Anikó Csepregi

The World I Know: Knowledge Sharing and Subcultures in Large Complex Organisations

Practitioners and researchers have agreed upon the fact that the culture of organizations is one of the most difficult challenges and holds the key to the success of knowledge management. The basis for formation of subcultures has been found in empirical studies to range from age and gender though to department and function within the organization and have a range of both positive and negative impact upon the performance of a range of areas in an organization. We examine how knowledge in its various forms may have an impact on the formation of subcultures on knowledge sharing, and through a quantitative approach, our explorative study uncovers five subcultures in a Hungarian higher education institution. Our findings confirm subcultural boundaries and tribes and territories in this context and we apply these findings to existing theory on the evolutionary nature of strategy implementation as a means of considering the potential impact of subcultures on knowledge management initiatives. We conclude that subcultural lenses affect the assimilation of knowledge from management in general and find that multiculturalism in this large complex organisation is likely the best approach as each subculture has its own specific range of competencies as part of an overall market orientation. As a concluding section, we offer a ‘subcultural audit’ model for practitioners that may reduce the subcultural obstacles to knowledge sharing as part of knowledge management programs.

A nemzeti kultúra hatása a mikrofinanszírozás sikerességére

Evtizedek ota kutatasok targya az orszagok es nemzetek kulturajanak vizsgalata. Az utobbi evtizedben egyre novekvő szamban jelentek meg elemzesek a mikrofinanszirozo intezmenyek (MFI-k) hatekonysagat befolyasolo tenyezőkről. Azonban – a szerzők legjobb tudomasa szerint – mindezidaig nem publikaltak olyan tanulmanyt, amely azt vizsgalna, hogy az MFI-k aktivitasat mennyire befolyasolja az orszagok Hofstede-fele nemzeti kulturaja, holott az ilyen jellegű vizsgalatok is relevansak lehetnek. Jelen tanulmany celja, hogy potolja a szakirodalomnak ezt a hianyossagat. A szerzők előszor bemutatjak az MFI-k műkodesi elvet, valamint a nemzeti kultura dimenzioit, majd 54 orszag elemzesere kerul sor kapcsolatvizsgalatokkal. Az eredmenyek alapjan az MFI-k azokban a kollektivista, ferfias, bizonytalansagot kerulő orszagokban aktivabbak, ahol viszonylag alacsony a hatalmi tavolsag. Az MFI-vel meg nem rendelkező orszagok kozul ilyen Gorogorszag es Japan. Reszukre a szerzők bizonyos tudasstrategia alkalmazasanak lehetőseget vetik fel, amelyekkel az MFI-k hatekony műkodese elerhetőve valhat.

Investigation of National Culture's Impact on Competitiveness and Knowledge-Sharing Competences

The twenty-first century offers new challenges for the global economy. Globalization is reflected in the cross-border trade in goods and services, international financial flows, and increasing flows of labor. On the score of the last one, for international business, culture is an important factor. The importance of national culture ensues from three points. Firstly, the nations are political units rooted in their history; secondly, the nationality has a symbolic value to people, and thirdly, the human thinking is conditioned by national cultural factors (Hofstede 1983). The aim of the research carried out by the Strategic Management Research Group was to study the characteristics and influences of national culture in different respects. The first idea was to identify the impact between cultural dimensions—measured by Fons Trompenaars—and national competitiveness of a country measured by International Institute for Management Development (IMD). Out of the cultural features, achieved status and neutral orientation are those that favorably influence competitiveness. The next purpose was to reveal that specific knowledge-sharing type and those competence groups achieved status and neutral orientation, as dominant dimensions of the national culture profile related to competitiveness. Based on these results, the Research Group has been interested on whether differences can be revealed on the individual level within these competence groups. By selecting middle managers as a target group, an empirical survey has been conducted, during which 400 middle managers working at medium- and large-sized enterprises in Hungary were investigated. The examined individual characteristics of middle managers were functional area, working years, and age. The results have shown that three competence groups (methodological competences needed for thinking, methodological competences used for work method and style, and social competences connected with communication skills) differ regarding these individual characteristics.