Sunrise in Shanghai 2010

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

The Hengshan Picardie Hotel, Shanghai

Morning skylight, at the Hengshan Picardie Hotel, Shanghai.
Photo © C M Cordeiro-Nilsson and Per-Olof Larsson for CMC 2010

And I thought I would walk into a city that would be so foreign to me that I would not have understood half of what was going on as soon as I landed. But I was wrong. In fact, the melding I felt to Shanghai was so immediate it was as if I had stepped off the plane, right back home.

One of the things I look forward to whether travelling or at home, is breakfast. Shanghai, being such a dynamic and cosmopolitan city, has no problems providing for all sorts of palates. In fact, settling for both a red bean steamed bun and a mini chocolate muffin at breakfast was just the sort of thing that a Singaporean for example, wouldn’t think twice about either.

The RESER 20th Anniversary Conference Gala Dinner, Gothenburg 2010

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

2 Patrik Ström and Cheryl Marie Cordeiro, RESER's local organizing committee 2010.

Dr. Cheryl M. Cordeiro-Nilsson and Associate Professor Patrik Ström (Chairman of the local Organizing Committee for RESER 2010), a last inspection of the Odd Fellows Estate grand hall, prior to dinner.
Photo © J E Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2010

The 30th September to 2 October, 2010 saw the world’s leading researchers in the field of Services Research gather in Gothenburg, Sweden, for their annual conference.

The Chairman of the local Organizing Committee for RESER 2010 was Patrik Ström, Associate Professor, Docent, PhD, Ek.Dr. Staffan Helmfrid Pro Futura Fellow at the School of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg, whom I had the pleasure to assist in the materializing of this event.

Fika and the Swedish Management style

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Cinnamon roll served with milk; kanelbullar med mjölk

The Cinnamon Roll – a Swedish fika staple.
Photo © J E Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2010

Before Sweden, I only ever heard of the British inherited concept of afternoon Tea in Singapore from my grandparents, more specifically, my paternal grandmother. She often served Royal Danish butter cookies, of which I favoured the ones with raisins and those that came coated with granulated sugar on top. Light sponge cakes were sometimes served at these sessions, and accompanying these cookies and cakes was tea, with lots of milk.

Melting butter for cinnamon rolls or kanelbullar.

Melting the butter – the first step in making Cinnamon Rolls.

The Swedish fika, which translates to ‘coffee break’ was an activity whose local ritualistic implications dawned on me only gradually, beginning actually with my attendance at late evening seminars at the university whilst pursuing my doctorate degree.

I came to know these research seminar sessions (often held as one large fika) as ‘cheese parties’ because the group of us attending these meetings would gather around a table in the seminar room, pass around buns, fruit, sandwiches, coffee, tea and sometimes red or white wine, discussing the most current research in the field, its challenges and how to move ahead in our projects,

As a side issue, I often wondered if these sessions were actually useful, since too many opinions might derail you rather than help you focus, but in hindsight I think they were both pleasant and valuable, and that my favourite ones were those where our creative spirits and constructive criticism were fueled by one or two glasses of wine to go with the cheese.

Kneading the dough.

Kneading the dough is a pleasant pass time that takes very little effort. Some soft kneading where you calmly let the springy gluten threads develop is all it takes.

And what is current at some fika sessions at work today are Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Sustainable Development, where one aspect of is the social well-being and welfare of employees – how can Swedish leadership create (and sustain) a working environment that nurtures creative innovation, etc.

Melted butter onto the dough.

Melted butter on the dough, just before the cinnamon and sugar goes on.

Hembakade kanelbullar, fikabröd.

Cinnamon Rolls, fikabröd.

And the Swedish fika, together with its fikabröd, one of which is the cinnamon roll, is focal in these discussions because all of these issues are currently being discussed, over coffee. No doubt the Swedish fika is one of the key ingredients of what makes the Swedish management style unique.

Awaiting this theory to be confirmed in some scientific paper, Cinnamon Roll day in Sweden is upcoming in about 2 weeks and I for one, am already looking forward to seeing lots of these at the upcoming fika sessions at work, improving as it were, both creativity and the Swedish Management style.

When failure is success: a change of view in expatriate integration

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The job of the expatriate in international job transfers is hardly an easy transition. Most Scandinavian expatriate contracts in Singapore for example average 3 years, during which time, the employees, usually at managerial level, are supposed to make adjustments along several dimensions, both in the private and public domains.

International managers not only need to adjust to a new home, perhaps a new language, and new schools for the children if the family is in tow, but they are also expected to adjust into the new role within the organization and perform on the job.

If the ballpark figure is given at about a year to adjust to a foreign environment, then 3 years for the average expatriate contract, isn’t much time given to get things working smoothly, since as soon as you begin to feel comfortable in the new environment, it’s time to go home. Going home is not also always smooth sailing since you’re perhaps faced with a host of re-acculturation issues due to that you have gained new knowledge from the new environment and now cannot help but apply that new knowledge back home.

During the 1960s and up until about ten years ago, the majority body of literature that governed relocation and expatriate managers’ experience overseas equated their transition success with how far they’ve come to be integrated with the host country’s culture (Black, 1988; Janssens, 1995)

In speaking with Scandinavian respondents about their experience in socializing with Singaporeans, many of them mentioned that they felt marginalized and not at all integrated into the Singapore society. It didn’t seem to matter whether they were there for three years or in some cases, fifteen to twenty-six years. Disheartened and feeling not quite successful in the aspect of cross-cultural socializing, many said they felt ‘outside’ of the local system, some even mentioning that they felt more ‘Swedish’ or ‘Danish’ when they were in Asia, than when they were back in Scandinavia.

When it came to cross-cultural socializing, the organizations had office functions and staff dinner and dances, which they found a perfect opportunity to mingle with the locals, but apart from such events, they found themselves rarely socializing with the locals.

The beginnings of profiling Scandinavian leaders in Asia: the 6 categories

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

juxtaposed_cities

The experience of being and working in a foreign city is like a juxtaposition of realities. It’s difficult not to impose what you already know from before, to the here, now and the Other. Photo by Doug Keyes, from his Becoming Language series.

In 2004, I had the opportunity to network and meet up with about 33 Swedish leaders (CEOs, MDs, regional managers, managers etc.) and their Asian counterparts. They all worked in Swedish related or Swedish owned organizations in Singapore, some of which being Ikea (I think almost all Singaporeans have something from Ikea these days, they have just opened a 2nd megastore on that tiny city island!), Sony Ericsson, Kvaerner E&C and ASSAB.

In search of the Singapore management style

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

singapore_print

A Singapore print by Charlotte, principal artist and creative director of Lotti Lane. The myriad of colours captures the multi-cultural fabric of Singapore.

Singapore: a nation with a multi-cultural fabric
With its immigrant beginnings, Singapore has long struggled with the forming of a national identity. The Chinese were the largest immigrant group during the 1800s and early 1900s. Hailing mostly from the south of China, where they had very strong ties and loyalty to mainland China in the beginning. Many never thought of permanently settling in Singapore, but hoped to return one day to China. And when money was made in Singapore, it was often remitted to families back in China. Today, the Chinese make up about 75% of the Singapore population.

The natives of the land were the Malays, who today make up approximately 14% of the population. And Singapore had immigrants from India and other parts of the world, such as the Arabs, Portuguese, British, Dutch etc. The Indians form about 9% of the population and the ‘Others’ including the Eurasians (European-Asian descendants) make up about 2% of the current population. The multi-racial fabric is also reflected in Singapore’s four official languages, which are Malay, Mandarin, Tamil and English.

Swedish management: its research beginnings, characteristic traits and style

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro Mölle 2014

Field in Mölle, Sweden.
Text & Photo © CM Cordeiro 2014

The Swedish management concept made headlines in 2001, as only sports news can do, when the BBC news reported that Swedish soccer manager Sven Goran Eriksson took England to the top in the World Cup qualifying rounds using Swedish management ideology.

As a field of research, studies on Swedish management is relatively new, beginning in the 1980s with research in the area of Scandinavian management. A prominent piece of work in the field at that time was Skandinaviskt management i og uden for Skandinavien by Geert Hofstede.

And in 1985, Jan Carlzon’s success as CEO (1980 – 1993) of Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) led to his book entitled Riv pyramiderna!, which mapped SAS’s winning management strategy under his leadership. His success and work gained much media attention and created a Scandinavian leadership ideal. Carlzon’s main idea was to lateralize hierarchies and decentralize decision-making within the organization, which empowered employees further out in the service line to serve customers better. With decentralization, employees were given the power to make decisions on the spot, without having to go to their managers to ask for decision approvals. And since they knew the customers better, Carlzon was convinced that the people ‘out there’ would fit best in making the right decisions regarding their work situations. The lateralization process had its problems and hiccups, one of which was the consequence of making middle managers feel rather redundant and had to be reassigned duties.

Sweden’s growing trade with Asia and it’s trade presence in Singapore

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

A view of the Merlion at the Esplanade, Singapore.

An interconnected world

The world is becoming an increasingly small place to live in, we can feel it in the pace at which the world economy runs these days. World trade is much larger, faster and more intense than what we knew even from 1819 when Sir Stamford Raffles founded Singapore as a trade entrepôt. Many organizations today are multinational in nature in order to compete on the global scene. Employees in such organizations are often located away from home countries in order to continue the work of the organization on a global scale, contributing to the existence, expansion and success of the organization.

Organizations going global would also mean that their people would be working on a global stage, having colleagues from foreign countries. It would mean working with someone who not only looks physically different from yourself but who share a different set of values, taken-for-granted assumptions and collectively shared beliefs, in other words, a different ideology (Simpson, 1993).

These collectively shared beliefs or ideology, stem from their own socio-cultural and political background and working together would mean communicating on a daily basis about work projects, negotiating meaning with each other so that each one understands what the other wants, the aim of which is to push the organization forward in reaching its goal.

Individuals who are often deployed to an overseas organization affiliate from their home country would often possess specialized knowledge, expertise and leadership skills, so that they can help set up and steer the affiliate organization in the new country.

The case of Sweden

Sweden for example, is today more active in terms of setting up businesses and business affiliates overseas than ever before. For example, in Eastern Europe, Sweden has 900 organizations in Estonia, 500 in Latvia and 150 in Lithuania. With its current trading figures, Asia seems to hold the most promising trade for Sweden: China in 2005 for example had 44,000 Chinese employed in Swedish organizations with an annual intake of 7.9 billion US dollars and Sweden’s presence in China since 2003 has also doubled (Serger Schwaag and Widman, 2005).

The fast-growing markets for Swedish exports today are found in Asia, especially Japan, China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Malaysia and Singapore. Asia now accounts for 13 percent of Swedish exports, making it the most important single region outside of Europe. As Asia is one of the fastest growing markets for Swedish exports, the increasing Scandinavian and Asian international trade relations mean a need for a better understanding of management styles and working relations in the interdependent countries. A contributing factor to many failed cross national joint ventures and start-ups is due to a lack of understanding of international markets, cultures and management behaviour (Hill and Hellriegel, 1994; Hambrick, Li, Xin, and Tsui,2001). A greater chance of both tangible and intangible success will thus depend on understanding and acting upon the similarities and differences between management behaviour in different international markets.

Swedish trade presence and Swedish management in Singapore

With 93% literacy rate in the population and English as an administrative language (Malay is Singapore’s native language and Singapore’s national anthem for example, is written in the Malay language), Singapore proves a strong rival with Hong Kong to be Asia-Pacific’s regional hubs (Langdale, 1989) and is currently already a regional hub for many internationally based organizations (Mutalib, 2002; Teofilo and Le, 2003).

According to the 2007 statistics of the Swedish Trade Council (STC), who have been present in Singapore since 1978, there are approximately 160 Swedish or Swedish related organizations in Singapore with 900 Swedes living in Singapore. Companies included in the STC’s list are of the following three types:

  • Singaporean companies which have a parent company in Sweden
  • Singaporean companies that sell Swedish products and who have active joint-ventures or partnership activities with a Swedish company and
  • Singaporean companies owned by Swedish citizens.

The existence of the Swedish Business Association of Singapore (SBAS) also makes easy access to Swedish owned or Swedish related organizations in Singapore. The SBAS also provides a focal point for the Swedish business community to gather and exchange ideas and continue a Swedish / Scandinavian heritage in Singapore.

References

  • Hambrick, D. C. / Li, J. / Xin, K. and Tsui, A. S., 2001. Compositional gaps and downward spirals in international joint venture management groups. Strategic Management Journal, vol. 22, no. 11 (Nov. 2001), pp. 1033-1053.
  • Hill, R. C and Hellriegel, D., 1994. Critical contingencies in joint venture management: some lessons from managers. Organization Science, vol. 5, no. 4 (Nov. 1994), pp. 594-607.
  • Langdale, J. V., 1989. The Geography of International Business Telecommunications: The Role of Leased Networks. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol. 79, No. 4, pp. 501-522. Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of the Association of American Geographers.
  • Mutalib, H., 2002. The Socio-Economic Dimension in Singapore’s Quest for Security and Stability. Pacific Affairs, Vol. 75, No. 1, pp. 39-56. Pacific Affairs, University of British Columbia.
  • Simpson, P., 1993. Language, Ideology and Point of View. New York: Routeledge.
  • Teofilo C. D. and Le H. H., 2003. Singapore and ASEAN in the global economy: the case of free trade agreements. Asian Survey, Vol. 43, No. 6, pp. 908-928. University of California Press.

The evolving concept of luxury

Posted on by Cheryl Marie Cordeiro
Mega Yacht Red Square Aft at Night - Image courtesy of Dunya Yachts.

Mega Yacht Red Square Aft at Night – Image courtesy of Dunya Yachts.

The definitions of luxury

Luxury is an extensive concept which connects with extravagance, prestige and elitism (Dubois and Czellar, 2002). Some standard dictionary definitions of luxury could include:

  • Something inessential but conducive to pleasure and comfort.
  • Something expensive or hard to obtain.
  • Sumptuous living or surroundings: lives in luxury.

One could see how the above three definitions found in the American Heritage Dictionary, are intertwined and difficult to separate. A very broad definition of what is luxury, from Coco Chanel reflects this interlacing of definitions to form a concept of luxury: “Luxury is a necessity that begins when necessity ends” (Gradvall, 2007).