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Top1. Introduction
Rapid invasion of information technology and global integration in last five decades has enhanced cross-cultural interactions, thus, making cultural sensitivity progressively more important. Being culturally sensitive entails to be aware of the fact that cultural similarities and differences between people exist. Researchers have clearly identified that cultural sensitivity increases individual and group level task performance when working in multicultural teams (Presbitero & Toledano, 2018). Various theories of national culture and its impact on organizational success have been proposed. These theories have grown into a cultural theory jungle; while, later attempts have emphasized on the convergence amongst these models to facilitate the researchers and managers for cross-cultural comparisons (Nardon & Steers, 2009).
The importance of cultural intelligence is multifold when members of a multicultural teamwork for a common goal or project. The influence of culture on project management (PM) is a phenomenon that has been explored by researchers (Bredillet, Yatim, & Ruiz, 2010; Shore & Cross, 2005; Zuo, Zhao, Nguyen, Ma, & Gao, 2018) in the last decade and it has been receiving greater attention as one of the critical success factors for project success (Henrie & Sousa-Posa, 2005). Pakistan envisages economic growth in the years to follow, as it is evident from China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and other inflow of foreign direct investments. As investments mean projects, thus, this notion of cultural sensitivity in managing projects in Pakistan is indispensable today than ever before.
Even when working within the same country or geographic boundary, project managers encounter the facets of diversity in their domestic teams because of the presence of subcultures (Richardson, 2014). Pakistan as a country shows significant differences in subcultures at provincial level as discussed by Shah and Amjad (2011). This cultural diversity calls for the cultural sensitivity even for the projects with all local team members but from different provinces.
Multicultural project management poses a big challenge in task allocation and finding the right person for the right job. On this, Pedersen, Lonner, Draguns, Trimble, and Scharron-del Rio (2016) cautioned that if an individual is assessed considering his or her culture then it can produce errors with unfortunate consequences. However, Lewis (2012) argued that stereotyping a team member, on the basis of national culture to understand influences and alignment, is better than simple avoidance; though, it has to be ensured that these stereotypes are research based (proven) and not peer based (careless) (Hassan & Ilyas, 2014). The argument is that individuals change but culture does not, or if it does then at glacial pace (Lewis, 2012). Thus, matching the right subcultural trait with the relevant PM lifecycle phase requirements is a literature gap and calls for finding the best fit.
This study has endeavored to shrink the literature gap by defining following objectives:
- 1.
Seeking convergence of ‘Lewis model’ of national culture with other models;
- 2.
Exploring where Pakistani project management teams can be placed on Lewis model;
- 3.
Mapping Pakistani subcultures in each phase of project management lifecycle; and
- 4.
Identifying Pakistani project managers’ preferred PM phase-wise traits in their teams.