How to compare something what used to be the same? The question which I could hear very often meeting people outside the Czech or Slovak Republic. In fact, even nowadays there are professional many sources which view Slovak and Czech business cultures as identical ones.
As a coach of intercultural communication I work with the Czech, Slovak and expat managers. Based on my practical experience and perceptions of my clients, I could see many differences which are visible at a closer look. I mean the differences which play a decisive role while establishing business cooperation or working on common projects.
To point out similarities and differences in Slovak and Czech business culture, I and my colleague Jerome Dumetz have chosen 10 cultural dimensions. The cultural dimensions display the cultural traits of the two countries and examine them for possible sources of misunderstanding.
Historical Background:
The close partnership between the Slovak and the Czech nations started during the Austrian-Hungarian empire when they fought against the same foes, the Austrians and Hungarians. The official marriage was declared on 28th October 1918 when the Czechoslovakia was established. From then on, the Slovaks and Czechs have been collectively referred as “the Czechoslovaks”.
On January 1st 1993 the Czech and the Slovaks officially agreed to a “velvet divorce”. This term refers not only to the “Velvet revolution” which saw the country escape from the soviet control, but also to the warm atmosphere that prevailed when negotiating the separation. While the older generation still argues about this controversial political decision, the youngsters welcome this opportunity to easily study and work “abroad”. No language training is necessary as both languages are very close. A brotherhood feeling is still vivid at all levels of social and political life. This apparent proximity is still quite spread abroad as many identify the Slovak and the Czech Republics as “Czechoslovakia”, even if there are now two independent nations.
At the diplomatic level, the Slovak and the Czech governments share their political opinions and delegations regularly visit each other to share good practices. Both countries are part of NATO and since 2004 members of the European Union. They frequently stay on the same political line concerning economical or international relations topics. Since 1991, together with Poland and Hungary, they form the Visegrád group, a political alliance of central European countries cooperating in a wide spectrum of fields.
Despite this apparent closeness, when asked about their satisfaction with the status of this situation, being two independent countries, polls confirm the satisfaction of both the Czechs and the Slovaks with this “velvet divorce” (Inštitút pre verejné otázky). The smaller of the two, Slovakia is proud of its “own” government, embassies and adopting euro. Slovaks have transformed their country “from a younger brother of the Czechs” to an independent and competitive partner. The competition nowadays is primarily on the economical level, with both countries aggressively attracting foreign investors. While the two countries are key partners to each other (Slovakia is the second export market of the Czech Republic and its third importer; the Czech Republic is also the second export market of Slovakia and its second importer (Observatory of Economic Complexity, 2015)), they are both highly ranked in Foreign Direct Investment surveys with the Czech Republic attracting 475USD per capita in 2013 and not far away Slovakia with 396USD. (EUcham, 2015) Despite having so much in common, it is clear the Czech and Slovak Republics are now two distinct countries with their own national interests. In the last 20 years, have they become two distinct cultures?
The first dimension used in the cross-cultural comparison is about choosing between agreed upon rules or bending existing rules to fulfil engagements in a relationship (particularism/universalism). Here lies a first difference with the Slovaks displaying slightly more particularistic behaviours than the Czechs. Slovaks condition their business relationships with trust and sympathy more than the Czechs do. For instance, promotion criteria may value a lot professional competency but the ability to approach people and build private contacts might make a difference.
The score of the Czechs with reference to the dimension of uncertainty avoidance is quite higher than in Slovakia. This dimension involves the extent to which ambiguous situations are threatening to individuals, the extent to which rules and order are preferred and the extent to which uncertainty is tolerated in a society. The Czechs are not fond of uncertainty and much favour situations to be clear and not ambiguous. The lower uncertainty of Slovaks is displayed in their need to build relationships before engaging in further business. If they trust someone, they are willing to take the risks because in their understanding everything depends on “people”.
Some differences appear with the specific/diffuse dimension. A diffuse culture means the split between one’s public and private life is not really clear. In other words, you belong to the inner circle of your friends, and you ignore (at best) the individuals outside your life (Trompenaars, 1993). Presented in a simple manner, diffuse cultures treat relationships in a very simple way: we are friends or total strangers to each other. In other words, diffuse people are relationship orientated, sometimes called “being”; while their alter ego, the specific cultures are more task orientated, otherwise called “doing”.
Despite an observed proximity, it appears that Slovaks tend to display a more “being” orientation than the more “doing” orientated Czechs (TMC, 2015). In order to start cooperation, the Slovaks need a “warmer exchange of ideas” in order to feel that the partners have become friends. Thus, to establish harmony in their relationships, they tend to adapt their communication style to their partner.
This attitude exists also internally, between superiors and employees. Therefore, indirect communication is the standard in Slovakia, while the Czechs may be more direct, to the point. To sum up, good relations are important in both countries at work, in negotiations, and generally in everyday’s life encounters. However, some extra “small talk” may be useful in Slovakia compared to the Czech Republic.
The dimension collectivism/individualism is about the question: Who needs whom? Does the group needs the individual and therefore accepts its individuality, or the individual accepts to adapt to the group’s requirement in order to keep harmony. In the Trompenaars’ profiles of the two cultures, Slovakia scores only 56/44 at individualism/communitarianism, while the Czech Republic displays a much higher result with 90/10 (THT, 2016). Such results would indicate two cultures that tend to reward moderately individual initiative and achievement over consensus decision-making and a group work. However, the weight of history has to be taken into account here. Visitors to the countries capitals working in new industries are correct to expect an individualistic behaviour from their Czech and even Slovak hosts. However, the same visitors should expect more collectivistic attitudes in organizations with an old history, such as brown field factories or state bodies born in the Communist period.
Hierarchy is also called power distance in cross-cultural management (Hofstede, 1980). This is a simple concept to understand: some cultures enjoy hierarchical relationships among their members (at work, in the street, or at home), while others, more egalitarian, value equality. Based on perceptions of expat managers both countries are hierarchical. Top managers enjoy unquestioned power in organizations and the organizational culture of many companies is both hierarchical and relationship orientated. This strong respect for hierarchy has the negative effect of having subordinates to pass off any responsibility to the next level of management, hence concentrating decision-making and power.
Another cultural dimension linked to hierarchy is how groups accord status. According to Trompenaars (1993), achieved status cultures give importance to past results, achievements or recent successes. Contrariwise, ascribed cultures believe status depends on the intrinsic characteristics of the person, such as seniority, gender or social connections. In this analysis, a first ascertainment is that the use of titles in correspondence is very important in both countries. However, this would be misleading to conclude that Czech and Slovaks Republics be ascribed today. Indeed, if ascription was the norm in communist Czechoslovakia, when the countries opened up, many national and foreign companies promoted young people to management positions based on their studies abroad, language skills and their competitiveness. The older generation was viewed as less “experienced” managers because of their communist background. A new ambitious generation (sometimes dubbed “young sharks”) has reached high positions in the hierarchical organizations and acquired strong status recognition.
When analyzing displays of emotions, statistically, both cultures belong to the middle group of countries in terms of assertiveness. It means individuals are not particularly aggressive in their relationships. We are in the presence of two cultures that do not favour emotional arguments over reason. Facts and figures will be more effective in convincing a counterpart than emotions. Shouting, weeping and the like are neither seen professional in the Czech Republic nor in the Slovak Republic.
Practice, however, sheds light on some slight variations. For instance, the difference regarding displays of emotions between the Czechs and the Slovaks is more visible among team members or in the relationships between a superior and an employee. The Slovaks match their good working relationships with emotional openness more than the Czechs. It means that good working relationships are based on sharing positive or negative emotions being outside the scene of an official meeting or negotiations.
Time is a major element of cross-cultural management. Among the topics of interest within this category, the past/present/future orientation of both countries is most instructive for this cultural review. Even if a gap exists among generations (older ones tent to be nostalgic of the past… everywhere!), both countries are usually considered “present” oriented which means past events are of lesser importance than current aspects: Brand reputation, for instance, is likely to be more quality based than history-based.
That being said, Slovakia may actually be more “present” orientated than the Czech Republic. Indeed Slovaks tend to have discontinued many traditions established during “Czechoslovakia” and even do not celebrate historical events, which the Czechs do. One of the examples is 28th October (when Czechoslovakia was established) which is not a public holiday in Slovakia, unlike in the Czech Republic.
The slight differences between the two countries may result from their recent historical and political development. After their “velvet divorce”, the Slovak Republic started to build its identity, values, symbols and institutions practically ex nihilo. While the Czech Republic preserved the flag and the anthem of former Czechoslovakia, the Slovak Republic came up with new national symbols. Also, the Czech Republic kept state organizations in the existing governmental buildings of the former Czechoslovakia while the Slovak Republic had to build a new parliamentary building. Thus, we could say that today’s Slovakia derives its identity and values from recent economic and political achievements while the Czechs are more easily anchored in the past.
Time is also analysed as monochronic versus polychronic cultures. While monochronic cultures view time in a linear manner with clear segmentation of task, polychronics tend to have a holistic understanding of time, where effectiveness is favoured over efficiency. This also influences one’s punctuality, monochromic people being keen on being on time as a show of respect to their counterpart’s agenda. In this case, we may label cultures fixed or fluid towards their time orientation. For this analysis, both culture highly value punctuality and visitors counting on a Slavic influence are often surprised by the strictness the Czechs and Slovaks enforce timetables.
Based on the perceptions of expat managers, both countries see the other one as less fixed than self. The Slovaks consider the Czechs to be more relaxed… and vice versa! For instance, Slovaks match the Czech perception of time with the Czech word “Pohoda” which is difficult to translate. Some dictionaries use the words “ peace” or “contentment”. However, the Czech understanding implies not being in a hurry, not being disturbed by others and enjoying relaxed approach to life. Yet, the Czechs still consider themselves to be more punctual than their Slovak neighbours.
This cross-cultural study reveals that the Czech and Slovak cultures have much more in common than they have differences. The long joint history of those countries is the first reason for it, followed by geographical and linguistics proximity. However, anyone involved in a cross-cultural project between those two countries would be well advised to withhold a series of cultural gaps. Indeed, many cross-cultural negative experiences involved cultures often believed as “quite similar”. The similarities being galore, one’s tend to forget the remaining differences, till they are shockingly exposed to the individual.
By PaedDr. Eva Gaborikova, M.A.,PhD., Cross-Cultural Coach and Consultant
Adapted from the original article: PaedDr. Eva Gaborikova, M.A, PhD. and Jérôme Dumetz, Msc: The Czech and Slovak Republics: A cross-cultural comparison
References:
Observatory of Economic Complexity, 2015 : http://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/cze/
EUcham, 2015, http://eucham.eu/charts/153-2015-03-foreign-direct-investment-per-capita-in-europe
Trompenaars, F. 1993. Riding the waves of culture: understanding cultural diversity in global business. 1st ed. Chicago, IL: Irwin Professional Publishing.
TMC Cultural Navigator, 2015, Czech profile
Trompenaars Hampden-Turner, 2016 Seven Dimensions Profile of Czech Republic and Slovak Republic, provided to the author by THT Consulting
Hofstede, G. (1980), Culture’s consequences: international differences in work-related values, Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Hall, E. T. (1973). The silent language. Anchor.