National Culture Conflicts in the Transfer of IT Solutions to Latin American Companies

Abstract

Culture plays a central role in shaping the particular orientation that each individual assumes in its behavior in an organization and can thus be related to the success of information technology (IT) solutions transfer between cultures, as IT artifacts are not culturally neutral, since they embody values, assumptions, meanings, and consequences. This can be exemplified through the identification of specific conflicts between values of IT outsourcing frameworks developed in the North American contexts with those of typical Brazilian companies. It should not be seen as a critique, per se, of these frameworks, given their important contribution to the improvement of the sourcing process, but instead to raise the cultural awareness of the designers of IT methodologies intended for global use. To speak about “Brazilian culture” and “Brazilian organizational culture” is certainly an oversimplification for a country that hosts multiple subcultures resulting from waves of immigrants from different countries, varied processes of local structuration over centuries, the increased presence of multinational corporations, and the globalization of local companies. Nevertheless, there are some cultural traits that permeate to a different degree in these subcultures and can be used to identify sources of potential adjustment or conflict in the process of technology transfer. The traditional Brazilian ability to adapt and its openness to innovation provide the conditions for hybridization and continuous adaptation, leading to the superposition of influence layers, and waves of novel accommodation processes.

Keywords:

• Information Technology Transfer
• National Culture
• Organizational Culture
• Outsourcing

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nicolau Reinhard

Nicolau Reinhard is a professor of management and coordinator of the Information Systems Group at the School of Economics, Administration, and Accounting of the University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil. Professor Reinhard has a degree in engineering, a PhD in management, and, besides his academic career, has held executive and consulting positions in IT management in private and public organizations. His research interests and publications are related to management of the IT function, the use of IT in public administration, and information systems implementation and impacts.