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The GLOBE debate: Back to relevance

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Abstract

This is a critical summary review of the debate about the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness (GLOBE) study in JIBS and other journals between November 2006 and the present issue. Several contributors did not realize that GLOBE used three essential constructs taken from my publications in a sense entirely different from mine: values, practices, and organizational culture. Not recognizing the ensuing confusion, they had no answer for the question in my 2006 review: what did GLOBE really measure? If you do not know what you are talking about, you can continue arguing for ever. Beyond the fuzziness of what is measured, the debate leaves us with an even more fundamental question: what is the use of the GLOBE dimensions?

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Correspondence to Geert Hofstede.

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Accepted by Alain Verbeke, Area Editor, 31 May 2010.

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Hofstede, G. The GLOBE debate: Back to relevance. J Int Bus Stud 41, 1339–1346 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1057/jibs.2010.31

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/jibs.2010.31

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