The influence of national culture on organizational culture of multinational companies

Abstract

The study investigated the influence of national culture on organizational culture of multinational companies in Ghana. A survey of 269 managers was sampled from Accra, Tema, Takoradi and Kumasi. Structural Equation Modelling statistical (SEM) technique with AMOS 24.0 was employed for the study’s analysis. It was observed that, high uncertainty avoidance and high power distance cultures of Ghana had significant positive consequence on companies’ organizational culture while collective and masculine cultures had positive effect on the companies’ culture but were insignificant in their influence—rejecting the stated hypotheses. The findings contribute significantly to the debate on the influence of national culture on organizational culture—especially on multinational research activities. It also suggests for further research to examine the relationship using different measurement scales in capturing the diverse ethnic groups and their respective effects on corporate culture of companies.

Keywords:

• national culture
• organizational culture
• multinational companies

PUBLIC INTEREST STATEMENT

The effect of national culture on organizational culture activities in the extant academic literature has not been explored so much in Ghana—a country that has become one of the destinations for many multinational companies in Africa. The paper examined the relationship between national culture and organizational culture of multinational manufacturing companies. It sampled 269 managers from four major business or industrial cities in Ghana—Accra, Tema, Kumasi and Takoradi. Data were collected through purposive and snowballing sampling techniques while Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) statistical technique was used to analyse the data. It was observed that, high uncertainty avoidance and high power distance cultures of Ghana had significant positive consequence on companies’ organizational culture while collective and masculine cultures had positive effect on the companies’ culture but were insignificant in their influence. The findings contribute significantly to the debate on the influence of national culture on organizational culture of multinational companies. The results have wider implications for academic, practice and policy.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

1. Introduction

The interface between national culture and organizational culture has become an incessant debate in academic literature on organizational theory for decades (Gerhart & Fang, 2005; Pedersen & Dobbin, 2006; Gerhart, 2009; Hatch & Zilber, 2012; Nazariana, Atkinsonb, & Foroudic, 2017). According to Michael, Kevin, and Roger (2010); Minkov and Hofstede (2012) as well as Klimas (2016), understanding the culture of people from different geographical environment has the propensity to provide responses to the challenges of contemporary international business. Metters and Verma (2008); Verbekea, Kanob, and Yuanc (2016) also observed that, a research on multinational companies in the present global business activity has the likelihood of offering both theoretical and useful implications towards superlative business practices. Numerous researchers such as Kotelnikov (2010); Smith (2010); Carrillo, Lung and Tulder (2012) have all advocated for studies on culture to be carried out in different cultural environments—most especially in non-western nations. An increasing body of literature has shown that, national culture has strong influences on numerous organizational activities such as fiscal decisions and strategies (Hua & Wei, 2016; Weber, 1996); financial systems (Kwok & Tadesse, 2006); financing methods (Aggarwal & Goodell, 2009); momentum strategy and trading behaviour (Chui, Titman, & Wei, 2010); protection of investor rights (Stulz & Willaimson, 2003), mergers (Ahern, Daminelli and Fracassi, 2012); dividend policy (Shao, Kwok, & Guedhami, 2010) as well as capital structure (Chui, Lloyd, & Kwok, 2002).

Studies by Hofstede (2001), Nelson and Gopalan (2003), Johns (2006) and Nazariana et al. (2017) have all revealed that, national culture has effect on the activities of organizational culture—such that, national cultural norms, values and beliefs are forced on organizations through societal establishment (Dennis et al., 2007; Fitzsimmons & Stamper, 2014; Gerhart, 2009; Hofstede, Hofstede, & Minkov, 2010). According to Meehan, Rigby, and Rogers (2008), culture has the only exclusive element in making a distinction between top performing companies from ordinary companies. Intercontinental businesses are often confronted with collapse and difficulties which are attributed to insufficient indulgent of the cultural circumstances other than market conditions (Adler, 1991; Lu, Plewa & Ho, 2016). Many of the complexities associated with MNCs are the changing business patterns—they face in the host countries (Ekaterina, 2008). According to Winklhofer, Pressey, and Tzokas (2006), culture has become a multifaceted construct in the academic literature—where much has not been done in terms of definition and its link essentials.

Figure 1. Conceptual model of the study.

The lacking of agreement on national and organizational cultural influences deserve further research to shed light on the probable impact of cultural difference on management and performance in both practice and in academia (Lu et al., 2016). Given the lack of visibility on culture influences as posited by Whelan (2012); further research ought to be carried out on the concept. Evidence preceding research works have led to contradictory results and considerable gaps relative to national culture influence on organizational culture. According to Alireza, Atkinsonb and Foroudic (2017), problems managers face in industries in which customers have globalized standards of anticipation ought to examine factors that influence on organizational performance. It is essential to take a closer look at national culture effect on organizations’ culture. Researchers such as Kotelnikov (2010); Smith (2010) have all advocated for research works on culture difference to be conducted in different cultural environments—specifically in non-western nations. According to Groseschl and Doherty (2000); Chen, Cheung, and Law (2012), there is a lack of research on the influence of national culture on other cultural levels specifically—organizational culture. There is scant research examining national culture and organizational culture relationship in Ghana and in Africa. To understand their relationship in the extant literature as well as on African organizations towards supervising African employees in particular, there is an imperative need to assess the organizational level factors (Jackson, Louw, & Zhao, 2013) with its national culture. In addition, studies have also shown that, there is little research on multinational activities in developing countries. According to Merchant, Van der Stede, Lin, and Yu (2011) there is little research on multinational activities outside of the United States. Murphy and Li (2012) also opined that, not much research has been conducted on multinational activities in Developing countries.

The present paper fills this essential gap by examining culture influences in multinational companies operating in Africa. The rest of the paper is organized as follows: discussion of related literature; presentation of the study’s methodology; the empirical results presentation and discussion as well as the study’s implications and conclusions.

2. Literature review

2.1. The resource-based view theory

The resource-based view (RBV) theory was propounded by Wernerfelt in 1984 which suggested that, organizational culture was probably a unique resource that allows organizations to make distinctions between themselves and their competitors (Barney, 1986, 1991; Wernerfelt, 1984). It demonstrates that, the evolving recognition of organizational culture for management scholars is mostly explained from the RBV angle. The theory views culture as a subtle, managerial and moderately intangible resource (Galbreath, 2005) that contributes to competitive advantage (Fiol, 1991; Flamholtz & Randle, 2011). Researchers maintain that, organizational culture is a tactical resource which unswervingly correlates with superior fiscal performance (Barney, 1986) as well as the entire performance in organizations (Gregory, Harris, Armenakis, & Shook, 2009; Zheng, Yang, & McLean, 2010). According to Denison and Spreitzer (1991), the RBV has become a motivating force towards the development of organizations. Organizational culture can resist imitation efforts of competitors while contributing more significantly to a sustained advantage than tangible resources (Galbreath, 2005).

In relating the resource-based view theory to the current study, this research submits that, the material and human capital associated with multinational companies have a greater influence in meeting external and cultural effects from their operating environment—making it more difficult for national cultural activities to have a direct effect on organizations’ activities. According to Lee and Kramer (2016), the human capital in organizations’ directly or indirectly affect its national culture. It therefore explains how the resource base of multinational companies give them a competitive advantage over their competitors and their respective external environment.

2.2. National culture

The concept of national culture has been acknowledged as the key to cross-cultural study and practice—which includes: cross-cultural psychology (Triandis, 1994, 1995), international business (Andersson, Johansson, & Lööf, 2012; Baskerville, 2003; Shamkarmahesh, Ford, & LaTour, 2003); international and cross-cultural relations (Minkov & Hofstede, 2011; Taras, Steel, & Kirkman, 2012; Usunier, Furrer, & Furrer-Perrinjaquet, 2011); organizational management (Lewis, 2006); differences in public sector (Maleki & Bots, 2013; Rao & Walton, 2002) as well as on governance systems which tend to impact inhabitants of a country (Helgesen & Kim, 2002; Inglehart, 1997; Minkov, 2009). Understanding the national culture of one’s country has innumerable benefits to countries organizations’ as well as individuals. According to Hofstede (2001), national culture is seen as the collective mental programming of the mind in a countrywide context. The description of divergence in behaviour of organizations by country of origin implies that each country has a distinctive set of features that tend to influence resolutions that are made in companies (Pagell, 2004). Brooks (2003) identified factors that tend to influence how the values of people are developed—with respect to language, religion, education, legal system, values as well as the political system.

2.3. Application of Hofstede dimension

Hofstede work has its own criticism but his work is being used by many authors and researchers in both marketing and management literature (Dickson, Hartog, & Mitchelson, 2003; Silva, Correia, Scholten, & Gomes, 2008; Soares, Farhangmehr, & Shoham, 2007). Triandis (2004) observed that, the Hofstede’s work has turned out to be the benchmark against which new works on cultural differences are authenticated. According to Sondergaard (1994); Steenkamp (2001); Christie, Kwon, Stoeberl, and Baumhart (2003); Cray (2006); Wendt, Euwena, and Emmerik (2009), Hofstede’s index has been used in different studies—ranging from: organizational behaviours, leadership behaviours as well as group process. Minkov (2011) again opined that, Hofstede’s framework was the extensively used national cultural structure in psychology, sociology, marketing as well as in management studies.

It is of importance to note that, many of Hofstede’s critics frequently do not propose any empirical substantiation to hold up their condemnation of his index. Hofstede’s model has been touted as the largely cited cultural framework (Hsu et al., 2013). Lanier and Kirchner (2013) evaluated Hofstede’s work and later recommended to scholars in applying Hofstede’s model in cultural research. The current study employed his concept as a result of his index being used more than the dimensions of Trompenaars (1993); Schwartz (1994) as well as the GLOBE project (2004) which are all used in assessing national culture of countries.

2.4. Organizational culture

The indefinite nature of organizational culture as a concept has led to its being explained differently by various researchers (Sudarsanam & Sorwar, 2010, Lu et al., 2016). Castro and Martins (2010) asserted that, organizational culture has profound roots in organizations—which used employers’ principles, beliefs as well as assumptions as its foundation. Schein (1992) defined organizational culture as the patterns of shared basic assumptions that a group learned so as to tackle problems of external adaptation and internal integration. As a way of behaving in organizations, it authorizes members to think and feel—about problems in organizations. Cameron and Quinn (2003) also observed that, organizational culture was an implicit set of values, beliefs, assumptions—commonly shared by members of organizations.While national culture recounts predominantly on deep-seated values, organizational culture relates mainly to share beliefs in organizational practices and processes (Sirmon & Lane, 2004).

2.5. Hofstede’s cultural dimension on Ghana

There are limited studies done on management using Hofstede’s dimension in Ghana. Ansah (2015) observed that, evidence from empirical literature on culture and business activities was limited in Ghana—especially in the area of Hofstede index. Bond (2005) posited that, the need for information on Ghanaian national and business culture was essential for managerial purposes. In classifying the index of Hofstede’s culture to Ghana’s culture, it was evident that, Ghana’s business culture was a masculine one, a very collectivist culture, large or strong power distance coupled with a very high uncertainty avoidance (Ansah, 2015; Meikano, 2009).

3. Hypothesis development

3.1. National culture and organizational culture

The relationship between national culture and organizational has been subjected to academic debate for years. Hofstede and Hofstede (2005) posited that, organizational cultures have different noticeable fact than national cultures; nevertheless, the formation of organizational culture exhibits some similarities with that of the national culture. Institutional theorists such as Aguilera & Jackson (2003), Nelson and Gopalan (2003) have advocated strongly that, national culture plays a significant role in shaping organizational culture. According to organizational theorists such as Wernerfelt (1984); Barney (1986) and Gerhart (2009), a strong organizational culture has a greater influence to outweigh national culture due to the resource-based view (RBV) theory which gives a superior advantage to organizations.

According to House, Hanges, Ruiz-Quintanilla, Dorfman, and Gupta (2004); Beugelsdijk, Koen, and Noorderhaven (2009) as well as Nazarian, Atkinson, and Greaves (2014), previous studies which have shown that, national culture affects organizational culture. Gerhart (2009) opined that, the extent to which a national culture has a greater probability of limiting the organizational culture of a company. Lee and Kramer (2016) also observed that, national culture has some precincts on organizational cultures due to the variations in cultural typology. National culture has a greater effect on strategic decisions (López-Duartea, González-Loureirob, Vidal-Suáreza, & González-Díaza, 2016). The culture of organizations must be tailored to suit that of its national policy, which could then be said that, national culture per its nature may have influence on the culture of one’s organization. Drawing from the foregoing discussion, this study therefore proposes the following:

H1: Masculine culture has a significant positive influence on organizational culture

H2: High power distance culture has a significant positive influence on organizational culture

H3: High uncertainty avoidance culture has a significant positive influence on organizational culture

H4: Collectivist culture has a significant positive influence on organizational culture

4. Method

4.1. Sample and data collection

The study’s sample was drawn from managers of multinational manufacturing companies in Accra, Tema, Takoradi and Kumasi in Ghana—through purposive sampling and snowballing sampling techniques. The survey was conducted from August 2015 through March 2016. The total number of returned questionnaires was 269 out of 400 questionnaires representing 67.3% of the response rate.

Letters were sent to all of the multinational manufacturing companies located in the named industrial or commercial business cities explaining the rationale of the study while a request was made for their participation in the study. At the end of the request, more than 40 of the managers responded that, they were ready to participate while the rest of the managers agreed that the questionnaires could be sent to them to participate in the study, after they realized that, the data collection exercise was for academic purpose and nothing else. Consent forms were then attached to the questionnaires and they were distributed through five trained research assistants while collection was also done after some days and weeks until the required sample size for the analysis was reached.

4.2. Measurement and questionnaire design

Research scales were structured to go with the preceding adapted works. Proper changes were made in aligning the current research context and purpose. Masculinity measure, high uncertainty avoidance measure, high power distance measure as well as collectivist measure were adapted from Hofstede and Hofstede (2005) characteristics of the cultural index exclusively to Ghana’s dimension. It was subjected to exploratory factor analysis to assess the study’s sampling adequacy. Masculinity measure; high uncertainty avoidance measure; high power distance measure as well as collectivist measure retained 3—item; 4—item; 4—item as well as 4—item, respectively. Organizational culture also used a five-item scale that was adapted from Mohd (2014). The measurement items were measured on a 5-point Likert scale that was anchored by 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree.

4.3. Analysis

A test was carried out on the study’s sampling adequacy in a form of exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to validate the factor structure of the measurement variables before the study’s hypotheses were tested. The exploratory factor analysis was done through Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). After which a two-step technique by Anderson and Gerbing (1988); Hair, Black, Babin, and Anderson (2010) was also used with the measurement model assessment as part of confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) which was later followed by structural model analysis or path analysis in determining the hypothesized relationship of the study.

4.3.1. Unidimensionality test

A dimensionality assessment was conducted in testing the study’s sampling adequacy along with Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and they were in a form of stages: First, Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) of sampling adequacy was greater than .7 for each of the study’s construct to authenticate the suitability of the data for factor analysis while the Bartlett’s test of sphericity was also greater than 0.05 (p < 0.05) for all the constructs used in the study (Meyer & Collier, 2001; Pallant, 2010, p. 187). Secondly, a principle components analysis and varimax rotation were also assessed to extract suitable factors for the study’s analysis. Third, in selecting criteria for significant factors and questions, the criteria were set to be significant at above 1.0 for Eigenvalue, above .1 for Factor loadings, and at p < 0.05 for significance probability (Pallant, 2010, p. 192). The goal of the exploratory factor analysis was to obtain hypothetically meaningful factors from what other researchers have used elsewhere rather than to reduce the number of constructs under each of the variables used in the study’s analysis.

The results of the analysis showed KMO, Bartlett’s sphericity test and significance probability levels all surpassing the recommended thresholds for each of the construct. Eigenvalues for the study’s constructs were as follows: masculine culture (2.542), collectivist culture or collectivism (2.372), high uncertainty avoidance (2.982), high power distance (2.756) and organizational culture (2.677). Factor loadings showed suitability—all exceeding .1. Cumulative variances within the five factors produced high explanatory power of 79.70%. The results showed that, unidimensionality was satisfactory for the measured items because each item showed high loadings in the factors—making it adequate for Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to be carried out in the next stage of the analysis under the measurement model.

4.3.2. Measurement model

The measurement model or validation analysis was carried out after the EFA. Confirmatory factor analysis was employed to assess the measurement model. Both the convergent validity and the discriminant validity were performed using Amos software version 24. The internal consistency was also assessed using Cronbach’s alpha, composite reliability, correlations, and average variance extracted (AVE) (See Table 2). Cronbach’s alpha and composite reliability were used to estimate internal consistency. The results of the analysis showed high internal consistency measures for Cronbach’s alpha and composite reliability values, respectively, surpassing .7. The results were: masculine culture (β = 0.738), (β = 0.851); high uncertainty avoidance (β = 0.839), (β = 0.893); high power distance (β = 0.722), (β = 0.842); collectivism (β = 0.932), (β = 0.951) while organizational culture (β = 0.858), (β = 0.858). All the results were above .7 which clearly confirmed the reliability of the measurements.

Table 1. Dimensionality statistics of the Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

Constructs (Number of items)	Factor loadings dimensionality model (EFA)
Masculine culture (3)	0.881; 0.797; 0.838.
High uncertainty avoidance (4)	0.877; 0.896; 0.847; 0.814.
High Power distance (3)	0.907; 0.856; 0.901.
Collectivist culture (3)	0.791; 0.756; 0.810; 0.901.
Organizational culture (5)	0.845; 0.749; 0.823; 0.730; 0.802.

Table 2. Accuracy and measurement statistics

Research constructs		Cronbach alpha	CR	AVE	Factor loadings
Power distance	PD1	0.722	0.842	0.640	0.740
	PD2				0.854
	PD3				0.803
Organizational culture	OC1	0.796	0.858	0.602	0.819
	OC2				0.750
	OC3				0.701
	OC4				0.736
	OC5				0.831
Masculinity	MA1	0.738	0.851	0.656	0.804
	MA2				0.824
	MA3				0.800
High uncertainty avoidance	UN1	0.839	0.893	0.676	0.782
	UN2				0.893
	UN3				0.858
	UN4				0.748
Collectivism	C1	0.932	0.951	0.830	0.882
	C2				0.909
	C3				0.907
	C4				0.944

The study’s convergent validity was assessed using factor loadings and composite reliability values exceeding 0.7. The results showed factor loading values exceeding 0.7 while composite reliability values exceeding 0 .8, a parameter of 0.70 as observed by Hair, Black, Babin, Anderson, and Tatham (2006).

Discriminant validity was assessed using Fornell and Larcker (1981) assessment—where the square values of the correlated coefficients were lower than AVE values of constructs. The confirmatory factor analysis revealed the following results: Chi-square/Degree of freedom (CMIN/DF) = 1.372, Goodness-of-Fit Index (GFI) = 0.935, Normed Fit Index (NFI) = 0.911, Incremental Fit Index (IFI) = 0.903, Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) = 0.934, Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = 0.962, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = 0.052, confirming that they were fit for data (See Table 2). Therefore, internal consistency, convergent validity, correlation, and discriminant validity all satisfied thresholds for the confirmatory analysis for structural model or path analysing to be carried out.

4.3.3. Discriminant validity

Discriminant validity represents how unique or distinct is a measure, a scale should not correlate too highly with a measure of a different construct (Hair et al., 2010). Discriminant validity was assessed using Fornell & Larcker (1981) assessment—where the square values (r²) of the correlated coefficients were lower than AVE values of constructs. The square values of the correlated coefficients were: masculine culture = 0.640; power distance = 0.624; high uncertainty avoidance = 0.675; organizational culture = 0.552 and collective culture = 0.829 which were all less or lower than their respective AVE values in Table 2. showing that discriminant validity was determined.

4.3.4. Structural model

Structural Equation Model was used to test the suitability of the research model. Analysis showed that, the Chi-square/Degree of freedom (CMIN/DF) = 1.694, Goodness-of-Fit Index (GFI) = 0.907, Normed Fit Index (NFI) = 0.935, Incremental Fit Index (IFI) = 0.911, Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) = 0.921, Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = 0.900, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = 0.061. All indices specified appropriate fit for the data and proved suitable.

In the current study, path coefficients were estimated using the structural analysis to comprehend the hypothesized relationships. Table 4 depicts the entire results, which are also shown in Figure 2. Testing results confirmed that, the path coefficient between high uncertainty avoidance and organizational culture recording the greatest relationship with a path coefficient of 0.513 which was positive and significant at (0.000, p < 0.05); followed by high power distance and organizational culture with (0.252) also positive and significant at (0.010, p < 0.05). Collective culture and masculine culture recording (0.180) and (0.117) as their respective coefficients at (0.320, p > 0.05) and (0.501, p > 0.05) with both indicating positive values but were not significant. The results therefore supported two of the stated hypotheses and rejected two as shown in Table 4 with its respective Figure 2. for the path analysis.

Table 3. Inter-construct correlation matrix

	C	MA	OC	PD	UN
Collective culture (C)	0.911
Masculine culture (MA)	0.615	0.800
Organizational culture (OC)	0.519	0.630	0.743
High power distance (PD)	0.742	0.735	0.564	0.790
Uncertainty avoidance	0.535	0.663	0.711	0.507	0.822

Table 4. Results of the structural analysis

Study’s hypothesis	Hypothesis	Path coefficients	P-Values	Supported/rejected
MA OC	H1	0.117	0.501	Rejected
PD OC	H2	0.252	0.010**	Supported
UN OC	H3	0.513	0.000***	Supported
C OC	H4	0.180	0.320	Rejected

Note: Masculinity = MA; Uncertainty avoidance = UN; Power distance = PD; Collective culture or Collectivism = C, while p < 0.05 ***.

Figure 2. Structural analysis of the study.

4.4. Discussion of results

High uncertainty avoidance and High power distance cultures were found to be influential factors on organizational culture of the multinational companies in Ghana. According to the research findings, the factor loadings of high uncertainty avoidance (0.513) and high power distance (0.252) were observed to be statistically significant with multinational companies’ culture. With Masculinity and Collectivism recording insignificant influence of (0.117) and (0.180) respectively. It explains that, high uncertainty avoidance culture among Ghanaians have become important factors in positively influencing multinational companies’ culture—such that employees’ inability to take risk has positively influenced the organizational culture of the multinational companies in implementing their companies’ corporate culture and policies without any interference. Persons in societies with high uncertainty avoidance culture are happy with institutions that lessen risk and guarantee financial security. In view of that, multinational companies put emphasis on stable careers and create many rules to control workers activities in decreasing ambiguity as part of their organizational culture. It therefore explains how the high uncertainty avoidance culture of Ghanaians is positively influencing companies’ cultures. Societies that are considered by high power distance are relatively unconcerned with inequalities and gaps at work. Employees in these countries allow them to grow over time. Companies are capitalizing on the risk–aversion nature of Ghanaians towards the implementation of their corporate policies by training employees to uphold the values of the companies. According to Klimas (2016), the rising recognition of organizational culture for management scholars and companies is well clarified from the Resource Base of organizations. Native Ghanaians who are employed in multinational companies are comfortable with the laid down rules put forward by the multinational companies. There is also a significant positive relationship between high power distance and organizational culture. The idea of respecting the elderly and the superiors at work as part of Ghana’s national culture has also contributed significantly towards the organizational culture of multinational companies in Ghana. People are used to the gap between employees and managers as part of the social norm and custom in Ghana—thereby contributing to the efficient organizational culture of the multinational companies.

According to Lee and Kramer (2016) national culture is bi or tri-modal in its delivery and is determined by the subcultures associated with the levels of tightness or looseness. Tight cultures in Asian countries are more likely to affect activities of multinational companies but lose national culture like that of Ghana where governments welcome foreign investors into the country are less likely to have stronger influence on multinational companies’ culture. Gerhart (2009) and Nazariana et al. (2017) opined that, tight national culture constricts organizational culture more than free culture ones. The collective culture of Ghanaians as part of their societal norm and custom has not had any influence on the organizational culture of the multinational companies. The idea of people always wishing to be in a group, other than on individual base has not had a significant impact on multinationals organizational culture. Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States are powerfully individualistic societies and these countries have a lot of companies in Ghana thereby limiting the powers that could have been exerted by a collectivist culture like Ghana. Many of the multinational companies’ culture restrict interdependency and allow individual initiative thereby limiting the influence of people who always want to work in group—as in the case of Ghana. According to Minkov and Hofstede (2012); Chui, Kwok, and Zhou (2016), national culture of a country has always been an element of the informal institution such as customs, norms, traditions and religion which might not always have serious effects on corporate culture of a big organization; due to their resource base. The masculine nature of Ghana’s culture—where men are empowered than women to be managers and leaders in organizations did not have influence on multinational companies’ culture. Multinational companies have the tendency to hire employees on the basis of skills and expertise other than gender differentiation and that has limited the masculine culture of employees on multinational companies’ culture. Values and preferences influence individuals’ understanding of and behavioural responses to the events surrounding them, including management practices (Jiang, Colakoglu, Lepak, Blasi, & Kruse, 2014, p. 5). López-Duartea et al. (2016) also observed in their study that, national culture has the likelihood to influence decisions and strategies but not at a whole due to differences in culture. According to Bachmann, Engelen, and Schwens (2016), the intracultural unevenness restrains the extent to which national culture constrict organizational culture of a strong company. This research is significant in the sense that, it helps understand the interrelationship between national culture of a country and organizational culture of companies and also provides implications and insights for growth and development of multinational companies in the sub-Saharan African countries. This research has proved empirically that, organizational culture of companies are generally not affected by one country’s culture since cultural differences in different countries are more likely to affect different organizations. The results are in consistent with Hofstede et al. (2010) and Lu et al. (2016) who observed that, the need for conformity on cultural differences on relationship management and performance deserve extra research to elucidate the possible impact. The findings of this research are likely to provide new ground to argument the influence of national culture on the culture of organizations. It has also been made evident that, the consequence of national culture on organizational culture is unswervingly and indirectly especially with organizations with resources (Lee & Kramer, 2016; Nazarian et al., 2014). Companies that have more resources such as human and material resources are more likely to limit the strength of one’s country’s culture and vice versa.

4.5. Conclusions

This study focused on Ghana’s national cultural analysis based on the Hofstede’s original dimensions. Ghana’s culture is potted as a high uncertainty avoidance, high Power Distance, Masculinity and Collectivism. The high uncertainty Avoidance indicates Ghana’s culture characterized with high uncertain to ambiguous situations is enabling the organizational cultures of multinational companies in taking moderate risk in tapping the unearth market opportunities in Ghana. The Power Distance index in Ghana indicates that Ghanaian employees in multinational companies are comfortable with power variations at work—which has enabled cultures of the multinational companies to be strong base on rules and regulations. Masculinity in Ghana’s culture, where there is separation of roles between men and women has not affected the multinational companies. Government policies towards investors in hiring the indigenous people devoid of gender segregation have compelled multinationals to hire on the basis of competence and expertise. A collectivistic culture means that, the culture is working on a common goal instead of individual interest. The proliferation of multinational companies from Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom whose interests are on individualism, had weakened the power of employees wishing to work in groups as part of Ghana’s culture. The results as interpreted have shown that, national culture does not have a direct influence on organizational culture. The resource-based organizations also limit the strength of national cultural influence. Again, different employees from different ethnic groups also exhibited different characteristics—making it easier to conclude that, national culture varies from one ethnic group to another. Future researchers are therefore urged to develop new scales in measuring national culture of a country by considering the various ethnic backgrounds that differ from one country to another—especially in the sub-Saharan Africa.

4.6. Implications

The implications of the study are into two folds: the theoretical implications and the managerial implications.

4.6.1. Theoretical implication

Implications for national culture and organizational culture relationship have made numerous contributions to the ongoing academic debate about the intensity of control a country’s national culture impose on organizational culture of companies. First, Barney’s resource-based view (RBV, 1986) has made it evident that, a competitive advantage for organizations due to their resource base had developed strong culture among multinational companies—making it difficult for national cultural activities in affecting their companies’ culture. Specifically, organizations that do not have resource in meeting the demands from its social norms and values are liable to cultural pressures on the activities of that country’s culture—which could have negative repercussions on such companies and vice versa. Secondly, the study provides a more wide-ranging structure that, a more defined and rigorous analysis of the limiting forces that national culture has on organizational culture. The measurement of national culture by Hofstede using the individual views without considering the ethnic background and other subgroups in Asia and Africa, makes it difficult for generalizations to be made. It was evident from the findings that, individual views and their ethnic activities where diverse based on the open-ended questions. It showed that, measuring national culture is not likely to be effective especially if the environment under consideration has a diverse cultural background. The revelation is consistent with Gerhart (2009), who criticized the methodological weakness of Hofstede’s studies in his research, a position the current study supports towards the measurement of a country’s national culture.

4.6.2. Managerial implications

The results have imperious implications for practitioners—especially managers in the indigenous and the multinational business organizations. By empirically testing the vital drivers of national culture on organizations’ culture; the results seek to provide managers of the various companies, strategic activities that management that are more likely to provide—regarding training and development activities to the newly recruited managers in the various organizations.

4.7. Limitation and future research directions of the study

This study contributes greatly to theory and practice. Nevertheless, it has some limitations. First, the use of a non-probability sampling techniques in the study restricts the findings towards generalizability. Also, the study was limited to four business cities out of ten in Ghana. For results association, succeeding researchers ought to consider replicating this study in other regions in Ghana. Finally, the study did not consider the latest dimension of Hofstede’s index (Long- and Short-term orientation) because its measurement from the Ghanaian perspective was limited from the extant literature. Future researchers ought to explore the latest index statistically and possibly include it in their study.

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the anonymous reviewers and the editor for their prolific insights and recommendations.

Additional information

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes on contributors

Martin Owusu Ansah

Martin Owusu Ansah is a fellow at Rhodes University in South Africa and a lecturer in the Department of Marketing and Corporate Strategy (School of Business) at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. He holds a PhD in Business Science—specializing in Marketing from the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa. He is an external examiner to some universities in South Africa, Tanzania and New Zealand.

Lynette Louw

Lynette Louw is a Professor of Management with over thirty years of lecturing experience and is currently in the Department of Management at Rhodes University in South Africa. She is the Raymond Ackerman Chair of Business Administration. Lynette is an external examiner to many universities in Europe and Africa as well as a reviewer to many of the top international journals in management.