| This study begins with the idea that organization is a metaphor for the human mind. It assumes that organization has rational, cognitive, aesthetic and epistemological dimensions, and that these are translated through design by leadership. The study then explores these two constructs of leadership and organization design through the experiences of leaders from one culture who are exposed to another culture. It uses Social Semiotics as grounded theory, building on the proposition that culture provides a context against which design ideologies are produced through discourse. Different cultural contexts produce different discourses and design ideologies, and individuals become aware of difference when at the margins of communities.;The proposition of this study is that such awareness does occur and can be explained against a cultural context. The empirical framework is holistic, describing the main constructs of leadership and organization design through the perspectives of Reason, Cognition, Aesthetics and Truth. The research intention is self-reflexivity and cultural inclusivity, and so multiple perspectives were chosen. For similar reasons, a design-based approach to methodology is used with qualitatively oriented interviews, quantitatively oriented surveys and metaphor analysis in a single case study of India. Research subjects are Indian students who had formerly held leadership positions in that country and then traveled to the U.S. for a Master's or PhD program related to Organization Theory. Thus the main constructs are explored and explained through dimensions of difference identified by research students through their engagement in discourses in these two countries.;Spanning nearly two years and including interviews and surveys from sixty research subjects across the U.S., it was observed that the research proposition was valid. Several dimensions of difference were identified and explained against a cultural context. Most of these were found to be significant despite gender and sector differentiation of the research population. Two metaphors of organization also emerged during the study, as design ideologies that helped research subjects think about and manage organizations in the context of India. Both these metaphors are contextually driven and leadership-oriented, insights that are critical for those who engage with India at a practical or academic level. Since these insights are culturally based, they are significant to the wider debate between universalism and relativism in Organization Theory.;This study makes no claims about generalizability of insights to other cultural contexts, nor does it propose causal claims of culture on the main constructs of leadership and organization design or vice versa. Instead this is a cross-sectional analysis that seeks to understand extant social phenomena, by focusing on what may be culturally inspired when we think about leadership and organization design in contemporary India. |
