From the old into the new: how an international practice transfer fostered an organization’s intercultural development

So far, the field of intercultural organizational development hasn’t received much attention in international business research but shall be the core focus of this dissertation. Triggered by the transfer of a sales practice to Spain and other countries, an organizational unit of a German automobile manufacturer develops a more and more ethnorelativistic attitude towards its international subsidiaries through processes of intercultural learning.

The author, first, ethnographically studies the international practice transfer to Spain. A central observation are the resulting intercultural learning processes on the part of headquarter actors. In the following, the author focuses her attention on this ongoing development, supporting it even more by enacting an action research approach.

This dissertation contributes by introducing an urgently needed empirical example in the field of intercultural development. Additionally, it expands the field of international practice transfer by not only looking at changes at recipient unit level but by also investigating the transfer’s reverse impact on headquarter actors.

Carina Stumpf studied international cultural and business studies at the University of Passau. In the following, she worked on and finalized the present dissertation in a cooperation between AUDI AG and the Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich. She is currently working in the Diversity Management of AUDI AG, still very much focused on intercultural communication and cooperation.

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