Today's session on Organizational Behavior focused on culture. Culture, we learned, is the context in which power is exercised. Power, we remember, is the ability to get things done in an organization. There is a hand-in-glove thing here, it seems.
In their everyday lives, everyone operates with a whole series of assumptions - it is these assumptions, often strongly held but rarely articulated, that form the basis of our cultures. Attending Insead, in this regard, is a bit strange. There are so many people from so many different countries that you simply can't make assumptions about anything. This forces you to think and be aware of the reasons for your behavior.
There is markedly little conflict between participants given the diversity level, and not many gaffes either. Which made today's class all the more poignant, as we discussed the success of Mary Kay on the international scene. Mary Kay seems to have, at first glance, an extremely American culture, but it has been successful in a huge variety of countries: Thailand, Kazahkstan, China, and Russia, to name a few. When discussing how the Mary Kay culture (a strong mixture of feminism, independence, and capitalism) was succeeding in Russia, this exchange took place between two Russians, one man and one woman:
A: "When you grow up in a totalitarian society, you are used to being told what to do. Independent thinking is discouraged."
V: "When you grow up in a totalitarian society, I think you find it appalling."
A: "Well of course we do!! That's why we left!!"
V: (a bit sadly) "I didn't leave. I still live there."
Ouch.
5:24:04 PM 
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