Leading
リード
How much distance is expected between a boss and the team.
Leading: NORD −3 (DK −3, SE −3, FI −2), NL −3, IL −2, US −1, UK −1, DE 0, FR +1, BR +1, PL +1, KR +2, CN +2, JP +3.
No source: India, Ukraine
NORD is drawn as a span over its members: DK −3, SE −3, FI −2.
Source: Erin Meyer, The Culture Map (2014) and her country mapping charts. Positions are approximate, read off her charts onto a seven-step grid.
Positions as text
| Country or region | Step (−3 to +3) |
|---|---|
| The Nordics NORD | −3 (DK −3, SE −3, FI −2) |
| Netherlands NL | −3 |
| Israel IL | −2 |
| United States US | −1 |
| United Kingdom UK | −1 |
| Germany DE | 0 |
| France FR | +1 |
| Brazil BR | +1 |
| Poland PL | +1 |
| South Korea KR | +2 |
| China CN | +2 |
| Japan JP | +3 |
The two ends
- Left end Egalitarian
- The ideal distance between boss and team is small. The best boss is a facilitator among equals, and skipping levels is normal.
- Right end Hierarchical
- The ideal distance is large. The best boss is a strong director out in front, status matters, and communication follows the hierarchy.
What it is built from
The expected distance between a boss and the team: whether skipping a level to talk to someone is acceptable, whether the boss acts as a facilitator among equals or as a strong director, and how much status shows in seating, titles and who speaks first.
Eight scales from Erin Meyer's The Culture Map (2014), built from her interviews and teaching with international managers. She publishes charts, not numbers, so each country is read off her chart onto a coarse seven-step grid. The positions are relative: a country is direct or indirect compared with the others on the line.
Limits: the scales are not a validated survey instrument, the source population is mostly managers in multinational companies, and neighbouring steps are not meaningfully different. How to read these scales