During the class discussion on the Hofstede Dimensions, I mentioned a story of the Korean airline’s accident, where a co-pilot failed to communicate an emergency to the airplane’s pilot, resulting in a crash. The co-pilot did not dare to challenge his superior due to the high power distance of the Korean  culture and the employees’ deference to their superiors. Malcolm Gladwell analyzed the cultural aspect of this story in his book called “Tipping Point.” In the chapter called “The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes,” Gladwell described the discussed Korean airplane crash from 1997 and another crash of an Avianca airplane from 1990. In the Korean airline case, the co-pilot failed to communicate an emergency to the pilot; in the Avianca case, the pilot failed to communicate the urgency of the plane running out of fuel to the traffic controller. Both planes crashed because the co-pilot and the pilot failed to challenge people who were “in charge,” even in the face of the impeding death.

The power distance is an important concept we need to keep in mind as future executives who may want to expand our business outside of the United States. The U.S. is a low power distance culture. We all call each other by name, we emphasize influencing versus directing, and we encourage feedback to the superiors. High power distance cultures are hierarchical in nature, and they emphasize deference and obedience. From an executive perspective, when dealing with individuals from a high power distance culture,  we may need to adjust our management style. The adjustment may need to be two fold. On one hand, we may want to explicitly encourage and reward feedback. On the other hand, however, we may need to adjust our own behavior by allowing a certain level of deference in order to gain employees’ trust and respect.