Cultural Differences of Effective Leadership : in Sweden, England, France and Germany

Abstract: As globalization is proceeding, it is more and more important to understand effective leadership also in terms of cultural dimensions. This new challenge in the business world has not been approached by scientists in a satisfactory way so far and was the main reason for the conduction of this study. The aim of this research is to investigate how effective leadership varies between cultures and to state the crucial differences of leadership effectiveness among Sweden, England, France and Germany. To be able to figure out these differences a research team out of four students and one professor designed a questionnaire which was sent out to employees in the four studied countries. In this questionnaire the subordinates had to assess different behaviours and skills of their direct leader. The different questions belong to a list of predetermined topic groups which were planned to be used afterwards to set the results into connection with existing theories. The results of this multinational survey offer a general picture about the differences among the average leaders in the four cultures. To be able to make statements about the different importance of leader attributes for effective performance, a statistical evaluation is made. After given the reader a general idea about the gathered data and its composition, the adequateness of the combinations inside the topic groups are revised and some additional topic groups are build up. The findings of the study are used to discuss and challenge McClelland’s Research on Managerial Motivation and to figure out the different relevance of Katz’ three skill dimensions for each national culture. The difference emphasis of task-, relations- and change oriented behaviour in relation to effective leadership as well as the importance of charismatic leadership for effectiveness is exposed and distinguished for every country. Hofstede’s theory of five cultural dimensions is used to provide the necessary explanation for the cultural differences regarding the different theoretical dimensions. As an additional theory the GLOBE Project is introduced. Unfortunately, the results of this project were not available on time, so that they could not be compared to the results of the study. The conclusion at the end of the paper summarizes the general outcome of the thesis and points out the found cultural differences of effective leadership in the four cultures. Charisma and Human skills were found to be important for effective leadership in all countries. However, for effective German leaders it is concluded to possess more technical skills as in the other cultures and to have a higher need of achievement. Controlling employees is much more important in Germany than anywhere else. In England the need of achievement is also higher than in France and Sweden. Effective French leaders have the strongest socialized power orientation. For Sweden no big difference to the others countries could be found. Effective Swedish manager mostly possess a good mixture of the different skills, needs and behaviours suggested in the theory, but were not outstanding significantly in one dimension in comparison to the other three countries. In total, a high concern for relations is concluded for them.