6 - A Structure of Inequality

Summary

A non-governmental organization (NGO) once sent its human resources director, Philippe Rosen, to visit its mission in Kenya. Upon arrival, Philippe was impressed by the progressive management style that the country team had adopted. The expatriates did everything they could think of to promote leadership by the local staff. One of their initiatives empowered Kenyan employees, even the lowest-ranking ones, to chair the biweekly coordination meetings on a rotating basis. Despite these efforts, Philippe heard multiple complaints about the international staff from the local personnel. He found most worrisome the various grievances indicating that expatriates inadvertently abused their position of authority. They would, for instance, ask Kenyan colleagues to run an errand; the Kenyans would accept with a smile, not daring to explain that doing so would mean forfeiting their lunch break, given their schedule. Then, they would run the errand and lose the opportunity to eat and rest during the day. The problem, Philippe realized, was that the Kenyan staff felt that they could not refuse to do anything the expatriates requested. Philippe brainstormed how to address this issue with the country management team, but even he did not appreciate just how insidious the problem was. One morning, he arrived in the office, entered the kitchen, and grumbled upon discovering that there was no coffee left. Ten minutes later, the cleaner told him that he could now have a cup. Philippe later realized that the cleaner had been so scared at the idea of having upset an expatriate (especially one sent by the headquarters) that she had dropped everything she was doing to run and buy coffee. “And yet,” Philippe said, “I had not requested anything. I had just showed that I was annoyed.”