The seven cultures of capitalism : value systems for creating wealth in the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Sweden, and the Netherlands

In this bias-breaking study, Charles Hampden-Turner and Alfons Trompenaars have discovered that the values, habits, and cultural styles ordinarily associated with social development or the arts turn out to be the key ingredients of economic success. Each of the seven cultures of capitalism – the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Sweden, and the Netherlands – has unique cultural habits and traditions of economic excellence. The way we structure time, or behave as we climb the career ladder, or the loyalty we believe we owe our employer and our employees, even our self-images – all these powerfully and often unconsciously influence our every business decision. To understand these habits is to help us gain control over our business behavior. In the same way, we can also learn, and adopt, the strategies and thought processes behind the world’s most successful economic practices. Just as a smart automobile manufactured might get its steel from Korea, its engines from Germany, its electronics from Japan, its leather and mahogany from Britain, and its safety systems from Sweden, so a smart capitalist can learn new ways of building wealth from understanding how the Japanese plan ventures that maximize their returns in knowledge as well as profit; how the Germans have created the world’s best trained work force and uphold the world’s highest environmental standards; and how the Swedish, with their national devotion to adapting work to people, not vice versa, have achieved the world’s lowest unemployment rate. In a world where more and more products and services are created by cross-teams, joint ventures, partnerships, through foreign subsidiaries, the competitive edge goes to thosewho can turn cultural differences into economic advantages.