Question

Case Study: Euro Disneyland

Questions:

1. Using Hofsrde’s four cultural dimensions as a point of reference, what are some of the main cultural differences between the United States and France?

2. In what what way has Trompenaars’s research helped explain cultural differences between the United States and France?

3. In managing its Euro Disneyland operations, what are three mistakes that the company made? Explain.

4. Based on its experience, what are three lessons the company should have learned about how to deal with diversity? Describe each.

Answer 1

2)

The Trompenaars Theory:

Trompenaars divides culture in four main categories:

Trompenaars analyzes the cultural differences that may exist between countries and within organizations.

Trompenaars identifies several dimensions that distinguish one culture on the other The model on the vertical axis is a distinction between hierarchical cultures and

egalitarian cultures, while the horizontal axis is the distinction between cultures people oriented and task-oriented

culture. According to this model, US is a classical example of guided missile culture, characterized by an organizational

culture promoting task orientation and support for people in the work environment. This type of culture is not only

task oriented, but it is also focused on people. In fact, employees should respect fixed set of rules and be highly

efficient. They should be more focused on the result of a project and not the process that led them to that result and

this culture asks for a very high loyalty to the project rather than the company itself. The US guide missile

organizational culture has a more domestic nature structure and employees are evaluated on their individual

performance, even though the success of this type of organization is strictly connected to teamwork.

On the other hand, France is an example of Eiffel tour organizational culture, which is more submissive, laid back,

and has a more traditional attitude towards management styles. Moreover, the Eiffel tour organizational culture has

a pyramid structure meaning that high management takes all the important decision. In France organizational

culture, hierarchy is very important and organizations duties are well established from the beginning. This type of

organizational culture pays more attention to people compared to the US one, thus interpersonal relationships are

more important than task.

3)

Mistakes made:

Many mistakes have been made in the realization of the Euro Disney entertainment park in France. They literally

transplanted US culture in France without taking into consideration the cultural clash that this might have caused.

US imposed their culture over the French one, and this was seen as an attack to French traditions and customs,

resulting in protests from local residence and farmers.

First of all, there was a general misunderstanding of the French culture both under the lifestyle and legal aspects.

The top management made wrong assumptions, which led them to take wrong management decisions. In fact,

French habits and traditions were not taken in to account. For example, breakfast at the park was not served;

instead in the French culture breakfast is one of the most important "moments" of the day. Moreover, alcoholic drinks

were not allowed in the park: contrary French always have a glass of wine during their main meals. In addition, also

the dress code requirements did not meet the French standards in work environments. And the fact that they were

supposed to be always smiling and kind did not reflect the French attitude and the staff was not comfortable with

these policies. Furthermore, the top management positions were al given to American, which made the situation

even worse because they were incapable to fix the mistakes made from the very start. Instead, if they had hired 3/4

French people to manage the park, they would have been able to assess these cultural differences in a more

efficient way, avoiding such a cultural clash.

Second, it was given for granted that French entertainment culture was as the US one. Thus, staff and resources

were allocated in the wrong way, because the peek days were not the same as the US Disney Land. This led to a

lack of staff in crowded days and a surplus of staff in empty days affecting efficiency and profitability of the park

negatively. Moreover, they assumes French would have gone to the park with their private transportation, thus they

built many car parks which were most of the time empty, instead the parking were not big enough for buses, which

was the more used transport used to get to the park.

4).

Lessons learned:

From this case study, many lessons can be learned.
, never give for granted that if one project is
successful according to the parameters of one society and culture, this does not mean that if we export it else where
this success will remain unchanged.
Cultural factors are crucial for the success of any business and to disregard and
to "attack" others traditions and customs can be destructive.
a very deep and targeted market research in order to better understand
both the culture is vital
More planning and market research was absolutely necessary and the human resources department as
well as top management was supposed to be in the hands of local people for a better cultural assessment.

Thanks!

Hope this helps you.