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Antecedents of Trust across Foci: A Comparative Study of Turkey and China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Syeda Arzu Wasti ,
Hwee Hoon Tan  and
Selin Eser Erdil
Syeda Arzu Wasti
Affiliation:
Sabanci University, Turkey
Hwee Hoon Tan
Affiliation:
Singapore Management University, Singapore
Selin Eser Erdil
Affiliation:
Sabanci University, Turkey
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Abstract

Instead of importing Western models of intelpersonal trust, we adopted a qualitative approach to understand trust relationships from indigenous cultures' perspectives. We examined trust relationships directed at diilerent foci in the organization (supervisor, peer, and subordinate) in two different countries, Turkey and China. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 Turkish and 30 Chinese employees working for a variety of large-scale organizations located in Istanbul, Turkey and Shenzhen, China. We report the content analysis of trust-building critical incidents narrated by the respondents. While the general antecedents of Ability, Benevolence, and Integrity were found to exist in both countries. Benevolence, with its culture-specific manifestations, played a very important role in trust-building across multiple foci in both countries. We also found that trust relationships in these two contexts tended to go beyond the professional domain, and to involve sharing of personal time, information, and space. Drawing on this evidence, we propose a trust-building process that is more affective in nature and which straddles both work and non-work domains.

Keywords

Chinacross-culturalculturetrustTurkey中国跨文化文化信任土耳其
Type
Regular Articles
Information
Management and Organization Review , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , July 2011 , pp. 279 - 302
Copyright
Copyright © International Association for Chinese Management Research 2011

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