Effects of collectivism and individualism on performance: Dynamic collectivism in Korean firms

Abstract

In order to understand cultural value orientations of Korean employees, in the study I adopted the concept of dynamic collectivism, defined as the tendency of showing high on both collectivism and individualism at the individual level. I hypothesized that employees with collective dynamism would show organizational commitment and creativity in performance. I tested the hypothesis with 384 employees of Korean firms representing different industries. As predicted, dynamic collectivism increased both organizational commitment and creativity in performance. Beyond this finding, the results indicated that collectivism increased organizational commitment but decreased creativity, and individualism dampened organizational commitment and increased creativity. I concluded that dynamic collectivism is key to understanding organizational dynamics and employees' orientations in Korean firms.