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Cultural DNA: The Psychology of Globalization, by Gurnek Bains
THE world in general, and business in particular, appears to be ever more homogeneous. Global brands and the intermingling of cultures make more of the world appear comfortingly similar.
As the author points out, this uniformity is an “illusion only held by the transient tourist or business traveller”. There are deep cultural and psychological instincts that cause significant differences.
The approach of this book is that while people have much in common, each culture has different economic performance, political institutions, and business practices.
For example, the culture and psychology of Greeks differs significantly from that of Germans. Greeks are more “persistent and ingenious” in circumventing EU rules regarding smoking in public places. This relatively trivial issue is an indicator of the more serious matter of Greece’s approach to finance and economics. The Greek approach was never taken into account by those who developed the common currency.
The book focuses on how people in eight regions around the world view reality. The regions covered are sub-Saharan Africa, India, the Middle East, China, Europe, North America, Latin America and Australia.
The author uses the term “Cultural DNA”, to stress the deeply-ingrained aspects of a culture which are the product of generations of experiences that have been replicated and reinforced.
The basis for the author’s conclusions is an assessment of 30 000 people working in organisations across the globe, over 1 700 in-depth reports, and the work of giants in this field such as Geert Hofstede. The result is a collection of insights that penetrates “the skin of differences and to provide an explanation for why they might exist”.
While most of the book is not about DNA in the biological sense, it is interspersed with relevant genetic information. For example, people with short alleles (a rough defintion of an allele is that it is a type of gene) are more prone to anxiety and depression following negative life events. About 80% of Chinese have the short allele, whereas 40% of Americans and 25% of South Africans do, affecting their attitude to negative experiences.
Italian and Spanish soccer players respond badly to slight physical impact, which looks to many like histrionics. They may quite genuinely be in pain, being biologically more sensitive.
America was created by distinct groups of people, who migrated there for reasons ranging from religious persecution to economic necessity. They left their homelands to find relief in “a vague and undefined land that lay at the other end of a forbidding journey across the cold, grey waters of the Atlantic”.
The effects on subsequent generations was to create distinctive cultural values. Only certain types of people were attracted to America, and were brave enough to make the move. With a select group banding together, their attitudes and characteristics became amplified in future generations.
Results include that the American attitude to hard work is very different to that of Europeans. Bankruptcy is not seen as a severe embarrassment, so failed entrepreneurs go straight on to their next venture. This same “get up again” approach explains why 40% of companies in the 2014 Forbes Most Innovative 100 are American.
Americans rate both themselves and their colleagues much more positively than Europeans do. This positive attitude makes American filmmakers distinct from their European counterparts, whose films do not all have happy endings. When Americans encounter severe problems, they have the attitude that everything can be fixed including people, which could explain the huge self-help industry.
The chapter on the Middle East stresses the origins of those societies – the deserts and civilisation. To survive, people living in deserts need to bind themselves into small, tightly-knit nomadic communities with strict rules ofr conduct. “There is pride in observing clear rules, as well as exclusionism, which measures the prioritisation of close relationships over wider societal commitments.”
Existing in the desert requires all members to obey the rules for living, just to to survive the extreme conditions. Without cooperation and submission to group rules, death is a real possibility.
From this required unity, religion and family are seen as more important than business obligations or civic responsibilities for most people. Leaders in desert conditions need to be strong, decisive and unambiguous.
China’s DNA has been shaped by the geography of the region with its teeming wildlife. This posed challenges for surviving these conditions that called for new thought patterns. “Practical inventiveness, planning, and sheer physical energy and endurance to survive” are required. Unlike Indian culture, the luxury of going off into the jungles to meditate was never an option.
There is a large focus in Chinese culture on living in harmony with others. To achieve this harmony requires discipline, impulse control, respect for law, relational focus, and many other psychological traits. This is probably true of many societies, but none has had as long a history in this pursuit as the Chinese.
To be a CEO today requires taking a global perspective with an understanding of the cultures of others.The position is that understanding those with whom we do business will make doing business easier and more pleasant.
The danger of falsely stereotyping people in the attempt to understand them will be greatly diminished by reading this book.
Readability: Light --+-- Serious
Insights: High -+--- Low
Practical: High ---+- Low
*Ian Mann of Gateways consults internationally on leadership and strategy and is the author of Strategy that Works. Views expressed are his own.
