Cultural influences on informal information sharing in Chinese and Anglo-American

Description
This study examines cultural factors which may facilitate or impede the sharing of informal information in the con-
text of face-to-face meetings in Chinese compared to Anglo-American organizations. Both qualitative and quantitative
data were collected through personally conducted interviews with middle level managers in a sample of Taiwanese and
Australian manufacturing ®rms. The results suggest the importance of individual di€erences, individual assertiveness,
and corporate culture in in¯uencing informal information sharing in Australia; and the trade-o€ between collective
interests, respect for hierarchical status and concern with face in Taiwan.

Cultural in¯uences on informal information sharing in
Chinese and Anglo-American organizations:
an exploratory study
Chee W. Chow
a
, Graeme L. Harrison
b,
*, Jill L. McKinnon
b
, Anne Wu
c
a
San Diego State University, USA
b
Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW 2109, Australia
c
National Chengchi University, Taipei, Taiwan
Abstract
This study examines cultural factors which may facilitate or impede the sharing of informal information in the con-
text of face-to-face meetings in Chinese compared to Anglo-American organizations. Both qualitative and quantitative
data were collected through personally conducted interviews with middle level managers in a sample of Taiwanese and
Australian manufacturing ®rms. The results suggest the importance of individual di?erences, individual assertiveness,
and corporate culture in in¯uencing informal information sharing in Australia; and the trade-o? between collective
interests, respect for hierarchical status and concern with face in Taiwan. # 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights
reserved.
1. Introduction
This study explores national cultural factors
which may facilitate or impede the sharing of
information in the interpersonal communications
context of face-to-face meetings in Chinese com-
pared to Anglo-American organizations.
A study of information sharing is important
because, as Macintosh (1994, pp. 58±61) notes,
information sharing is crucial for increasing the
capacity of organizations to process information
in planning and controlling their operations.
Other writers have also emphasized that open
sharing of information among organizational
members is fundamental to such processes as
benchmarking (Smith, 1994, p. 32), managing the
value chain (Nanni, Dixon & Vollman, 1992, p. 3),
networking (Fairtlough, 1994, p. 89), total quality
management (Chenhall, 1992, p. 4), and organiza-
tional learning (Levinthal & March, 1993, p. 96).
Information sharing in organizations occurs
through formal and informal mechanisms. Formal
mechanisms include traditional management
accounting systems which collect data in routine
form from di?erent parts of an organization, and
``manipulate, aggregate and distribute'' that
information, typically in report format (Emma-
nuel, Otley & Merchant 1990, p. 97; Bruns &
McKinnon, 1993, p. 104). Informal mechanisms
include interpersonal communications in the con-
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Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
www.elsevier.com/locate/aos
* Corresponding author. Tel: +61-2-9850-8515; fax: +61-2-
9850-8497.
E-mail address: [email protected] (G.L. Harrison)
text of meetings and conversations, direct obser-
vation and informal reports (Bruns & McKinnon,
pp. 94 and 104; Macintosh, 1994, p. 39).
This study focuses upon informal information
exchange in face-to-face meetings. This context is
chosen because, as Bruns and McKinnon (1993, p.
94) found, informal information sourced through
interpersonal communications such as face-to-face
meetings ``dominate other sources of information
for day-to-day needs and remain important for
longer term needs''. Similarly, Abernethy and Lillis
(1995, pp. 244 and 252) identify meetings among
decision-makers of di?erent departments and func-
tions as one of the integrative liaison devices which
need to supplant formal and structured information
reporting and exchange as ®rms increasingly pursue
¯exible manufacturing strategies.
The study focuses speci®cally on information
which may be seen as carrying some tension, con-
¯ict or diculty for a participant in a face-to-face
meeting. In such a meeting, a participant may be
an information provider or seeker, and the infor-
mation may have di?erent attributes and con-
notations for the participant. Some information
provided to the meeting may be supportive of the
otherwise general view of the meeting while other
information might constitute a contrary or chal-
lenging view. Similarly, some information may
enhance the provider's standing in the view of
others (for example, information about the parti-
cipant's past successes), while other information
might potentially detract (information about past
failures). In the information seeking role, the
information sought might be perceived by the
participant as unknown to the meeting generally,
or unknown to the participant only. In this latter
context, seeking information might be perceived to
reveal his or her lack of knowledge.
We concentrate in this study on information of
the second type in each of these three examples;
i.e. on information which may challenge or con-
front, may expose a past mistake, or may expose
lack of knowledge. We do this because it is infor-
mation of this type which, on the one hand, is
likely to produce the greater con¯ict and tension
in the mind of the participant and, hence, be the
more dicult to share, but which, on the other,
has been seen in the literature as important to
share for organizational bene®t.
1
Levinthal and
March (1993), for example, observe in relation to
organizational learning that such learning is often
biased by the tendency to emphasize success and
de-emphasise failure. Similarly, Peters (1994, pp.
54±55) argues that organizations need to foster
the promotion of challenging ideas, the creation
of a questioning environment, and to de-stigma-
tize failure so as not to deter innovation and crea-
tivity.
The study explores the factors which facilitate
or impede sharing of information of the type
detailed in the previous paragraph in two national
cultural settings; Anglo-American culture which is
typically regarded as characterising countries such
as the US, UK, Australia and Canada, and Chi-
nese-based culture, typically regarded as char-
acterising countries such as China, Hong Kong,
Singapore and Taiwan. The cross-cultural focus is
motivated by the ®ndings of a growing body of
research which suggests that people in di?erent
nations often di?er in how they react to given job-
related conditions (see, for example, Chow, Kato
& Merchant, 1996; Chow, Kato & Shields, 1994;
Chow, Shields & Chan, 1991; Birnberg & Snod-
grass, 1988; Harrison, 1992, 1993; Harrison,
McKinnon, Panchapakesan & Leung, 1994; Mer-
chant, Chow & Wu, 1995; O'Connor, 1995). The
Anglo-American and Chinese-based cultures are
chosen for study because of their general eco-
nomic and political signi®cance globally, and
1
It is acknowledged that these are just three examples of a
number of possible incidents of information sharing in inter-
personal interactions and communications. However, pilot tests
in the design stages of the study involving interviews with
selected managers in both Australia and Taiwan showed these
examples to be common occurrences, and ones which did have
the potential to produce diculties in the information sharing
process. The pilot interviews also showed that managers in
both countries saw the issue of open exchange of information
in face-to-face meetings as being important to their organiza-
tions. (Feeding forward for a moment, so too did the inter-
viewees from both Taiwan and Australia in the main sample.)
This is important because, as pointed out by the reviewers, it is
not necessarily the case that theories, issues and concerns rele-
vant to western nations are also relevant in Chinese nations.
In this case, however, it appears that information sharing in
face-to-face meetings is relevant to both Western and Chinese
organizations.
562 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
because they encompass a number of substantive
di?erences observed to exist in Western and East-
ern cultures.
It is acknowledged at the outset that the study
focuses only on cultural inputs to information
sharing propensities and factors in the face-to-face
meeting context. It does not examine other vari-
ables identi®ed in the literature as relevant to the
need for, or ecacy of, informal integrative liaison
devices generally. Such other variables include, for
example, the degree of interdependent coordina-
tion requirements of the organization (Macintosh,
1994, p. 61) arising from exigencies of structural
di?erentiation or the implementation of programs
such as Total Quality Management (Chenhall, 1992).
Nor does the paper assume that all organizations
are subject to the same contexts or require the same
characteristics of organizational learning, experi-
mentation and innovation described by Levinthal
and March (1993) and Peters (1994). While these
multiple variables and contexts are relevant in
developing an overall model of when and where
such liaison devices will be e?ective, this study
seeks solely to contribute some understanding of
one potential input to the model when the model is
extended to a cross-national setting. That input is,
how national cultural characteristics might a?ect
the intrinsic propensity of individuals in organiza-
tions to share information in the speci®c context
under study. Because of this restricted focus, the
study does not seek to measure the e?ectiveness of
information sharing, which, as noted above, will
be dependent on multiple independent variables
outwith the scope of this study.
2
Finally, the study must be seen as exploratory in
that, while the literature identi®es face-to-face
meetings as an important information sharing
context, no empirical research into how people in
di?erent cultures operate in that context has yet
been conducted. Such research is important, how-
ever, for several reasons and audiences. First, it
adds to the growing body of research literature
directed at understanding how people in organi-
zations in di?erent cultures may respond di?erently
to work-related practices and conditions, and,
hence, is intrinsically important for cross-cultural
research development generally. Second, the rese-
arch has pragmatic importance to managers and
management accountants in organizations operat-
ing either in a sole Anglo-American or Chinese
cultural context, or across such cultural contexts.
In both contexts, the research may enable man-
agers to understand when (and how) national cul-
tural characteristics might facilitate or, more
importantly, impede information sharing in their
organizations, and prompt the development of
mechanisms to overcome such impediments.
While the cross-national comparison in this study
might be most important for managers and man-
agement accountants in organizations operating in
both cultures, the results for each culture should
also be important at the single country level.
2. Theory and hypothesis
A consequence of the exploratory nature of
research in this area is the absence of prior litera-
ture or established theory to develop de®nitive and
directional hypotheses which might then support
empirical testing using standard statistical meth-
ods. There is considerable literature available
which describes the cultural characteristics of
Chinese-based societies and which contrasts those
characteristics with Anglo-American societies.
However, that literature does not directly address
the phenomenon at issue in this study, and, when
we searched that literature for cultural insight into
the phenomenon, we were confronted with several
relevant, but sometimes con¯icting implications.
Hence, our approach is to put forward those
implications from the literature, and then seek
both quantitative and qualitative data to shed
empirical light on them. The qualitative data,
obtained from personal interviews conducted with
managers in the ®eld, allow in-depth exploration
of the implications from the literature.
Students of national culture frequently point
to three attributes as being particularly di?erent
between Anglo-American and Chinese-based
2
The scope of the study is partial also in that it does not
take account of the multiple circumstances where, as the
reviewers accurately pointed out, information might be com-
partmentalized to reduce information overload, or for legal
reasons, as in the defence industry.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 563
cultures: the emphasis on the interests of the self
versus those of the group, sometimes referred to as
individualism/collectivism (Hofstede, 1980, p. 51;
Triandis, 1995); the importance placed on the
concept of ``face'' (Bond & Hwang, 1986; Redding
& Wong, 1986); and the respect for authority and
hierarchy, often referred to as power distance
(Hofstede, 1980, p. 70).
3
2.1. Individualism/collectivism
``Individualism pertains to societies in
which. . .everyone is expected to look after himself
or herself and his or her immediate family. . .its
opposite, collectivism pertains to societies in
which people from birth onwards are integrated
into strong cohesive ingroups'' (Hofstede, 1980,
p. 51). One attribute of collectivism is a ``we''
consciousness and orientation to the collectivity
(Triandis, 1995, p. 43). Consequences of this are a
perceived moral involvement with the company,
and individual behaviour premised on a sense of
loyalty and duty to the organization (Hofstede,
1984, p. 166). This contrasts with an ``I'' orienta-
tion and an emphasis on the self in an individualist
society, leading to a calculative involvement with
the company, and to behaviour allowing for indi-
vidual initiative, expression and assertion (Hof-
stede, 1984, p. 166). Triandis (1995) supports this
by noting:
One can identify collectivism when group
goals have priority and individualism when
personal goals have priority... (Cognitions)
that focus on norms, obligations and duties
guide much of social behavior in collectivist
cultures...(while cognitions) that focus on
attitudes, personal needs, rights, and con-
tracts guide social behavior in individualistic
cultures (Triandis, 1995, pp. 43, 44).
Students of Chinese culture have often cited
collectivism as one of its main characteristics, not-
ing especially its emphasis on subjugating personal
interest to that of the collective (Hofstede, 1991;
Leung & Bond, 1984), while individualism and the
self-interest motive are frequently cited as typify-
ing Anglo-American culture (Hofstede, 1991; Tri-
andis, Bontempo, Villareal, Asai & Lucca, 1988).
4
At ®rst pass, therefore, it could be expected that,
when faced with a situation where a person has
information to share which is bene®cial to the
collectivity but potentially disadvantageous in
some way to the individual, a person in a collecti-
vist society would be more likely to share that
information than one in an individualist society.
2.2. The concept of ``face''
Complicating this expectation, however, are
other characteristics of collectivist cultures which
also appear to have implications for the informa-
tion sharing issue. One, arising from the collecti-
vist culture's group orientation, is the concern
with maintaining ``face''. At a general level, Ho
(1976, pp. 871 and 876) explains that ``(a) person's
`face' is assessed in terms of what others think of
him. . .Face may be lost when conduct or perfor-
mance falls below the minimum level considered
acceptable''. At this level, face is a human uni-
versal and, indeed, appeared in the Western
sociological literature as long ago as Go?man
(1955), who de®ned it in self-presentational terms
as ``the positive social value a person e?ectively
claims for himself'' (p. 213).
However, there are two features which distin-
guish the importance of face in Chinese collectivist
and Western individualist cultures. The ®rst is that
in Western cultures: ``Everyone has a free choice
in the use of language and action'' (Bond &
Hwang, 1986, p. 245); i.e. people are free to
determine whether, and how, they engage in self-
presentation. By contrast, no such choice exists for
a person in Chinese collectivist cultures. Here, face
is an automatic consequence of their belonging to,
3
As will be seen in the subsequent theory development in
this section, these three attributes of culture are also of parti-
cular relevance to the phenomena at issue in this study.
4
Studies quantifying the degree of individualism/collecti-
vism across countries, using Hofstede's (1980) original mea-
surement instrument or variants thereof, have consistently
supported these di?erences between Chinese and Anglo-Amer-
ican cultures. See, for example, Cragin (1986), Harrison (1992,
1993), Harrison et al. (1994), Hofstede (1980, 1991) and
O'Connor (1995).
564 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
and their status in, the collective. Face is main-
tained or lost through compliance with or viola-
tion of the behaviour expected of the person in
that particular status (Bond & Hwang, 1986,
p. 249). The second distinguishing feature is the
general belief in the permanence and, hence, criti-
cality, of loss of face. Stover (1974, pp. 244±245,
cited in Bond and Hwang, p. 245) notes that: ``It is
generally believed (in Chinese society) that the
image of self presented to others has a lasting
impact, so one has to be very careful about one's
behaviour''. Similarly, Redding and Wong (1986,
p. 286) argue that one of the features which dis-
tinguish the importance of face in Chinese cultures
is the sheer degree of concern with it.
The degree of concern with face in Chinese
society is re¯ected in both the amount of literature
devoted to it (see, for example, the references to
this literature in Bond & Hwang, 1986), and the
depth of its permeation into social relationships
and interpersonal behaviour. Bond and Hwang
(pp. 245±249) discuss six types of face behaviour
in Chinese society, including saving one's own
face, and saving the face of others. They (Bond &
Hwang, 1986, p. 248) also cite the importance of
maintaining group structural harmony in collec-
tive Chinese societies, and reinforce the impor-
tance of face as determined by the behaviour of
individuals relative to their status, particularly
hierarchical status, within the group.
In a...society where the importance of struc-
tural harmony within a group is emphasized,
every person has to concern himself or herself
with `right conduct in maintaining one's place
in a hierarchical order' (Stover, 1974, p. 274).
He or she must pay attention to preserving
others' face in social encounters, especially
the face of superiors. Since exposing a per-
son's mistake may provoke public reaction
and create disharmony, Chinese usually show
heightened reluctance to criticize others.
The nature and importance of face in Chinese
collectivist cultures would appear to constitute a
constraint on information sharing in each of the
three examples we posit. The examples of reveal-
ing a past failure and asking questions (which
might be seen as revealing one's ignorance) both
invoke the concern with protecting one's own face.
The example of openly expressing a contrary or
challenging view and implying a criticism of others
invokes the concern with protecting the face of
others, and indirectly one's own face.
In sum, the moral involvement with the com-
pany associated with collectivist cultures emerges
from the literature as a factor facilitating sharing
of information of the type, and in the contexts, of
the three examples in the study. By contrast, the
calculative involvement with the company and the
emphasis on self, associated with individualist
cultures arises as a factor impeding information
sharing in those same contexts. However, the
importance of face in collectivist cultures compli-
cates hypotheses development, in that it emerges
from the literature as a factor impeding information
sharing in collectivist cultures. As such, the study
proceeds to examine the relative importance of these
factors as they are perceived to exist in the minds of
organizational participants in both cultures.
2.3. Power distance
The quote from Bond and Hwang (1986) near
the end of the previous section highlights the
importance of subordinate/superior relationships
in Chinese-based societies. The importance of the
hierarchy, and of the socially expected behaviours
of people in di?erent statuses in the hierarchy,
constitutes the third attribute frequently seen as
particularly di?erent between Anglo-American
and Chinese-based cultures. This attribute is com-
monly known as power distance.
Power distance has been de®ned as the degree to
which people accept interpersonal inequality in
power and the organizational institutionalization
of such inequality (Hofstede, 1991, p. 28). In high
power distance societies, there is acceptance of a
``broad and unquestioned authority'' of the
superior (Bond, 1991, p. 78), and a regard for the
superior as the most knowledgeable and ``the
most intelligent member of the group'' (Tse, Lee,
Vertinsky & Wehrung, 1988, p. 83). Subordinates
(i) believe that the opinions of their superiors
are more important than their own; (ii) accord
superiors a wide range of prerogatives, authority
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 565
and leadership, while also expecting them to take
the responsibility of authority and leadership
(Bond; Bond & Hwang, 1986); and (iii) regard
the involvement of subordinates in decision mak-
ing as a sign of poor leadership by the superior
(Child, 1981; Hofstede, 1991, pp. 33±34). By con-
trast, subordinates in low power distance cultures
consider themselves to have equal rights to their
superiors, and expect to be consulted on, and have
input to, decisions a?ecting them (Child, 1981;
Hofstede, 1980). Observers of Chinese-based cul-
tures have placed them among the highest in power
distance (Chinese Cultural Connection, 1987; Hof-
stede, 1980, 1991), while members of the Anglo-
American cluster are generally seen as being low on
this dimension (Hofstede, 1991, p. 26).
5
The importance of power distance in Chinese
culture, and its implications for the expected
behaviours of subordinates and superiors, point
to a potential di?erence in information sharing
behaviour in face-to-face meetings depending on
whether a person's superior is present at the
meeting or not. This di?erence would be expected
to be manifest in each of the three examples we
consider in this paper. In all three examples, the
perception of Chinese subordinates that their opi-
nions, information and questions are less impor-
tant, knowledgeable and intelligent than those of
their superiors would tend to reduce the pro-
pensity that they would o?er those opinions and
information, or ask questions, when their superior
is present compared to when absent. By contrast,
the perception of an intrinsic equality between
superior and subordinate in low power distance
cultures, together with the subordinate's expecta-
tion to have input into decisions and discussions,
suggests that the information sharing propensities
of participants in face-to-face meetings will be
less (or not) a?ected by the presence or absence
of a superior.
In sum, the cultural literature reviewed in this
section does not allow directional hypotheses to be
formulated for di?erences in information sharing
behaviour between people in Anglo-American and
Chinese organizations in the context of face-to-face
meetings. The literature does suggest, however,
that the behaviour is likely to be di?erent
depending upon the presence or absence of super-
iors in the Chinese setting, but not in the Aus-
tralian setting. Hence, we state the following
interactive hypothesis as an exploratory hypoth-
esis, which we examine using both quantitative
and qualitative data.
There is no interaction between the presence
or absence of a superior and a subordinate's
culture (Anglo-American or Chinese) a?ect-
ing the subordinate's propensity to share
information through asking a clarifying
question (H1a), expressing a contrary or
challenging opinion (H1b), and revealing a
past mistake (H1c) in the open forum of a
face-to-face meeting.
3. Method
Data were collected through both a structured
questionnaire with closed-ended questions and
follow-up, open-ended questions in personal
interviews with middle level managers in their
organizational settings in Australia and Taiwan
(chosen to represent an Anglo-American and Chi-
nese culture respectively). The interview instru-
ment comprised three scenarios, each describing
one of the three information sharing examples of
asking questions, expressing a contrary or chal-
lenging opinion, and revealing a past mistake in
the context of a face-to-face meeting. The details
of the scenarios are given in the Results section of
the paper. To ensure the scenarios simulated the
circumstances intended, the instrument was pilot
tested with managers in both countries with simi-
lar organizational positions and level to those in
the main sample. The instrument was ®rst devel-
oped in English, translated into Chinese by a bi-
lingual person not associated with the study, and
then back-translated by one of the bi-lingual
research team members. The instrument was then
evaluated by a second bi-lingual member of the
5
Studies quantifying the degree of power distance across
countries, using Hofstede's (1980) original measurement
instrument or variants thereof, have consistently supported
these di?erences. See Hofstede (1991), Chow et al. (1991),
Harrison (1992, 1993), Harrison et al. (1994), Sondergaard
(1994) and Cragin (1986).
566 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
research team. The English version was used in
Australia and the Chinese version in Taiwan.
Each scenario was accompanied by two ques-
tions asking the respondent to indicate, on a nine-
point scale, the likely behaviour of a ``typical per-
son'' in his/her organization in the scenario con-
text. One question assumed that the person's
superior was present in the context, and the other
assumed that the superior was absent. These
questions were designed to obtain quantitative
data for the exploratory hypothesis. After the
respondent had provided his/her numerical
answers, the interview proceeded to probe the
reasons for the answers with the purpose of elicit-
ing the factors that the respondents saw as in¯u-
encing the likely behaviour of people in their
organization in the context of each scenario.
Two aspects of the data collection are of note.
First, asking for the likely behaviour of another
person, rather than the behaviour of the person
him/herself was designed to reduce the potential
for social desirability bias.
6
Second, the use of
scenarios and follow-up discussions is a variant of
the ``in-basket'' format developed by Frederiksen,
Saunders and Wand (1957), and used in a number
of studies of managers' decisions (e.g. Mac-
Crimmon & Wehrung, 1984; Tse et al., 1988). For
an exploratory study such as ours, a major
advantage of this approach is that it allowed us to
move beyond the numerical responses to explore
the reasons why the respondents had given the
answers they did. Tse et al. (p. 92) argue that the
``in-basket'' format has advantages over ``conven-
tional tools for studying executives' decisions,
such as belief statements'' because it provides
more relevant decision variables to respondents.
7
3.1. Respondent sample
Data were collected from 52 (50) middle level
managers from 13 (14) Taiwanese (Australian)
companies. To control for in¯uences other than
culture on information sharing behaviour (e.g.
technology and competition), the companies were
matched on size (assets) and were drawn from the
same ®ve industries: cement, glass and steel; che-
micals, plastic and rubber; construction; food and
beverages; and paper. The Taiwanese member of
the research team identi®ed a sample of companies
in Taiwan. The Australian team members then
matched this sample using data from corporate
directories and business periodicals. Companies
were initially contacted by letter personally
addressed to the Chief Executive Ocer. Follow-
up telephone calls were then made. We targeted
wholly-owned companies within each nation to
avoid contamination by a non-Chinese or non-
Anglo-American culture.
8
6
It is acknowledged that this approach does not overcome
the potential for socially desirable responses entirely. However,
it provides some guard against such bias. Additionally, while
some respondents had diculty visualising the ``typical per-
son'', others were able to do so easily. Respondents frequently
said that they recognized the situation in the scenarios well,
that they had had exactly these types of incidents occur in their
organization, and then described what had happened in the
organizational reality of the scenario. Even in the cases of
respondents who questioned the ``typical person'', these
respondents usually answered by giving us explanations of, and
factors underlying, how di?erent people might react in the sce-
nario. As it was these explanations and factors that we were
essentially interested in, we do not think social desirability bias
was a problem in the study.
7
A diculty in cross-national research in countries with
di?erent languages is ensuring the cross-cultural equivalence of
the terms, concepts and decision meanings used in the research
instrument. Tse et al. (1988, p. 92) note that the use of ``in-
basket'' scenario formats is particularly appropriate for cross-
cultural studies in that ``because executives representing di?er-
ent backgrounds and organizations are responding
to. . .common decisions, their behaviour can be compared''.
Additionally, the process of translation and back-translation of
the instrument involving independent bi-lingualists also lends
con®dence to the equivalence of terms and concepts, as did the
pilot testing of the instrument which was conducted in both
Australia and Taiwan. In both countries, and using the respec-
tive language versions of the instrument, the pilot test managers
supported the authenticity of the scenarios and their terminol-
ogy in capturing the essence of the decision contexts and
meanings, as well as supporting the comparability and typi-
cality of the scenarios in both countries.
8
Some of the targeted Australian companies chose not to
participate and, given the low number of wholly-owned Aus-
tralian companies in the size and industry classi®cations drawn
from, some replacement companies in the ultimate sample were
partially foreign owned. However, all companies in the sample
had long-established operations in Australia, had major or
substantive Australian ownership, and, where there were over-
seas ownership interests, these were vested in other Anglo-
American countries, speci®cally the UK or the USA.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 567
The respondent managers were matched on
function with half the sample in each country and
company drawn from sales/marketing and half
from production/operations. The purpose of
matching was, again, to control for any in¯uences
other than culture on information sharing beha-
viour (e.g. nature of task and occupational sub-
culture). The managers in each company (we
initially sought four in each company) were selec-
ted by the Chief Executive Ocer or his/her
nominee, based on speci®ed criteria. These criteria
were that the respondents be at middle manager
level (such that they both reported to a superior
and were reported to by subordinates), and that
two be in sales/marketing and two in production/
operations. Two quali®cations on the data arose
from restrictions imposed by some Australian
companies. First, not all Australian companies
allowed access to four managers, necessitating a
14th company being drawn on. Second, four ®rms
restricted the number of managers we could inter-
view, allowing the other managers to complete the
(closed-ended) questionnaire only. Thus, the Aus-
tralian data comprise both completed ques-
tionnaire (quantitative) and personal interview
(qualitative) data for 42 respondents, and com-
pleted questionnaire data only for a further eight
respondents.
9
3.2. Content analysis
We drew on content analysis to guide us in
analyzing the qualitative data.
10
Two members
of the research team analysed the interview
transcripts, both jointly and independently, and
at di?erent points in time. First, all transcripts
were read jointly and discussed, with the objec-
tive of identifying and classifying into categories
the factors given by respondents as in¯uencing the
likely behavioural outcomes in the scenarios.
Some months later, one team member reread all
transcripts with the same objective, but, on this
occasion, (i) determined and documented a set of
decision rules for category identi®cation and clas-
si®cation, and (ii) applied those rules to obtain a
count of the relative frequency with which cate-
gories were raised across the respondent samples.
The decision rules consisted of a list of the text
units of words and phrases regarded by the team
member as being indicative or connotative of
factors in¯uencing the behavioural outcomes in a
given scenario. The second team member then
independently read the transcripts with the pur-
poses of; (i) evaluating the categories and decision
rules, and (ii) applying those rules to the tran-
scripts to conduct a second and independent fre-
quency count.
The two readings and classi®cations separated
by time allowed some comfort of reliability
through stability (Krippendor?, 1980, p. 130) in
that the categories identi®ed by the same coder on
the second reading were the same as the ®rst,
except for a ®ner gradation of categories in some
instances. The two subsequent codings and counts
by each researcher independently allowed some
comfort of shared meaning of the categories and
decision rules (Gray, Kouhy & Lavers, 1995, p.
80), and of reliability through reproducibility
(Krippendor?, p. 131) in that again there was a
high level of agreement between the two coders.
11
We acknowledge that our use of content analy-
sis is tailored to suit our study, and falls short in
some ways of the reliability and validity criteria
ideally associated with content analysis. In parti-
cular, the categories we developed were generated
from the interviews themselves, rather than froman
external referent. Hence, we cannot assure exhaus-
tiveness of the categories or factors in¯uencing the
9
Mean comparisons of responses to the scenario questions
between the eight who completed the questionnaire in non-
interview format and the 42 who completed it in interview set-
tings showed no di?erences. The analysis of the quantitative
data is, therefore, based on the full Australian sample of 50
managers.
10
Weber (1990, p. 9) describes content analysis as ``a
research method that uses a set of procedures to make valid
inferences from text'', and can be used for many purposes,
including coding open-ended questions.
11
Our objective was to determine the relative frequency with
which a factor category was raised among the respondents in
each sample. We used words, phrases and sentences as the unit
of analysis (or text unit), rather than paragraphs or pages, and
we did not count repetitions within an interview (Weber, 1990,
p. 70). The use of small text units carries the advantages of
greater ease and reliability of coding (Gray et al., 1995, p. 84).
568 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
likely behavioural outcomes in the contexts at
issue (Guthrie & Mathews, 1985, p. 260). Rather,
we can only report and compare the relative fre-
quency of occurrence of those categories perceived
by our respondents as important in¯uences on
information sharing behaviour in those contexts.
However, given that the categories and their iden-
ti®cation were relatively straightforward, we do
not believe that this process detracts substantially
from the credibility of the categories and their
de®nitions. To provide transparency, the cate-
gories and examples of text units included in each
category are given in Tables 3, 4 and 5 for each
scenario so that readers can also assess their rea-
sonableness.
4. Results
The three scenarios used were as follows. Sce-
nario 1, asking a clarifying question, involved a
meeting of peer managers to decide between two
investment proposals. The focal manager has
completed his own ®nancial analysis beforehand
and favours one alternative.
12
In the meeting,
another manager argues in favour of the other
alternative, basing this argument on the results of
a ®nancial analytical technique referred to by the
acronym IVA (for intrinsic value analysis). The
focal manager has no knowledge of this technique,
but it appears to be familiar to all the other man-
agers at the meeting and is apparently leading a
number of those managers to favour the other
alternative.
Scenario 2, expressing a contrary or challenging
opinion, described a situation in which a divisional
manager has called a meeting of his marketing,
design and production department managers, and
their assistant managers, to discuss the poor per-
formance of the division. With the meeting not
going well and the marketing and design managers
each blaming the other, the assistant marketing
manager speaks up. He provides information he
has obtained from customers and suggests that
there are de®ciencies in both the marketing and
design departments. Scenario 3, revealing a past
mistake, involved a department manager who had
been promoted to that position a year earlier. The
manager had, as one of his ®rst decisions, pushed
for the introduction of a new technology to
replace an existing technology in the department.
A year later, the new technology is looking like
an expensive mistake through cost mis-estima-
tion, but a mistake which the manager has been
able to conceal in the absence of post-audits of
speci®c projects. The scenario states that the
manager and his superior have been asked to
attend a meeting at another plant to advise on a
similar technology replacement decision. The sce-
nario creates a situation where, unless the depart-
ment manager openly discloses his previous mis-
estimation, the other plant is likely to repeat that
mistake.
4.1. Quantitative results
As noted earlier, for each scenario respondents
were initially asked to indicate how likely it was
that the focal manager (if he were a typical person
in the respondent's organization) would ask a
clarifying question (Scenario 1), speak up and
express a contrary or challenging opinion (Sce-
nario 2), or reveal a past mistake (Scenario 3).
Respondents were asked this question twice, once
assuming the superior were present in the context,
and the other assuming his absence.
13
A nine-
point response scale was used for each question
anchored by 1=``would de®nitely not (ask; speak
up; reveal mistake)'' and 9=``would de®nitely
(ask; speak up; reveal mistake)''. The descriptive
statistics are given in Table 1.
12
All subjects in the scenarios were males to avoid any
potential gender e?ect. The focal managers in the scenarios
were given typical Chinese names in the Chinese version of the
interview instrument used in Taiwan, and typical Anglo-Amer-
ican names in the English version used in Australia.
13
The order of superior presence/absence was varied. In
Scenario 1, the ®rst question assumed the superior was absent,
while the second asked if there would be a di?erence in beha-
viour if the superior were present. In Scenarios 2 and 3, the ®rst
question assumed the superior was present, with the second
asking if there would be a di?erence in behaviour if the super-
ior were absent. The variation was used simply to ensure that
the respondent managers were thinking carefully about each
scenario and question.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 569
Table 2
Results of estimating interaction model for scenario responses
Variable Coecent Value SE t p
Panel A: asking clarifying questions (Scenario 1)
a
Intercept b
0
6.840 0.231 29.595 0.000
Nation b
1
0.872 0.324 2.693 0.007
Superior b
2
À0.770 0.327 À2.356 0.019
Interaction b
3
À0.692 0.458 À1.511 0.132
Panel b: speaking up and expressing a contrary or challenging opinion (Scenario 2)
b
Intercept b
0
7.510 0.233 32.196 0.000
Nation b
1
À1.029 0.327 À3.150 0.002
Superior b
2
À0.700 0.330 À2.122 0.035
Interaction b
3
0.758 0.462 1.640 0.103
Panel C: reveal a past mistake (Scenario 3)
c
Intercept b
0
7.080 0.229 30.875 0.000
Nation b
1
À0.138 0.321 À0.429 0.669
Superior b
2
À0.960 0.324 À2.960 0.003
Interaction b
3
À0.117 0.454 À0.257 0.797
a
R
2
=0.14; adjusted R
2
=0.12; F=10.54; Signif. 0.0000.
b
R
2
=0.06; adjusted R
2
=0.04; F=4.15; Signif. 0.0070.
c
R
2
=0.09; adjusted R
2
=0.08; F=6.99; Signif. 0.0002.
Table 1
Descriptive statistics for scenario responses
a
Scenario Country Observed
range
Mean
(SD)
1. Asking clarifying questions:
with superior absent Taiwan 6±9 7.72 (0.72)
Australia 2±9 6.84 (1.74)
with superior present Taiwan 3±9 6.25 (1.43)
Australia 1±9 6.07 (2.29)
2. Speaking up and expressing a contrary
or challenging opinion:
with divisional manager absent Taiwan 3±9 6.48 (1.78)
Australia 2±9 7.51 (1.54)
with divisional manager present Taiwan 3±9 6.54 (1.50)
Australia 2±9 6.81 (1.76)
3. Revealing a past mistake:
with superior absent Taiwan 3±9 6.94 (1.24)
Australia 2±9 7.08 (1.66)
with superior present Taiwan 2±8 5.87 (1.59)
Australia 1±9 6.12 (1.94)
a
Response scale: 1=low, 9=high.
570 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
The hypothesis was tested using the following
multiple linear regression model:
Y ? b
0
?b
1
X
1
?b
2
X
2
?b
3
X
1
X
2
?e
where:
Y= likelihood of asking question (Scenario 1),
speaking up and expressing a contrary and
challenging opinion (Scenario 2), revealing a
past mistake (Scenario 3);
X
1
= nation, coded 0 for Australia and 1 for
Taiwan, proxying for culture; and
X
2
= superior absence (coded 0) or presence
(coded 1).
The results are shown in Table 2, with Panels A,
B and C presenting the results for Scenarios 1, 2
and 3 respectively. Table 2 shows the main e?ects
for nation in Scenarios 1 and 2. The Taiwanese
managers were perceived as more likely than the
Australian managers to ask clarifying questions
(Panel A, t =2.69, p =0.007); however, the Aus-
tralian managers were perceived as more likely to
speak up and express a contrary or challenging
opinion (Panel B, t=3.15, p=0.002). No di?er-
ence was reported in the tendency to reveal past
failures. In all three scenarios and for both the
Australian and Taiwanese samples, Table 1 shows
that mean scores are above the mid-point indicating
an overall propensity to share information. Table
2 also shows a main e?ect for presence/absence of
a superior in all three scenarios, with the direction
in each case being a reduced tendency to share
information with the superior present compared to
absent. A weak interaction e?ect was found only
in Scenario 2 (at p=0.10). This e?ect was contrary
to expectation with the Australian respondents
perceiving that the presence of a superior would
have a greater e?ect on reducing the likelihood
that a manager would express a contrary or chal-
lenging opinion than the Taiwanese.
4.2. Qualitative results
The quantitative results reveal little about
information sharing behaviour in the face-to-face
meetings context. This was not unexpected given
the lack of prior theory, and the fact that the lit-
erature reviewed for the paper provided several
relevant but potentially con¯icting cultural impli-
cations for such behaviour. Hence, the qualitative
data from the open-ended interview questions
were looked to for insight. These data are reported
in Tables 3, 4 and 5 for Scenarios 1, 2 and 3
respectively. The tables show: (i) the categories of
factors identi®ed by the interview respondents as
reasons for or against information sharing in each
scenario;
14
(ii) examples of the spoken text units
contained in the interview transcripts which were
taken to indicate each category; and (iii) the
absolute and percentage frequency of citation of
each category across the Taiwanese and Aus-
tralian interview responses. Panel A in each table
summarises the factors in¯uencing the likelihood
of information sharing in each scenario, while
Panel B focuses speci®cally on the impact of a
superior's presence (Scenario 1) or absence (Sce-
narios 2 and 3). By contrast with the quantitative
results, the qualitative data were revealing, with
Tables 3, 4 and 5 showing several systematic and
consistent di?erences underlying the general pro-
pensity to share information. These di?erences
are, in turn, consistent with the cultural char-
acteristics of Taiwanese and Australian societies.
4.3. Scenario 1: Asking clarifying questions
Table 1 showed that both national samples
considered it likely that the typical person would
ask (for the IVA technique to be explained to
them) when only his peers were present at the
meeting. However, Table 3 (Panel A) shows that the
factors or reasons underlying this propensity to ask
were seen and expressed di?erently by the Taiwa-
nese and Australian respondents. First, by far the
most frequently stated reason seen as underlying
14
Occasionally, a factor was raised by a respondent on a
one-o? basis. Such factors are not shown in the tables for e-
ciency reasons. This is not to say these factors are not impor-
tant in speci®c contexts. As a reviewer pointed out, factors such
as the nature of the superior's characteristics or the dyadic
relationship between superior and subordinate may all be
important in speci®c circumstances. This paper concentrates,
however, on factors that were identi®ed with some frequency
by interviewees.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 571
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574 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
the tendency to share information in the Taiwa-
nese sample was the good of the company, with
this reason being stated overtly by 47 of the 52
Taiwanese managers (90%). The Taiwanese sam-
ple almost universally noted the need to under-
stand (IVA) in order that the problem could be
understood and, consequently, that a better deci-
sion would be made for the company. Comments
such as ``the problem can't be solved without fur-
ther explanation'', and ``because the analysis
would a?ect the decision, he has to understand it
entirely'' were representative.
By contrast, although the good of the company
might have been implicit in the responses of the
Australian sample, it was not stated overtly in
those terms. Instead, the reasons given either
re¯ected an individualist theme, or reference was
made to the corporate culture. Six of the 42 inter-
viewees (14%) noted individual di?erence factors
including personality (``some people are intro-
verted, some are extroverted''), while 26 (62%)
made comments which we classi®ed as individual
assertiveness because they re¯ected a tendency not
even to ponder why someone would ask, or not
ask, for an explanation, but to simply assume they
would assert themselves and do so. Comments
such as ``these guys are pretty forthright'', and
``people are not worried about sticking their necks
out'', are expressive of this.
Among references made by the Australian man-
agers to corporate culture were descriptions of
existing cultures or ones being instituted to pro-
mote openness in contexts such as this scenario:
I hope that the culture of support should pre-
vail here as well. It's OK to say I don't know.
You're not expected to know everything.
The process here is transparent. The (corpo-
rate) culture allows speaking up. No-one
would feel embarrassed. One of the big gains
here (resulting from a deliberate cultural
change within the company) is that if you feel
something is wrong, you put your hand up.
Table 1 shows that the likelihood of asking a
clarifying question decreases for both the Taiwa-
nese and Australian samples when the person's
superior is present at the meeting compared to
absent. However, the regression results in Table 2
(Panel A) do not show a statistically signi®cant
di?erence in the decreases (t=1.51, p=0.13).
Despite this, a headcount showed that almost all
(43, or 83%) of the Taiwanese sample had
decreased their quantitative score of likelihood in
the presence (versus absence) of a superior, com-
pared to just half the Australian sample. Addi-
tionally, almost all the remainder (46%) of the
Australian sample stated overtly that the presence
of the superior would have no e?ect on the sub-
ordinate's propensity to ask for an explanation,
while only 17% (9 respondents) of the Taiwanese
made this statement.
15
These results do suggest some support for a
greater sensitivity to the hierarchy in information
sharing behaviour in the Taiwanese compared to
the Australian sample. The reasons given in the
open-ended discussions also provide support for
the cultural underpinnings of that sensitivity.
Table 3 (Panel B) shows that the Taiwanese
respondents' reasons for the reduced likelihood of
asking for explanation in the superior's presence
were overwhelmingly related to face and its inten-
si®cation in the presence of hierarchical status
di?erences. Of the 52 Taiwanese respondents, 39
(75%) explicitly referred to a concern with loss of
face if the superior were present, and a further ®ve
(10%) referred to a concern with the superior's
adverse opinion or perception of them. The fol-
lowing comments were typical:
If his superior is present, he (the subordinate)
would ask less to protect his face.
If his superior were at the meeting, he (the
subordinate) would not dare to ask for an
explanation because of the problem about
face.
15
Six of these nine came from just two companies, indicat-
ing a speci®c culture in those companies which was serving to
reduce the implications of hierarchical status di?erences. If
those two companies are removed from the analysis, then only
three of 44 respondents across 11 Taiwanese companies said
that there would be no e?ect on subordinate behaviour result-
ing from the superior's presence, compared to 23 respondents
distributed across all 14 Australian companies.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 575
In addition to being worried about provoking
disagreement at the meeting, and expecting
the superior to make decisions directly, they
are also afraid of losing their face, so they
tend not to ask.
In contrast, none of the Australian respondents
made any reference to face, with the main reason
given for a greater reluctance to ask for explana-
tion in the presence of a superior being ``concern
over career''. That explanation itself was given by
only 17% of the Australian sample (compared to
75% of the Taiwanese respondents who gave the
explanation of concern over face). Even among
those Australian respondents who had decreased
their quantitative scores in the superior present
(versus absent) situation, the typical assessment
was that the e?ect would be relatively minor.
He might be a little less likely to ask with his
superior there, but not much. His boss may
expect him to be at the forefront of things.
And among those Australian interviewees who
had not decreased their quantitative scores, com-
ments were generally unequivocal.
Most people would ask and there would be
no di?erence if the superior was there.
It doesn't matter who is there. He (the sub-
ordinate) would ask.
4.4. Scenarios 2 and 3: Expressing a contrary or
challenging opinion, and revealing a past mistake
The interview data for the second and third
scenarios provided a high degree of consistency
with Scenario 1. Again, while Table 1 showed that
both national samples considered it likely that the
typical person would speak up (and express a
contrary or challenging opinion) in Scenario 2,
and reveal a past mistake in Scenario 3, Tables 4
and 5 (Panels A and B) corroborate di?erences
in the factors underlying information sharing
behaviour in the two national samples. Similarly,
those di?erences are consistent with cultural
explanations.
Tables 4 and 5 again show the good of the
company as the predominant reason given by
Taiwanese respondents as supporting information
sharing tendencies, with 34 of the 52 respondents
(65%) citing this reason in Scenario 2 and 33
(63%) in Scenario 3. For Scenario 2, the solution
to the problem (of poor divisional performance)
was seen to depend on ``righteous speaking'',
``speaking truth'', and recognition that ``solving
the problem is everyone's responsibility''. These
statements were relatively unequivocal in their
emphasis on the collective responsibility of people
to speak up for the company good.
By contrast, the responses from the Australian
sample in both scenarios conveyed, as in Scenario
1, the two themes of individualism (individual dif-
ferences and individual assertiveness) and refer-
ence to corporate culture. Although, again,
concern for the company's interests might have
been implicit in the Australian responses, there
was no statement overtly conveying the sense of
an assumed collective obligation to speak up for
the good of the company in Scenario 2 (Table 4,
Panel A), and only six such citations in Scenario 3
(Table 5, Panel A). Rather, individual-oriented
factors, such as personality, style, skill and con-
®dence were cited by 16 (38%) of the Australian
respondents in Scenario 2 and 12 (29%) in Sce-
nario 3, compared to just one such reference from
all 52 Taiwanese respondents in each scenario
(Tables 4 and 5, Panel A). Individual assertiveness
was also strongly present in Scenario 2, with 14
(33%) Australian respondents making overt state-
ments using terms such as ``forthright'', ``keen to
put their oar in'', ``not at all backward (in coming
forward)''. The following quotes are representative.
People are pretty open and vocal here. In this
company, there are a lot of voices saying
what they think.
There is a strong input from anyone who has
something to say. You end up trading pun-
ches. It's very open and you've got to be pre-
pared to take it back Ð to take as good as
you give.
If you've got the facts, present them.
576 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
They would speak up. There would be an
inhibition to some extent, but if there's a
point to be made, it will be made regardless of
the consequences.
The emphasis on individual di?erences and
individual assertiveness is consistent with an
individualist society, where a person's unique
characteristics are seen as more important deter-
minants of behaviour than in a collectivist society,
and where people can come into overt confronta-
tion in one public forum without prejudice to the
continuing relationships between those people in
other contexts. The ability to separate and
abstract the instance of confrontation and con¯ict
in one context from the ongoing relationships
between people was implied frequently in the
interviews.
This characteristic may be seen to contrast with
the dictates of a collectivist society. In Scenario 2,
for example, the importance of the maintenance of
harmony, and the lesser ability to disassociate
instances of confrontation and challenge between
parties in one context from the ongoing relation-
ship between those parties, was frequently expres-
sed by Taiwanese respondents. Illustrative quotes
were: ``he wants to avoid the scene in which
speakers blame each other and cause future trou-
ble'', and ``he has to cooperate with colleagues
afterward''. Reinforcing this was the emphasis
given in the Taiwanese responses to the nature of
the ongoing relations with others as a contingent
factor a?ecting whether a person would reveal a
past mistake in Scenario 3. Table 5 (Panel A)
shows that eleven of the Taiwanese respondents
(21%), compared to no Australian respondent,
identi®ed the existing state of interpersonal rela-
tions, including the strength of ongoing friendship,
as an important determinant of information shar-
ing behaviour.
The second theme in both Scenarios 2 and 3
arising in the Australian responses was the impor-
tance of developing an organizational culture of
openness wherein people who, by personality or
other individual characteristics, might not other-
wise speak up and express a contrary or challen-
ging view, or reveal a past mistake, are
encouraged and supported in doing so. In an
individualist society, and in the absence of a per-
ceived collective responsibility to act for the good
of the company, the creation of an organizational
culture which aligns individual interests with cor-
porate interests is an appropriate response. The
importance of creating a climate of openness was
the most frequently raised issue in the Australian
interview discussions of both Scenarios 2 and 3,
being cited by 16 (38%) respondents in each sce-
nario (Tables 4 and 5, Panel A), with those
respondents representing eight of the 14 Aus-
tralian companies in the sample. The following
quotes were representative.
We don't shoot the messenger here. We don't
punish people here Ð it is important to
understand the problems (Scenario 2).
This is a real mixed bag. Some people would
(admit their mistake), some wouldn't. How-
ever, the corporate philosophy is that mistakes
are made. It (the philosophy) acknowledges
that. We take it on the chin and analyze the
mistakes (Scenario 3).
Respondents from ®ve of the eight Australian
companies claimed that their companies had well
developed and accepted cultures of openness
wherein people, irrespective of level, were encour-
aged to share information freely. The remaining
three companies were instances of organizations
seeking, through restructuring and cultural change
mechanisms, to overcome problems of interfunc-
tional and interdepartmental communication.
These, and the companies which claimed to have
such cultures already in place, provided consistent
evidence of the central thesis of this paper Ð that
the open exchange of information is seen as one of
the essential operational attributes for competi-
tiveness in the contemporary global environment.
Mistakes will be made if we are going to be
innovative. We have to be tolerant of our fail-
ures. We are supportive of mistakes.
We would rather have people doing things
and making mistakes than not have them
doing things.
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 577
Although the overall tendency of both the
Taiwanese and Australian samples was to speak
up (in Scenario 2) and reveal a past mistake (in
Scenario 3), the reasons underlying the residual
tendency against doing so were also informative
and consistent with cultural premises. In the Tai-
wanese sample, face was the most frequently
cited reason for not speaking up and for not
revealing a past mistake (cited by 7 and 12 of the
17 and 20 respondents who gave reasons for not
speaking up and not revealing a mistake in Sce-
narios 2 and 3 respectively) (Tables 4 and 5, Panel
A). By contrast, there was no mention of this fac-
tor among the Australian responses. In Scenario 3,
the issue of face was identi®ed by Taiwanese
respondents in each of its contexts of concern with
the face of the individual him/herself, that of their
peers, and that of their superiors and collective
organizational units. The following quotes are
representative.
To protect his face, and his superior's face.
He must protect the face of executives of his
plant.
Domestic shame should not be made public.
Compared to the whole entity, the indivi-
dual's face is more important.
The impact of face and of power distance dif-
ferentials between the two societies was most visi-
ble when the superior was taken out of the
scenario. Recall that Scenarios 2 and 3 ®rst posited
a meeting context in which the focal manager's
superior was present and then asked respondents
to discuss the likely behaviour of the manager if
the superior were absent. The interview discussions
for Scenario 2 are most illuminating here. The
quantitative results for Scenario 2 showed that,
contrary to expectation, the presence of a superior
was seen to have a greater e?ect on reducing the
likelihood that a subordinate manager would
speak up and o?er a contrary or challenging opi-
nion in the Australian sample. It was expected
that the e?ect would have been greater in the
Taiwanese sample. The reason for the quantitative
results was, as shown in Table 1, that the Taiwa-
nese mean response for likelihood to speak up
remained virtually una?ected by the absence or
presence of the superior, while the Australian
mean response changed between the two condi-
tions.
While the quantitative data suggested the
absence of the cultural e?ects we had anticipated,
the interview data revealed that those cultural
in¯uences were indeed operating, but in ways we
had not anticipated. For the Taiwanese sample,
the relatively unchanged mean between the two
questions was not due to the individual responses
having remained the same. Rather, almost half the
respondents (24 of 52) had increased their score
(by an average of 1.6 points on the nine-point
scale), while another 18 respondents had decreased
their score (by an average of 2.2 points).
As shown in Table 4 (Panel B), the Taiwanese
interviews revealed that the reasons for the
increased likelihood of speaking up in the absence
of the superior were consistent with the cultural
literature on the importance of hierarchy (power
distance) and face. The reduction in felt pressure
from superiors, and its consequence for a greater
perceived freedom in speaking up, was raised
explicitly by 19 of the 24 respondents who had
increased their score on this question. The fact
that there would be a reduction in the concern for
loss of face was also raised by four of these
respondents. The 18 Taiwanese respondents who
had decreased their scores almost universally gave
the same reason. As shown in Table 4 (Panel B),
this was that, in the absence of the divisional
manager, the meeting had lost its decision-maker.
In that situation, the respondents stated that there
would be little point in speaking up; doing so
could not achieve anything purposeful or con-
clusive, and would instead only cause the meeting
to focus on blaming people. The following two
quotes are representative.
Because the person who has the real power is
not present, it is useless for him (the sub-
ordinate) to speak up. Besides the meeting is
ine?ective without the superior at the meeting
and he is afraid that he may o?end his col-
leagues so he would speak less.
578 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
The problem can't be solved without the
superior at the meeting. Speaking up is useless.
By contrast, the Australian responses to the
removal of the superior from the scenario split
virtually into halves, with 24 respondents indi-
cating that the focal manager would be more
likely to speak up, and 23 making the overt
statement that there would be no di?erence. Of
the former 24, none made mention of face as a
factor. Rather a typical theme was that, in the
divisional manager's absence, people in the focal
manager's position would be freer and more
likely to make speculative statements, to ``kite
¯y'' ideas, and to engage in ``brainstorming'';
activities and behaviours which are generally
argued to be important in sustaining a creative,
innovative organization.
The interview discussions associated with Sce-
nario 3 reinforced the factors emerging from Sce-
nario 2. Once again, although the responses to the
quantitative scaled questions did not show a sta-
tistically signi®cant di?erence between the sam-
ples, the interviews suggested that the presence or
absence of the superior was again of greater per-
ceived importance to the Taiwanese than the Aus-
tralian respondents. Of the 52 Taiwanese
respondents, 39 (75%) increased their assessment
of the likelihood that the typical person would
reveal his mistake without the superior at the
meeting. The main reasons given by these respon-
dents (shown in Table 5, Panel B) were, as for
Scenario 2, a reduction in concern for face (27
respondents or 52% of the Taiwanese sample) and
a reduction in felt pressure from the hierarchy (35
respondents or 67%). The corresponding number
increasing their assessments in the Australian
sample was 26 (52%). While eight of these cited
less pressure and less career concern with the
superior absent, the concern for face was, again,
not evident in the Australian responses, and the
frequency of citation of felt pressure from the
hierarchy was substantially less compared to the
Taiwanese sample (4 respondents or 10% com-
pared to 35 or 67%). Hence, the contrast between
the reasons given by the two national samples of
respondents again provides support for the cul-
tural dictates of greater (lower) emphasis on the
hierarchy in high (low) power distance societies,
and the more intense and pervasive emphasis on
hierarchy and face in Chinese-based culture.
5. Conclusion
The study identi®ed several systematic di?er-
ences in the factors underlying information shar-
ing behaviour in Taiwan and Australia; di?erences
which, in turn, are consistent with the cultural
characteristics of Chinese and Anglo-American
cultures. First, a consistent theme emerging from
the Taiwanese responses across all scenarios was a
sense of collective responsibility on the part of
organizational members to share information for
the good of the company, even if doing so was
potentially disadvantageous for the person con-
cerned. This motivation accords with an intrinsic
acceptance of a moral involvement with the com-
pany which is consistent with the precepts of a
collectivist culture. By contrast, the preparedness
to share information in the Australian context was
seen to depend on individual di?erences (such as
personality, style and skills), and to be related to
individual assertiveness and personal expression
and choice. These considerations are, again, con-
sistent with the behavioural precepts of an indivi-
dualist culture.
Second, although the results show that sharing
information which is potentially personally dama-
ging is constrained by the presence of a superior in
both Taiwan and Australia, the interview respon-
ses suggest that sensitivity to the hierarchy in Tai-
wan is greater than in Australia. The responses
generally attributed such sensitivity to concern
with face, and its intensi®cation in the presence of
a superior, and to the perception of the superior as
the greater authority, and the legitimate and obliged
decision-maker, relative to subordinates. Again,
these attributions and perceptions are consistent
with the high power distance dictates of Chinese-
based culture.
The study is acknowledged as exploratory;
nonetheless the results suggest some implications
for managers and others interested in informal
information processes in organizations in Chinese
and Anglo-American cultures. The study might
C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582 579
allow managers of organizations in those cultures
to understand when (and which) cultural char-
acteristics might facilitate information sharing, and
when such characteristics might impede informa-
tion sharing. Recognition of this latter circumstance
may prompt the development of mechanisms to
overcome such impediments. The current study
revealed instances of this, particularly in the Aus-
tralian sample. In this sample, recognition that the
calculative rather than moral basis of involvement
of the individual with the organization does not
provide an intrinsic acceptance of collective
responsibility appeared to underpin the relatively
frequent approach of seeking to build an organi-
zational culture conducive to cooperative, infor-
mation sharing behaviour.
It should be noted that the di?erences in factors
underlying information sharing behaviour in the
two societies, and their cultural determinants, were
revealed only in the qualitative data gained in the
interview discussions. By contrast, the aggregated
responses to the scaled questions washed these dif-
ferences out and typically concealed, and, in one
instance, potentially misrepresented the underlying
motivations and behaviours. The instance of
potential misrepresentation occurred in Scenario
2, where the mean response of the Taiwanese did
not di?er between the circumstances where the
superior was present and absent, resulting in the
regression analysis showing no e?ect of the super-
ior on the Taiwanese sample's behaviour. Further
analysis from the interviews, however, revealed
that there were, in fact, two e?ects, both impor-
tant and consistent with national cultural char-
acteristics but which were o?-setting in their e?ect
on the quantitative analysis based on mean
response comparisons. This circumstance high-
lights the importance of using qualitative, con-
textual data in studies which are exploratory and
unable to be guided de®nitively or directionally by
prior literature or theory.
As noted in the introduction, the study has a
number of limitations, particularly scope limita-
tions. It studies only one instance of informal
information exchange (face-to-face meetings) and
one type of information (information which has a
potentially damaging e?ect on the subject person).
Additionally, although motivated by the impor-
tance of integrative liaison processes in con-
temporary business organizations, the study
concentrates on just one input to such processes
(cultural considerations in cross-national compar-
isons). The study does not address other inputs or
di?ering organizational circumstances which may
a?ect the need for, or e?ectiveness of, such pro-
cesses. Finally, although the scenarios were gen-
erally seen by respondent managers as realistic
and representative, and the qualitative data arising
from interview discussion of those scenarios
revealed much about perceived information shar-
ing behaviour, it must be acknowledged that the
scenarios are arti®cial manipulations which sim-
plify complex situations and may also therefore
simplify perceived behaviours.
Similarly, the study relies on the value dimen-
sional conception of culture which Harrison and
McKinnon 1999), in their review of cross-cultural
research in management control systems design,
argue is a restricted focus on culture and one which
is ``limited in its ability to examine and understand
the dynamic processes of MCS (management con-
trol systems) and their cultural interplays'' (Harri-
son & McKinnon, 1999). Thus, although the study
implements Harrison and McKinnon's suggestions
for enhancing the methodological basis for cultural
research using the values lens (particularly in the
use of ®eld and interview-based data collection
methods), the functionalist lens of values remains
limited in its ability to reveal the complexities and
dynamics of behaviour in cultural contexts that
might be revealed by other lenses, particularly those
emerging from the anthropology, sociology and
history literatures. Further research overcoming
these limitations, studying other types and venues
of informal information sharing, examining beha-
viours rather than perceptions of behaviours, and
drawing on conceptions of culture other than those
in the value dimensional mode, will be valuable.
Such research will be valuable because, as
organizational participants or researchers con-
cerned with information and information ¯ows,
accountants need to understand organizations'
informal information processes as well their for-
mal ones. To the extent that behavioural and cul-
tural factors are likely to in¯uence informal
information processes more than formal ones, we
580 C.W. Chow et al. / Accounting, Organizations and Society 24 (1999) 561±582
hope that our study may help inform, albeit in a
modest way, future cross-national research in this
area.
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to acknowledge the helpful
comments of Anthony Hopwood, two anonymous
reviewers, and participants at the Ninth Asian-
Paci®c Conference on International Accounting
Issues, Bangkok, November 1997, the 1997
Annual Conference of the American Accounting
Association, and the Fourth International Meet-
ing of the Decision Sciences Institute, Sydney, July
1997. The authors are indebted to the C.F. Koo
Cultural and Educational Foundation for its
®nancial support, and to the managers of the
sample ®rms for their participation and assistance.
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