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Journal of
Managerial
Psychology
16,6
404
Received June 1999
Revised December 2000
Accepted April 2001
Journal of Managerial Psychology,
Vol. 16 No. 6, 2001, pp. 404-423.
# MCB University Press, 0268-3946
http://www.emerald-library.com/ft
Cultural dimensions of
decision making: Denmark and
France compared
Jette Schramm-Nielsen
Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark
Keywords Decision making, National cultures, Denmark, France, Differentiation,
Rationalization
Abstract In spite of decades of focus on decision making and decades of research on cross-
cultural management, few authors have devoted attention to the combination of decision making
and specific cultural settings. The focus of this paper is the decision-making processes in French
and Danish companies. Results from empirical data indicate that there are clear differences in the
ways decisions are arrived at in terms of how managers emphasize different phases of the
decision-making process. The analysis also shows what happens when different stages become the
responsibility of people in different roles within the organisation. In the analysis, the importance
of decision rationality is discussed, and the different cultural styles are linked to the classical
theories in decision making such as economic man, administrative man, and muddling through.
Since these are found inadequate to characterize French and Danish actual behaviour, new
models are suggested under the labels of emotional man and action man.
Introduction
Since the Second World War much literature has been devoted to the process of
decision making, for instance Simon (1947), March and Simon (1958), Lindblom
(1959), Cyert and March (1963), Mintzberg et al. (1976), Brunsson (1985), to
mention a few classical examples, and the topic is a must in textbooks on
management, for instance Mullins (1985), Hatch (1997). For a review on
strategic decision-making literature, see for instance Eisenhardt and Zbaracki
(1992).
Of more recent date is the interest in comparative management originating
in the path-breaking research of Haire et al. (1966), followed by Pugh and
Hickson, the Aston studies, (1976), Hofstede (1984), Adler (1986), Lane (1989),
Peterson (1993), and Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1993) to highlight
just a few of the more outstanding researchers. Most of these studies are
quantitative studies, the most recent comprehensive questionnaire study being
the GLOBE study, data collected in 1995, from which results begin to be
published: Den Hartog et al. (1999) and Brodbeck et al. (2000).
Qualitative research in comparative management has gained momentum in
recent years, much more so in Europe than in the USA. Examples are Brunstein
(1995), Joynt and Warner (1996), Usunier (1998), Schramm-Nielsen and
Lawrence (1998), Lawrence and Edwards (2000).
An earlier version of this article has been printed in Revue FrancËaise de Gestion, No. 128, March-
April-May 2000, under the title ``Dimensions culturelles des prises de deÂcision. Une comparaison
France-Danemark’’.
 Comparative management is necessarily concerned with the concept of Cultural
culture, and some authors have elaborated theories and models that may serve dimensions of
as guidelines for studies in comparative management research or decision making
organisational culture. Examples would include Hofstede (1984), Schein (1985),
Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1993), Sackmann (1997), Kuada and
Gullestrup (1997), all of whom are Europeans, or of European descent.
However, there has not been much focus on decision making in a 405
comparative management perspective, especially not based in qualitative
research, questionnaire surveys being the dominant method (see Ronen, 1986).
This is not meant to indicate that quantitative research is not valuable and
important, but we would like to suggest that qualitative methods do offer
deeper insight and are more likely to yield psychological explanations that help
to understand the problems at hand. An exception of qualitative and
comparative research in decision making is Sethi et al. (1984) on the differences
between Japan and the USA, and one notable recent exception is d’Iribarne et al.
(1998). This example is the more interesting as he reports on a case of
interaction between French and Swedish managers and employees working on
a joint project. The Danish and Swedish cultures being comparatively close, the
d’Iribarne case will be referred to to support the results of the study to be
discussed in the following. Other studies on decision making including a
Scandinavian country are rare (Kreiner, 1976; Sùndergaard, 1990), and this text
is therefore a contribution meant to fill some of the gap.
At the same time there is a lack of concern with the cultural aspects of
decision making in the classical theories, which present decision making as a
universalist phenomenon, meaning that the principles of decision making
processes and practices are universal, and that managers act much the same
way in comparable situations in highly industrialized countries. We find this
universalist attitude not only in theories of decision making, but also in
connection with most other organisational issues (see Boyacigillar and Adler,
1991).
The aim of this article is to evaluate and explain cultural differences in
actual practice in the two cultural settings of Denmark and France. The two
conceptual frameworks used are the decision-making process and decision-
making models. Results indicate that there are clear differences in the ways
decisions are arrived at in terms of how managers emphasise different phases
of the decision-making process. The analysis also shows what happens when
different stages of the process become the responsibility of people in different
roles within the organisation. The paper will lead on to a discussion on decision
rationality linked to the classical theories in decision making such as economic
man, administrative man, and muddling through. It will then move to the
different cultural styles of Frenchmen and Danes, and since the classical
theories just mentioned are found inadequate when characterizing French and
Danish actual behaviour, new models will be suggested under the labels of
emotional man and action man.
Journal of Comparisons of decision-making practices are interesting because managers
Managerial as well as employees will increasingly be involved in cooperation across
Psychology borders, in multi-cultural teams, in mergers and acquisitions, in international
and multinational corporations as well as in international organisations like the
16,6 European Union (EU), World Trade Organisation (WTO), United Nations (UN),
Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), international aid and the like. We
406 are also likely to experience increased mobility of managers within Europe and
internationally. Knowledge and understanding of differences as those here put
forward will be crucial to a more smooth cooperation between actors from
different cultures.

Methodology
The empirical data explored in this article were collected in 1988/89. They are
based on qualitative, in-depth, semi-structured interviews in rather traditional
production enterprises covering the following branches: electrical and
electronic equipment, food, chemical industry, machinery, glass, furniture and
transportation equipment. In terms of size, the Danish companies were small,
medium- and large-sized (1-99, 100-499, 500< employees), and the French
samples were medium- to large-sized companies. The French sample includes
some of the largest companies in France, world leaders within their area of
business.
The objective was to examine the respective perceptions of Danish and
French managers employed in foreign subsidiaries and working together, in
order to evaluate and explain cultural differences, if any, in leadership style, in
working methodology, in decision-making style and in social interaction.
The formal criteria for the selection of companies were Danish companies
operating in France with a Dane as top manager and vice versa for French
companies in Denmark. The respondents were French and Danish managers
and their two immediate subordinates, themselves managers or employees
according to the size of the company, a total of 31 people in 12 companies, seven
in France and five in Denmark. The top managers were foreign to the host
country, and their subordinates were then indigenous to that country. We
would like to emphasize this research design, since it has the advantage of the
respondents’ double competence as informants, being representatives of their
own culture and working on a daily basis with representatives of the other
culture.
It is also important to note that although the amount of host-country work
experience varied, a substantial number of the respondents had prolonged
contact with the culture in question (2-35 years). This means that most of the
respondents had an extraordinary background for comparing the two cultures,
giving them a solid basis for reflection, so that their statements pointed far
beyond any superficial stereotyping.
To researchers working with quantitative research methods, the number of
respondents may seem small. However, it is recognized to be a fair and
acceptable number in qualitative research and about the limit of the capacity of
a one-person research project. On the other hand, and for the same reason, the Cultural
study may well be considered an explorative study to be followed up by more dimensions of
research in the area, and the present writer would welcome such follow-up decision making
studies. Thus, the present text is in no way intended to be a full treatment of the
complex problem of decision making in a cross-cultural and comparative
perspective.
All interviews, which lasted between one and two hours each, were tape- 407
recorded, typed in extenso (about 700 pages) and content analysed by themes,
the theme of decision making being one of them.
A phenomenological and hermeneutic approach has been adopted for the
description and the interpretation of the data. Analytically speaking, the
themes and the elements studied have been linked into a conceptual coherence,
which makes them more than the sum of their parts.
Apart from the study mentioned above, the article will draw on evidence and
contributions from a number of other sources in Danish, French, and English,
to discuss the empirical findings.
Before presenting our findings, some of the key concepts that will be referred
to in the discussion below need to be defined.

Concepts defined
The concepts that need to be defined are:
Rationality. Justification on grounds that are satisfactory to reason. For
something to be rational it has to be within the scope of conscious,
deliberate action or reflection (Elster, 1989, p. 7). Synonyms are:
reasonable, sensible, sense-making, coherent, logical, Cartesian, and
deductive, and antonyms are: empirical, inductive, irrational, passionate.
Accidental decisions. Accidental decisions are characterized by being not
fully intentional, but marked by intuition and possibly later defended by
logical reasoning.
Emotional man. A person who is impulsive and emotional in decision
making, creatively irrational as opposed to consciously rational.
Action man. A decision maker marked by pragmatic rationality based
on experience and on induction from empirical findings.

The decision-making process and rationality

Textbooks on decision-making processes traditionally propose a model which
takes the decision maker step-by-step through a series of stages from the
moment a problem has been perceived until action has been taken to solve it.
Figure 1 includes the phases proposed in the decision-making literature by a
number of authors (Mintzberg et al., 1976; Bakka and Fivelsdal, 1988, p. 197;
Jennings and Wattam, 1994, p. 10).
There is supposed to be a certain linearity in the process, but it also typically
loops back to earlier stages. Several authors have paid attention to different
phases of the process. We will be concerned with stages 4 to 9, from ``Search for
Journal of
Managerial
Psychology
16,6

408

Figure 1.
The decision-making
process

alternatives’’ to ``Control’’, which are the phases where our study indicates
cultural differences.
Traditionally, decision making has been closely associated with the notion
of rationality, this concept generally being considered positive for managerial
action.
Especially in France, decision makers are keen to emphasize the rational
aspect of their thinking and actions, rationality being an ideal, often referred
to with its French synonym ``Cartesianism’’ derived from the name Descartes,
French philosopher of the early Enlightenment Era (1596-1650). Indeed it has
become customary to consider Descartes as the very model of intellectual
rigour and the founder of modern rationalism (Revel, 1995, p. 7). The
Cartesian method consists of a few simple rules, the first of which is to find a
starting point which is so evident that it is beyond doubt. The second rule is
to go from the simplest elements to the more complex in a deductive and
strictly controlled way without leaps. Finally, one should have a
comprehensive overview of the problem, so as to make sure that all
possibilities have been considered. Descartes’ ideal in science was the
mathematical way of reasoning, and he rejected intuition and emotion as
possible means of gaining insight.
 Examples of reference to Cartesianism and deduction abound in French Cultural
texts in magazine and newspaper articles. More specifically examples here dimensions of
might include Desjeux (1996, p. 45), French anthropologist, who states that decision making
French philosophers prefer deduction to induction, likely a legacy from
Descartes. Another example is d’Iribarne et al. (1998, pp. 89-115), who reports
on a case where French participants in a joint project again and again stress
rational reasoning to explain the French point of view. 409
Rationality and decision-making models
The most comprehensive form of rational decision making has been called
``economic man’’, defined by March and Simon (1958, p. 158) as ``the rational
man of economics and statistical decision theory’’. According to this model, the
decision maker will decide on the basis of clear goals and the known
consequences of all possible alternatives. Linking this to the nine-stage
decision-making process, it means that this model would stress the stages 4:
Search for alternatives, 5: Evaluation of alternatives, and 6: Choice of
alternative.
As early as 1958, March and Simon criticized the economic man model for
not agreeing well ``with common-sense notions of rationality’’, and for making
the above ``exceedingly important demands upon the choice-making
mechanism’’ (1958, p. 158). Instead, they put forth another theory of rational
choice which was labelled ``administrative man’’ (Simon, 1947). According to
this theory the decision-maker will have ``a limited, approximate, simplified
`model’ of the real situation’’, the elements of which will be ``the outcome of
psychological and sociological processes’’. The decision maker, they claim, will
look for a limited number of alternatives and have a more or less
comprehensive knowledge of their consequences. In practice, the decision-
maker will most often choose from satisfactory alternatives (by Simon termed
``satisficing’’) something that is good enough in relation to goals and not try to
find the optimal alternative. Linking this model to the decision-making process
it means that administrative man would be concerned with the same three
stages as economic man, but to a less stringent and comprehensive degree and
arrive at stage 6: Choice of alternative without optimising.
This model too came under attack for lack of realism, from among others
Lindblom (1959) who suggested ``the science of muddling through’’ or
``disjointed incrementalism’’. His model may be summarized as follows:
(1) The understanding of the problem at hand is limited to an approach
similar to the prevailing one.
(2) Instead of adapting solutions to goals, goals are chosen which suit the
means at disposal.
(3) Few alternatives are considered.
(4) Goals and means are chosen simultaneously.
(5) New goals are constantly discovered, and former goals reconsidered.
Journal of (6) The problem is seldom finally solved, but constantly reconsidered.
Managerial (7) Decisions are more a flight from various evils than a movement towards
Psychology a goal.
16,6 (8) Few dimensions of consequences are considered.
As will be seen this model has moved even farther away from the Cartesian
410 ideal, i.e. the deductive and strictly controlled way without leaps.
According to his model the decision maker would emphasize stage 6: Choice
of alternative simultaneously with stage 5: Evaluation of alternatives, looking
for only few alternatives, stage 4, and going back and forth over the stages 4, 5,
and 6.
The Danish researcher Enderud (1976, p. 128) described some decision-
making situations which are characterized by unintentional and automatic
decisions in which rationalization is subsequent to the ``decision’’, and where
the decision makers will try to justify by logical reasoning a decision arrived at
more or less accidentally. This model cannot be said to be rational in the
Cartesian sense of the word, but Enderud argues that such decisions often go
hand in hand with intuition and that intuition is not pure imagination, but more
often than not the result of some prior knowledge and experience. (For more
discussion of these concepts see for instance Agor (1986), David (1991) and
Pettinger (1996). This model can thus be said to be one step further away from
the muddling through model.
The Enderud (1976) model we will call accidental decisions characterized by
being not fully intentional, but marked by intuition and creativity and possibly
later defended by logical reasoning. At least one other study (Frederickson,
1985) showed that executives combined rational analysis and intuition (from
Eisenhardt and Zbaracki (1992)), and in the opinion of this writer, intuition may
be a swift and effective solution to a complex problem.
According to this model, focus would be on stage 6: Choice of alternative,
and the process would be either backwards, or it would jump back to stage 1:
Problem perception or 2: Problem identification and start the analysis only
after having made the decision.
If we place the above decision-making models on a continuum according to
their degree of rationality-irrationality with their characteristics we get Figure 2.

The cultural styles of Frenchmen and Danes

The study here reported on, specifically inquired into the question of rationality
and found that Frenchmen and Danes analysed problems and tasks differently.
A Danish top manager in France offers this description:
They [Danes and Frenchmen] do not analyse and synthetise the same way. The French tend
to think that Danes are not thorough enough, and the Danes tend to think that the French are
too complicated. At his desk, the Frenchman tends to keep on working on a case. He seems
not to agree neither with his surroundings nor with himself. This means that when he has
analysed a case and has come to a conclusion, then he would like to go over it once more. I
think that Frenchmen think in a more synthetic way . . . and he has a tendency to say: ``well,
 yes, but what if it can still be done in another maybe smarter way’’. This means that in fact he Cultural
is wasting time instead of making improvements.
dimensions of
Another Danish top manager in France has this observation: decision making
I think the French people here are very rational in their way of thinking and reacting. Only
their rationality may be different from in Denmark . . . It is a question of education, traditions
and culture.
411
A third Danish top manager says:
Yes, I think Frenchmen are rational. They probably consider more aspects (than the Danes)
when they are about to decide something.

A fourth Danish manager:

Danes and Frenchmen certainly analyse problems differently. If we really have problems,
then I prefer by far to analyse them with Danish technicians, because we[1] are very quick to
get into the high pitch, imagine the great catastrophe, getting heated and all that. It is always
exaggerated, where Danes can bring it down to a sensible level . . . Things quickly get very
emotional here . . .

A French respondent has this observation:

The French are rational, yes, but this statement has to be graded. They are rational in their
reasoning, but much more subjective in their actions and their reactions.

A Danish respondent:
They tend to be very impulsive, it is here and now . . . and then we (= they) reflect later on.

It also seems to be a question of abstract reasoning as opposed to a more

concrete, pragmatic way, as can be eloquently illustrated by the following
quotation by a Danish manager:
Yes, they work in a somewhat abstract way. I think that is quite a good way of putting it. I
mean 2 + 2 makes 4, but I have the impression that Frenchmen are not always sure of that. It
may be 4, but it might also be 4.2. Simply saying that it makes 4 seems not to be enough. It
has to do with being concrete or not. Look, you must be able to tell whether this is possible or
not. I think that is our greatest problem with the French. Germans are much more concrete.
That thing there is round, isn’t it, we can agree on that. That other thing there is white, that
one is black. The French will say, yes maybe.

Figure 2.
The continuum of
rationality-irrationality
and the decision-making
models
Journal of These statements and others not quoted, all indicate that the French colleagues
Managerial do analyse problems in a systematic way, looking for as many alternatives as
Psychology possible and trying to evaluate them before coming to a conclusion and then go
back to see whether there might be more possibilities to be considered, other
16,6 ways of doing things.
We may therefore say that the French have a predilection for logical analysis
412 in accordance with the Cartesian ideal, which means that they will aim at using
the deductive model represented by ``economic man’’.
At the same time the respondents ± French as well as Danes ± also pointed to
the fact that what seemed to be analytical rationalism was often coupled with
emotion and impulse, the very opposite of cool, reasoned rationality. In order to
try to comply with the rational ideal, the French sometimes carried out the
exercise subsequently in order to defend the solution arrived at.
Thus we would suggest that the French seem to be analytically rational and
creatively irrational at the same time, and, as such, able to swing between two
extremes.
This figure is not represented in any of the existing classical models of
decision making, and we would therefore suggest another concept, that of
``emotional man’’ to designate persons or reactions at the opposite extreme from
pure rationality. Whether or not emotional decisions should be called irrational
is well worth discussing. We might need to find a better word, but the word
``irrationality’’ is the antonym of ``rationality’’, still in the Cartesian sense, and
we will therefore stay with that for the moment.
Being emotional in decision making is not meant in any pejorative way;
in some cases we may even find that emotions may provide quite a good
basis for decisions (Brunsson, 1985), and Brunsson even argues that
rational decision-making procedures are irrational in an action perspective
(1985, p. 27). The point here is that, in the Cartesian sense of the word,
rationality, emotions and impulse should be separated from the methodic
and logically coherent analysis. The French do not, therefore, seem to
comply entirely with the Cartesian ideal, and we may therefore be allowed
to call it a myth, or at least an espoused model, and not necessarily a model
in action.
If we now turn to the Danish decision-making style as revealed by our data,
we have seen already that the respondents stress that they analyse and work
differently from the French.
The following quotations may be illustrative.
A French respondent:
Danes are more pragmatic . . . The rationality of the Danes tends to be modulated by their
actions and their knowledge of the practical side of things.

A Danish top manager:

When a Dane makes a report, it is less emotional, more down to earth; on the other hand . . .,
the Danes are less engaged. The French are more creative, but less able to stick to the subject
and get the report done . . . and get things done.
A French respondent: Cultural
Our Danish colleagues clearly work methodically and not in confusion as is often the case in dimensions of
France. decision making
A Danish top manager:
The main difference is at the level of ideas. If for instance we are to market a new product, the
Danes will say after a short meeting: ``It must be done in such and such a way. We have made 413
a market analysis, the product has been examined, it is ok, and it can be sold for such and
such a price. Let us get started.’’ All that is very professional. Then the French will tend to
respond: ``Yes, well that may be, but have you considered this other way of doing it . . . If we
did it that way, would it not be even better?’’ The Danes get terribly irritated thinking that it is
a waste of time. The French would like to go over it once more . . . The French would like to
have eight more meetings about it, and the Danes get frustrated. The French prefer to wait
three more months to be sure that we have considered everything and in order not to make
mistakes. Which/who of them is rational and which/who is not, I cannot say.

Thus the Danes tend to conclude on the basis of a short meeting bringing into
the discussion concrete data and past experience and arguing for a specific
action to be taken.
Another Danish top manager in France:
You see, we[2] are good at the level of ideas, and I think that the Danish touch means that the
company as such is fairly good at carrying out ideas . . . When we look at French companies
in general . . . they are not smart, when it comes to implementing things. We have difficulties
organising things.

To those already cited above, these quotations add a picture of pragmatic

Danes wanting to get down to action, to start operation, they are better than the
French at organising, better at implementation, better at the practical side of
the process, and are shown to use less time looking for alternatives and
evaluating them.
We have noted already that Danes tend to use less time than the French in
analysing according to the stringent, rational principles which characterized
the Cartesian ideal. The Danes seem to consider a limited number of
alternatives since they spend less time at stage 4, ``Search for alternatives’’, and
therefore also must live with less comprehensive knowledge of their
consequences. Further, they seem to understand the problem at hand in the
light of previous experience, or, perhaps, as suggested by Mintzberg et al.
(1976) follow various routines. They adapt goals to the means at hand rather
than the opposite, since they are primarily concerned with finding realistic,
pragmatic and workable solutions. In the terminology of Simon (1947), they use
``satisficing’’ and not ``optimizing’’ in relation to goals.
As the Danes tend to use an inductive procedure, they arrive sooner at stage
6, ``Choice of alternative’’.
Where then could we place Danish style decision making?
Compared with the French, the Danish decision-making style is nearer to
the ``administrative man’’ model with its limited rationality, and even to
``muddling through’’ where, to quote Lindblom (1959), ``the understanding of
the problem at hand is limited to an approach similar to the prevailing one’’,
Journal of where ``goals are chosen to suit the means at disposal’’, and ``few alternatives
Managerial are considered’’.
Psychology However, Danes do not entirely fit those two models either. As for the model
of ``administrative man’’, if they tend to ``satisfice’’ in the terminology of Simon
16,6
and not ``optimize’’ in relation to goals and to ``accept limited insight’’, I would
go so far as to suggest that they do not aim at being very analytical, but rather
414 at being realistic.
As for the ``muddling through’’ model, arguments which go against it as
characterizing the Danish style would include points 5, 6, 7, and 8 mentioned in
the description of the ``muddling through’’ model:
(5) New goals are constantly discovered, and former goals reconsidered.
(6) The problem is seldom finally solved, but constantly reconsidered.
(7) Decisions are more a flight from various evils than a movement towards
a goal.
(8) Few dimensions of consequences are considered.
In the Danish context new goals are normally not constantly discovered, and
former goals reconsidered; on the contrary, goals are relatively constant, and
problems are solved, and not ``constantly reconsidered’’ (point 6). It cannot be
confirmed either that decisions in the Danish style are generally ``more a flight
from various evils than a movement towards a goal’’ (point 7). Finally, it
cannot be confirmed that ``few dimensions of consequences are considered’’
(point 8).
Inspired by Swedish theorist Nils Brunsson (1985, pp. 25-7), who has
suggested the concept of ``action rationality’’ as an alternative to ``decision
rationality’’, thereby shifting the focus from cognition to action, our suggestion
would be to supplement the model of the continuum of rationality and the
decision-making models with an action man model, which would imply
pragmatic rationality based on experience and on induction from empirical
findings.
This will give us Figure 3, in which action man and emotional man have
been added as models:

Figure 3.
The continuum of
rationality-irrationality,
the decision-making
models and cultural
patterns
We can now see that Frenchmen and Danes have different patterns of preferred Cultural
decision-making styles, and that each of them have strengths in different areas. dimensions of
The figure reflects six different ways of arriving at decisions, where at the decision making
left side the person would use just reason, logic and deduction, the example of
French philosophers was given earlier in the text; in the next positions
decisions are based on routine or past experience, and the right side represents
the more creative and emotional spectrum of decision making. 415
The figure says nothing about the quality of the decisions that might be
arrived at by using one or another of the possibilities described here. The
question of quality is altogether another discussion, but to our mind they are all
a priori workable methods, and each of them may yield good results. It all
depends on the context at hand.
Although we have made a point of documenting different decision-making
styles, it has to be conceded that they are of course to a certain extent
generalisations.

The decision-making process revisited

Reverting to the decision-making process we can now plot in the Danes and the
French at different stages according to which they emphasize most in practice
(see Figure 4).

Discussion
In the following we will discuss the above in light of supportive evidence from
other authors and the experience of the present writer.
We have seen that the French tend to use much time at the stages 4 and 5 of
the decision-making process, Search for alternatives and Evaluation of
alternatives, and we argued that this could be a predilection for logical analysis

Figure 4.
The decision-making
process
Journal of in accordance with the Cartesian ideal. This point is supported by the case
Managerial described by d’Iribarne et al. (1998, p. 98) reporting on a joint project between a
Psychology French and a Swedish company, in which expressions like ``strict logical
arguments’’, ``in the name of reason’’, ``in accordance with reason’’, ``abiding by
16,6 reason’’, ``rational argumentation’’ keep being used to explain the French
positions[3]. However, there might also be another explanation, namely that
416 those (middle managers) who analyse and prepare the case have to present
their results to their superior, who will normally make the decision. The middle
manager or subordinate depends entirely on his/her superior for recognition,
promotion and other important aspects of his/her working life (Schramm-
Nielsen and Hjort, 1996), and the subordinate will consequently do his or her
utmost to look good in the eyes of the superior, which means not only having
considered all possible alternatives, but also showing intellectual brilliance in
terms of analysis. In the d’Iribarne case we find the expression ``show one’s
analytic abilities’’[4]. This situation is evidently also a reflection of the power
distance that has been documented by Hofstede (1984) and many other
subsequent studies, e.g. Schramm-Nielsen (1993) and Sùndergaard (1994).
The respondents in the study here reported on also pointed to the fact that
French managers tended to look for new, out of the ordinary and individualistic
solutions, and on this point the following explanations could be offered.
The first is that this may reflect customer wishes since customers in France
often do not just accept standardized solutions, but also want to have their
personal imprint on the final result.
A second explanation could be that during school socialization, French
pupils are urged to demonstrate their intellectual capabilities. At school, as
elsewhere in French society, this is what really counts and what gives prestige.
In their book, Management in France, Barsoux and Lawrence state (1990, p. 30):
A longstanding feature of French society is the high premium it places on intellect. Where
America extols money, West Germany work and Great Britain blood, France has nailed its
flag to the post of cleverness.

A third explanation could be that this is also an opportunity for the (middle)
manager to compete with colleagues precisely by showing his intellect through
unusual and individualistic proposals for solutions, which might set him apart
from competitors. Such a situation is nothing but the continuation of a lifelong
competitive context starting in preschool classes.
What is more, as is generally accepted, in France intellectualism is also
linked to the abstract, to concepts, and to mastering mathematics, the most
abstract of disciplines, the mastery of which is considered the ultimate proof of
intelligence.
The French researchers Alain and Philippe d’Iribarne (d’Iribarne and
d’Iribarne, 1987, p. 45) offer the following explanation of this phenomenon, an
explanation which points to a deeply ingrained structure.
In French society there is a long tradition for ranking, and intellectual activity is no exception.
In consequence, professions and departments are ranked according to the degree of
 Cultural
abstraction they may represent. The more they require theoretical knowledge and abstract
treatment, the more noble they are.
dimensions of
To give some examples from various writers, finance is more noble than decision making
production (Barsoux and Lawrence 1990, p. 69), maintenance more noble than
production (d’Iribarne, 1987, p. 47), an electrician has more prestige than a
mechanic (d’Iribarne and d’Iribarne, 1987, p. 44), and among engineers
technology is considered more prestigious than production (Lane, 1989, p. 100). 417
This distinction, according to the amount of abstraction and theoretical
knowledge required, says d’Iribarne (1989, p. 41), recalls the distinction
between the spiritual and the secular professions of earlier centuries.
D’Iribarne, who is himself an engineer, asks polemically what could be more
noble than ``pure’’ mathematics, i.e. mathematics which has no practical
purpose or direct application. The nearer one is to basic science, and
consequently the further away from applied science, the higher one’s standing
on the ladder of intelligence. The most prestigious school of engineers in
France, EÂcole Polytechnique, prides itself on not dealing with technique at all
(d’Iribarne and d’Iribarne, 1987, p. 45).
Let us now turn to stage 6 in the decision-making model, the ``Choice of
alternative’’. The study showed that this is where the French superior steps in,
since decision-making authority is seldom delegated to the people who search
for alternatives and evaluate them. In the d’Iribarne case we find the
unequivocal statement that ``decisions are taken by the heads of
departments’’[5]. A simplification would be to say that (middle) managers
prepare the case, look for alternative solutions including their evaluation, while
their superiors make the decisions and lower level subordinates implement
them. This means that a decision does not necessarily reflect the preferences of
those who are to carry out the instructions, and lack of commitment and
motivation on their part may be a barrier to optimizing implementation.
It was also indicated in the study, as seen from the quotations, that the
French often have problems in giving their ideas substance and implementing
them. This could be explained by the fact that, in the French context,
implementation is generally not considered ``noble’’ work, according to the
d’Iribarne terminology. That part is considered as the boring, ``secular’’,
practical work, which does not earn prestige and which people therefore prefer
to leave to lower levels.
It could of course be discussed whether it is a strong or a weak point that the
superior is the decision maker and not the people who prepare the case. If we
look at it from a result and efficiency-oriented perspective as would a Dane, it
seems rather to be a weak point, but one might also argue that the superior is in
a better position to judge being the one who has more information than lower
levels. In most cases this would be the situation in a French context.
However, the French have one more strong point, which is ``Control’’ stage 9.
Indeed, compared to Danish management, French control is extremely tight at
all levels (Schramm-Nielsen, 1993), and this will obviously compensate for lack
of commitment on the part of implementors.
Journal of Attempting to explain Danish decision-making style, we would first suggest
Managerial that if Danes tend to use less time than the French in analysing according to the
Psychology stringent, almost mechanical, rational principles which characterized the
Cartesian ideal, it is not that they are unable to do that, but they tend to look at
16,6 the problem-solving process as a whole, the aim of which is to reach a workable
solution. In the same vein, d’Iribarne et al. (1998) report that the Swedish looked
418 to ``proven solutions’’ instead of trying to optimize.
Second, since the Danes tend to use an inductive procedure, they have the
advantage of arriving sooner at stage 6, ``Choice of alternative’’. An
additional point is that in the Danish context, not only is decision making
often delegated to the people concerned with the problem, but the same
people will often also find themselves responsible for implementation. These
important points mean that the Danes will be able to arrive sooner at stage 7,
``Start of operation’’, and tend to choose a solution which they know for
certain that they can handle. Another consequence of this is that there will be
greater loyalty towards ``Implementation’’, stage 8, or, as stated by Brunsson
(1985, p. 22):
the stronger the expectations, the motivations and the commitment incorporated in the
decision, the greater the strength of the decision as a basis for action.

Where Danes seem to have a problem compared to the French decision-making

style, is in ``Control’’, stage 9, due to the principle of ``responsible autonomy’’
(Schramm-Nielsen, 1993).
By this expression is meant that people are generally given a great amount
of leeway in terms of autonomy in decision making within their own sphere of
work, and at the same time they are expected to live up to a similar level of
responsibility for actions taken.
One implication of this is that they are supposed not to need to be controlled,
and a further implication is that control is seen very negatively as a sign of lack
of confidence in the person(s) who might be subject to control[6].
Two further and related points should be made here. The first is that Danes
are judged more on their cooperative abilities than on individual performance.
The second is that they are also judged on results obtained rather than on
brilliantly intelligent, but perhaps less workable ideas (Fivelsdal and Schramm-
Nielsen, 1993).
The literature offers practically no other comparative studies of Danes in
decision-making situations, and one therefore has to resort to other sources for
verification. One such source might be Danish textbooks on organisational
theory. It is interesting to see that as for normative solutions, Danish authors
all stress the pragmatic and realistic, instead of the ideally rational and
analytical decisions (Enderud, 1976; Junge-Jensen and Ry Nielsen, 1978; Bakka
and Fivelsdal, 1988; Fivelsdal and Schramm-Nielsen, 1993).
Holt Larsen (1987), a Danish academic, also states that generally Danes do
not start by defining formal goals, but by looking at the resources and means at
hand. To push the point further, it is important to note that in Denmark there is
much interest in ``action learning’’, which takes as a starting point what people, Cultural
decision makers, actually do (Holt Larsen, 1990). Again, pragmatic approaches dimensions of
seem to be more appealing to Danes than ideals. decision making
Being a believer in the effects of socialization, we would suggest that this
pragmatic rationality is one of the outcomes of socialization in the Danish
educational institutions, where pupils are not much encouraged to demonstrate
intellectualism and analytical abilities. On the contrary, what is demanded of 419
them is more often functionalism, pragmatism and understanding of coherence
(Fivelsdal and Schramm-Nielsen, 1993; Schramm-Nielsen and Hjort, 1996).
An interesting question is how top managers and lower level managers/
employees adapted to the situations arising from the encounter of the two
cultures with different power distances. The study showed several instances of
French top managers in Denmark or their headquarters in France complaining
about Danish lower level managers delegating too much decision power to
employees (see Figure 4, stages 6, 7 and 8), and about not taking control
seriously enough (stage 9). The Danes on their part found the control
mechanisms and procedures overwhelming and unnecessary, believing that
people could be trusted to do their best and to be capable of assessing the
situation.
In France, Danish top managers reported that once their French lower level
managers understood the scope of decision-making manoeuvre delegated to
them, they reacted with great enthusiasm and commitment, and it had an
extremely positive effect on performance. However, not all French employees
appreciated the idea of accepting responsibility.
Some of the Danish top managers in France ± especially old timers ± had
accepted the role of controlling authority, while others tried to make their
subordinates understand that they were expected to be self-controlling and not
look to the superior to check their work.
Whether or not subordinates in a high power distance culture can be trusted
enough to be empowered, is of course a delicate question that has to be
considered in each case.

Conclusion
This paper set out with the establishment of the fact that the dominant
literature on decision making has so far been universalistic and has generally
not treated the subject in the light of different cultures.
We have demonstrated that when we compare the French and Danish
practices, and relate them to the decision-making process and the classical
theories of decision making and problem solving, we find that they fit into
different patterns according to what is considered important in relation to the
desired outcome.
It has also been shown that the French decision style may be characterized
by rationality on the one hand, inasmuch as there is a thorough search for
alternatives, but also by emotion and impulse on the other hand, which is
clearly prohibited by the rational ideal, and which point to the opposite end of
Journal of the continuum of rationality-irrationality. For this last mentioned mode of
Managerial decision making the label ``emotional man’’ is suggested to supplement the
Psychology classical models of economic man, administrative man, muddling through, etc.
Owing to an apparently traditional division of labour into intellectual and
16,6 practical work, into thinking and doing, the French managers are less oriented
towards operation and implementation, which will typically be left to lower
420 levels in the hierarchy. This fact, however, is counterbalanced by a very tight
control at all levels.
The Danish decision makers have other ideals. In decision making most
Danes tend not to look for many alternatives and to use ``satisficing’’ instead of
optimizing, thereby accepting limited rationality.
However, the Danes do not quite fit the description of ``administrative man’’,
nor indeed the ``muddling through’’ model. Where the French aim at showing
intellect and creativity, the Danes aim at being pragmatic, realistic and result
oriented, including the phase of implementation. Their weak point is probably
``control’’ due to the principle of ``responsible autonomy’’.
Since none of the existing classical models cover the Danish decision-making
style, a new model called ``action man’’, typified by pragmatic result-oriented
rationality, is suggested.
It has also been shown that Danes and Frenchmen tend to emphasize
different stages of the decision-making process according to the hierarchical
context that they are part of and to which they have to conform.

Avenues for further research

An obvious question arising from this research is how and how far the results
apply to situations other than those here reported on, and what might be the
limitations of the study.
For one thing data are admittedly not recent (dating from 1988-89). However,
in this connection that is not a very crucial point, since cultural patterns of this
nature change extremely slowly; this will have been amply demonstrated by
the legacy from Descartes, seventeenth century French philosopher.
Another point of critique might be that the number of respondents in the
study reported on are relatively small. We believe that studies of different
cultures in decision-making processes would be particularly timely, and we
would welcome more research and more discussion on the cultural aspects of
decision making.
Whether or not decision making can be delegated to lower levels and
whether the actors in the different levels in the hierarchy are willing to delegate
and are respectively prepared to live up to the responsibility is at the very core
of the concept of empowerment being discussed in the current theoretical
literature.
Finally, it would also be interesting to have documentation of decision-
making situations in other industries than those represented in the study here
reported on, especially we would welcome data from the service sector, which
forms the major part of economic activity in industrialized countries.
Notes Cultural
1. This Danish respondent, an old-timer in France, identifies with the French. dimensions of
2. A long-timer in France, he identifies with the French. decision making
3. In French: la rigueur logique de l’argumentation, au nom de la raison, conforme aÁ la raison,
alleÂgeance aÁ la raison, une argumentation rationelle.
4. In French: montrer sa capacite d’analyse.
5. In French: Les deÂcisions sont prises par les responsables des deÂpartements. 421
6. It should be added that this relates mainly to the individual level. At the business level, for
instance, budgeting, finance, stock, sales etc., there is general control.

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