Empowerment and continuous improvement in the United States, Mexico, Poland, and India: Predicting fit on the basis of the dimensions of power distance and individualism
C. Robert et al., Empowerment and continuous improvement in the United States, Mexico, Poland, and India: Predicting fit on the basis of the dimensions of power distance and individualism, J APPL PSYC, 85(5), 2000, pp. 643-658
Although variations in national cultures predominate as explanations for th
e belief that universal approaches to management do not exist, there have b
een few reports of systematic studies. Data from employees of a single firm
with operations in the United States, Mexico, Poland, and India were used
to test the fit of empowerment and continuous improvement practices with na
tional culture. Using the theoretical constructs of individualism-collectiv
ism and power distance, the authors predicted that the practices would be m
ore congruent in some cultures than in others and that value congruence wou
ld result in job satisfaction. Using structural equations modeling, the aut
hors found that empowerment was negatively associated with satisfaction in
India but positively associated in the other 3 samples. Continuous improvem
ent was positively associated with satisfaction in all samples. Substantive
, theoretical, and methodological implications are discussed.