comparative value priorities of chinese and new zealand

Conservation
6. Security
7. Conformity + 8. Tradition
Self transcendence
9. Benevolence
10. Universalism
Schwartz’ Individual Values theory will be discussed in detail below.
Schwartz: Culture and Organisations
I will focus on behaviour in organisations, making the hypothetical assumption that
businesspeople behave similarly in business organisations (they in fact do not), as that is
the context of business behaviour. Members of organisations bring their personalities
with them when they join (Sagiv and Schwartz, 2007), which moderate individual value
priorities. Personal values are trans-situational goals that guide the ways people choose
amongst alternatives, evaluate people and events, and explain their actions and
evaluations (see, e.g., Kluckhohn, 1951; Rohan, 2000; Rokeach, 1973; Schwartz, 1992).
Values affect what people perceive and attend to (de Dreu and Boles, 1998), the way
they interpret information (van Lange and Liebrand, 1989), what they are concerned
about and how much they are concerned (Schwartz, Sagiv, and Boehnke, 2000) and
their attitudes, decisions, choices and behaviour (Schwartz, 2006b; Verplanken and
Holland, 2002).
Personal value priorities are products of the individual’s shared and unique social
experiences and genetic heredity. Members of a specific society exhibit value
similarities because they are socialised by and must adapt to common family,
educational, legal, media, market, and governmental systems. Societies express a
generally consistent set of value emphases in specifically defined cultures. In
organisations, Sagiv and Schwartz (2007) find that in daily organisational activities
members express their important values and the goals to other members through their
expression of ideas, preferences, and choices they make. Members’ personal values
influence the objectives and goals the organisation adopts, the norms and practices that
evolve, and the shared perceptions and interpretations of events in the organisation.
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