National culture and new product development management practices and workgroup dynamics: A Cross-cultural study between Singapore and New Zealand

Abstract

This dissertation addresses the relationship between national culture and new product development (NPD) workgroup dynamics in a matched sample of successful manufacturing firms in New Zealand and Singapore. The underlying research question addressed if differences in new product development (NPD) practices within two distinct national environments, Singapore and New Zealand, can be attributed to national cultural differences. NPD is an important tool to assist the firm to maintain its position in the international environment, with management and practitioners alike searching for new tools to aid them in the development process. Many of these tools have been applied outside of the national context from which they have been derived, with a consequence that they may not be ideal for their intended destination. There have been few studies that have examined directly the role of national values on the usefulness of different NPD management tools for workgroups. Dividing the workgroup tools into three major areas, stage setting tools, enabling elements, and behaviour elements this thesis looks at many of the suggested tools that would improve NPD workgroup effectiveness. An incidental objective was to determine if Hofstede's dimensions have converged or diverged since they were originally derived. A two stage research design was used in this dissertation to investigate the stated issues. Stage one was a quantitative recalculation of the Hofstede dimensions to determine if there were any levels of convergence or divergence. Qualitative case study analysis was undertaken in stage two investigating the workgroup dynamics in the two samples. Results indicate that there was some evidence of convergence, particularly on the dimensions of uncertainty avoidance and masculinity/femininity with the Singapore showing higher levels of uncertainty avoidance and masculinity. The second stage results also showed some differences between the samples in terms of the tools that should be used contingent on their national cultural tendencies. Results indicate that Singapore has a greater use of centralisation and formalisation tools which is consistent with their higher power distance and uncertainty avoidance. Other results showed a tendency of the New Zealand sample to work in team structures and higher empowerment which is consistent with their national cultural tendency.