Mba Dissertation Proposal Proforma
In spite of incredible riches coming from natural resources particularly oil, Saudi Arabia is still seen as a country not developed basing on its GDP. The Kingdom was admitted into World Trade Organization membership in 2005, and as a result the long time sheltered market is currently undergoing global competition from foreign companies. Cultural aspects as well as religious practices have resulted in the country depending on overseas workforce, particularly pertaining crucial, expert technological and specialized positions.
Many Saudis desire to become managers, but a few want to be computer programmers to create programs or be learn other professional work. A survey done on organizational culture of some of companies in Saudi have indicated that, Saudis cultural practices have reduced performance and productivity of these companies. As Vecchio (2005) suggest, Organization culture has a direct impact towards the performance of the organization. Culture of the organization is related to the process of the organization, client outcomes, service quality and employee’s attitudes behaviors and perceptions.
Literature review There exist few studies about Saudi Arabia’s Experience with Organizational Culture. Management together with leadership is influenced mainly through family customs passed over during past years. Few management books have just gotten attention of Saudi Arabia companies in the 90s. Nearly all Arabic management books and other works are founded on the exploits of past leaders respected by the Arab countries Walker, et al (2003) observes that management practices found in Islamic countries is impacted by tribal customs whereby a manger is supposed to behave like a father figure.
Yavas (1997) points out that in such a management style where by the manager is expected to make all decisions, hampers the change process and performance of these organizations. At the same time according to studies done by Alanazi and Rodrigues, (2003) they reveals that the Saudis like being directed and informed on what to do, more so, they prefer government involvement in the organization practices (Bhuian et al, 2001) Research question The question designed for this research is: (1) What are the Saudi Arabia’s employees Experience with Organizational Culture?
The question seeks to find out how Saudi’s culture affects employees’ performance. Aim: This research is aimed at finding out how Saudi Arabia culture affects the attitudes and behaviors of Saudi employees in their work performance. More so, how companies deal with these attitudes and what companies should know about the attitudes and behaviors and ought to do. 1. To examine the impact of Saudis’ cultural practices on organizational performance of organizations operating in Saudi Arabia 2. To examine the attitudes of the Saudis employees pertaining employment pathways i. e.
managerial and technical pathways Research methodology This research is a descriptive which entails carrying out interviews to give a picture of different varying factors correlated to this research subject. A research that is descriptive is very appropriate in providing answers to important issues concerning views and concerns. This research design employs communication method. This implies gathering primary information from a sample connected to the research-linked populace. The data collected will then be analyzed using a database application program. a) Target population
This research uses five top companies in Saudi Arabia which are some are private and others public as a sample of other Saudi Arabia organizations. The companies selected are: 1. Saudi Aramco (SA) 2. Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) 3. Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) 4. Procter & Gamble (P&G 5. Saudi Telecom Company (STC) (Saudi Companies, 2006) Data gathering instrument Data was mainly collected through questionnaires which were structured to offer answers to selected five main questions. In deciding what type of scale to apply to measure the answers, the research put into consideration the main questions’ nature.
The Likert-type scale was chosen for this survey to measure the scale of variation in the attitudes as well as views of the respondents used. Another reason for selecting Likert-type scale is because it is simple to be understood by the participants since it is uni-dimensional scale. The chosen Likert scale was a five point choice from I strongly Agree point to I strongly Disagree. The questionnaire was purposely formulated to be easy, precise, and simple in order to comprehend. The survey objects are indicated in Appendix. 1 The software for analyzing the results
Suitably, the survey used in this research was carried out through a device that was self-directed computer-conveyed using the Internet for indiscriminately picking managers as well as professional personnel from the five companies selected earlier. The targeted population were identified to depend a lot and constantly on the Internet as well as on e-mail in transacting business. In addition, online survey had an advantage of providing comprehensive information and it is fast hence accelerating the research process and lowering research costs via the self-administered research questionnaires.
Feasibility The study is feasible since all requirements and material needed to complete the study are available, the sample participants are willing to take care, questionnaires are available and data analyzing apparatus are set. And the researcher ready to go on Results The questions of the survey were formulated to provide consequential replies to research questions. The results table is found at the appendix 1. The survey established that, the five companies acknowledged the models of technical as well as managerial career rankings.
Also the many of the participants, confirmed the presence of Saudis who had taken the technical ladder. However, when it came to the liking of the Saudis for technical or managerial ranks, over 50% of the participants affirmed that the Saudis favored the administrative or managerial hierarchy. Merely 15% affirmed the contra. This finding is in consistence with the literature review that has showed Saudis employees are inspired with status. Question two aimed at finding out how effective human resource management practices of these companies are in attracting highly qualified employees and flushing out those who do not perform.
Though, the entire participant agreed that there was need of having freedom on hiring and also firing the Saudi employees not performing, 80% of them revealed that they have not fired Saudis on the basis of their performance. Most of these participants (80%) acknowledged that making improvement is employability was the best way to improve organizational performance. Over, 60% of respondents, SA, 69STC 40, SABIC 65 and P&G 69 revealed that their own companies employed KPIs in improving performance. In all these companies, the managers monitored and employed KPIs frequently.
Many participants’ uses KPIs, a few do not. Nonetheless, about 32% disagreed that their employees put in use KPIs regularly; this may point to employees’ reliance on the management style of father-figure association which make it hard for the management to persuade workers in using the KPIs. (Hughes and Curphy, 2000) Question four of the research was aimed at establishing if top Saudi corporations use the conceptions of community of practice, to effect organizational performance improvements and influence changes of attitude amongst the Saudi workers to prefer technical positions.
The five respondents all were aware of CoP conceptions. 66% of SA respondents revealed being familiar with CoP and knowing its role. But for SABIC only 18% respondents were aware of CoP Generally all respondents 73% from all the five sample companies concur that workers do support reward for performance incentive method. These findings indicate that employees have a competitive character. More so 67% of the participants revealed that the method produced good results regarding organizational culture, though 10% did disagree. Discussion: how the current research fits with existing studies
In general many of the respondents (80%) agreed that their companies ought to have freedom of hiring and also firing Saudis on performance, though only 15% of them had indeed fired Saudi employees on the basis of their performance. In addition, the survey revealed an obvious regarding different level of using of KPIs in selected top five companies. Such an observation is in agreement with the Bell (2005); Al-Turki and Andijani (1997) who highlighted that companies in Saudi Arabia have a big concern over organizational performance enhancement and improvement of quality. Using KPIs has brought some amount of success in these organizational.
Commonly, it is clear from the observation that only few of the respondents were family with Cops, even though 42% of the participants were aware of Cops, 38% were not aware. The research also found out that due to the fact that employees view their mangers in as a father-like figure, the mangers fail to give accurate performance appraisals and fail to fire non performing employees. This findings agrees with Beer et al. (1985) who observed that managers in many organizations in Saudi (both in the private sector and the public sector) do not provide sincere and honest performance appraisals since might harm the self-esteem of workforce.
Gopalakrishnan, (2002) Bhuian, et al (2001) also add that, providing sincere feedbacks in Saudi Arabia on employees’ performance may be seen as being unfriendly. Within the Arabic cultural aspect, it is usual to provide a response via a go-between to evade disagreement as well as giving the incorrect message (Beer, et al, 1985; Curry and Kadash, 2002). The issue is worsened when managers compare performance of Saudi employees with foreigners, a comparison that usually is seen as supporting the foreigners at the expense of the locals.
Thus, as the present This research has established that when it came to the liking of the Saudis for technical or managerial ranks, over 50% of the participants affirmed that the Saudis favored the administrative or managerial hierarchy. Merely 15% affirmed the contra. This finding is establishes that has Saudis employees are inspired with status and they are motivated by working in administrative or managerial positions that working in technical position where they view the position as a low status.
Lastly, corporate managers and business executives in Saudi Arabia have continued to face a big challenge in their attempts to advance the performances of the organization they ran. As Al-Turki and Andijani (1997) notes the biggest challenges are cultural aspects as well as employment practices which restrict workforce performance standards contrast with those found in western countries multinational companies. Maintaining and also increasing a broad number of Saudi expert and specialist workforces is a big challenge since Saudi employees are motivated a lot by their status as well as their rank in the society.
The importance of this research to the researcher The currently research is for my masters’ degree. I am conducting a research in the subject area of how Saudis’ cultural Practices on impact organizational performance. This research is part of my course requirement and is very important for my success in this course. The research also offers companies interested in setting their plants or braches in Saudi Arabia important information on how culture impacts employees’ performance. Conclusion From the findings it is clear that Saudi companies still have a big challenge in changing Saudi employees to be their competitive advantage.
In the words of Robbins (2000) the big task is cultural since Saudis keep on preferring managerial jobs which leas to scarcity of technical workers. This study has endeavored to discover and learn these cultural blockades to achieve better performance in the organizations. As Yamani (2000) assets, companies which want to establish their presence in the country, they should prepare themselves to deal with cultural aspects which play a major role in employees’ performance. Reference: Alanazi, Fand Rodrigues, A (2003): Power bases and attribution in three cultures; The Journal of Social Psychology: – 141(3), 370-391.
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et al (2001): Business education and its influence on attitudes to business; consumerism, and government Saudi Arabia: Journal of Education for Business; 76(4), 220-230. Curry, A and Kadash, N (2002): Focusing on key elements of TQM Evaluation for sustainability: The TQM Magazine; 12 (4), 207-214. Retrieved May, 6 2008, from; Emerald Database. Galapon, A and Khawaja, T (2002): A systemic approach: – A Saudi Arabian experience; 56th ASQ Annual Quality Congress Proceedings; 511-524. Gopalakrishnan, R (2002): Leading diverse teams. Business World; Retrieved May 6, 2008; from: http://www.
tata. com/tata_sons/media/20020408. htm Hughes, G, and Curphy (2000): Enhancing the lessons of experience: – 4th Edition McGraw-Hill companies, Inc. New York Jannadi, O, et al (2000): Service quality gaps analysis at SCECO-East, Saudi Arabia. Journal of Energy Engineering, 126(3); Retrieved May 6, 2008, from Academic Search Premier Database Robbins, P, S (2000): Organizational behavior: 10th Edition Pearson Education Inc. , Upper Saddle River, New jersey 07458 USA Saudi Companies. (2006). Retrieved may 6, 2008; from: http://www. mopm. gov. sa/html/en/saudico_e. html
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