Hofstede’s Dimension in Korea

Write 7 pages thesis on the topic hofstede’s dimension in korea. Korean is the main and highly used language of the country. The language is used together with Korean and Hangul alphabet. Korea is an export driven country, focusing on the export of electronics and automobile goods and services. Figure 1: Hofstede’s Five dimension in Korea There are five dimensions of Korea’s Hofstede, such as Power Distance, Masculinity vs. Femininity, Individualism, Long Term Orientation and Uncertainty Avoidance. If the essay explores the culture of Korea through the Hofstede’s Five Dimension Model lenses, then an effective overview of the deep drive of the country’s culture can be attained relative to the world’s culture. Power Distance This particular dimension deals with the fact that each and every individual in society cannot be equal. Especially, it expresses the cultural attitude of people towards the inequalities among the people in a society. Power distance can be defined as the extent to which limited powerful individuals of an organization or an institution within a society accept and expect that power is not equally distributed. The power distance score of Korea is 60. The people within the societies and communities of Korea always maintain and give value to the people who are in the top of hierarchy. Therefore, regulations and norms take huge account as the people of Korea accept a hierarchical order. Each and every individual within the society has a place that does not need further justification. Hierarchy in an institution or an organization is seen as reflecting intrinsic inequalities. In addition to this, people within the organization follow centralized structure or order. Boss or top management in an organization decides what to do. The subordinates always expected to do what their top management wants in the organization. The employees or subordinates do not raise their voice against the opinion of the boss or the top management. In a single word, people in Korean organizations give high respect to the authority and the decision making process in business management organization is totally centralized. Individualism The basic issue addressed by this particular dimension is the degree of interdependence that is maintained by a society among its each and every member. This dimension has to deal with whether the self image of people within a society is defined in terms of “WE” or “I”. There are two types of dimensions of the society, such as individualist society and collectivist society. According to the concept of individualistic society, people only can look after their direct family and themselves. On the other hand, people of collectivist society can look after or take care of the people who are belonging to the group and exchange loyalty. In terms of individualism, Korea has a score of 18. It means that the people of Korea follow collectivistic social structure and values. People of Korea have close long-term commitment to each and every member of the group (Greet-Hofstede, 2012, p.1). Loyalty in the collectivist culture over-rides several societal rules and regulations. In addition to this, this collectivist culture is considered as paramount. A particular society fosters strong relationship where each and every member within a group takes significant responsibility for fellow group members. Koreans always like to follow the collective decision of family (Lee and Boster, 1992, pp. 11-13).