Transnational Management

A case study of a particular population, transnational businesspeople working in German multinational corporations in Seoul, and examines nunchi (emotional intelligence), an important non–Western organizational phenomenon, and the role of symbols of identity in the recontextualisation process of adopting nunchi into strategic self-presentations.

Consequently, this book will be a unique source for both scholars and practitioners, as its ethnographic approach provides enlightening new insights contributing towards an improved understanding of nunchi and identities in transnational management. In contributing a challenge to peculiar perspectives by taking a non-Western concept and exploring its relevance, this book provides a unique picture of nunchi and identity than has previously been presented in management studies. Thus, this book implies that nunchi is not a fixed object but a strategic tool, which allows transnational businesspeople to promote their individual drives, which leads on to new forms of self-presentation tailored to transnational business.

Steffen Kromer is a business anthropologist and management consultant, who earned his PhD from Royal Holloway, University of London.