Page 66 - Crossing Cultural Boundaries - Cees den Teuling

solidarity and consensus, but on conventions, social control, calculated tactics or public opinion. Third is the pattern of innovation. Employees share future ambitions of the organisation that forms the most important source of organisational identity. Knowledge sharing fits well within this cultural pattern as a result of its focus on collective efforts and its orientation towards future. Similar to the entrepreneurial OC, weighing the personal and group ambitions may tip the balance toward the personal interest.
The theory developed by Denison and Mishra (1995) highlights the characteristics of the most efficient organisation. These characteristics are strong missions with high levels of employee involvement, adaptability and internal consistency. “Employees involvement is the extent to which the organisation encourages empowerment, team based cooperation, and individual learning and development, internal consistency is the degree to which there exists a clear set of espoused values, agreement about values, and inter-departmental coordination that arises from this common and agreed upon set of values” (Denison & Mishra, 1995, p. 205). Adaptability represents the level to which the organisation is focused on learning from its competing environment and his clients and advertises flexible and adaptive reactions at both the organisational and employee levels. Finally, a mission statement clarifies the extent to which the organisation has a clearly and outspoken strategy direction that provides conditions for actions and goals against which progress can be measured.
Returning to the questioning of “transfer” versus “translation” in the implementation of “MK transfer”, it should be mentioned that it is a process of “mutual collaboration” in which both parties are involved in the exchange of information to be effective in achieving the success. In the whole activity of “translating”, the positions of both parties are open to a “debate” to be resulting in a “translated curriculum”, eventually leading to newly created directions. In the underlying research project emphasis on the implementation of the “translation” approach is put.
2.5.1 Contrasts in Organisational Culture: Russian and Western perspectives
Unlike the Western orientation towards individualism, the Russian work-related values, like in a number of countries with a collectivistic orientation, include the strong dependence on and the responsibility for employees. Knowing the right connections can be essential for the development of a person’s career. Rather than perceiving as a source of income only, employees are morally involved with their workplace organisation (Hofstede & Hofstede, 2001).
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