Recent developments in the global economy and in multinational corporations have placed significant emphasis on the cognitive orientations of managers, giving rise to a number of concepts such as ‘global mindset’ that are presumed to be associated with the effective management of multinational corporations. This paper reviews the literature on global mindset and clarifies some of the conceptual confusion surrounding the construct. We identify common themes across writers, suggesting that the majority of studies fall into one of three research perspectives: cultural, strategic, and multidimensional. We also identify two constructs from the social sciences – cosmopolitanism and cognitive complexity – that underlie the perspectives found in the literature. We then use these two constructs to develop an integrative theoretical framework of global mindset. We then provide a critical assessment of the field of global mindset and suggest directions for future theoretical and empirical research. Journal of International Business Studies (2007) 38, 231–258. doi:10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8400265

SummaryDrawing upon the managerial cognition and the upper echelons perspectives, this study proposes that the cognitive capabilities of top executives significantly affect globalization efforts. Specifically, the study suggests that managerial attention patterns or the cognitive processes of 'noticing and constructing meaning' about the environment influence strategic posture of firms. Based on a longitudinal sample of U.S. firms operating in technologically intensive industries, the results indicate that firms were more likely to develop an expansive global strategic posture when their top management paid attention to the external environment and considered a diverse set of elements in this environment. On the other hand, firms led by top management that paid more attention to the internal environment were less likely to be global.

This article tests a model of organizational commitment in multinational corporations (MNCs). According to the model, organizational culture and human resource management (HRM) affect employee commitment directly as well as indirectly through top management team orientations. Szpecifically, we examined the effect of top management team global orientation and geocentric orientation, which are seen as contributing uniquely to employee commitment in MNCs. The model was tested on a sample of 1664 core employees working in 39 affiliates of 10 MNCs. We found strong overall support for the model. In particular, organizational culture characterized by high adaptability and a HRM system characterized by high performance work practices were found to have a significant and direct effect on employee commitment. In addition, we found that the effect of these traditional elements of the human organization is partially mediated through top management orientations, specific to international firms. The validity and generalizability of these results are reinforced by the control of a set of demographic variables as well as nationality of parent company.

How is social hierarchy in multinational corporations (MNCs) culturally produced, contested and reproduced? Although the international business literature has acknowledged the importance of culture, it gives little consideration to its role in constructing social hierarchies and symbolic boundaries between individuals and groups within MNCs. We take a Bourdieusian approach to understanding the role of cultural capital in structuring the social hierarchy in the MNC under two contrasting organizational architectures: hierarchical and network architecture. We argue that cultural capital serves as an instrument of power and status within the MNC, influencing access to valuable resources such as jobs, rewards and opportunities. Our framework further suggests that the transition from hierarchical towards network architecture sets in motion a high-stakes political struggle between headquarters and subsidiary actors over the relative value of their cultural capital in a bid to preserve or gain dominance and to determine the ‘rules of the game’ that order the social hierarchy in the MNC. We elaborate on this political struggle by theorizing about the relative dominance of cultural versus social capital, the content and relative value of firm-specific and cosmopolitan cultural capital, and the convertibility of cultural capital into other forms of capital under hierarchical and network architectures.

TRANSCULTURAL BROKERAGE: THE ROLE OF COSMOPOLITANS IN BRIDGING STRUCTURAL AND CULTURAL HOLES ABSTRACTThe growth and proliferation of global systems and transnational cultures have generated larger and more diverse types of cosmopolitans, all of whom span conventional social boundaries. Understanding this diversity is increasingly important because cosmopolitans often bridge across a wide range of transnational and global networks within and across global organizations. Drawing on multiple disciplines, we conceptualize cosmopolitanism as an embodied disposition characterized by high levels of cultural transcendence and openness that are manifested in and enacted along varied trajectories of cultural embeddedness in one's own culture and cultural engagement with the cultural Other. We then propose an analytical framework for the influence of cosmopolitan disposition on transcultural brokerage processes, specifically on bridging structural and cultural holes. Finally, we present a typology of cosmopolitan brokers and their corresponding practices and activities as they engage in transcultural brokerage. By recognizing the diversity and complexity of cosmopolitans and their respective dispositions, we significantly expand the pool of "global talent" beyond the traditional focus on expatriates, and we challenge the conventional wisdom on who counts as talent in an interconnected world.