Western Management Theories Research Articles

Integrating Western Management Theories with Indigenous Knowledge Systems: Ethical Conduct and Development in the Indian Subcontinent's Informal Sector.

Integrating Western Management Theories with Indigenous Knowledge Systems: Ethical Conduct and Development in the Indian Subcontinent's Informal Sector.

Chinese Management Studies: A Matched-Samples Meta-Analysis and Focused Review of Indigenous Theories

The field of Chinese management studies has grown tremendously over the past four decades. Management theories originating from the United States have remained dominant in the analysis of Chinese firms, prompting the question of how powerfully these Western lenses explain management practices in non-Western contexts. Through a matched-samples meta-analysis, which integrates matching techniques into meta-analysis, we compare the mean effect sizes for five classic Western management theories—institutional theory, resource dependence theory, the resource-based view, agency theory, and transaction cost theory—on 452 matched samples drawn from 1,028 U.S. and Chinese studies. Surprisingly, as compared to their U.S. counterparts, Chinese firms (a) are less responsive to coercive and mimetic pressures yet more subject to normative pressures, (b) establish fewer business relations when faced with resource dependencies and transaction costs, (c) extract more profit from managing generic strategic resources, and (d) are more sensitive to pay incentives and private blockholders. To understand the specificities of Chinese management practices, we furthermore conduct a focused review of the emerging literature on China-endemic explanations: political institutional imprinting theory, state-driven sustainable development, and China-endemic corporate governance. We conclude that indigenous theories effectively complement Western perspectives when accounting for Chinese management practices.

The Role of Confucian-Transformational Leadership in Shaping and Influencing Chinese MNEs

The demand to comprehend leadership across the world is becoming necessary and more urgent since the inevitable trend of globalization. In today’s global arena, on the one hand, China has maintained its remarkable economic performance and Chinese culture will have a more powerful influence in the foreseeable future; on the other hand, due to the policy of reform and opening and the economy market, western management theories and practices have flowed into the Chinese market and influencing Chinese companies. Thus Chinese leadership needs to develop more compatible with western leadership, thereby Chinese MNEs become more adaptive and competitive in the current global business environment. Against this background, this paper focuses on Confucian leadership, the most important Chinese leadership shaped by traditional Confucianism for more than 3000 years, and attempts to explore the compatibility of Confucian leadership and transformational leadership. After a thorough case study of Haier Group and its CEO Zhang, Ruimin, the research found that the great success of Haier is due largely to Zhang’s Confucian-transformational leadership, which combines both the wisdom of traditional Chinese Confucianism and the essence of western transformational leadership theory. Therefore, it is demonstrated that Confucian leadership plays a vital role in shaping the management style and performance of Chinese companies, and there can be a high level of compatibility between Confucian leadership and transformational leadership.

Assessing and Extending the Unique Contributions of Chinese Management Studies

The field of Chinese management studies has grown tremendously over the past four decades. Despite an increasing interest in uniquely Chinese phenomena, Western management theories have long been the dominant perspectives for understanding Chinese firms and managers. Yet, the explanatory potential of our current theoretical toolkit remains unelucidated in non-Western contexts. Through a matched-samples meta-analysis, which integrates matching techniques into meta-analysis, we compare the mean effect sizes for five classic Western management theories (i.e. institutional theory, resource dependence theory, the resource-based view, agency theory, transaction cost theory) on 452 matched samples drawn from 1,028 U.S. and Chinese studies. Results show that, contrary to popular belief, Chinese firms (a) are less responsive to coercive and mimetic pressures yet more subject to normative forces, (b) are less focused on establishing relational ties when faced with resource dependencies and transaction costs, (c) are better at managing strategic resources for profit, and (d) respond better to pay incentives than their U.S. counterparts. To understand the specificities of Chinese management practices, we furthermore conduct a focused review of the emerging literature on China-endemic explanations: political institutional imprinting theory, a specifically Chinese take on sustainable development, and a China-specific theory of corporate governance.

О принципе культуросообразности в управлении персоналом

The article analyzes the methodological contradiction between the introduction of Western management theories into personnel management and the need for a national-original theory and practice of management. It emphasize the negative consequences of imposing management models developed in other socio-cultural conditions on the personnel motivation system. The paper notes that scientific paradigms are formed under the effect of both science development internal logic, and non-scientific factors such as political, economic, and ideological competition between states. The focus on Western management models is due to Russia-USSR defeat/capitulation of in the «cold war» and the voluntary surrender of the Russian scientific and educational space «at the mercy of the winner». The cultural conformity principle has been first proclaimed in pedagogy but its application is appropriate in any other complex field of activity, including personnel management. For Russia, this principle means the justification of the personnel management theory and practice with the socio-cultural values and norms developed by its millennial culture. Content analysis of the textbook and training manual content devoted to personnel management confirmed the assumption that foreign authors topped the rating of reference authors and concepts with a clear advantage. The most frequently mentioned are Taylor, Fayol, Mayo, Maslow, and Ford. Among domestic researchers, Gastev, Kerzhentsev, and Vitke are the closest to them. The Soviet managerial thought during the heyday of the USSR (1950-80s) was not represented practically, although the country launched a man into space for the first time in the world, reached the forefront in many areas of science and technology, and built a socially targeted system unprecedented in the world’s history these decades. It is impossible to imagine, that all these achievements are not related to the effective system of management and motivation. The article concludes that in the field of training specialists to work with personnel, it’s necessary a turn to develop such training programs, textbooks and textbooks that would reflect the civilizational specifics of Russia, and meet the cultural conformity principle.

Human resource management in China (in the financial sector)

Systematically carried out over the past forty years economic reforms have given impetus to the development of the financial industry in China. Any changes suggest new approaches in the management system. Despite the results obtained there are some problems in the financial industry of China. In modern China there is a synthesis of Western and Eastern management theories, but it is necessary to pay tribute to traditional values, that influence on the thinking of leaders. The problems of human resource management in China in the financial industry have been considered in the article. The areas, where the most revolutionary changes are currently taking place, such as cross-border e-commerce, also have been indicated. In China, the proliferation of the Internet finance industry has been made possible by the surge in e-commerce. The fundamental factor in the psychology of the Chinese is Confucianism, on which they rely in all spheres of life. Despite the fact that in modern China there is a synthesis of the Western and Eastern theories of governance, it is necessary to pay tribute to the traditional values, which influence the thinking of the leaders of Chinese organizations. But new areas of activity require other, more advanced approaches to personnel training. The advantages and disadvantages of human resources management in the banking sector of China have been considered in the article. As a result of the analysis of indicators and problems of personnel management in the financial sphere, the main conclusions and recommendations on the structure of human resource management at this stage of improving society in China have been presented.

Kinship-like Relationship and Organizational Crisis Management Ability Grounded in Chinese Local Culture: The Comprehensive Role of Employees’ Crisis Awareness and Organizational Citizenship Behavior

In the era of self-media and mobile internet, very small incidents may lead to severe public opinion and crisis for organizations. Once the organizational crisis breaks out, its dissemination and destructiveness will bring great harm to the organization and society. Therefore, exploring the impact of kinship-like relationship based on Chinese local culture on the improvement of organizational crisis management ability and its internal mechanism and path can enrich the theoretical research on organizational crisis management in China and guide Chinese organizations to improve their crisis management ability. Compared with the instrumental trade contracts based on the principle of reciprocity in the West, kinship-like relationship rooted in traditional Chinese culture helps to improve organizational crisis management ability. Based on the local culture of China, 1226 sample data are collected from employees of organizations in China, which include employees’ crisis awareness and organizational citizenship behavior. This paper empirically tests the relationship between kinship-like relationship and the improvement of organizational crisis management ability, and analyzes and refines its internal path and mechanism. The results show that: （1） the cultivation of kinship-like exchange relationship contributes to the improvement of organizational crisis management ability, in which employees’ crisis awareness and organizational citizenship behavior play an important role; （2） compared with organizational citizenship behavior, employees’ crisis awareness plays a more significant role between kinship-like relationship and the improvement of organizational crisis management ability, and the kinship-like relationship between employees and organizations enhances organizations’ crisis management ability by enhancing employees’ crisis awareness; （3） kinship-like relationship promotes employees’ organizational citizenship behavior, thereby enhancing employees’ crisis awareness and organizations’ crisis management ability. Based on the above, combined with Chinese traditional culture, this paper puts forward some practical value enlightenment from three aspects: cultivating kinship-like exchange relationship between employees and organizations, stimulating organizational citizenship behavior, and cultivating employees’ sense of hardship. The main contributions of this paper are as follows: （1） Combining with Chinese culture, from the perspective of organizational culture and individual employee, this paper explores the mechanism of kinship-like relationship based on Chinese traditional culture to enhance organizational crisis management ability, so as to enrich the theoretical discussion of localized crisis management of Chinese organizations and enhance the adaptability of Western organizational crisis management theory into Chinese local organizations. （2） This paper combines Chinese local organizations with traditional culture, and embeds employees’ unique psychological, emotional and behavioral characteristics into management practice; it combines Western crisis management theory and practice with Chinese traditional culture, and directs localized management practice with the formation of organizational management situation; it also has practical value in management to improve China’s organizational crisis management and response ability.

Inspiring prosociality in hotel workplaces: Roles of authentic leadership, collective mindfulness, and collective thriving

Drawing from social learning theory and the conservation of resources theory, this study examines the relationships between authentic leadership, collective mindfulness, collective thriving, and prosociality in hotel workplaces. Data from 86 hotel units with a total of 354 full-time frontline employees were used to test the research hypotheses via structural equation modeling. As anticipated, statistical results revealed that authentic leadership is positively related to collective mindfulness and collective thriving; collective mindfulness is positively related to collective thriving; and collective thriving is positively related to prosociality (helping behavior and proactive customer service behavior, respectively). This study links Buddhist culture to Western management theory and highlights that collective mindfulness partially mediates the relationship between authentic leadership and collective thriving.

Letter from the Editor

In the age of disruption, affecting the restructuring of industries, social organizations, the organization of work, globalization, international trade, and technological innovations, this issue showcases two disruptions. The Perspective Essay ‘Opportunities and Challenges of Engaged Indigenous Scholarship’, by Andrew H. Van de Ven, Alan D. Meyer, and Runtian T. Jing, followed by the commentary of Anne Tsui, confronts management scholars with the imperative to break out of the straitjacket of testing hypotheses derived from the dominant Western economic, management, and psychological theories with indigenous data. Tsui and Van de Ven, Meyer, and Jing challenge us to rediscover scholarship, which starts with observing actual indigenous phenomena, and employ eye-opening insights and abductive reasoning to arrive at new or different explanatory mechanisms. Data on indigenous phenomena can come from observations of actual phenomena relating to individuals, families, and organizations addressing the limitations of bounded rationality, finding the way, preserving harmony, and so forth, and moderated by indigenous institutional envelopes, history, cultural roots, and national aspirations. Indigenous scholarship welcomes applications of diverse approaches, including qualitative and quantitative data from actual case studies, field surveys, experiments, and ethnographies. This call for indigenous engaged scholarship dovetails with MOR's initiative in favor of the preapproval of research ideas and empirical plans (https://doi.org/10.1017/mor.2017.37), and we hope it will provide scientific legitimacy for indigenous research, which observes actual phenomena and eschews predetermined lenses of Western theories.

Evaluation Of The Application Of Traditional Western Management Theories In Africa From A Survey Of Nigerian Organizations

The paper presents analysis and evaluation of the extent to which traditional theories are adopted and applied in contemporary management practice by Nigerian organizations/managers. To this end,1200 managers of different categories, from different companies were randomly selected for interview in Lagos and Ogun state, Nigeria, through the instrument of questionnaire using the same set of questions. The analysis of the responses reveals that some of the prescriptions of the various theories are being applied unconsciously by some organizations, but many largely depart from the formal framework of existing theories. Most managers did not quite know what theories are, and what theories exist in their areas of management, let alone applying them to making decisions. Evidently most of the managers do not have formal education in management, and most on the job management trainings often fail to expose managers to lessons in management theories and their relevance to management practice. The paper recommends that there is need for management training schools and consultants to emphasize in their programmes, the aspects of theories, to manager trainees, as the basis for good management practice.

A Cultural Approach to African Management Philosophy

Despite acknowledging the existence of indigenous management capabilities and skills in Africa, management practice in precolonial African societies was seen by the colonizers as primitive management. Africans have ways of exercising power and authority at the workplace, ways of motivating and rewarding people to make them work harder. Neither the institutions nor the political structures put in place by the colonizers acknowledge these indigenous knowledge structures, but much of them have survived in the traditions and cultural values of the African people. However, unlike in Europe and most parts of Asia, the attempted modernization or Westernization after independence has completely neglected the indigenous sociocultural knowledge and tried to transplant western management theories and models to traditional African societies. This article draws attention to the relevance of cultures to management philosophy with the purpose of contributing to a culturally appropriate practice of management in Africa. It has been shown that the different management theories in the form that they have been developed in the West reflect western philosophical thoughts which may not fit culturally in Africa management practice. However, in developing theories and building models of management theories in Africa, it is unlikely to pay Africans to throw away all that the West has to offer. Rather, the approach to appropriate management theorizing is to reflect on assumptions of Western management theories, compare Western assumptions about sociocultural values with African cultural values to rebuild the theories and models. The use of anthropological and philosophical concepts in this context will help in the development of appropriate management practice.

A Study of Factors Analysis for Organizational Change in China Government-Owned Enterprise

After three decades of reforming and opening up, the enterprises in China economy system, no matter the type or the scale of these businesses, face dramatic changes in their environment. This study aimed to investigate the applicability of western management theories in a China government-owned enterprise and to identify key factors of the organizational change in an enterprise. For practical verifications, we developed a thirty-item survey of the enterprise’s cultural change. The survey was validated statistically by analyzing the responses from 303 individuals in a large China government-owned enterprise using the confirmatory factor analysis models, and results were in good agreement with our theoretical structure. In addition, a number of significant correlations between items and factors were found, and five principle components were identified from thirty indicators.

Contextualizing a social enterprise opportunity process in an emerging market

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of how a social enterprise opportunity is brought to fruition in an emerging market. Design/methodology/approach This real-time longitudinal case study tracks the emergence of a micro-franchise start-up from conception to inception. Using a narrative perspective as a conceptual lens focuses attention on the relational, temporal and performative elements of the interactive process that occurs between social entrepreneur(s) and the environment(s). While interviewing provides the primary source of evidence, multiple data collection methods were utilized. Findings The analysis of the process elements centres on the narratives of the micro-franchise co-founders and other key informants that prompt action aimed at bringing the opportunity to fruition, showing how the social entrepreneurs bring the inside out and the outside in. Research limitations/implications Despite challenges to the appropriateness of Western management theory within emerging markets, this study has shown that theory at a sufficiently high level of abstraction can be useful. It also demonstrates the need to study process over time and be inclusive of the range of stakeholders and contexts that influence it. Social implications The findings indicate that social enterprise start-up is a co-creative process that evolves in unpredictable ways over time. Beyond start-up, only time and further study will determine whether social enterprise will prove to be the panacea for poverty and marginalization that governments expect. Originality/value This research gains real-time insight into social enterprise emergence. It underscores the multi-dimensional nature of context and provides evidence indicating that the relationship and influence between social entrepreneur(s) and their environment is not one way.

Frontiers on Research of Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Review of the Keynotes of “The 2015 International Conference on Innovation and Entrepreneurship”

“The 2015 International Conference on Innovation and Entrepreneurship” was successfully held on 12th and 13th of December 2015 by Jilin University. The attendees’ views of the conference follow: First, the innovation and entrepreneurship of China is now attracting the attention of scholars all over the world, yet the research has seldom been published in the world’s top journal. Chinese scholars need to discuss the theory more deeply and develop general conclusions, to build and establish a common theoretical language, which matches with that of the world. Second, at present, the research on innovation and entrepreneurship in China is still based on the western management theory, lacking the integration of Chinese traditional theory and culture. Chinese scholars need to build an eastern management theory which portrays the Chinese situation. Third, the research on innovation and entrepreneurship is gradually changing into qualitative research and case studies and the rich and objective secondary data has been playing more of an important role in each study, Chinese scholars should pay more attention to this previous research. The success of this conference contributes to the development of the Chinese research field and theory of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Competing in Complex Cross-Cultural World: Philosophical Insights from Yin-Yang

Purpose – The purpose this paper is to comment on the “Global Implications of the Indigenous Epistemological System from the East: How to Apply Yin-Yang Balancing to Paradox Management” (Li, 2016), which is a timely and important piece. Li (2016) offers epistemological insights into what Yin-Yang is, why Yin-Yang can serve as a guiding frame of thinking and how to apply this frame of thinking to paradoxical issues to organizations that compete in a complex cross-cultural world. Western management philosophies and perspectives have dominated the mainstream theories in organization and management around the world over the past five decades, paying very limited attention and appreciation to Eastern philosophies that exist already for over 2,500 years (e.g. 551-479 BC’s Confucianism). In this commentary, the authors added more explanations, suggesting that given intensified complex and competing needs to fulfill for today’s businesses, the indigenous Eastern epistemological wisdom of Yin-Yang balancing is an ...

Postcolonialism, Organization, and Management Theory

This article contributes a critical discussion of postcolonial theory. It opposes the binary nature of much contemporary discussion of the topic in theory and in organization and management theory in particular. We identify the challenges facing postcolonial theory, which we identify in epistemological terms. The dualism of “colonial” and “postcolonial” theory masks considerable diversity that the binary logic occludes. In place of this dualism, we introduce the notion of epistemological third spaces. As a theory of this third space, we introduce the indigenous theory of southern Africa, Ubuntu, discussing its interaction with more conventional Western management and organization theory. We also highlight a case in which the notion of epistemological third spaces would have been valuable had it been applied to the spread of the Nile River virus. We conclude the article with a discussion of the potential links between epistemological third spaces.

State-Owned Banks Risk Management Research

This paper mainly studies the concept of state-owned bank's risk and risk management, the state-owned Banks' risk types and western state-owned banks risk management theory. Through the observation of the state-owned Banks risk management status qua in our country at present stage analysis, find out the problems that exist in the state-owned Banks' risk management at the present stage in China and the insufficiency, in the understanding of problems gradually put forward the corresponding improvement to our country state-owned Banks' risk management methods and countermeasures.

African Values for the Practice of Human Resource Management

Ozet: The importance of cultural values for management practice in Africa has become increasingly obvious in recent years as many expectations of African organizations and institutions created and managed along lines of Western management assumptions, textbooks and models have not achieved the expected results of sustainable economic development and growth. In Africa, we have very limited knowledge about its cultural values and the consequences it poses for management practice in African organizations. The research project investigated some African traditional values in Nigerian work organizations. The research question that the study tries to address is: to what extent is the assumptions in Western management theories consistent with the African Traditional values for the practice of management in Africa? The research findings strongly suggests that the applicability of Western management assumptions in theories and models for motivating African workers from a high power distance and collectivistic societies is doubtful and suspect. The transplantation of Western management theories and models has not met the needs and aspirations of the peoples of Africa. The study suggests that elements of traditional values pose serious challenge to African managers’ ability to adopt traditional and modern practices that can improve the effectiveness of HR in their organizations.

Indigenous Management Research

While the last years have witnessed a tremendous economic boom in many emerging markets around the world, the knowledge of management practices in these countries lags behind their growing relevance in the world economy. One reason for this is that concepts, such as guanxi, jugaad, ubuntu, and blat, are not adequately reflected by traditional Western management theories. We call for more context-specific research and for drawing on indigenous thought in developing new theories that do not only help to better understand management practices in emerging markets, but contribute to global management knowledge as well. Examples of indigenous management concepts are illustrated and adequate context-sensitive research methods, such as locally-meaningful constructs and measures, participatory research, storytelling, and visual ethnography, are discussed. Moreover, we provide an overview of current research and conclude with major implications for indigenous management research.

Philosophy, training and spirituality: a longitudinal, empirical study

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyze whether Chinese philosophy can have positive results in long‐term training.Design/methodology/approachThe paper examined its effect based on Kirkpatrick's model. The qualitative data were the interviews, observations, and documents from 2004 to 2012. The quantitative data included three questionnaires for the employees and the customers distributed in 2005, 2006, and from 2009 to 2011, with 3,601 valid ones in total.FindingsThe results show that using Chinese philosophy as training content can increase trainees' training motivation. In addition, better training motivation can bring positive reaction, learning, and motivation for transfer. Second, at the individual level, Chinese philosophy can increase the employees' motivation for transfer and workplace spirituality. Third, at the organizational level, it shows an enhancement of service quality (SQ).Practical implicationsFirst, human resource (HR) practices can take the country's cultural features into account and do not necessarily have to adopt Western management theories and practices. Second, the “best practice” can be a useful reference for HR managers in the Chinese organizational context. Finally, the training contents are not necessarily about knowledge or skills. For the service industries with intensive interaction with customers, enhancing work attitude can further increase SQ.Originality/valueFirst, Chinese philosophy involves the concepts of business management. Second, this longitudinal research pointed out that Chinese philosophy can enhance employees' workplace spirituality; and further, it enhanced the SQ. Third, the training evaluation result is more comprehensive for it includes individual level and organizational level.