Asian management style: an introduction

Citation

Speece, M. (2001), "Asian management style: an introduction", Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 16 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/jmp.2001.05016baa.001

Asian management style: an introduction

Asian management style: an introduction

About the Guest Editor  Mark Speece has worked in Asian countries since 1990, initially as Lecturer in Marketing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and subsequently as an Associate Professor of Marketing at the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok and at Bangkok University. In 1999 he took up the position of Associate Professor of Marketing at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Dr Speece's teaching interests are wide-ranging, extending from personal selling, sales and channels management through sales forecasting to advertising and sales promotion. Consulting work has focused on marketing research, strategy, and marketing evaluation in Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Taiwan.

This special issue of the Journal of Managerial Psychology focuses on exploring exactly what is meant by "Asian management style". Asia's recent financial crisis and economic recession seems to be nearing an end, but the issues that were brought into the open because of the crisis are still very much under debate in the region. Many question whether some elements often associated with Asian management are appropriate in the modern, global economy. This, however, begs the question of whether there actually is an "Asian management style". Many so-called Asian management traits, for example, heavy reliance on connections, might simply be holdovers from pre-modern management. In the absence of information or strong analytical training, there are not many ways to reduce risk other than by dealing only with those one knows well and trusts. As Asia modernizes, might such "Asian management" practices decline?

Even if there is an "Asian" management style, what is it? Asia is really more of a geographical concept, rather than well-defined, homogenous cultural entity. East and Southeast Asia are home to a multitude of cultures. Is management similar across them, or are there as many Asian managements as there are Asian cultures? East and Southeast Asia currently offer an excellent context in which to address such issues. The crisis and recession focused people's attention on management issues. Managers and management scholars are attempting to identify what elements of management caused or contributed to the crisis, what needs to be changed, what should be kept. Management in the region is under constant reassessment, and is changing. The next generation of Asian managers will likely still operate differently from Western managers, but probably also differently from "Asian" managers of the previous generation. Will they still have an "Asian" management style?

Asian management, Asian context

The level of sophistication is also rising rapidly about "Asian" management, and exactly how it differs (or does not differ) from Western management, and from other "Asian" management. Some Western observers, who perhaps were not very familiar with broader Asia, occasionally used to talk about Japanese management as Asian management. Of course, more careful analysis makes it clear that "Japanese" and "Asian" are not synonymous when applied to management. Chinese management has also now received quite a lot of attention (e.g. Kao, 1993; Chen, 1995; Redding, 1996a; 1996b; Redding and Wong, 1986). Although Japanese and Chinese management may share some common elements, few observers now believe that they are very similar at all (for example, dissimilarity is specifically pointed out in Haley and Tiong (1999) and Wijewardena and Wimalasiri (1998)). It is even quite clear that Chinese management in China, with the strong overlay of socialist state-owned enterprise management systems, is not exactly the same as Chinese management in capitalist economies (see, for example, Strange, 1998; Selmer, 1998).

Some work has also been done on identifying distinguishing characteristics of "Asian" management in other Asian cultures, though much of this work on the smaller Asian economies is not as widely disseminated in international journals. Also, much of the work has aimed initially at contrasting management style or elements of management philosophy with Western management, rather than at distinguishing from Japanese or Chinese management. Nevertheless, careful comparison with respective elements of Japanese and/or Chinese management in the literature suggests that there are many subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle differences. For example, in the case of Thai management, there has been work examining strategic orientation of Thai executives (Park and Krishnan, 1997), influence tactics of Thai managers (Noypayak and Speece, 1998), negotiation process (Chandarapratin, 1995) and, more broadly, business practices (Hughes and Sheehan, 1993). Lawler et al. (1997) even suggest that there is not a single "Thai" management, but rather Thai and Thai-Chinese versions, with additional bureaucratic influences coming from state-owned corporations, and, of course, foreign influences.

While most observers eventually recognized that Japanese management and other Asian managements were not exactly the same, transfer of Japanese management to other cultural contexts was once a hot academic topic (e.g. Drucker, 1971; Kono, 1982; Ishida, 1986). Some authors maintain that other Asian managements, while perhaps not Japanese originally, are becoming Japanese under the strong influence of Japanese investment. The "flying geese" theory of Japanese-led economic development in Asia has been around for many decades, and still receives attention (e.g. Ray et al., 2000). Some authors have applied this theory to the development of management style and practice, arguing, for example, that under Japanese corporate influence, East and Southeast Asian companies are developing strategic decision-making processes similar to those in Japanese companies (e.g. Nakamura, 1992). This "Japanization" of aspects of Asian management, following the "flying geese" theory, still receives some discussion (e.g. Sikorski and Menkhoff, 2000).

However, many observers question whether Japanese management can be exported (e.g. Hodgetts and Luthans, 1989; Sullivan, 1983). Certainly, much current discussion of the evolution of business and management in Southeast Asia, while recognizing change and professionalization, do not see any particularly strong Japanese influence on local management practice (e.g. Lim, 2000; Yeung, 2000). Some authors specifically argue that many elements of Japanese management are not transferable to other Asian contexts. Sammapan (1996), for example, measured 43 different Japanese management practices as applied by Japanese companies in Thailand, and concluded that over half of them had very little potential for successful transfer. Another quarter of the elements had only moderate chances of successful transfer into the Thai management context, according to this analysis. However, the issue of transferability (or non-transferability) of Japanese management has not yet been entirely settled, and is still debated today (e.g. Naylor, 2000). The issue of direct transferability of Western management is also still debated, as many of the articles in this issue demonstrate.

My own views are based on Western origin, but influenced by long residence in several different parts of Asia, and entry by marriage into Asian culture. I have been an academic researching business in Asia and teaching Asian managers, and have also at times been in industry when I dropped out of academia to practice business in Asia. To me, it is clear that Asian cultures are distinct from Western ones, and therefore, Asian management thinking and implementation is somewhat different. However, I also believe that focus on the differences has often caused observers to overlook the fact that there are many things common between Asian and Western thinking, and thus, management. In addition, many observers obscure the fact that there is no single Asian culture, or management style, but that Asia consists of a multitude of very distinct cultures, and thus, many different ways of thinking about and implementing management. Finally, it seems that observers often confuse the indisputable fact that there are differences between Asia and the West with the causes of the differences. Many differences may well come from different levels of economic development, or simply from different historical circumstances, rather than from culture.

Many writers, for example, argue that the key elements of the Chinese concept of guanxi fit within the context of Confucianism and are inherent in Chinese culture (e.g. Yeung and Tung, 1996; Luo, 1997). However, we hinted above that guanxi may actually be an adaptation to conditions in which there is little information and little ability to analyze information. Thus, we would say guanxi is more likely to come from economic and social conditions, and is not a core cultural element. While this is probably not the majority view, it has been suggested before that guanxi arises from China's historical conditions, and is not necessarily inherent in Chinese culture (e.g. Kao, 1993; Wong, 1997; Wong and Chan, 1999). Certainly, Tan (2000) seems to believe that the strong preservation of guanxi among overseas Chinese in Indonesia and Malaysia is a response to the strong discrimination which outsiders often face in those cultures. Speece and Igel (2000) note, however, that Thai-Chinese do not face much of this discrimination, and that the strong ethnic connections have not always been necessary; Thai-Chinese will do business with ethnic Thai and integrate them into their own networks.

Table 1 East and Southeast Asian populations and per capita incomes

More broadly in context, Mallet (1999), for example, argues that much of what people call "Asian values" is actually characteristic of pre-industrial societies. In this view, much of Asia, which industrialized very rapidly in the last half of the twentieth century, still has societies and cultures which have not completely caught up with the rapidly changing economic conditions. Table I shows an overview of East and Southeast Asian per-capita incomes, which roughly indicates the very wide range of development in the region. Countries range from pre-industrial (such as much of Indo-China), through what might be termed take-off economies (such as China and the Philippines), to newly industrializing (now Thailand and Malaysia, not the set of economies that used to be called the NICs), to fully industrialized or even post-industrial in modern terminology. Even many of the most advanced parts of Asia today were not very advanced just a few generations ago. Much of the old-style thinking in Asia is probably "pre-industrial", rather than "Asian", and many of the elements can be found in other parts of the world which have not yet or have only recently industrialized. Indeed, many elements were present in the West historically, before strong industrialization.

Management change

Our own work suggests that what are sometimes called "core" cultural elements change in practice as management modernizes. We do not particularly care to argue whether this is because the "core" cultural elements are changing, or because the culture allows for change in practice; either way, "Asian" management is changing. For example, the concept of guanxi (connections in poor Western translation) in China has generated a copious literature contrasting the Chinese versus the Western way of doing business. In sales, it is often summed up by the observation very commonly heard in China: "You can't sell anything in China without connections". Our own research on sales management in interior China, away from much foreign influence, shows that this is not strictly true. Some state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are starting to build modern, trained sales forces, and this is changing the role of guanxi.

The customers of such companies, themselves all Chinese SOEs from the interior, say emphatically that they prefer to deal with these new sales reps, rather than the old style ones who rely purely on guanxi. Guanxi is not necessary, they say, for them to place a trial order if the rep is good. Guanxi still plays a role, but it comes subsequent to the sale, and is no longer a prior condition. A well trained rep does not need guanxi to get in the door, and for longer term growth of the business relationship, a well trained rep who subsequently develops some guanxi is very likely to take most of the sales away from poorly trained reps who had prior guanxi (Speece and Han, 2000). A survey among sales reps in Beijing similarly shows that reps who have better training themselves believe that guanxi is somewhat less important than reps who have had less training (Speece et al., 1998).

Other work in Hong Kong suggests that ethnic Chinese sales reps change their conceptual structure in the use of many guanxi elements when they work in a Western corporate culture. They not only adapt how they "do", but also how they think, when they come in contact with non-Chinese thinking (So and Speece, 2000). Thus, even if guanxi may be a core concept in Chinese culture, it is not a static concept. Rather, it changes as the economy changes, as the knowledge base in society grows, as other views come in from outside Chinese culture. Where once guanxi may have been a necessary condition for any transaction to take place, it is no longer necessary. Guanxi is still useful; in particular, it gives better access to information. Given that many Asian companies are still secretive about information, this gives reps with guanxi a better chance of using modern sales skills to fit their products to customer needs. In Hong Kong, even when reps change their thinking about exactly how guanxi implementation elements relate to other sales activities, they still use it. But the evolution is the critical issue here. Cultures evolve, a point made by several of the authors in this special issue. What is "Asian" in the future may not be exactly the same as what is "Asian" now.

All of these are my own views; the authors in this special issue do not necessarily agree with me. Some of the papers were chosen to present the various views about these issues. Some argue strongly about the fundamental differences between Asian and Western culture and management thinking; some do not see strong fundamental differences, but only adaptation at the level of implementation detail. However, even among those who argue that many so-called "Asian values" or "Asian management styles" are not really inherently Asian, most would agree that management concepts, whatever their origin, do need to be adapted in the details to the specific context, whether the management or the context is Asian or Western. Thus, some papers were chosen to illustrate how the application of management concepts may require this adaptation in specific Asian contexts, even if we accept that the Western concepts themselves may be valid in Asia.

We cannot hope to answer everything about these complex issues in a single small volume of contributions. We can, however, give a good overview of some of the key issues which must be examined, across a range of different Asian cultures. If nothing else, this volume should demonstrate the wide range of thinking about management in Asia. There certainly are some management elements which are "universal", practiced in the same ways in businesses in any culture. But such culture-free elements are probably the exception, not the rule. The papers in this issue demonstrate that there are widely different ways of looking at many management elements, both comparing Asian and Western concepts, and also comparing thinking within different Asian cultures. Even where the conceptual structure may not be very different, implementation details may differ.

Management theory

Tsz-kit Cheng, Domenic Sculli, and Fiona Shui-fun Chan, in their article "Relationship dominance: rethinking management theories from the perspective of methodological relationalism", discuss the general issue of theory application across different cultures. They point out that conceptual models which come from the West, as most management theory does, were developed in a Western context using Western data. Concepts and how concepts fit together may not be exactly the same in Asian cultures. Specifically, they argue that much of Western management theory is based in "methodological individualism", i.e. research traditions which assume that the individual should be the main focus. This approach may not work in Asian cultures, where most observers see strong group orientation. Thus, these authors propose that a better approach to studying management in an Asian context would be "methodological relationalism", which specifically takes account of the individual's relationships with others. Many of the elements one would need to address in this approach are characteristic of the relationship and the context in which the relationship takes place, and are not specific to a particular individual.

Many observers have commented on the dichotomy between Western focus on individualism, or more generally, the particularistic level, i.e. individual issues as well as individual people. Asian thinking is often characterized as more holistic; thus the discussion in Cheng, Sculli and Chan about looking at people embedded in their broader social networks. John B. Kidd, in his article "Discovering inter-cultural perceptual differences in MNEs", also looks at the individualistic versus relationships orientation, as well as makes the point about the more holistic thinking in many Asian cultures. He examines in more detail several of the specific elements usually associated with Asian management, and contrasts them with Western management. Business process re-engineering (BPR), knowledge-based systems (KBS) and organisational learning (OL) are all quite important concepts and processes in Western management, but Kidd shows that these things may work very differently in Japanese and Chinese management thinking. Blind application of concepts, systems, and processes which have been developed in the West may be doomed to failure if differences are not taken into account. He also makes it clear that while both "Asian", and sharing much, Japanese and Chinese management thinking is not exactly the same.

Kidd even hints that some things, for example, organizational learning, may be more embedded in traditional Asian management styles, which are more group-oriented and long-term in outlook, than in Western management, which tends to focus on the individual and is often more short-term. It may be that elaborate theories and systems have evolved in the West for some things because such things are needed in Western organizations, but they do not come naturally from Western culture. The mechanisms may be embedded in Asian cultures, so that Asians have seen little need for the complex theories and processes in such cases. And, Kidd hints, Asian management thinking (and Asian culture) evolves, sometimes becoming more like Western management. This may actually make implementation of some of these Western concepts in Asia more, rather than less, difficult. The underlying cultural concepts, which were implicit before and would have supported careful, well-adapted implementation, may no longer be conducive to application of such management theory.

Sometimes, it may be possible that the differences between Asian and Western management style are over-emphasized. There are certainly some common elements. Low Sui Pheng and Christopher H.Y. Leong, in "Asian management style versus Western management theories: a Singapore case study in construction project management", present a contrary view to those who stress the fundamental differences of Asian versus Western management. They argue that the basic elements of management are not actually substantially different, and much of what goes on in Asia can be understood from management theory developed in the West. Thus, it is not so much that management theory or management style differs strongly, but rather that the details are adapted to fit into the specific cultural context. In their view, the Asian financial and economic crisis, from which the region is just now recovering, came from basic poor management of the type that could (and has) happened elsewhere, and not from anything intrinsically "Asian" about how management operates in the region.

Management practice

The first three articles are primarily concerned with the macro-level issues, specifically, whether or not Western management concepts work in Asia, given that the cultures are quite different. Supitcha Morakul and Frederick H. Wu, in "Cultural influences on the ABC implementation in Thailand's environment", discuss these issues more at the micro-level of implementation. Given that Western methods are often used as Asian firms modernize, do they work well? Or, is there a need for cultural adaptation when implementing management concepts based on Western theories? They look at how three Thai organizations have implemented activity-based costing systems, and compare resistance to the new system among employees when the organization simply imposes the system from the West, versus when it attempts to make some adaptations to account for cultural differences. They hypothesize that cultural adaptation is necessary to gain employee cooperation. However, their results are not as clear-cut as one might expect, whether one believes that cultural adaptation is imperative, or that cultural adaptation is unnecessary.

Apart from its use in looking at how organizations may adapt versus adopt, this work is also quite useful in showing the difficulty of translating concepts from a Western context and measuring them in Asian culture. Morakul and Wu show that in-depth discussion, which reveals more of the nuances of cultural details, may be a better way to understand how cultural issues in the organization affect implementation of managerial initiatives. However, their work also shows that it is difficult to capture such cultural nuances in quantitative survey questions.

Lee Soo Hoon and Vivien K.G. Lim, in "Attitudes towards money and work: implications for Asian management style following the economic crisis", look at how the crisis may have changed thinking among the future managers in Southeast Asia. They argue that some of the "Asian" values related to work ethic, and the belief that hard work will pay off, may have changed. (They also show that attitudes toward money have changed, but they would probably not wish to imply that such attitudes are necessarily cultural in origin.) Their data indicate some change in thinking in Singapore from before the crisis. They suggest that the much more severe crisis in Thailand is the reason for the stronger thinking about many of these issues among Thai respondents. In their recommendations, Lee and Lim mention a number of points which make the Asian family business style more able to deal with the shock to employees' thinking which resulted from crisis. But they also suggest some measures which can be adopted (or adapted) into the "Asian" management style of such companies to deal with employee disenchantment. Implicitly, of course, such arguments assume that some "Asian values" and, by implication, "Asian management style" are responses to the environment, rather than cultural givens.

Vagelis Dedoussis, in "Keiretsu and management practices in Japan – resilience amid change", looks at the evolution of several aspects of Japanese management under the impact of Japan's lengthy economic slowdown, which started long before the Asian crisis of the late 1990s. He notes that many observers, mainly Western, see changes in management practice as evidence of the Westernization of Japanese management. Dedoussis, however, argues strongly that there is very little Westernization going on, but rather, that Japanese firms are simply adjusting some practices to current economic conditions, and that the fundamental elements of Japanese management remain intact. It is more the keiretsu membership structures that are changing, as some companies in the groups become impossible to sustain in the modern economy, but others are brought into the close relationships with the keiretsu core companies.

Dedoussis also notes that some of the new companies coming into strong supplier relationships with Japanese companies are not Japanese, but local, in Southeast Asia and elsewhere. This hints that some of Japanese management's adjustment may simply be accommodation to other Asian managements, as Japanese companies have become heavily involved throughout the region, though Dedoussis does not specifically say this. The overriding message, however, is that Japanese management is changing, certainly, but it is becoming another Japanese management style, not a Western form of management.

Conclusion

Thus, we hope this issue will summarize well some of the key issues in research on Asian management, or management in Asia. Is Asian management different from Western management? Can Western management be applied in the Asian context? Are Asian culture (the management context) and Asian management static, or do they change? A number of views, not necessarily all in agreement, are presented here. We hope to see research in the future exploring these views and arguments in more detail. Readers who agree with some of this work should examine it in their own, different Asian context to see how it works. Readers who disagree should gather data to show how and why the thinking presented here cannot hold up. The literature on Asian management is large and continuously growing, but we are still at the beginning of understanding it. There still remains an enormous amount of work to be done to clarify all of the issues which come up in this issue, and more.

Mark SpeeceNanyang Business School, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

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