The impact of national culture in MNC's home country on the strategy making process in their overseas subsidiaries: a comparison between Dutch and Japanese companies in Thailand

<font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">The main purpose of this dissertation is to understand that the national cultures of MNCs' home countries play an important role in determining the SMPs in their overseas subsidiaries. To attain this purpose, a comparison between Dutch and Japanese companies in Thailand concerning the relationship between national culture and SNIP has been the focal point of this dissertation. The research findings with the integrative model answer the central research question that the national cultures of the Netherlands and Japan intervene in the SMPs of Dutch and Japanese companies in Thailand respectively.<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">The research findings have theoretical implications for further developments in comparative management because the outcome of this investigation discovers some constructs that can minimise difficulty in and complexity of conceptualising and operationalising some variables for comparing SMPs across cultures. A synthesis of Hofstede's model of national culture and Wheelen and Hunger's model of SNIP develops a model of comparative strategic management for comparing SMPs in MNCs when taking national culture into account. However, the empirical evidence from this study is insufficient to verify the validity of Quinn and Rohrbaugh's (1983) CVM even if a presumed linkage between SNIP and corporate performance exists. However, the relationship between national culture and SNIP does presumably exist.<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">With the qualitative research design developed for this cross-cultural study, the interaction between theory and evidence generates the propositions for the future research. In comparison with the outcomes from most cross-cultural survey research, the research findings from this dissertation give a more profound, comprehensive, integral picture of the SMPs of the companies under this study.<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">The research findings also help the practitioners, the corporate strategists and the top executives in MNCs, both in the parent companies, the regional head offices and the overseas subsidiaries, international managers and expatriates to understand how national culture of MNCs' home countries has an influence on the SNIP in their overseas operations. This comprehension helps them to formulate better corporate strategy when dealing with other cultural perspectives different<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">from their own ones. The employees of MNCs also derive the benefit of hindsight from the research findings. When these employees understand the impact of foreign cultures on foreign-based companies in their countries, they can accommodate themselves to the foreign working conditions and behaviours in these companies. All the parties in MNCs can work out a better solution for multicultural problems on the basis of mutual understandings.<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">Nevertheless, the limitations of this study comprises lack of combinatorial and broader factors, indigenous subjectivity on interpretation, asymmetrical perspectives on corporate settings, less responsiveness to and less interaction with the local national culture in the host country and lack of HQs', RHOs' and other host countries' perspectives. To minimise these shortcomings in the future research, the inquirers must analyse the effect of combinatorial factors concomitantly, include more macro factors, co-operate with foreign researchers, pay more attention to a lowest-rank workers' perspective, and embrace the industries that are more responsive to local markets and the perspectives of HQs, RH0s, and other host countries.<br/></font><font size="""3" FACE="Times Roman" COLOR="#000000">To gain a better insight into the cultural impact on SNIP, the researchers in the future need to pursue more comparative research. They must change the choice of MNCs' nationalities and the locations of the host countries. To counterpoise a tendency to conduct this kind of research in industrialised countries, the locations in the future research must be industrialising countries. If possible, these researchers must test the integrative model through the use of quantitative survey with a largescale sample. The outcome of the future research might help to develop a new theoretical framework for comparing SMPs across cultures further. The field of comparative strategic management might emerge from a synthesis of comparative management and strategic management when the linkage between national culture and SNIP is confirmed