A cross cultural comparison of perceived managerial competence

Abstract

For the past years and up till today, the concept of managerial competence has been a

popular topic for researchers to explore. John Beck (1984) developed a composite model

of managerial competence based largely on the integrated competency model of Richard

E. Boyatzis (1982). He also developed a 145-item questionnaire on managerial

competence and administered it to groups of Hong Kong and Singapore MBA students

over a period of ten years. The purpose of this report is to establish the internal reliability

of this self-administered questionnaire and to do a comparison between the competence

profile of Hong Kong and Singapore samples. Generally, the interitem reliability

coefficients of the questionnaire are acceptable after omitting some questions with low

correlation and only a few coefficients are unacceptable. Different clusters of competences

emerged from both Hong Kong and Singapore data and they differ significantly from the

composite model of John Beck. Four competences that significantly differentiate Hong

Kong and Singapore managers are identified. Further research can be conducted to

establish the validity of the emergent models of managerial competence and to find out

why managers in the two countries differ in terms of the four competences identified.

Also, the questionnaire may also be modified to improve the interitem reliability.