Cross-cultural studies on organizational strategies for shipping firms : aspect in uncertainty avoidance, conservative or autonomy and gender egalitarianism

• Main Author: Low, Shi Pei.
• Other Authors: Chew Ah Seng, David
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Maritime studies::Maritime management and business
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/52617
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Every shipping company has its own unique organisation cultures, influencing the implementation of its strategies. The culture within the organization is also much influenced by the culture of the country. As such, the strategies taken can affect the financial performance of the organisation. This study hopes to provide organizations with a deeper insight on how organization cultures affect the strategies. A research was conducted on organizational culture of the shipping companies across three continents, the United States, Europe and Asia and how it affects the strategies taken. The recommendations on organizational cultures and strategies to be implemented for Singapore shipping companies are also included in the research. The research was conducted based on a wide-range of past literatures reviews, primary and secondary sources. Literature review focuses on the dimensions of three different culture frameworks and organizational cultures on organisations in each of the three continents and in Singapore. In addition, past studies on impact of organization cultures on organizations in other industries, except shipping are researched upon. The primary data was collected from eight interviews conducted with the management team from shipping companies in the three continents and Singapore. Lastly, secondary information was gathered from Annual reports and Sustainability reports of nine shipping companies from the three continents and three other shipping companies in Singapore. Based on research findings, shipping companies in the United States have medium inclination towards uncertainty avoidance. Whereas, shipping companies located in different areas of Europe are faced with different levels of uncertainty avoidance. Furthermore, shipping companies in Asia are faced with high uncertainty avoidance culture. Next, the shipping companies in United States have autonomy culture while shipping companies in Asia and Europe have conservative culture. Lastly, shipping companies in both the United States and Asia have low gender egalitarianism, as compared to the shipping companies in Europe. Moreover, a financial analysis was conducted based on the free cash flow (FCF) and return on equity (ROE), with reference to the nine shipping companies in the three continents. It is concluded that Nippon Yuken Kaisha (NYK), Hanjin Shipping and Hapag Lloyd serve as good references as they have relatively good FCF and ROE. In addition, benefits reaped from adopting the culture were taken into consideration. Therefore, recommendations of the dimensions of organizational cultures such as uncertainty avoidance culture, accompanied with autonomy and high gender egalitarianism are proposed to shipping companies in Singapore. However, the success of implementing these cultures depends on the environment as well. These results also suggest promising avenues for further research such as implementing other culture framework from other researchers, such as Trompenaars, to give a more critical evaluation. Extensive work in conducting interviews with both the employees from the executive level and senior management coupled with development of culture metrics can be done to provide a better accuracy of the results.