Analysis of the Case Study :Multicultural and Multinational Teams at IBM

Case Study: Multicultural Multinational Teams at IBM By: Muhammad Nabeel Akhter Khan Reg ID: 27153 Date: April 24, 2015 Course: Organizational Behavior Program: MBA Submitted To: Dr. Siraj Jamal Siddiqui

ANALYSIS OF THE CASE: This case study talks about the effectiveness of multicultural and multinationals teams and how these teams have helped IBM to win business and growth opportunities in the long run. IBM used to have a focus on individual accomplishments in the past with traditional ways of doing business but with the passage of time IBM grew its business outside the U.S and now have clients in over 170 countries. The growth has forced them to change the traditional style of business and to form cross-cultural teams to be successful in winning business in different parts of the world. There are many benefits of having a multicultural teams as the members of the team belong to different cultures, they have knowledge about other cultures, the different style of communications which can create a lot of confusion and every member has a different set of skills which they bring as a benefit to the team. IBM has managed to capture emerging markets and build a huge customer-base because of effective multicultural and multinational teams who have worked together successfully in many countries such as Turkey, Tanzania, Vietnam, Ghana and Philippines etc. The case also highlights the experiences of two team members of IBM multicultural team who share how they had helped international firms and how their advised made these firms more productive.

Answers to Questions: Question: 1. If you calculate the person-hours devoted to IBM’s team projects, they amount to more than 180,000 hours of management time each year. Do you think this is a wise investment of IBM’s human resources? Why or why not? Answer: In my opinion, it is a very wise investment because the teams have helped IBM to expand globally by bringing new clients from across the world and these teams also helped many international organizations such as GreenForest to become more productive. Teamwork is an essential skill in today’s fast changing global environment and all the successful organization in today’s world such as Google, Apple and IBM are investing heavily on multicultural and multinational teams with members from different cultures possessing different competencies and skills. The employees of IBM who were part of these teams got a chance to learn about different culture which enabled them to work effectively in a distant culture. These team based projects also helped them to learn leadership skills and the members also had a chance to learn from their fellow members’ different competencies and skills of various backgrounds. The return on investment on the teams is very high and their success in different parts of the world is a proof that the human resources of IBM have made a wise decision to invest in multicultural and multinational teams.

2. Why do you think IBM’s culture changed from formal, stable, and individualistic to informal, impermanent, and teamoriented? Answer:

The formal stable and individualistic culture is good for a static

organization working within a limited geographical boundaries. But for an

organization, which is expanding its business in many countries and becoming a multinational firm, stable culture is not the ideal way of doing business. Since IBM grew its business in 170 countries, it is necessary for them to adapt to the needs and requirements of these different cultures and to cope up with the challenges of foreign business assignments, IBM had to follow team-oriented approach as diversified teams are ideal for being successful in dynamic and fast changing external environments. Firms who operate in many countries require quick decision making and knowledge of the local laws and cultures and team-oriented style of working enable the team members to take decisions instantly and they don’t have to wait for the approval from the headquarters for the decision. Whereas in stable and formal organizations, decisions can only be made after the approval from the directors and managers in the headquarters. Therefore, IBM has done the right thing by changing its culture from individualistic to team-oriented style.

3. Would you like to work on one of IBM’s multicultural, multinational project teams? Why or why not? Answer: Yes, I would like to work for multicultural, multinational project teams for the following reasons: 

By working with other highly competent members of the team, I will have the opportunity to learn various competencies and skills from

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them which will help me in my career. I will also have the opportunity to visit different countries and learning

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about different cultures and their lifestyles. It will help me to develop leadership skills which is the single most

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required skills in today’s challenging business world to be successful. I will also get the opportunity to practically learn the group decisionmaking process, the art of group cohesion and effective teamwork skills.

4. Multicultural project teams often face problems with communication, expectations, and values. How do you think some of these challenges can be overcome?

Answer: Multicultural teams often generate frustrating management dilemmas. Every member belongs to a different background and these cultural differences can create obstacles in effective teamwork. The challenge in managing these cultural issues is to identify the causes of these conflicts. There are several ways to overcome these challenges. 

Adaptation will work when the team members acknowledge the differences and finding out ways to understand and respect the differences. When team members have this mindset, they can be creative about protecting their own substantive differences and respecting others too. This process of adaptation is ideal because it involves less managerial time because the team members solve their

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problems themselves. The team can be reorganized or redesigned to reduce the conflict from the group. If there are interpersonal differences, then the manager or the leader of the team should arrange a dialogue among the conflicting

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members to allow them to resolve the issue in a productive manner. Feedback is also an important factor in removing the cultural conflicts from the team. Some culture have very open style of communication while other cultures are not comfortable in open communication. It is therefore necessary to ask for feedbcack from all the members of the team to make sure everyone has clearly understood the assignment and the procedure that is going to be followed by the group.