Cultural Differences: Different Time 'Zones' (Part-2)

The author has made an try In Search Of Bigfoot analyse the HRM practices Kentucky Lemon Laws Care Bears India and Japan, in the context of cultural-differences in the perception of time. The choice of these cultures have been based on the fact that traditionally USA is recognised as a M-time culture, India as a P- time culture, while Japan is a mix of M- time and P- time behaviour. However these cultures do not exist in isolation, and the time perception in these cultures is being influenced and changed by cross-frontier trade and other interactions.

The implications of the difference in the perception of time in different cultures can be organization wide, individual directed or task centric.

Study1:
Human resource management practices in Japan

The influence of elements of culture like collectivism, medium levels of power distance and high uncertainty avoidance, on the Japanese HRM practices can be easily seen.

The Japanese HRM practices of lifetime employment, emphasis on trainability in staffing and the high amount of stress on training, display the influence of time dimension of the culture, besides the other elements of the Hofstede study. As the Japanese consider it normal to spend years in deciding crucial issues, long term perspective to employment becomes essential to retain continuity in decisions and vision. The importance attached to continuity of employment is obvious in the practices of seniority wage and promotion (nenko system). The same issue could be attributed to the policy of enterprise unionism in Japan (for example, Aoki 1992b). The principle characteristics of enterprise unions are that membership is limited to regular employees, temporaries and part times being excluded. There is only one union in the organisation and enterprise unions generally have a co-operative attitude towards management, although in substantive terms they appear to serve their members well.

Japanese job classification is simple and broad. Thus the job assignments are much more fluid and flexible Bewitched to the western bureaucratic norms (Cole 1979, Lincoln 1986, Aoki 1986). Employees are expected to perform a large range of job functions and accept frequent assignment change as a part of their regular day to day operations. that fits in with the concept of P-time where the simultaneous occurrence of many things is acceptable and multi-skilled labour is the norm. Multi-skilled workers besides being self-motivated and promoting dynamism in employees, also facilitate job rotation and substitution in case of absenteeism of the team members leading to reliable production.

Training is an important component of HRM in Japan and often makes use of both on-the-job- training (OJT), which are continuos as well as periodic off-the-job-training (Off-JT). that shows the future oriented mentality in Japan where the functions like Training are a part of grooming of its managers, undertaken with a far-sighted intent.

For compensation and rewards in Japan, both merit and seniority are the criteria, though the proportions of merit increase in case of total increment may go up to 60% (Shirai 1992), showing M-time inclination. An employee's skill-grade-pay is another component of his pay besides the base pay and fringe benefits. that skill-grade-pay or shikakukyu is affected by the supervisor assessment. Though that skill-grade-pay might appear to be similar to the job-based pay of USA, it is different as it is based on the worth of the person himself and not on the worth of the job of the person. that is due the characteristic of P-time culture where people and St. John's Wort gain precedence over transactions.

The presence of codifies rules and legitimized practices of all work bring out the M-time elements of the Japanese culture. that is called employment bureaucracy used to rationalize Japanese employment and bring predictability and controllability to the behaviour of the major actors, employees and employers.

Study2:
Human resource management practices in USA

USA ranks high on power distance and individualism and low on uncertainty avoidance. Hence traditionally USA has been viewed as been an aggressive society, rewarding employee for individual performance with negligible stress on group achievements.
The perspective of time is highly monochronic, with time delays being associated with such dangers as subsequent backlogs, poor organisation and technical complexities. A delay in decision-making is considered a sign of low interest in the task. Thus the failure of activities like collective decision making and decentralization of decision making in USA was predictable, as it could be viewed to be calling for too much time to reach a consensus. Not surprisingly American industrial relations have been described as adversarial, as a relationship of confrontation leaving hardly any place for worker participation or for union activities within a firm- other than the grievance procedures.

With respect to the strategic nature of HR a sizable group of HR departments (P. Devereaux Jennings and Larry F. Moore) are either not involved in such fundamental decisions as work redesign or they do not have any control over the process of implementation. Thus indicating the low priority given to personnel management and development at strategic planning level. Firms in USA use elaborate, highly formalized, internally controlled employment procedures to govern their internal labour markets. Elaboration of labour titles, rule, procedures, rights and responsibilities are the means of guiding the workers in the system. that includes the use of testing and the use of long-term provisions for seniority. In a survey conducted by P. Devereaux Jennings and Larry F. Moore over 90% firms have entry, transfer, and exit procedures, and atleast 80% firms have moderate control over these practices. Firms are using compensation and benefits procedures under the control of HR departments. But job evaluation, job description, job enlargement and job enrichment appear to be less under the control of HR department than under the control of other units. Thus type of control that exists with in the firm over employment relationship is still bureaucratic indicating monochronic time perception, with rigid, time bound approach to tasks.

But the scene on the HRM front US appears to be in a state of transition. The managers are being forced to recruit from a shrinking pool of resources; coping with greater workforce diversity and helping employees balance work and family (Wagel and Levin 1990). Showing increased sensitivity to people related aspects at work. Continuing on that note, the future trend of HRM in USA point towards a development of a clan type culture emphasizing long term work commitments, continuing learning and international competitiveness that wold lead to the worker becoming an organisation citizen (Kunda 1992, Lincoln and Kalleberg 1991). These predictions point towards a greater acceptance and tolerance P-time element at work. These could be attributed to the hypothesis of convergence of cultures and consequently of HRM practices across nations.

Study 3:
Human Resources management practices in India India ranks low on power distance and medium on individuality, aspects of work place. The situation of India is unique with most of the enterprises here being public sectors units or families run businesses. The liberation of the economy has lead to many multi-national organizations setting up offices in India but many of the HR practices in these organisations are still influenced by the cultural perception of time.

The traditional state enterprises are bureaucratic and the HRM practices are more rational and systematized, similar to the ones followed in the M-time but that is the legacy of the long British rule and the existence of the caste system and the resulting horizontal social hierarchies in the Indian society. The society and consequently the HRM policies in practice are inclined towards polychronic time perception.

The stress on relationships and people are evident right from the recruitment and selection stage in an organisation as up to 52% of organisation surveyed in a study, quoted personal interview to be the favored method for selection. Seniority and performance are most important criteria for compensation and increment decisions.

Since a large section of the industrial or blue-collar employees are unskilled their wages are determined on the basis of industry-cum-region basis. The wages of the unskilled workers are, to some extent, linked with the job evaluation. The wages for workers and staff constitute basic wages, and dearness allowance linked with the fluctuation in the cost of living index, incentives linked to the production and the annual bonus. The average wages are supplemented with overtime compensation. that correlation of income to the economic fluctuations and the tradition of giving employee bonus on important festivals are highlights of the importance placed human aspects at work. The prevalent practices of workers participation in management and collective bargaining and the presence of many influential trade unions, in India reaffirm that aspect of work.
Job shifts and retrenchments were unheard of in the state owned enterprises or in family run businesses where the employer expected to take care of the employees. Formal participation of the employer or seniors in the organisation in the events of joy or sorrow of the family of the employee was common and that element has been retained in most of the newer private firms. The perception to work is of it being an end in itself hence little

Attention is paid to issues like job satisfaction or multi-skilled work force to aid in job rotation.

Most Indian firms rely on on-job-training. Due to the availability of a large pool of skilled labour many companies viewed training as risky and wasteful, that could explain the reliance on on-the-job-training. that and the lack of exit interviews and personnel research could be viewed as proofs of a lack of future-oriented mentality leading to little or no planning in HRM issues. The recently arrived MNC have led the change in the perception of time, atleast at work. Now issues like technicians' salaries are linked mostly to the job analysis or job evaluation and managerial salaries are linked to the qualification and responsibilities being shared in the organisation.

Along with the world India is changing, to show mixed time perceptions, as the business meetings would start on time but the personal element in the transactions remain.

Conclusion
The deeply entrenched perceptions, which have even shaped cultures, would be difficult to melt to mould together in one universal time-perception. But the desire to seek or introduce homogeneity in these matters are uppermost in the minds of a managers dealing with various issues of international HRM, ranging from managing of subsidiaries to training of expatriates. The slow progress towards acceptance of similar mixed time- perceptions at least in the place of work is visible.

While on one hand the Japanese promote dynamism, future-orientation, Gourmet Kitchen work and adherence to rules, on the other hand importance is placed on relationships, broad job descriptions, decentralization and respect for seniority.

HRM practices in USA are showing a similar trend, be it in greater tolerance of trade unions or in forays in building corporate loyalty. Similar trends in India are being forced towards a more monochronic approach to wards work, by advent of competition for the state owned enterprises from the private sector firms, including MNC.

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