Intercultural management: Sweden

With the globalization and our studies in international management, we are more and more faced to different cultures. That is why it is important to be interested and open minded to other culture if you want to succeed at an international level. Often, businessmen from other culture don’t expect businessmen to act in a different way from themselves in management, behavior, clothing… Most of them would be surprised if they were told that their business culture differs from the international norm.

so it shows how important it is to be aware of cultural differences and be able to apply an intercultural management in some case. For this case study, I have chosen the Sweden because I have always been interested by this Nordic country. Actually, you have a lot of international companies established in this country, such as H&M, Ikea, SEB, Volvo… The Sweden with its capital Stockholm has a population of around 9,100,000 inhabitants. This country has one of the highest standards of living in the world.Sweden became a great power of Europe in front of Finland, Norway and Denmark.

[...] To study the cultural aspect of the Sweden we have chosen different variable to analyze in order to make connections between them. In that way we will get a better understanding of the Swedish culture and be able to work with them more easily. Understanding Scandinavian mentality and more especially Swedish society and culture is essential to successfully do business in Sweden. PEOPLE One of the most important variables is to know the people, the Swedish. Their culture will be different from ours so you have to be aware of it in order to adapt yourself to them. [...]

[...] Economic situation Sweden is a country known for its incredible low rate of unemployment and its continuous growth rate. The GDP per capita has been in constant growth for 10 years as well as the household revenue. The inflation rate is around nowadays. The main reasons that are responsible for the Swedish economic rise are the fact that the government implemented new fiscal policies, decrease the risky asset and their spread and gave a greater access to the capital markets for business in Sweden. [...]

[...] As we have seen before, Sweden is one of the countries the most connected on earth. Nearly of the households have access to internet and 80% of the population is internet users, that is why the Swedish government emphasize electronic commerce, both in consumer and business sectors. We the success of Facebook; a law has been created on the internet surveillance in 2008. This law allows the government to intercept any internet traffic that passes Sweden border (no need for a court warrant). [...]