Icelandic National Culture compared to National Cultures of 25 OECD member states using VSM94

Abstract

Researchers such as Hofstede (2002) and House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman and Gupta, (2004) have defined well-known cultural clusters such as, Anglo, Germanic, and Nordic cultural clusters. However, Iceland was not incorporated in these studies and therefore the research question of this paper is: In relation to Hofstede´s five cultural dimensions where does Iceland differ in relation to 25 of the OECD member states using VSM94? A questionnaire was sent to students at the University of Iceland, School of Social Sciences by e-mail in October 2013. The five dimensions of national culture were measured using scales developed by Hofstede called VSM 94. The results indicated that Iceland differs considerably from nations such as Slovakia, Japan, India, Thailand and China, which were found high in PDI and the MAS dimension while Iceland was found to be high in IDV and low in PDI. When considering the 25 OECD countries, Iceland is more similar to the Anglo cluster, C3, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdon, Australia and United States than the Nordic cluster, C1 i.e. Denmark, Sweden and Norway. Iceland is similar to those countries in relation to high IDV, low PDI but differs in the dimensions MAS and UAI where Iceland scores higher.

Individualistic Vikings: Culture, Economics and Iceland

“…A follow-up study by the same authors was conducted in 2013, which analyzed its results from various perspectives (Gudmundsdottir, Gudlaugsson & Adalsteinsson 2015). The general results were similar to their previous study.…”

Societal Culture in Iceland and Lithuania: Managerial Implications

“…This is reflected in the business world in the following way; hierarchy is perceived as something unavoidable (existential), subordinates expect to be told what to do, as the leader has a legitimate power. The data show Iceland with a relatively high Power Distance mean, whereas it has generally been described as a low Power Distance country (Guðmundsdóttir, Guðlaugsson, & Aðalsteinsson, 2015). This may be due to the fact that the sample in this research consists of businesspeople, whereas Guðmundsdóttir and associates surveyed university students.…”

Iceland

“…Mixa and Vaiman (2015) conducted a study focusing on saving ratio and found that Icelanders were much more risk-seeking prior to the financial crisis that hit Iceland in 2008. Entrepreneurship and innovation is strongly embedded in the culture and there are many shared characteristics between American and Icelandic cultural values (Guðmundsdóttir et al 2015). There is materialistic pressure in Iceland which promotes the social compulsion to compete with others on material things.…”

“…They rely on informal rules, co-workers, however they mostly rely on their own experience and how it can relate to the particular situation at that point in time (Davíðsdóttir 2006;Eyjolfsdottir and Smith 1996;Vaiman et al 2010). As for communication in organizational settings, Icelandic managers use direct communication because of the low power distance that is typical within Icelandic culture, (Guðmundsdóttir et al 2015;Eyjolfsdottir and Smith 1996). Iceland ranks in the 6th place out of 138 countries on the Global Innovation Index (Cornell, INSEAD, WIPO 2017).…”

“…To conclude, it is difficult to determine whether Iceland's societal and business culture was influenced more by America (Americanization) or merely followed the pattern of normal modernization of the Western world (Hannesson 1964). Nevertheless, it can be argued that Icelandic business culture differs from Scandinavian business cultures and even though it is leaning more towards an American way of managing (Davíðsdóttir 2006;Guðmundsdóttir et al 2015) it does not fully resemble US business culture either. Thus, it appears to have its own unique business culture.…”