International partnership between the Growth Hub Ghana, Hofstede Insights

The Growth Hub Ghana is a 100% Ghanaian-owned consulting firm that provides advisory and capacity-building services to small, medium, and large-scale businesses in Ghana. Mrs. Lovelace Adjei-Aku, a former banker and experienced professional, is the company’s Lead Consultant.

The Growth Hub Ghana recently secured an international partnership with Hofstede Insights, a Finland-based international consulting group. Hofstede Insights curates and commercializes the research of late Prof Geert Hofstede – a Dutch academic regarded by the Economist™ Magazine and the Wall Street Journal™ as one of the most influential management thinkers that ever lived.

His work is a standard part of most international MBA programs and other postgraduate management studies. Hofstede Insights uses this body of work to help organizations build the best Organisational Cultures. They also use it to improve intercultural understanding and collaboration in the workplace, especially amongst colleagues from different nations.

The company identified Ghana as one of the African countries to focus on in its international expansion. They also selected the Growth Hub Ghana as their preferred partner to represent the brand and deliver its knowledge-based services to prospective clients in Ghana.

The two companies organized a media launch event and an executive roundtable for a select group of businesspeople and media professionals to celebrate this partnership. In observing the Covid-19 protocols, less than thirty persons were allowed into the event hall. However, over 1,700 other participants joined the event virtually on Zoom™ and Live Streamed Facebook™. monitored at the global HQ Helsinki, Finland. A goodwill message was delivered by the group CEO Mr. Egbert Schram, who dialed in from Helsinki.

The Growth Hub’s Lead Consultant Mrs. Lovelace Adjei-Aku in her address said, at the Growth Hub, we believe that the key differentiator or competitive advantage for any organization is its people.

Given that a diverse set of employees contribute to the company objectives realization, one needs to ensure value is not destroyed in the process of managing these people from different backgrounds and nations.

It’s based on this firm belief that we partner with Hofstede to provide support and insights into how organizational culture, leadership identity, employee diversity, and inclusion can be an integral part of a long-term strategy.

The Growth Hub and Hofstede partner with you to co-create cultural experiences that would influence leaders to transform and achieve business goals whilst ensuring that both leaders and employees are productive, creative, and fulfilled.

Dr. Okey Okere, Hofstede Insights’ Regional Vice President for Africa, who flew in to attend the event from the Hub Office in Nigeria made a short presentation. In his presentation, Dr. Okere explained what Hofstede Insights does and how they intend to collaborate with the Growth Hub Ghana.

The special guest of honor, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hon Kwaku Ampratwum-Sarpong, gave the keynote speech. The Hon Deputy Minister spoke about the importance of culture in the workplace. He highlighted how culture affects doing business with persons from other countries.

In addition, Hon Ampratwum-Sarpong mentioned that having a functional workplace culture would ensure that people in organizations hold a shared view and would be more likely to succeed together. He also remarked that the ministry of foreign affairs is constantly looking at infusing cultures that would enable them to remain relevant and effective, especially in the face of the “New Normal.”

In the event’s second segment, Dr. Okere hosted the executive roundtable. He invited Mrs. Amma Korantema Ansah (Lead Consultant, Peak Resources Consulting) and Mr. Samuel Kwadjo Teye (Director, Human Capital, Stanbic Bank Ghana) to join Mr. Schram and Mrs. Adje-Aku as panelists. The round table covered a wide range of issues, including:

1.How to define culture

2.Why culture is essential for strategy

3.Scientific ways of measuring organizational culture, and its impact on strategy and decision making

4.How new practices such as flexi-hours, remote working or the four-day week are affecting workplace culture

5.The significant challenges organizations faced in executing strategy in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic

6.The main lessons that organizations can take from the COVID-19 pandemic regarding culture and strategy

7.What would dominate the discourse on organizational culture in the next decade

An organization’s culture must become aligned with its strategy if it would stand any chance of success.

There is no universally applicable or “one-size-fits-all” solution regarding organizational culture. Every organization is different and requires unique measures to deal with cultural misalignment.

Many firms, unfortunately, go about workplace culture transformation by guesswork and end up failing to make any substantial changes.

Hofstede Insights has a structured, research-based, data-driven method to help organizations identify their peculiarities and design a unique culture to help them succeed.
The firm would help organizations in Ghana strategically identify and implement the necessary culture changes to help them succeed.

Watch the video below: