Comparing value orientations of German and Chinese managers: impacts of demographic and business-related factors

Abstract

This article investigates the impact of demographic and business-related factors on universal values through surveying a large sample of German and Chinese managers. ANOVA analyses indicate that especially the factors age, job tenure and business sectors have substantially large and significant effects on basic human value orientations of German managers. For Chinese business leaders, the educational level and job tenure are the most relevant factors affecting their value priorities, while the factor age has lower impacts. Consistently with Schwartz (2006b), who postulates a pan-cultural consensus regarding value priorities, the findings of this study reveal a broad basis of similarities between both countries' managers. However, distinctions evolve; the factor company location has impacts on Chinese managers' but not on German managers' values. This indicates a distinctive Chinese intra-cultural variety which may have arisen from the heterogeneity of Chinese culture, whereas the relatively low degree of intra-cultural variety in Germany is likely to result from the homogeneity of German culture. Whether the diverse geographic sizes of both countries have impacts on the degree of intra-cultural diversity is an issue which may be debated.

Keywords::

• China
• cross-cultural study
• cultural dimensions
• cultural embeddedness
• demographic factors
• Germany
• managers
• universal values

Notes

^1. The calculations of the Pearson r scores predominantly support the results of the ANOVA analyses.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ronald Busse

Ronald Busse is a PhD candidate of the School of Management at Xi'an Jiaotong University. His research field is to examine the linkage between cultural embeddedness, universal values and leadership styles.

Linyan Sun

Linyan Sun (deceased 2013) was professor and vice dean of the School of Management at Xi'an Jiaotong University. His main research fields were industrial engineering and supply chain management.

Valerie Zhu

Valerie Zhu is associate professor of the School of Management and research fellow of the Knowledge Management and Innovation Research Center of Xi'an Jiaotong University.