Culture shock re-visited: What features of the Polish culture most bother expatriates in Poland?

Abstract

This paper investigates how symptoms of culture shock may be related to cultural features. A group of expatriate executives are tested on how they respond to Poland's culture dimensions which are specified in accordance with Hofstede's indices. Symptoms of their culture shock are identified and juxtaposed with everyday behaviours of Poles in the workplace and public place/social arena. The results show that some of those functional patterns of Poles which result in extreme/inefficient/counterproductive behaviours and constitute sources of culture shock for the expatriates are linked to large Power Distance and strong Uncertainty Avoidance in Poland or a combination of the two dimensions. Implications for researchers are specified. Recommendations for expatriate managers vis-à-vis induction training and the content of in-company courses for Polish managers are listed. © 2011 The Clute Institute.