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Intercultural management practices of Chinese returnees in Shanghai in knowledge intensive industries
Abstract
This paper analyses how cultural perceptions of Chinese return migrants affect the design of interfirm practices with native business partners in China's knowledge intensive industries. Theories related to interfirm networking such as the innovation system approach ascribe culture to spatial/territorial scales, particularly the national. By taking the perspectives of Chinese returnees in top management positions the paper challenges the apparent national cultures and spatially defined cultural boundaries. The factors that underlie the perceived cultural stereotype of Chinese business routines show neither such clear spatiality nor predominantly national characteristics. Cultural effects on economic organisation are hence argued to be better understood from a relational perspective.
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James A. (2005) Demystifying the role of culture in innovative regional economies, Regional Studies 39 , 1197–1216. Within the regional learning and innovation literature, the precise impact of regional ‘culture' on firms' competitive performance remains unspecified. In response, this paper draws on research on Utah's high-tech industrial agglomeration, embedded in a highly visible regional culture: Mormonism. Focusing specifically on computer software firms, the paper first shows how the cultural embeddedness of firms in the region is best understood as a series of sustained tensions between: (1) self-identified regional cultural traits imported into the firm; versus (2) key elements of corporate cultures known to underpin innovation. Second, the paper measures the material impact of that regional cultural embedding on firms' innovative capacities and hence abilities to compete. Finally, it outlines the wider relevance of the author's work with regard to the spatial limits imposed on high-tech cluster policy by cultural context.
There are changing but increasingly important ways in which international migration contributes to knowledge creation and transfer. The paper focuses on four main issues. First, the different ways in which knowledge is conceptualized, and the significance of corporeal mobility in effecting knowledge creation and transfer in relation to each of these types. Second, the significance of international migration in knowledge creation and transfer, and how this is mediated by whether migration is constituted within bounded (by company structures) or boundaryless careers, and as free agent labour migration. Third, the situating of migrants within firms, and the particular obstacles to their engagement in co-learning and knowledge translation: especially positionality, intercultural communication and social identities. Fourth, a focus on the importance of place, which is explored through theories of learning regions and creativity, and notions of the transferability of social learning across different public and private spheres. The need to view migrant learning and knowledge creation/transfer as widely dispersed, rather than as elite practices in privileged regions, is a recurrent theme.
AOYAMA Y. Entrepreneurship and regional culture: the case of Hamamatsu and Kyoto, Japan, Regional Studies. Successful entrepreneurship today must respond to the demands from global market forces. Yet, simultaneously, entrepreneurs must also respond to local social contexts, shaped by historical and regional economic conditions. This paper illustrates how regional culture plays an important role in shaping entrepreneurship, even in a new economic sector. By taking two 'entrepreneurial regions' of Japan, Hamamatsu and Kyoto, it is shown how historical legacy and lead firms strongly influence business practices of information technology entrepreneurs. Results of this qualitative research show how entrepreneurship is an integral aspect of evolving and complex regional systems.
In this research we explore the relationship between high-technology regional development and ethnic networks in the connection between Silicon Valley, California and Hsinchu, Taiwan. We elaborate the argument that regional industrial structure and embedded social networks, rather than the multinational firm, should be the focus in the study of transnational business. The complementary regional industrial structures allow economic and technological collaboration between these two regions while the social networks help coordinate these transnational (cross-regional) collaborations. However, we seek to distinguish this account from the dominant perceptions of the role of guanxi (interpersonal relationships) in overseas Chinese business networks (OCBN). In contrast with the arguments for OCBN, that guanxi provides resources for Chinese firms to coordinate and control transnational business, we argue that the skill and competence required for technological upgrading are not necessarily guaranteed within the ethnic network. Although ethnic networks facilitate transnational business and technology cross-fertilization, it seems go too far to argue the Silicon Valley - Hsinchu connection is another version of Chinese guanxi capitalism.
China’s science and technology prowess is expanding. Whether one examines the number of science and engineering papers that Chinese researchers publish in international journals, the amount of investment made in research and development (R&D) in China, or the number of patents that Chinese are filing, statistics indicate that the science and technology (S&T) capabilities of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are developing rapidly (see Figure 1.1). These advancements are in line with China’s leaders’ clearly stated goal to make China “an innovation-oriented country” by 2020 and a “world’s leading science power” by 2050.1
Observes that strategic alliances continue to be an important research and business focus. Many firms struggle with how to link alliance theory with actual practice. In particular, managers question how long-term commitment between alliance partners is developed and achieved. Traditional business practice has relied primarily on formal written contracts, but informal social contracts or verbal agreements are also utilized. Examines the role of formal and informal contracts in positioning alliances for long-term success. Findings indicate that extremely successful alliances exhibited informal social contracts regardless of whether or not formal written contracts were included in the relationship. In other words, while a written contract may initially serve as an agreement to collaborate, the partners’ actions signify long-term commitment to the alliance. This has important managerial implications for how key contacts in the alliance develop co-operation, trust and loyalty which illustrates the strength of the informal contract.
It is a widespread perception that the role of contract in Chinese society is limited because obligations often derive from personal relationships. It is not clear how Chinese managers view the governance and importance of contracts when they deal with foreign counterparts in their joint ventures. To addresses this issue, this study proposes and verifies the governance structure and performance implications of interpartner contracts in a setting of international joint ventures (IJVs). Extant research on IJVs has extensively examined IJV performance but inadequately assessed how this performance is influenced by contractual design. Our analysis of 114 sample IJVs in China suggests that the governance structure of an IJV contract includes four dimensions, namely, issue inclusiveness, term specificity, contingency adaptability, and contractual obligatoriness. Each of these dimensions is validated to be important to IJV formation, interpartner cooperation, and process efficiency as perceived by Chinese managers working in IJVs.