their colleagues and their staff; externally with their customers, suppliers, professional advisers and national and local government officials.

A leading writer on management, Henry Mintzberg has suggested that managers have:

1. Interpersonal roles: acting as a leader, providing guidance and motivation and maintaining a web of relationship with many individuals and groups.

2. Informational roles: continually seeking and receiving information as a basis for action, passing on factual information, and transmitting guidance to subordinates in making decision.

3. Resource allocation roles: making choices about scheduling their own time, allocating task to people and authorizing actions.

4. Disturbance handling roles: dealing with involuntary situations and change beyond their control.

The human resources of an organization consist of all people who perform its activities. In a sense, all decisions that affect the workforce concern the organization's HRM function. Human resource management concerns the personnel policies and managerial practices and system that influence the workforce. Regardless of the size-or existence-of a formal HRM or personnel department (many small businesses have no HRM department). So as an example, line managers will spend more than 50% of their time involved in human resource activities such as hiring, evaluating, disciplining and scheduling employees.

2.4 Key concepts for Global Managers:

The following concepts contain the underlying message of this article. An awareness of and an application to one's organization of these concepts has direct relevance to the effectiveness of global managers. An understanding and utilization of these concepts are critical to one's successful global performance.

• Global leadership- being competent of operating effectively in a global environment and respectful of cultural diversity. This is an individual who can manage accelerating change and differences. The global leader is open and flexible in approaching others, can cope with situations and willing to re-examine and alter personal attitudes and perceptions.

• Cross cultural communication- recognizing what is involved in one's image of self and one's role, personal needs, values, standards, expectations, all of which are culturally conditioned. Such a person understands the impact of cultural factors on communication. Furthermore, they are aware of verbal and non-verbal differences in communication with persons from another culture. Not only does such a person seek to leans another language, but also they are cognizant that, even when people speak the same language, cultural differences can alter communication symbols and meanings and result in misunderstanding.

• Cultural sensitivity- integrating the characteristics of culture in general, with experiences in specific organizational, minority, or foreign cultures. Such a person understands the cultural influences on behaviour. This individual translates such cultural awareness into effective relationships with those who are different.

• Acculturation- effectively adjusting and adapting to a specific culture, whether that be a subculture within one's own country or abroad. Such a person knows the impact of culture shock in successfully managing transitions. Therefore, when dealing with employees from diverse cultural backgrounds, this person develops the necessary skills and avoids being ethnocentric.

• Cultural influences on management- understanding that management philosophies are deeply rooted in culture and that management practices developed in one culture may not easily transfer to another.

• Effective intercultural performance- applying cultural theory and insight to specific cross-cultural situations that affect people's performance on jobs.

• Changing international business- coping with interdependence of business activity throughout the world as well as the subculture of the managerial group. The global manager appreciates the effect of cultural differences on standard business practices and principles, such as organisational loyalty.

• Cultural synergy- building on the very differences in the world world's people for mutual growth and accomplishment by co-operation. Cultural synergy through collaboration emphasizes similarities and common concerns and integrates differences to enrich human activities and systems.

• Work culture- applying the general characteristics of culture to the specifics of how people work at a point in time and place. In the macro sense, work can be analysed in terms of human stages of development. In the micro sense, work culture can be studied in terms of specific industries, organizations or professional groups.

• Global culture- understanding that, while various characteristics of human culture have always been universal, a unique global culture with some common characteristics may be emerging. Global managers are alert to serving this commonality in human needs and markets with strategies that are transnational.

2.5 Construct area of diversity:

Diversity is “the representation, in one social system, of people with distinctly different group affiliations of cultural significance” Cox (1993). Deresky (1994) also highlighted that, the differences between group members illustrated in terms of the extent such as culture, age, race, sexual orientations, gender and ethnic.

There are three characteristics of construct area of diversity, which are classified employees differences. These are Demographic, organisational and socio-cognitive diversity.

• Demographic diversity: According to Jackson et al (1995), diversity such as ethnicity, age, nationality and gender those are considered visible attributes that can be easily characterised in particular individuals.

• Organisational diversity: The second category is organisational diversity. It may include: a) Staff job security in the firm. b) Work or professional experience. c) Occupation, functional or job portfolios of the employees such as marketing, production, and finance.

• Socio-cognitive diversity: The last category is socio-cognitive diversity, which includes cultural and religious values, knowledge level, beliefs and personalities characteristics.

By establishing and organising the staff according to their distinctive attributes, it will facilitate business managers to have a more objective understanding and appreciation of their diverse staff's behaviours, attitudes and values, given the implications for interpersonal and organisational processes and outcomes when staff members work together. As peoples values and beliefs vary individually as a result of their socio-cultural differences, this will affect organisational processes and configurations. For examples:- cross-cultural communication, management-subordinate relationships, international team management, leadership and decision-making styles, staff motivations, staff recruitment, selections and development, and other managerial functions.

Apart from the jobs, employees also have differences based on their position within society. Whether an employee a man or women, from a particular ethnic group, is of a particular sexual orientations, has a disability may affect what they want from employment and what are able to offer. Some of these differences may also affect people's access to jobs and their progress within organisations.

2.6 Discrepancies between academic research and HRM practice:

While HRM executives and managers are more educated and professional than in the days when they were in charge of personnel, the level of knowledge in practicing HRM in another part. Many companies hire MBAs for HRM jobs when not even a single HRM course is required in the typical curriculum for an MBA.

Recruitment:

As an Academic research finding, quantitative analysis of recruitment sources using yield ratios can facilitate in recruitment.

On the other hand HRM practices, less than 10% calculate yield ratios and less than 25% know how.

Staffing:

According to academic research findings, realistic job previews can reduce turnover and weighted application blanks reduce turnover.

Alternatively, HRM practices, less than 20% of companies use RJPs in high-turnover jobs and less than 30%.

Performance appraisal:

According to academic research findings, do not use traits on rating forms, make appraisal process important element of manager's job.

On the other hand, more than 70% still use traits, less than 35% of managers are evaluated on performance appraisal.

2.7 International HRM:

Domestic HRM is involved with employees within only one national boundary. And we define the field of IHRM broadly to cover all issues related to the management of people in an international context. Hence our definition of IHRM covers a wide range of human resource issues facings MNCs in different parts of their organisations. Additionally, we include comparative analyzes of HRM in different countries. The complexity of international HR can be attributed to six factors:

• More HR activities.

• The need for a broader perspective.

• More involvement in employee's personal lives.

• Changes in emphasis as the workplace mix of expatriates and locals varies.

• Risk exposure.

• Broader external influences.

In addition to complexity, there are four other variables that moderate differences between domestic and international HRM. These four additional moderators are:

• The cultural environment.

• The industry with which the multinational is primarily involved.

• The extent of reliance of the multinational on its home-country domestic market.

• The attitudes of senior management.

2.8 International HR policy:

In spite of the corporate business strategy unique to each company that they will drive the specifies of an international human resource policy, there are certain objectives that any effective IHR policy should aim to accomplish. And these objectives are:

• The policy should attract and motivate employees to accept international assignment.

• It should provide competitive pay plans to ensure the assignee can maintain his or her accustomed lifestyle.

• It should promote career succession planning and include guideline on repatriation and additional overseas assignment.

• It should facilitate relocation between home and host location.

• And finally, it should be cost-effective, understanding and easy to administer.

To meet these objectives, we must have internal and external programs functioning to handle the following six areas.

1. In addition to the required technical and business skills, key traits to consider include: cultural sensitivity, interpersonal skills, and flexibility.

2. Document and formally communicate the assignee's specific job requirements and associated pay in an assignment letter.

3. Identify the compensation, benefits and tax approach that meets company objectives. Some common approaches to pay include: home balance sheet, destination-based, net-to-net, flexible.

4. Assist the assignee with disposition or management of home and automobiles, shipment and storage of household goods, work permits and pre-assignment visits.

5. Provide cultural orientation, language training, spousal support, education assistance, home leave, and emergency provisions.

6. As the average cost of sending an expert on an overseas assignment is between three and five times the employee's pre-departure salary, quantifying total costs for a global assignment is essential in the budgeting process.

2.9 Integrated HR systems to develop global leaders:

Companies with global human resource information systems are likely to be far better positioned to succeed in the highly competitive international market. The task of developing global leaders and global HR function over the next decade in IPA's latest research effort.

Multinational companies often discover that, especially in newly emerging markets, local management talent is rarely available to establish and build operations. Consequently, many companies conclude that the only way to start doing business in these markets is to relocate experienced managers from around the globe. Companies doing work in the international marketplace have discovered that providing pre-departure screening and orientation- a potentially lengthy and time-consuming process- is essential to achieving the highest rates of success. A human resource information system might include data on the potential expatriate's families, training needs and past technical and cross-cultural experiences. Having such data would enhance the probability not only of selecting the best candidates, but of chances for success on the assignment, thus having a great impact on the future development of global leaders. Because most multinational companies now require international experience in order to move up the corporate hierarchy, tracking information related to international assignment can make a significant contribution to management development.

2.10 Diversity in multinational companies:

The rise of multinational companies and increased global diversification by even small companies has resulted in people of diverse background and cultures working together in the same office or for the same organization. Conflict in such situations is expected, but understanding the diversity issues can help to minimize the conflict and take benefits from diversity group of people brings to an organisations. To understanding how diversity is manage in multinational organizations, try to understand the concept of corporate culture, which defines organisational diversity programs and their use to minimize conflict among employees.

Companies and countries can no longer operate as if the rest of the world did not exit. New trading blocs, based on regional, not national, interests have formed with the European Economic Community and the North America Free Trade Agreement. There will be increased pressure influenced by the country culture. For examples, some corporate cultures may encourage women and men gathering together socially after work while country culture would prohibit this. A female executive from the USA might well have difficulty adapting to the rituals of her own company in a foreign country, particularly when the country culture differs greatly from the American cultures. In the case of working mothers, it is usually the woman who is responsible for picking children up from childcare (Deal &Kennedy, (1982, p. 80).

2.11 Understanding crosses cultural communication:

Some cultures communicate most readily via written messages, while others prefer talking. To relate successfully, understand what communication is, how it works, and how to tailor it to the cultural context into which it will be received.

When we “deliver” a message. We assume that we have “communicated”. But it is often the case that what has been said is not the same as what has been heard. Although the communication may feel in control, it is the receiver who determines whether communication takes place. The outcome of successful communication is agreement about meaning. This can be difficult to achieve in cross-cultural communication where some degree of misunderstanding is inevitable.

In relationship-focused cultures, such as those in Asia, words only convey a small part of the message; the listener infers the rest, based on their knowledge of the speaker, the setting of the conversation, and any body language. Task-focused cultures such as Germany or the United States prefer to use words as the key form of communication.

Autonomy cultures prefer explicit and precise communication, with little use of body language. Consensus cultures tend to be more indirect: meaning depends on the wider context, such as who says what to whom. In status cultures, communication tends to be rhetorical and emotional, using exaggeration and repetition.

2.12 Avoiding cross-cultural blunders:

“Brand blunders” when brand names travel abroad can have disastrous results, risking being politically or culturally insensitive or sometimes hilarious. In all cases, however, it makes brand-owners look silly at best and as branding is all about image, this is damaging. The Absolute vodka company, for examples, came to regret an advertising campaign that showed the south-western part of the US as forming part of Mexico, as it had done in the 1830s, before the 1848 Mexican- American War. The ad was designed to please the Mexican market, but offended some Americans who called for a boycott.

2.13 Managing conflict:

Legislation and the high profile of equal opportunities in the UK has had both positive

And negative effects on the way people view each other. On the one hand, there is now widespread recognition that discrimination at work on the grounds of gender, race or ability alone is unjust, although the practice still continues. However, the grouping of minorities such as disabled, women or ethnic has produced responses. For example, there has been a considerable increase in course for women returning to work after a career break; but not all women require courses, nor are they all likely to need courses on the same topic. More recent thinking has moved towards managing diversity-recognizing and valuing differences in people and their unique contributions to the workforce.

However, differences particularly if not well managed or recognized can also create conflict which may develop into formal grievances or require taking some form of disciplinary action.

In many cases, it is the manager's responsibility to deal with cases of grievance or to become involved in disciplinary action when this becomes to be expected. It is also his or her responsibility to offer help and advice to staff who have work-related problems and, where necessary, to recommend that they seek professional advice.

Managing diversity focuses on individuals rather than on groups. This does not mean that all the work done in the name of equal opportunities is not valuable and that positive or affirmative actions, such as women -only training or targeted recruitment, are not sometimes necessary as remedial actions. It does mean that they should not be considered necessary as a matter of course.

Kandola and Fullerton (1994) argue that an organization that manages diversity effectively should adopt a non potential treatment view that does not give individuals preference only because they are members of minority group. For example, assertiveness training is very often provided only, or mainly, for women. If assertiveness is a valued organizational characteristic, training should be provided for anyone who needs it.

2.14 Sources of conflict in organizations:

Interpersonal differences- For all kinds of reasons, some people don't get on with others; you can't expect to like everyone you meet or work with, or to be liked by everyone else. There are differences in personality, temperament, outlook and beliefs which make this impossible. Recognizing these differences are half the battle and, as a manager, trying not to force people with real interpersonal differences which cannot be resolved to work together.

Misunderstandings- These can arise because of different languages or accents or simply because people genuinely didn't understand what was said or implied. Often, misunderstandings can be cleared up if a third party realizes what has happened and can persuade the protagonists that it was, simply, ‘a misunderstanding'.

Differences in Values and Beliefs- Values and beliefs are shaped by experiences and upbringing and, thus, are likely to differ considerately. For example, in a manager course run by Swedish company, SAS, participants were asked to list the values most important to them. Most of the Swedish managers chose honesty as the most important whereas North American managers chose competition, liberty, and freedom and did not mention honesty in the top 15th. Same, competition is not important for Swedish managers. Values and beliefs are usually difficult to change; again they need to be recognized and respected if conflict is to be avoided.

2.15 Contingency matrix approach to IHRM:

According to Luthans and Stewart (1977), the contingency matrix is based on “If-Then” relationships that are then used to analyze and provide practical guidelines for effective IHRM. Specifically, the “If” in the contingency matrix is the country or culture and the “Then” is the human resource management concept or technique that will best meet the goals of the multinational corporation. In strategic management terminology, the contingency matrix approach to IHRM attempts to make the best “fit” between the country/cultural environment and HR concepts and techniques that will strengthen the HR core competency of the multinational companies.

2.16 The cultural side of the contingency matrix:

There are some comprehensive research that can be used in diagnosing the cultural dimensions of given countries in constructing the contingency matrix.

Hofstede suggested that a country's culture can be depicted along five cultural dimensions, which can be summarized as follows:

1. Power distance: The extent to which members of a society accept a hierarchical or unequal power structure. In large power distance countries, people consider themselves to be inherently unequal and there is more dependence by subordinates on bosses. In small power distance countries, people tend to see themselves more as equals. Asian, Latin American and African countries tend to have large power distance, while northern Europe has relatively small power distance.

2. Uncertainty avoidance: how members of a society cope with the uncertainty of everyday life. High levels of stress and anxiety denote high uncertainty avoidance countries. These cultures tend to be more expressive and emotional than those of low uncertainty avoidance countries.

3. Individualism: The extent to which individuals perceive themselves as independent and autonomous beings. At the opposite pole is collectivism, in which people see themselves as integrated into ‘in-groups'.

4. Masculinity: The extent to which a society is inclined towards aggressive and materialistic behaviour. This dimension tends to present stereotyped gender roles. At the opposite extreme is femininity, which denotes sensitivity, caring and an emphasis on quality of life.

5. Long-term vs. short-term orientation: people's time perspectives in their daily lives. Hofstede added this dimension as a result of work by another researcher, Michael Harris Bond, who found different time orientations between Western and Eastern ways of thinking.

Similar to Hofstede, Trompenaars also have used individualism and collectivism but also added some new dimensions, which are briefly summarized below:

1. Universalism vs. particularism: Cultures with high universalism place more weight on formal rules, whereas more particularistic cultures value relationships more than formal rules or agreement.

2. Individualism vs. collectivism: This relationship mirrors one of Hofstede's four dimensions, but the findings were somewhat different. Trompenaars found Japan to be much further towards the collectivist extreme. On the other hand, Mexico and Czech Republic, which had found to be more collectivist, now tend to individualism.

3. Neutral vs. emotional: In a neutral culture, people are less inclined to show their feelings, whereas in an emotional culture, people are more open in showing emotion and expressing their views. In the findings, Japan has the most neutral culture and Mexico the most emotional.

4. Specific vs. diffuse: In a specific culture there is a clear separation between work and private life. In diffuse cultures, the whole person is involved in a business relationship, not merely the contracting role.

5. Achievement vs. ascription: In an achievement culture people derive status from their accomplishment and record. In an ascription culture status is what matters, which could relate to birth, family, gender or age. The US and UK are achievement cultures, whereas China and other Asian cultures are ascription cultures.

Trompenaars' dimensions seem to go beyond Hofstede's and can provide relevant guidelines for now a day IHRM. The above discussion of the “if” cultural environment provides a point of departure for filling in the cells of the IHRM contingency matrix. The real challenge, however, lies in drawing from the body of relevant research and practical experience in developing the matrix.

2.17 Culture and Market:

People point to McDonalds or coca-cola or TESCO as examples of tastes, markets and therefore cultures becoming similar everywhere. There are, indeed, many products and services becoming universal to world markets. What is important to consider, however, is not what they are and where they are found physically, but what they mean to each culture. The real meaning of culture is not what is visible on the surface. It is the collective ways groups of people understand and interpret the world. So the fact that we all can listen to Walkmans and eat Hamburgers tell us that there are some novel products that can be sold on a universal message, but it does not tell us what eating hamburgers or listening to Walkmans means in different cultures. (Trompenaars, 1994).

2.18 Cultural awareness:

Growing cultural awareness has also brought into the international public interest between national self-awareness and existing state institutions. There are two different examples of nationhood and cultural identity:

*Japan, an old state with a consistent culture.

*The new states of Eastern Europe, where diverse cultures present challenges for nation-building as well as for constructing new institutions of state.

2.19 The role of cultural Diversity training:

Most companies tackled diversity as a way to comply with government equal employment opportunity and affirmative action regulations. Because of growing importance, companies are integrating diversity management into how they conduct business rather than having stand-alone programs. The increasing cultural diversity in the workplace has significant implications for human resource management and development programs and leads to important questions. According to Laurent (1983), cultural differences more pronounced among foreign employees working within the same multinational organisation than among employees working for organisations in their native lands. When they are working outside their native land, it seems that Germans become more German, Japanese more Japanese, and so on. The implications of this cultural diversity in the workplace for HRD are already felt. While such programs with cultural awareness content are important in addressing this demographic shift in the workplace, it is equally critical that training professionals concern themselves with the process of training for this changing clientele. As training environment become more culturally diverse, are trainers responding to the demographic shift with respect to instructional design? All too often, it is merely assumed that, by learning a new language and joining a new learning environment, participants will naturally adapt to new learning styles. The role of cultural diversity training means different attitudes and behaviour are more often that not conditioned by culture- values, assumptions and perceptions that are instilled early on in life and are expressed in the way we behave and interact. These cultural influences are so deep those we upon them instinctively- in everything we do, from the way we stand and talk, to the way we deal with superiors, conflict management and decision-making. Since these differences are so deep and intuitive, they can often lead to substantial misunderstanding and miscommunication. Nowhere is this more detrimental than in an international workplace, where misunderstanding based on culture can make or break lucrative business deals, international mergers and any other type of cross-cultural working.

2.20 Speaking different languages in the workplace:

Nowhere in the workplace do some differences show up more dramatically than in the area of communication. Not only people from different cultures speaking different languages, but they don't realize it; they think they are speaking the same language. Although the words are the same but the meaning can be completely different. The same expression can easily have a different emotional emphasis. Misinterpretation is so common and consistent that eventually we develop limiting perspectives of each other.

Although no federal law specifically supports or prohibits English-only rules, states have determined that it could be illegal to prohibit employees from speaking in a foreign language at work (title VII of the 1964 Civil Right Act). Therefore, it's best not to create ant specific hard-and-fast rules without gaining appropriate legal counsel first. One of the more balanced interpretations taken by certain states is to allow employees to speak with each other in a foreign language during breaks and meal periods, while requiring them to speak English during the normal work shift. This reasonable approach allows co-workers to converse in their own language during their free time, while permitting management to supervise and maintain control and safety during the regular shift.

2.21 How religion impacts on business life:

Religious beliefs and practices may have direct or indirect influences on many aspects of business life, including:

*Particular foods that are forbidden for example pork for Muslims

*Ban or restrictions, on consumption of alcoholic drink.

*Religious festivals, during which work may be forbidden or curtailed.

*Requirement for daily prayers.

*Weekly day of religious observance for example Saturday for the Jewish faith.

2.22 Motivating Across Cultures:

A global Human resources manager needs to identify the needs of individual employees, within the context of the culture in which he or she is working. Recognise the personal priorities of the diverse individuals in your team and apply the appropriate motivational tools.

People worldwide work to satisfy their needs and wants. These vary according to the circumstances of the individuals, and on factors such as cultural values. It is difficult to generalize but research suggests that professional in a range of countries value challenge, autonomy, and the opportunities to use their skills. Not surprisingly, lower level workers place high importance on security, earnings, benefits, and working conditions. Make sure that as a global manager you are sensitive to the different priorities of the individuals in your global team.

Beyond personal circumstances, individuals are influenced by wider cultural values. For example, in Latin America, job status and good personal life are key motivators. But in Saudi Arabia, family esteem is more important than public recognition. In one country, a job may be viewed as an economic necessity, in another country it may be tied to self-identity.

To understand fully what motivates an individual, take personal circumstances into account and allow for cultural changes.

Using tools-

Local knowledge enables a manager to determine the best motivators in the culture. In autonomy cultures, individual incentives are the most suitable. Use praise, promotions, and pay raises. In consensus cultures, group-based incentives work best. Distribute bonuses, formal recognition, competitive awards, and holiday awards throughout the team. Recognize that anything that enhances respect is motivational in status cultures- these include titles, position, and flattery, gifts for the individual and the family, and bonuses.

Thinking about Motivation

Understand the culture ---------------What are the priorities of this culture?

Understand individuals ---------------- How different are the people I am managing?

Select motivators ----------------- How will people be most effectively motivated?

2.23 Giving Feedback:

Managers need to give and receive feedback on performance. There are various methods of providing feedback, some more direct than others. Choose the appropriate method, depending on the culture in which it is being received.

Formal, direct feedback is typical in autonomy cultures. The focus is on the performance and personal strengths of the individual. Use two-way communication so that the employee can give his or her point of view and negotiate new goals. In Britain and the United States, for example, encouraging words are said at the beginning and end of a performance review. In Germany, criticism is more direct.

THIRD CHAPTER

RESEARCH METHOD

This research critically examined the fact of diversity in one of the supermarkets in UK named Sainsbury's (London Colney). The researcher explored the topic “How international human resource managers effectively manage diversity in a multinational company”. To achieve the objectives of this research, the primary as well secondary data has been collected. This chapter of methodology gives detail overview about the methods and techniques used to collect data for the present study.

3.1 What do we think about Methodology?

The first thing we need to do is to think about our research methodology. This is the philosophy or the general principles which will guide our research. It is the overall approach to studying about topic and includes issues we need to think about such as the constraints, dilemmas and ethical choices within our research.

Methodology refers to more than a simple set of methods; rather it refers to the rational and the philosophical assumptions that motivate a particular study relative to the logical method. “Methodology is the rationale and the philosophical assumption underlying a particular study rather than a collection of methods, though the methodology leads to and informs the methods” (Wisker, 2008).

It is believed that the success and failure of any research depends on its methodology. The selection of research methodology is one of the most crucial and a sensitive part of the research. Different research questions lend themselves to different methodologies. The research methodology used in the present study is based on ‘Constructivist Approach' to study the role of management and attitude of employees. According to this approach “Human beings are subjects and have consciousness and mind, they raise knowledge and meaning from experience and from relationships between things, people and events” (Wisker, 2008). According to Wisker (2008), Methodology of any research explains ontological and epistemological views.

3.2 Research Design:

A research design provides a framework for the collection and analysis of data. A choice of research design reflects decisions about the priority being given to a range of dimensions of the research process. Research design is the rational structure of the research question.

There are two functions of research design: first, to develop an operational plan and second, to make sure that the procedures adopted within the plan are sufficient to provide valid, objective and precise solutions to the research problems. In this discussion of research design, five different types will be examined. These are - experimental design, case study, cross-sectional or social survey design, longitudinal design and finally comparative design.

3.3 Case Study design:

Case study research is widely used and very effective in management research. Furthermore, it is a very popular approach among students preparing their final theses, as it combines business practices with science and also allows them to supplement their studies, with gaining practical experience. Case study research is suitable for explanatory, descriptive and exploratory research, like the other approaches.

The basic case study entails the detailed and intensive analysis of a single case. A case can be; a single organization, a single location, a person, or a single event. The most common use of the term links the case study with a location, such as a workplace or organization. Yin defines a case study as “an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context; when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident; and in which multiple sources of evidence are used”. This definition shows clearly how case study research differs from other research approaches.

Having examined different methods of research, I have decided that case study is the most appropriate method to get the answer of my research question. The current incident in my research is the organisational diversity happened in the store in the last two years. I am ‘investigating' the role of management while implementing diversity in the store and exploring the impact of this diversity on employee's attitude.

3.3.1 The Strengths of case study:

According to Bell (1993: 8), “the great strength of the case study method is that it allows the researcher to concentrate on a specific instance or situation and to identify or to attempt to identify the various interactive processes at work”. One of the natural characteristics of case studies is that they operate with a severely restricted focus. It is a truism that all social research simplifies the phenomena investigates. However, case studies can do this in ways that strongly relate to the experiences of individuals, small groups, or organizations.

One of the strength of case study approach is that it allows the researcher to use variety of sources and a variety of research methods as part of the investigation. A variety of data collection techniques may be used in this method and are likely to be used in combination. They may include, for instance, interview, participant observation, documentary analysis and questionnaire. This is also called ‘Triangulation' which refers to the use of different data collection techniques (Saunders et al, 2007). In the present research, ‘literature review' as a secondary source and ‘interview' and ‘questionnaire' as a primary source has been used to collect the data.

3.3.2 Limitations of Case Study:

Some people criticise the case study approach on its ‘credibility of generalizations' made from its findings. The researcher needs to be particularly cautious to drive out doubts and to show the extent to which the case is similar to, or different with, others of its type (Denscombe, 1998). However, it was not my aim in this study to generalise. I was specifically interested in finding out that how management of Sainsbury's, London Colney manage while implementing diversity and I was concerned with the impact of this diversity on employee's attitude. Because I am also working in the same store and I just wanted to examine that how HR manager successfully manage diversity in the last two years in this particular store.

Negotiating access to case study setting can be a problem for the researcher. Research process may put in danger if access is suspended or withdrawn. Some times in case studies, access to documents, people and settings can generate ethical problems in terms or ethical issues (ibid, 1998). In regard to access to the setting, the management of the store cooperated with me a lot. People team manager discussed my questionnaire with me in detail and approved it and granted me access to approach to the management and employees.

3.4 Data Collection Methods:

Data for any research can be obtained either from quantitative methods or from qualitative methods or from both of them altogether. To collect the data for this research I have used both qualitative and quantitative methods. In qualitative methods, literature review and interview has been used and in quantitative methods questionnaire has been used to collect the data.

3.5 Quantitative Methods:

Quantitative data deals with the numbers and any thing that is quantifiable. The strength of the quantitative data is that since methods of data collection are well known and open it is easy for other researchers to follow the same procedure, check the statistical tests and, if those have been carefully done, arrive at the same result (Burnham et al, 2004). Quantitative approach is complementary. Proceeding from the positive assumption that if something exists, it exists in some degree, and can therefore be numerically measured (Jankowicz, 1995). He further characterized quantitative research by following:

• Involving you in concentrated attention on a limited number of variables and constants which are important to you and which are usually spoken in the language of your own investigation.

• A search for the significance of relative proportions, in order to identify what is more important or significant and what is less so in the issue which you are exploring.

• An attempt to understand the ways in which selected factors in a situation are structured or interrelated, in importance or precedence.

In the present research, I have used questionnaire as a quantitative data collection techniques. Advantages and disadvantages of questionnaire and why it has been used in this research for data collection has discussed later in this chapter. With quantitative data collection method, well structured questionnaire some time it is difficult for the respondents to understand the exact meaning of the word, phrase or statement in the same way as researcher understands it. To overcome these limitations, qualitative methods have also been used.

3.6 Qualitative Methods:

Qualitative research is common in social and behavioural sciences, and among practitioners who want to understand human behaviour and functions. It can be short list of responses to open-ended question in an online questionnaire to more complex data such as transcripts of in-depth interviews or entire policy document. According to Miles and Huberman (1994: 6), a qualitative approach has the following features:

• It demands that you take tour informants seriously in their own language, and from their own point of view, suspending your own personal and project related preconceptions while you are gathering data, no matter how legal those preconceptions might be.

• It seeks to discover how people understand the situation or issue you are investigating, and how that understanding guides their actions.

• It seeks to develop knowledge by linking the accounts people give to an underlying body of theory.

Qualitative approach provides useful methods for exploring and examining organisational events such as diversity. Qualitative approaches to data collection and analysis can provide the flexibility required for attaining an in-depth understanding of individual employee experiences of working with different culture people and the relationship and context in which these take place. The researcher seeks to find meaning in the respondent's narratives of diversity and dialectical since respondents constructions of diversity can be elicited and refined only through interaction between and among investigator and respondent. With such a methodology, the participant and researcher can make sense of and interpret their shared understanding about diversity.

3.7 Data Collection Techniques:

In the present research, three techniques literature review, as a secondary data source and interview and questionnaire, as a primary data source has been used to collect the data.

3.7.1 Secondary Data (Literature Review):

In this research, I have presented review of the existing literature, as a secondary data to get the answer of my research question and in this regard collected data from different useful sources like, books, journal's articles and professional websites. For certain types of research project, such as those requiring national or international comparisons, secondary data will probably provide the main source to answer the research question and to address our objectives. Secondary data is quite useful for most research project. It refers to the information and data, collected by some one other than the researcher who is conducting a current study. These include such as personal documents, books, research papers, government and business reports and the mass media. The mass media involves a huge range of potential sources i.e newspaper and magazine's articles, television news, reports and documentaries, films, plays and novels. Secondary data include both quantitative and qualitative data, and they are used principally in both descriptive and explanatory research. The data you use may be raw data, where there has been little if any processing, or compiled data that have received some form of selection or summarising ( Kervin, 1999).

Advantages and Disadvantages of secondary data which are as follow:

• One of the biggest advantages of collecting secondary data is the enormous saving in resources, in particular time and money (Ghauri and Gronhaug, 2005). The researcher just needs to go to the library and locate and utilise the sources. To use secondary data, we can save our time as data will already be collected and subsequently we will be able to spend more time and effort analysing and interpreting the data.

• To get data quickly, secondary data may be the only viable alternative. In addition, they are likely to be higher-quality data than could be obtained by collecting our own (Stewart and Kamins, 1993).

• Another advantage of using secondary data is that it can be useful to compare data that we have collected with secondary data. Furthermore, it provides a comparison instrument with which we can easily interpret and understand our primary data.

In its disadvantages include:

• One of the main problems is that these data are collected for another study with different objectives in mind and may not completely fit with our study.

• Sometimes, where data have been collected for commercial purpose, to gain access, it may be difficult or costly. The variables might have been defined differently.

• Another problem is that it is the responsibility of the researcher that data are accurate; inaccuracies can not be blamed on the secondary source. It is the researcher's responsibility to check whether findings presented by another researcher are based on secondary or primary data.

3.7.2 Primary Data:

Because of some problems associated with secondary data, I have also collected primary data. Primary data is the one directly collected by the researcher.

3.8 Interview:

One of the data collection techniques used in this research is the interview. Interviews are the most widely used source for collecting information for evidence. Interviews carried out with respondents to a survey, case study interviews are often unstructured, or even in the form of quite informal discussions with a key informant for the case. Semi-structured, or focused, interviews are another type of interview that is often used in case study research. In such cases, the researcher schedules interviews with people who possess relevant information on the case issues, and follows particular structures in order to collect information.

Semi-structured interviews have two main objectives:

• The researcher wants to know the informant's perspectives on the issue.

• They also want to know whether the informant can confirm insights and information the researcher already holds.

Finally, an interview within a case study can take the form of a structured interview as it is used in survey research, where the respondent is asked to respond to a fixed set of closed questions.

As mentioned above, I am conducting this research on Sainsbury's, London Colney. I know very well that what has been the role of management in implementing diversity initiative and how it manages by management. Being a participant observer I have worked with so many different cultures people and I have seen closely and deeply the other colleagues behave when they realize different rules for different peoples. According to those practical experiences, it was easy to take an interview whether I know the activity of management. The involvement can be intense or slight, open or covert, but extend over a significant period of time. The researcher observes and records the behaviour of the people in the social setting and may collect additional evidence through formal or informal interviews. The outcome of the research is the detailed account of the activities and behaviour of those involved in the social situation.

3.8.1 Advantages of interview:

The main advantages of interviews are:

• They are useful to obtain detailed information about personal feelings, perceptions and opinions.

• They allow more detailed questions to be asked.

• Respondents own words are recorded.

• Interviewees are not influenced by others in the group.

• Some interviewees may be less self-conscious in a one-to-one situation.

3.8.2 Disadvantages of interview:

The main disadvantages of interviews are:

• They can be very time-consuming: setting up, interviewing, transcribing, analysing, feedback, reporting.

• They can be costly.

• Different interviewers may understand and transcribe interviews in different ways.

To overcome the weaknesses of interview and to make my research more reliable I have used another technique which is questionnaire.

3.9 Questionnaire:

Questionnaires are a part of our everyday lives. Another technique used to collect data for this research is the questionnaire. Questionnaire is one of the most widely used data collection techniques within the survey strategy. Because each person is asked to respond to the same set of questions. Questionnaire can be self-administered or interview-administered. Self-administered questionnaire are usually completed by the respondent. Interviewer-administered questionnaire are recorded by the interviewer on the basis of each respondent's answer. Self administered questionnaires (delivery and collection) have been used. The main advantage of this type of questionnaire according to Saunders et al (2007) is that, response rate is quite high as compare to others. The researcher can easily distribute and collect the questionnaires from the respondents which improve the involvement of the respondents. The researcher can easily satisfy the respondents about their queries about questionnaire and can spend some time while giving the questionnaire to the respondent and can introduce his research to them.

The questionnaire used in this research is the combination of open ended and closed ended questions. Most of the questions are closed ended where answers have been asked in form of ‘yes' or ‘no' or different degrees of agreement or disagreement have been given and respondents have selected the best suitable to them. Open ended questions have also included in the questionnaire where answers have been asked in descriptive way. As Saunders et al, (2007) describe that, in open ended questions respondents may answer any thing which is in their mind. They can describe it in their own way, but these kinds of questions are bit difficult to analyse. In closed ended questions respondents have the specific choice and they have to select from that and they can not explain the things. These kinds of questions are easy to put into a table or chart and analyse.

3.10 Sampling:

Before an organization conducts primary research it has to be clear which respondents it wishes to interview. A company can not possibly interview the whole population to get their opinion and views. This simply would be too costly and not viable. A sample of the population is taken to help them conduct this research. To select this sample there are again different methods of choosing our respondents, a mathematical approach called probability sampling and a non-mathematical approach, simply called non-probability sampling. There are many different ways to choose a sample, and the method used will depend upon the area of research, research methodology and preference of the researcher. According to Saunders et al, (2007), “non-probability sampling is more frequently used for case study research”, so for the present research non-probability sampling has been used. It has been decided with the help of my supervisor that sample size would be between 40 to 60 employees and 15 to 25 people from the management. To further specify my sample I have decided that I would include more employees in my sample (approx 20 to 30 out of total sample) from customer services and check outs department. The reason is that because firstly, I am working in the same department so it was quite easy for me to get the data from my colleagues. Secondly, this is the biggest department in the store with the maximum number of employees and thirdly, because as I wanted to asses the attitude of employees after getting new colleagues from different cultures so, for this purpose checkout operator's opinion was required because this group of employees was the most affected group.

Convenient sample was selected in which most employees were included from customer service and check outs department and rest of the employees were from other departments of the store. As Saunders et al, (2007) defines “Convenience Sampling is based on the need to obtain a sample as quickly as possible where you have little control over the content”. It involves those cases which are easiest to obtain for the sample.

3.11 Data Analysis:

The collected data first coded and quantified then all the responses were tabulated and analysed. All the responses were simply interpreted through simple percentage method. The tabulated data was systematically analysed by writing down each question's response and discussing it in detail. The primary data findings were supported by the secondary data collected for this research.

3.12 Limitations:

The main problem in collecting the primary data for this research was to get the time from the management because the HR manager suddenly got transfer to another store and the new HR manager still didn't come. So between those times there was an acting HR manager who helps me lots to get the information from management team. So all the managers were really busy with meeting and they have not got any free time to answer my detailed questionnaire. Because of this only 15 managers were included in the sample by keeping in mind their availability.

 

FOURTH CHAPTER

PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND ANALYSIS

This chapter presents the findings of the collected data. In order to draw the results, each question has been discussed separately through tabulation. To investigate and examine the research question primary and secondary data was collected. In primary data collection questionnaire (see appendix, 1) has been used to get the opinion of the management and the employees. The questionnaire was a combination of close-ended and open-ended questions but most of them were close ended. The sample size has been selected as 15 managers and 50 employees. The questionnaire has been distributed among all of the respondents. 12 managers out of 15 have responded so response rate from management was 80%. 3 managers did not reply the questionnaire, the reason was one of them have gone to his yearly holidays, one was unwilling and hesitant to fill the questionnaire and one of them were just busy because of her trainings going on. From the employee's side 45 respondents out of 50 have responded the questionnaire so response rate was 90%. 5 employees did not responded in spite of frequent reminders to them.

4.1 Findings:

Question No: 1

Job Title

Table 1.1

The data presented in above table shows that 80% (12) out of total number of 15 respondents (from management side) have responded the questionnaire and 90% (45) out of total number of 50 (from employee side) have responded.

Question No: 2

Gender Wise

Table 1.2 Management Responses:

Table 1.2.1 Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that 42% (5) out of total number of 12 respondents are male and 58% (7) are female. From the employee side, 27% (12) out of total number of 45 respondents are male and 73% (33) are female.

Question No: 3

Age Group

Table 1.3 Management Responses:

Table 1.3.1 Employee Responses:

Analysis Q. no -1, 2, 3:

The findings can be analysed as, firstly, from the management side, I was selected 15 managers and you can see 80% of them response and most important thing 58% are female. 75% of the respondents were between 30 to 45 years of age. From the employee's side, most of the respondents aged between 18 to 30 years and 64% were females. The reason why most of the respondents were female is that more than half of the respondents were selected from the customer service and checkouts and in this department female colleagues were more than males and also somehow its look likes they have female managers more than males. Most of the employees were working from the last more than two years or more.

Question No: 4

Do you follow a particular Religion based?

Table 1.4: Management Responses:

Table 1.4.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 83% (10) respondents out of total number of 12 have given their response in Yes and 17% (2) said no. From the employee side, 91% (41) respondents out of total number of 45 replied yes and 9% (4) respondents replied no.

In this table we can say, most of the respondent believes in religion. But they are not conservative about it. They follow their own religion and they don't have any problem about others believe.

Question No: 5

Q.5. From which of the following ethnic/ racial groups do you feel that you or your family originate?

Table 1.5: Management Responses:

Table 1.5.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 83% (10) out of total number of 12 respondents from European, 8% (1) from Asian, 17% (1) are mixed. From the employee side, 24% (11) have followed European ethnic, 42% (19) from Asian, 7% (3) from African ethnic, 18% (8) are mixed and 9% (4) have mentioned others.

In these table shows, from management 83% are European, but from employees, 42% are Asian. So there are little bit different. From my two years experiences I have seen Asian ethnic group work hard but they can't control people. That means for managing people European are good to manage people rather than other ethnic group.

Question No: 6

Q. 6. “Sainsbury give priority based on gender”. Do you agree with that?

Table 1.6: Management Responses:

Table 1.6.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) out of total number of 12 respondents are disagree with the asked question. From the employee side, 7% (3) respondents out of total number of 45 are strongly agree, 38% (17) are agree and 55% (25) have given their response as disagree.

In these table shows, 100% managers responses they don't give priority based on gender. But there are big differences between management and employees. Some employees agree that Sainsbury give priority based on gender. If you see table no-2,you will understand, somehow there is a more female colleagues rather than male.

Question No: 7

Q. 7. Have you ever felt mistreated by co-workers or any other person within your organization because of different ethnic groups?

Table 1.7: Management Responses:

Table 1.7.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 17% (2) respondents out of total number of 12 have given their response in Yes and 83% (10) said no. From the employee side, 91% (41) respondents out of total number of 45 replied yes and 9% (4) respondents replied no.

In these table shows, from management level they don't have any complain against their co-workers. Their percentage says, they are quite happy with their co-workers. But according to employees, there is 92% colleagues say, they felt mistreated by co-workers. And only few people says, they happy with their working environment.

Question No: 8

Q. 8.Have you found any age differences treated for work in your organization?

Table 1.8: Management Responses:

Table 1.8.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) respondents out of total number of 12 have given their response in no. From the employee side, 9% (4) respondents out of total number of 45 replied yes and 91% (41) respondents replied no.

According to these table, 100% managers think, in Sainsbury's, there is no age differences treated. Employees also agree with managers. But few people think, there have been age differences treated with them. And those felt mistreated, most of them are over 45.

Question no: 9

Q. 9. Work with different culture people is not easy as we think.

Table 1.9: Management Responses:

Table 1.9.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 17% (2) out of total number of 12 respondents are agree 83% (10) are disagree with the asked question. From the employee side, 38% (17) respondents out of total number of 45 are agree, 62% (28) are disagree.

Above table shows, from manager's level 83% disagree with that question. They felt working with different culture people is easy as they thought. From employee side, 62% respondent also felt same way. 38% has found difficulty because of different language speaking in shop floor.

Question No: 10

Q. 10. Do you promote diversity and equality within your service?

Table 1.10: Management Responses:

Table 1.10.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) respondents out of total number of 12 have given their response in Yes. From the employee side, 100% (45) respondents out of total number of 45 replied yes.

Here is the same result from both sides. In these table shows from management and employee label 100 % respondent think, they provide equality and diversity within their service.

Question No: 11

Q. 11. Are there plans in place within your organization to promote equality more effectively?

Table 1.11: Management Responses:

Table 1.11.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) respondents out of total number of 12 have given their response in Yes. From the employee side, 100% (45) respondents out of total number of 45 replied yes.

According to this table 100% respondents agree with that there is plan in place within in their organisations to promote diversity more effectively. Though they don't have any diversity training for employees.

Question No: 12

Q. 12. A company should follow diversity policy nowadays to remain competitive with other organisations.

Table 1.12: Management Responses:

1.12.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) respondents out of total number of 12 are strongly agreed. From the employee side, 100% (45) respondents out of total number of 45 are strongly agreed as well.

In these table shows, 100% employees think that a company's should follow diversity policy to remain competitive with other company.

Question No: 13

Q. 13. Do you think that management of this store embodies your vision of a diverse workplace?

Table 1.13: Management Responses:

Table 1.13.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above tables show that, 100% (12) respondents out of total number of 12 replied Yes to the question. From the employee side, 80% (36) out of total number of 45 replied Yes and 20% (9) replied No.

Here is little bit different between manager and employees. 100% management thinks that they listen to their subordinate's point of view and embodies their vision in a diverse workplace. But there is 20% subordinates think they didn't get any response from their managers when they thought there is a some view which can make better environment for all of subordinates if those follow by management label.

Question No: 14

Q. 14. Employee's involvement and participation is important in implementing diversity initiatives.

Table 1.14: Management Responses:

Table 1.14.1: Employee Responses:

The data presented in above table show that, 100% (12) management respondent out of total number of 12 is strongly agreed. From the employee side, 49% (22) respondents out of total number of 45 are strongly agree, 51% (23) are agree.

For a company, it's not easy to look for manager the entire sector without employee involvement. 100% managers are strongly agreed with that. Especially for diversity workplace, it is important that employee involvement is necessary to hold the competition with another company. But management also need to listen to their subordinates. Employees also think that their participation is important for successful company.

Question No: 15

Q. 15. Have you received any diversity complaints/comments about your service?

Table 1.15: Management Responses:

Table 1.15.1: Employee Responses:

In these table shows, most of respondent didn't get any complain about their service.

Question No: 16

Overall impression about diversity brought in this store.

This question was asked in a subjective form and different comments respondents have given will be discussed in below:

Most of the employee thinks, working with different culture people is good to know about other culture. It's good for the business. Some times it's easy to handle group of customers. If we work with different people, there will be different ideas from different person. And we can involve those ideas to implement our business. so, overall it's good for a company to brought diversity.

4.2 What Management think about diversity in Sainsbury's?

According to HR managers in Sainsbury (London Colney), there is no problem to work with different people. Instead of there is a language problem. Some times employees use their own language in shop floor, which is a problem for other colleagues and customers as well. And sometimes it's not easy to understand them, what their saying because of different essence. But overall there is a benefit for company. Because, different people brings different ideas.

The company follows the diversity policy. Their commitment to diversity fundamentally underpins their business. They seek to employ colleagues who appreciate and reflect the diversity of the community in which they reside and the customers they serve. They think, only success can come when they will be able to reflect that diversity at all levels and across all groups of jobs in Sainsbury's.

When they have any complaint about diversity, they treated very seriously. They ensure that all employees are treated fairly in all aspects of their job and for all the time they spend at work.

For example, there had a problem to recruiting process because of same ethnic group. The managers, who was recruiting his own people. He had to leave that jobs, because of other ethnic group felt that was against the company policy.

Another diversity policy followed by Sainsbury's colleague is harassment. If cause of unwanted, unreasonable and offensive behaviours which makes colleague feels offended, humiliated, frightened or threatened, immediate action will be taken by management. Sometimes a particular form of bullying comes from a management. For that situation action is taken by top level management. Management have found harassment cause usually because of race, colour, ethnic or national origin, sex, sexual orientation, religious or political attachment.

To prevent that harassment against employees, Sainsbury's provide training for managers and team leaders.

4.3 The Role of Communication & Employee's Involvement and Participation:

Employee's involvement and participation is very necessary in implementing diversity initiatives. And their involvement and participation is very important to make success business in the entire world. In the present research data shows that although respondents from management and employees were strongly agreed and agreed (100% & 49% 51% respectively) with this fact.

According to Smith, (2005), the best management is the one which gives priority to the communication between management and employees because this is the way through which fears and doubts of the employees can be addressed and it is also important to convey the right messages to the employees. The findings of this research also indicated that communication between management and employee is very important to make any organisational action successful.

One of the features closely related to diversity is the uncertainty among employees about their job security and about their relationship with the management in the future. Majority of the respondents (managers & employees) suggested that all employees should give equal opportunities in the process of diversity and management should ensure to the employees that their job is secure with the store. And another thing which respondents identified was the better communication between management and employees which can play a central role to lessen this level of uncertainty.

Summarising this survey when asked to the respondents that what was their overall impression about diversity brought in this store (Q 16), different respondents (managers& employees) replied differently some of the comments are as follow; “I think working with different people to help you to know about different culture”, “Good for company to remain competitive with other company”, “Problem to work with vast group of people from same ethnic, coz they do favour for their own people”, “problem to talk with different people coz of different essence”, “good for company to get a new ideas to improve working environment”.

These were some of the concluding remarks given by different respondent about working in a diversity environment.

4.4 Comparison between findings and participation observations:

This research has been conducted on Sainsbury's London Colney and the researcher is working in its customer service and checkouts department from the last two years. In these two years this store recruited lot of different culture peoples. So as a colleague I have a practical experience to work with different culture people. From questionnaire for employee and interviewing management says, there are happy with their working environment. Some of the colleague says, they found some discrimination against them. From my point of view, it's a habitual attitude. Management don't give favour for their own people. They follow same rules for everyone. As a participant observer, I can remember very well that how diversity brought in the store, how they have been implemented from the management and what kind of attitude I have developed during and after their implementation. From my finding you can see there is less negativity about diversity. It might be because of employee scare to loosing their jobs. Or may be their really happy with their working environment.

One of the things I have observed in these two years is that when ever management open a position in the store they don't follow the appropriate way to recruit people. Sometimes we don't know about the open position. They have not arranged any meetings or any sessions with the colleagues to let them know that what is going to happen in the store. I have not seen healthy and enthusiastic involvement and participation from the colleagues (except very few) in the recruiting process. The communication has always been lacking between management and employees before taking new actions initiative and during implementing it. The management of the store did not use any particular diversity training for colleagues. There has been a kind of favouritism among employees every time when any types of inside recruiting going on.

According to Henry Mintzberg, managers need to acting as a leader, providing guidance and motivation and maintaining a web of relationship with many individuals and groups, also continually seeking and receiving information as a basis for action, passing on factual information, and transmitting guidance to subordinates in making decision. One more thing I have found that, management said they ensure that assignment and opportunities for improvement are handy to everyone. In that case, my practical experience says, sometimes management also don't give time for improvement. There are lots colleagues who want to get more responsibility in workplace. Management have good relationship with team leaders. But they actually don't have individual contact with colleagues. It might be because of its one of the biggest Sainsbury's in UK. And it's not possible to contact with every colleagues. Another findings, which is similar to my observations is about company new policy. According to HR managers, any existing rules and policy 1st apply on small group of people. If it's fairly accepted, then they apply in group of Sainsbury's. And then it comes in the big store. But if those policy affect on individual attitudes, then it's happily change by management. One unexpected thing has found during my research that nobody has any complain against the management. It might be because they are worried about loosing their jobs.

4.5 Importance of diversity training:

Today's business needs to appreciate other cultures, age groups, gender and lifestyles and be acutely aware of possible unintentional slights against others, especially work colleagues. There are many issues that can create misunderstandings, including racial, cultural, sexual, physical and verbal concerns. Training can be a critical factor in whether an organisation is able to successfully achieve its goals and is often the first contact for many employees with the whole subject of diversity.

According to Elaine Sihera, training is the most obvious choice to develop the diversity process and is a fundamental part of any new initiative. It provides the opportunity for organisations to inform senior management and staff about the issue, it increases understanding of workplace diversity and also develops concrete skills among employees to enhance communication and productivity. It is important that training alone cannot resolve other diversity related challenges that may exits, but effective training does play a vital role in the success or failure of an establishment's overall diversity strategy. Implementing training has become a primary part of their corporate diversity initiatives.

Diversity training is not an optional extra which can be taken or rejected. Confident, skilled and professional staff needs increased awareness and training. That is not negotiable. Staff who are trained in diversity management are an important investment for a more knowledgeable, satisfied and successful workforce. However, the crucial management actions for increasing diversity awareness and skills relate to what training is needed for a particular environment and cultures, which staff, initially, should be trained when the budget is low or non-existent; how an effective trainers is selected how one can tell if the trainer is not very good or is giving useless information. These are very important concerns which few business owners are able to answer at all, let alone respond to with any real confidence, which might explain why many are not yet addressing diversity training issues within their environment.

4.6 Options for treatment of minorities:

Much of the discrimination is invisible, un-remarked and unchallenged. Change that has been achieved has largely been due to a minority of outstanding dedicated women, many highly educated, who work long hours to achieve their goals. As well as the large numbers of people work in the same place or in their own business. Opportunities for women in Asia are opening, although more so in some countries than others. But for other minorities the future is less immediately favourable. Members of racial and ethnic minorities throughout Asia continue to be caught in a vicious circle of family poverty, lack of education and hence problems in accessing high-skill jobs which pay well.

FIFTH CHAPTER

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

 

In conclusion, managing diversity in the workplace is without question a necessary part of doing business today. It always has been. Businesses that survive and flourish in the coming years will be those that find ways to attract retain and get the most out of the best people available to them. This will necessarily include different ethnic, age, religion, people of colour and sexual orientations.

 

The conclusion at this point is that cross-cultural managers should possess a good knowledge of work within this tradition as a basis for informing their view of culture and cultural difference as these impacts on real-life work situations. The most influential writer on culture, Geert Hofstede, has re-emphasised the importance of five core value dimensions to an explanation of cultural difference. According to him, for the next hundred years, countries will remain culturally vary diverse. If we accept this finding, then the ‘culturalist' school of thought within business and organisation studies will most definitely maintain a key role, particularly as it provides a welcome counterpoint to the proliferation of supposedly universally applicable business and management solutions which turn out to be anything but in reality. An awareness of culture as a factor within business can at the very least lead to an explicit engagement with the topic- many business and management models and theories appear to be culture-blind, and their ideas have emerged in a particular time and place.

 

This overview of the cross-cultural management at that time viewed it as an emerging area, responding to profound change within the business sphere- in particular, the emergence of diversity as a concept that can be used as a competitive differentiator. However, a new role for cross-cultural management centring on breaking down barriers and allowing new ways of approaching issues to create effective business solutions might usefully be supported by a developing academic paradigm which preserves the most enduring insights of existing models and theories while applying them to situations that require collaborative working between diverse groups. throughout this research I have also stressed that cross-cultural management theory should be applicable at the level of individual workplaces-not just across national boundaries-given the increasingly multicultural workforces found within countries across parts of the world.

 

As the world economy becomes progressively more global in nature, business corporations are engaging in increasingly complex and interdependent operations across national borders. A key factor in organisational success involves closer relationship between colleagues and management to establish universal standards, while maintaining business operations that identify with possible local interest. In this regard, management need to align organisational development with a more culturally responsive orientation, to enhance effective international human resource management. This is essential as much as staff from different culture is engaged to meet organisational objectives. The increasing interaction of colleagues from diverse socio- cultural backgrounds in organisations has serious implications for management in terms of international human resource development. Business managers need to understand and appreciate the extent of complexities that diversity workforce would create for their organisations, as more MNCs become increasingly multinational and multicultural in nature.

 

Managing diversity involves recognizing and accommodating diverse cultures and characteristics, not excluding them on arbitrary grounds. It is arguable that to truly value diversity there needs to be all encompassing legislation, which requires employers to justify all their employment practices on objectives grounds. However, for any government this would be a far too interventionlist approach and too great an imposition on business. The traditional UK reactive approach to discrimination legislation is changing. Although the law has differently recognizing the concept of diversity there are moves towards this approach, which places a positive duty upon specified public sector employers and service providers to promote racial equality.

As a participant observer I have been observing working with different culture people and how HR managers manage that diversity workforce. I have observed through out these two years that it is good to work with diversity environment but if most of the subordinates from same ethnic group on this case there are some problem for doing favour for same ethnic groups. And management of this store did not follow any particular techniques or models to implement diversity initiatives. Though they do give some training process for their management. The findings of the data collected from management and employees also supported my opinion.

It has been found that the management plays an important and key role in implementing diversity but the role of the management of this store was not very good in implementing diversity. The management did not arrange any particular training for colleagues to know the rules for diversity effectively. There were no training courses or other sessions for the employees to tell them about diversity. It has been found that employee's participation and involvement is very important but management of the store did not involve employees properly in implementing diversity initiatives. Communication has been found as one of the crucial and very important factor to make successful working environment in multinational companies. If communication between management and employees is good during implementation of diversity then whole process can run smoothly and nicely. In this store communication has always lacked and this communication gap has developed the negative relationship between management and employees. This lack of communication has also become the reason of uncertainty among employees about their future roles and their relationship with the management.

The data collected exposed that working with vast same ethnic group is not easy because of doing favour for them and its affects others employee's attitude. A clear difference of opinion between the management and employees has been found where majority of the employees said that they have developed a negative attitude because of the little change for different people in the store but management here was absolutely positive and said that they have developed a positive attitude. Employee's attitude is also responsible to work with other group and employees.

Decision makers should look closely at their mechanism and practices for recruiting promotion candidates. Open promotion systems permit greater use of employee skills and abilities than closed systems. Criteria for making promotion decisions should be apply in a manner consistent with the nature of the work force and organizational goals. Seniority is a prime factor in making promotions among unionized employees; performance and promotability are important in promoting nonunionized employees. The aging work force requires the HR department to consider policies that meet the unique needs of this growing labor group.

Historically, women and other minorities have faced formidable obstacles in their advancement into managerial ranks. Management development can play a dual role in removing these obstacles by,

• Developing special courses dealing with discrimination in the advancement of women and other minorities,

• And creating management development programs to meet the particular needs of these workers.

Employees generally dislike and fear PA and even supervisors find the process stressful. Employees tend to be satisfied with the process if the appraisal interview is constructive and if the chosen method is job related and provides specific direction for future performance. Supervisors also need to be trained for and give adequate attention to during the appraisal. Depends on appraisal management also should provide feedback to colleagues.

Language use that acknowledges status distinctions is part of cultural differences in power distance. In some culture such as USA, the psychological distance between bosses and subordinates is small. The subordinates do not feel that their bosses are better people, often address bosses using first names, and look forward to the day when they will be bosses. In other culture such as Korea, the psychological distance is much greater. Bosses are highly respected, receive deference from their subordinates, and are often viewed as role models for proper behaviour according to Korea social norms. Respect for this power distance is communicated when subordinates use honorifics during interactions with their bosses. To maintain their high status and to obtain continual respect, power holders must engage in behaviours that meet the expectations of subordinates.

One of the thing is quite clear that in the long run employees doesn't want to follow the procedures and they think little bit change doesn't change the normal organisational life but in the short run employees and management follow the rules very actively where they just worried about their jobs and try to compromise with that though they are not happy with that different rules for different people. And this difference brings in always negative effect for organizations but its success or failure depends on the management that how they manage it and also on the attitudes of the employees towards it. To best manage the working with diversity people, managers need to learn new techniques and models so that they can implement diversity systematically and it is also important for the management to ensure a positive attitude of their employees towards diversity.

5.1 Recommendation:

On the basis of findings and conclusion the researcher has made an attempt to give some recommendations to the management of Sainsbury plc, London Colney, through which they might improve the implementation of diversity in the store and can also improve the relationship between management and employees during this process. These recommendations may also help the employees to change their attitude for working with different culture peoples and think that everyone is same for organizations and everybody should get same facility. The recommendations are as follow;

1. The management plays a vital role in implementing diversity initiatives. The management don't provide any diversity training for employees. They give training to management and team leaders. It is recommended that there should be certain training courses for employees as well where they can learn that how they can properly implement diversity in their store. These training courses can help the employee to better understand to work with different people, follow the company rules and help management to manage organizations successfully.

1. It can be recommended that management should devise certain strategies in the store through which they can better communicate with the employees before taking new actions initiatives and during implementation of it. As I have observed, right now employee's voice mechanism is not very impressive in the store so management should introduce a new solid voice mechanism so that colleagues can better express their fears and doubts to the management.

1. Employee's involvement and participation is important but always ignored in this store while brings any new activities. It is recommended that all the employees should be the part of new decisions and the management should give them proper participation before and during implementing actions so that they can feel themselves as a part of a team and feelings of isolations and alienations can be lessened.

1. Negative attitude of the employees is dangerous for the overall success of organisational. It is recommended that management should work out some particular strategies regarding employee's attitude after implementation of diversity in the store. The management can hold the group sessions or group meetings where they can hear the problems, fears and doubts of the employees regarding new decisions.

1. In our changing workplace and competitive market environment, motivated employees and their contribution are the important currency for organization's survival and success. Motivational factors in an organizational context include working environment, job characteristics, and appropriate organizational reward system and so on. Management should give emphasis on proper motivation and incentive for all employees, as they work very hard to achieve the organizational objectives.

So, all overall, the role of the HR manager must parallel the needs of the changing organizations. Successful organizations are becoming more adaptable, resilient, quick to change directions and customer-centred. Within this environment, the HR manager should know how to manage effectively through working with different people, motivate them and leading them to achieve organizational goals.

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