British Petroleum and the intercultural management

Résumé du document

BP is a petroleum company. Even if this name does not exist anymore, BP is more known as British Petroleum. The company was founded in 1908, in England. After three mergers (Amoco in 1998, Atlantic Richfield in 2000 and Burmah Castrol in 2000), the company became the biggest company in England and the third largest energy company in the world after Exxon and Shell. So big, that the company decided to enter in the video game market 'Second Life', we can see BP Stations, we can have sustainable products in order to build our house and there are some other moments and situations where we may need BP's help. The company wanted since the beginning, to be different from the other energy companies; they decided to show it again when BP chose the following slogan: 'Beyond Petroleum' in 2000, when the company became only 'BP'. With this slogan, the company wanted and still wants to show their awareness of the environment and more. They are trying to extend its range of services because of the 'petroleum peak' in 2006, now the oil production could decrease by 3 % each year. The other meaning that the slogan has, is the human side of the company, the men and women who work for the company, for the customers. The company has 97, 000 employees all over the world, and must have a strong intercultural management in order to deal with them. We will see if the directors and the company in general manage well the difference, analyzing the company management with the five dimensions of Geert Hofstede: Large or small power distance, Individualism or collectivism, Masculinity versus feminity, Strong or weak uncertainty avoidance, Long term versus short term orientation.

Extraits

[...] There is another advantage: the one to solve problem and settle the conflicts. In the masculine culture, the conflicts are open and hierarchy can discuss with employees in order to find an agreement. Strong or weak uncertainty avoidance Definition: This dimension deals with uncertainty and ambiguity. It measures the feeling of people in face of an unstructured situation: are they comfortable or uncomfortable. This dimension shows the reaction of a population to new situations, do they are afraid or not of what it is unknown? [...]

[...] “Intercultural management is the combination of knowledge, insights and skills which are necessary for adequately dealing with national and regional cultures and differences between cultures, at the several management levels within and between organizations”.[2] The globalization of the economy (with alliances, ventures, partnership, mergers and global relocations) and the development of the e-business are the causes of these new theories of intercultural management and cross borders differences. Thanks to that, some relationship between different cultures and organizations emerge from these causes. Homogeneity is now a workforce's qualification that has disappeared. The cause of this fact is the development of the international business and to the globalization. The way to conduct a business is always evolving but to manage and understand the cross-cultural management is an evolution which needs special skills not only for managing the foreign subsidiaries or partnership but also in their own country. [...]

[...] This large power distance means that it is the contrary of Austria: there exists no good equality between all the societal levels. The Power Distance Index's average (every countries where BP sales its fuel and gas stations) is about forty nine, which means a small power distance if we compare it the world average. Its second Strategic Business Unit, For the home is sold in fourteen countries where the Power Distance Index average is about forty three : it is again under the world average but the difference from the countries are important (for example, Austrian PDI is about height, the Australian one is about thirty six and the Indian one is about seventy three). [...]

[...] British Petroleum offers to its workers the possibility to have training, to be promoted and to change the job inside the society (internal moves). We can see in this chart that the United Kingdom is a country very individualistic, but it is not a big cross-cultural management problem for British Petroleum because they succeed to create a collectivistic society inside the company: employees work for the company and offer promotions in order to make involving more the workers but with this idea of working with the other, for the company and at least a little bit for them (without a little bit of individualism, there is no motivation: we are speaking about the fourth level of the Maslow's hierarchy: Esteem needs). [...]

[...] Everybody knows that petroleum is not eternal; they began to change extending its range of products to green energy as solar energy for example. They are ready to evolve and they make it come into sight. In order to avoid this uncertainty, the countries have three solutions: firstly, try to avoid this uncertainty thanks to the technology, secondly, they create and apply juridical rules and thirdly try to be in security turning to the religion. One of the positive consequences of the low uncertainty avoidance of United Kingdom is that they minimize rules for business. [...]