Long Term Orientation in Saudi Arabia

Posted by Winnie Melda on October 5th, 2018

Long Term Orientation in Saudi Arabia

The longer term orientation attribute is in the fifth dimension of Hofstede and was an addition to the original four dimensions in an attempt to distinguish between the thinking of the east and the west. The research was implemented to assess the situation in 93 countries and the conclusion was that China has the highest while Sierra Leon had the lowest scores ion the oriented cultures. The conclusions made sense in that china’s higher score is as a result of their strong regard for tradition, all the way down to the countries that had divergent views as Sierra Leon (Raddawi, 2014).  More precisely, the research indicated that these countries possess some attributes that can be seen in the chart below. It was evident that the countries with a high regard for long-term orientation normally has a high value for persistence instead of the immediate results. The attribute play a huge role in the business decisions whereby the long-term orientated nations have the desire to develop long term commitment whereas the short-term oriented nations desire to make decisions faster to ensure they attain immediate results. The attribute is evident in those cultures whereby spending money is more common that the saving cultures (Kayed& Hassan, 2013). Also, the countries that practice superior long-term orientation most commonly make rash decisions on the issues of investing in areas as the stock market, luxuries, real estate among others.

The dimension presents a description of the manner in which every society maintains some links with their past and at the same time dealing with the challenge that results from the present as well as the future. Additionally, societies have a tendency of prioritizing the two existential goals in different methods. The normative societies that have a low score the dimension prefer to maintain time-honored traditions as well as norms and at the same time view societal change with elements of suspicion. The countries with a culture that has a high score of on the other hand possess a more pragmatic approach in that they encourage the thrift as well as efforts in the modern education as a strategy of being prepared for the future. The normative attribute of the Saudi Arabian society can be seen via the country’s high score of 68 on the orientation (Raddawi, 2014). The people in this society thus possess strong concern with the establishment of the absolute truth as they are normative in their thinking. The Saudi Arabian society exhibits a huge respect for traditions, which creates a relatively small propensity for saving for the futures and thus their focus is on the attainment of the quick results. Thus, the high long-term orientation score that Saudia Arabia enjoys is mainly due to their high emphasis on social order that is evident in their respect for elders along with the emphasis they have on the long range goals in opposition to the short team results (Kayed& Hassan, 2013). The attribute is meant to indicate that support that the Saudi Arabian society has a strong work ethic whereby the long term rewards are expected as a result of the hard work performed today.

References

Kayed, R., & Hassan. K (2013). Islamic Entrepreneurship. Routledge.

Raddawi, R., (2014). Intercultural Communication with Arabs: Studies in Educational, Professional. Springer.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at Melda Research in customized research paper if you need a similar paper you can place your order for medicine essay writing.