DIFFERENCES BETWEEN INDIAN WORK CULTURE AND WORK CULTURE IN U.S.
• In USA, people strictly adhere to the time. They work in the office for eight hours a day. They attend the meetings sharply in scheduled timings. . They take lunch break for half an hour.
• In India, people do not adhere to the timings. No doubt, they work for long hours approximately for 10-12 hrs a day and sometimes even on weekends, but take long tea breaks and lunch breaks.
• In USA work-culture, they give more value to the time spent for their personal life. They do not carry the workplace pressures or stress to home. Eventually work is a part of their life, but not the life itself. Nevertheless, they stay back at office occasionally, when they need to work.
• Most of the Indians think workplace as an opportunity to build their future and put forth extensive efforts to climb the corporate ladder and earn monetary benefits. They work day and night beyond limits, which results in losing work-life balance .This also makes them encounter a lot of pressure ,as the demands at work place and family are almost opposite.
There may be a greater sense of ownership of work in Indians and they value work more than that of personal life.
Whereas in USA work culture the relation between boss and subordinate is not more formal and hierarchical, superiors treat subordinates with respect and do not demonstrate ranks. Subordinates are entrusted with important assignments. Blame for things that go wrong is either shared or is often accepted by the superior, due to it being their responsibility to
manage. Managers often socialize with subordinates.
Meetings are interactive sessions to arrive at best
decisions.
• In mentoring, Indian managers are a bit soft in critical
assessments. Seniors tend to lean more on positive
feedback during an appraisal, leaving the criticism
unsaid. In India either due to the appraisal process or
due to the lack of skill of the appraiser, the muchneeded
critical assessment is often held back.
In the US, there is a better balance in practice.
• In Indian work-culture, people do not accept change
easily; lot of resistance is encountered in order to
implement change.
In western work-culture, people are adaptive
and conductive to change implementation.