7 Interculturality and Job Crafting
Learning Objectives
By the time you finish this chapter, you should be equipped to
- Review dimensional models of culture (e.g., Hofstede).
- Use the multicultural compass model to navigate cultural dilemmas.
- Make connections between job crafting and culture.
Culture and Job Crafting
At this point in your reading, you might be wondering what the relationship between job crafting and interculturality might be in the context of your learning. That’s a fair question! Job crafting and interculturality are two topics that aren’t often found together.
In this section, we will explore how you might use job crafting within the context of understanding and applying your intercultural knowledge to your experiences in the workplace. Work is often a place where we experience conflicts between our values, skills, and long-term goals and the demands of the workplace, which can lead us to feel dissatisfied or to struggle to grow in our careers. Job crafting provides a pathway for seeking alignment between making a strong contribution to our workplaces and honouring our strengths and values.
Review: Understanding Cultural Dimensions
Earlier in your learning, you explored cultural dimensions, as defined by Hofstede (The Culture Factor Group, 2024) and Hall (1976). To review, cultural dimensions are group-level differences, based on the national culture(s) that shaped us during our life journeys. Dimensional perspectives on navigating cultural difference are based on the idea that country-level cultures can be associated with certain values, which will be observed a normative behaviour within a country. Therefore, when people from different countries are working together on a team or in an organization, these cultural values may shape the way each team member behaves. If these differences are not understood well, conflict might result.
Cultural dimensions are different from personality, and they should not be used in the same way as a personality framework like Myers-Briggs or DISC. They do not explain individual differences. Therefore, if/when we use this model, we should be thinking about preferences that are linked to our national culture, or values that emerged by living in a particular country. This model generally should not be used to explain differences in behaviour between two people in the same country.
Exercise: Cultural Dimensions in the Workplace
| Cultural Dimension | Score in my Primary National Culture | Score in the National Culture of my Team/Workplace | Observations |
| Power distance | |||
| Individualism | |||
| Motivation towards achievement and success | |||
| Uncertainty avoidance | |||
| Long term orientation | |||
| Indulgence | |||
| High-context/Low-context communication | |||
| Attitudes towards space and time |
Reflection Questions
- In what areas do I experience tension or conflict because of dimensional differences between my own national culture and that of other people on a team I work with?
- How could I use job crafting strategies to use strengths connected to my cultural values in my current work team?
- Task crafting strategies
- Relational crafting strategies
- Cognitive crafting strategies
- Skill crafting strategies
Review: The Multicultural Compass Model (Wasilewski, 2012) [Link | NewTab]
To review, the Multicultural Compass Model is a tool to help us understand the choices we might make as we navigate among cultures. The model outlines six choices that we might make as we move between different sets of cultural values and practices (e.g., the culture of our family of origin, and the culture of the place we currently live). The choices outlined in the model are:
- Maintaining (staying with what is familiar)
- Converting/assimilating to the practices of a new culture
- Adding new cultural behaviours (e.g., learning new languages, adapting a new style of communicating with colleagues)
- Subtracting (choosing not to use some of our cultural practices)
- Mixing/synthesis (combining behaviours/practices from more than one culture)
- Creating (inventing an entirely new way of behaving)
Exercise: The Multicultural Compass Model and Job Crafting
Consider a current work, volunteer, or team project situation. Evaluate how each of the four job crafting strategies might correlate with choices on the multicultural compass model.
Example: Skill crafting strategy
I recently learned that I was passed over for a promotion to assistant manager because my supervisor does not perceive me as a leader. This is likely because I usually prefer indirect communication styles. I am going to broaden my skill set by trying out new ways of communicating with other team members in a more direct, yet polite way. This relates to the adding strategy in the multicultural compass model, as I am choosing to expand my communication strategies in some contexts, while not denying my own preferences.
Example: Task crafting strategy
I began my current food service role 6 months ago, and out of necessity took a job where I handle meat product, though I prefer a vegetarian lifestyle. I have been performing well, so I will meet with my supervisor to ask if I can be placed on the drive through or cashier roles more frequently, as my workplace skills, teamwork, and communication have improved over the past months. This allows me to more closely maintain my cultural practice of avoiding handling meat products (while still imperfect, this improves the alignment of my job tasks to my values).
| Description of a job crafting strategy I might use | Relationship with the Multicultural Compass Model | |
| Task crafting | ||
| Relational crafting | ||
| Cognitive crafting | ||
| Skill crafting |
Job crafting is designed to increase our job satisfaction, and to provide a way for us to build skills in our current roles that allow us to progress towards our goals. As we relate these functions of job crafting to culture, we might find that we experience some tensions. For example, choosing the maintaining path of the Multicultural Compass Model, where we align more closely with the value dimensions of our most familiar culture may lead us away from opportunities to develop new skills. On the other hand, converting/assimilation may be a strategy that supports workplace success, but that may lead to stress and a loss of job satisfaction when our values and identity are not fully honoured. This is why self-knowledge of our cultural values and our preferred ways of moving through tensions is both complicated and important.
Chapter References
Hall, E. T. (1976). Beyond culture (Anchor Books ed). Anchor Books.
Hofstede, G., Hofstede, G. J., & Minkov, M. (2010). Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind, Third Edition (Third). McGraw-Hill. https://go.exlibris.link/n65xCyfN
The Culture Factor Group. (2024). Global report 2024: A cultural guide to management—Understanding employee needs and expectations. The Culture Factor Group. https://www.theculturefactor.com/resources/report/global-report-2024
Wasilewski, J. (2012). Framework: Multicultural Compass Model: A Tool for Navigating Multicultural Space. In K. Berardo & D. K. Deardorff (Eds.), Building Cultural Competence: Innovative Activities and Models (pp. 316–323). Stylus.
