Discussion: View Thread

Nikos,
I share your view. It does not make sense to invent 'cheap examples', while a the same time numerous cross-cultural encounters take place where serious conflict may emerge from different types of culturally determined patterns of behaviour.

In my research team we can refer to more than 1000 interviews in international business context in 13 countries. With open coding seven important categories of patterns of cultural dependent behaviour were identified: 1) patterns of communication styles; 2) time related behaviour; 3) rule adoption and rule obedience; 4) loyalty versus performance orientation; 5) conflict management styles (styles of criticizing); 6) knowledge transfer and integration; 7) separation of private life and business (Fink & Meierewert 2001, Fink et al. 2004, Fink et al 2005, Fink & Lehmann, 2007, Fink & Holden 2010).

Fink, G., Holden N. J., 2010. Resistance to the transfer of management knowledge in international ventures: steps towards a pathologic interpretation. In: Jan Ulijn, Geert Duysters and Elise Meijer (eds.), 2010. Strategic Alliances, Mergers and Acquisitions, The Influence of Culture on Successful Cooperation, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, Northampton, MA, USA, pp. 255-278.
Fink, G., Kölling, M., Neyer, A.-K., 2005. The Cultural Standard Method, Europainstitut der WU Wien, Working Paper 62. http://epub.wu.ac.at/450/
Fink, G., Lehmann, M., 2007. The people's twist: The cultural standard of loyalty and performance in former socialist economies. In: Pauleen D, (ed.). 2007. Cross-cultural perspectives on knowledge management. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited. pp 135-154.
Fink, G., Meierewert, S. (eds.), 2001. Interkulturelles Management – Österreichische Perspektiven. Wien: Springer Verlag.
Fink, G. and Meierewert, S. (2004): Issues of time in international, intercultural management: East and Central Europe from the perspective of Austrian managers, in: Journal for East European Management Studies, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2004, p. 61-84.
More was published in German, Czech, and Hungarian language.

There is no need to invent 'presumably good' examples, which basically are not making sense in comparison with  results derived from serious research, which delivers empirical evidence about conflict emerging in management interaction due to different unwritten, yet culturally determined  rules of behaviour.

Best wishes
Gerhard Fink

Nikos Bozionelos schrieb:

Hello to everyone

From my perspective, I cannot see any absolution or justification in consciously providing false information to learners. Students' interest can be stimulated in many ways, and certainly one does not have to resort to actions that are ethically questionable. Besides, there are many true facts about culture and cultural differences that are inherently fascinating.

Nikos Bozionelos PhD CPsychol

Associate Editor for Career Development International - a Thomson Scientific indexed Journal

Professor in OB & IM

Durham Business School

Durham University

Ushaw College

Durham DH7 9RH

United Kingdom

Tel:  (44) 191 3345512

Fax: (44) 191 3345201

Personal web-page of Nikos Bozionelos - http://www.dur.ac.uk/nikos.bozionelos/index.html

---

From: International Management Discussion List [IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] on behalf of Betty Jane Punnett [eureka@CARIBSURF.COM]
Sent: 17 June 2012 22:50
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Re: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

Great discussion! As one of the authors/lecturers who has perpetuated some of the intercultural myths, let me say that when I teach this 'stuff', I preface it by saying that we don't know the 'truth' of the examples, but that I believe they are helpful in getting the students to see the possibility of making mistakes internationally and interculturally. Students like these examples, and the key is to get them interested in the whole concept of cultural differences, so that they then want to go to a deeper level of understanding. A simulation like Bafa Bafa is not 'real' but it gets students' interest and that's the key. So let's not be too hard on the myths, but let's correct them wherever we can.

 

BettyJane Punnett

Professor, International Business & Management

University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus

Barbados

For Information on Managing: A Developing Country Perspective (Punnett, 2012, Routledge) go to http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415590693  

check MailScanner has detected a possible fraud attempt from "urlblockederror.aspx" claiming to be www.healthyweightvillage.com for a healthier lifestyle

to learn more about Punnetts www.Punnetts.com

 

From: International Management Discussion List [mailto:IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Romie Littrell
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2012 6:36 PM
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

This excellent article names names:  Frank B. Tipton, (2008),""Thumbs-up is a rude gesture in Australia": The presentation of culture in international business textbooks", Critical Perspectives on International Business, Vol. 4 Iss: 1 pp. 7 - 24, Emerald Publ.

Hope for the USA? "If something is unsustainable, it will stop."--Herb Stein, an economic adviser to Richard Nixon
Romie F. Littrell, BA, MBA,PhD, FIAIR, An fánaí fiáin
AUT Business School N.Z., romie.littrell@aut.ac.nz
http://www.romielittrellpubs.homestead.com/
Facilitator, Leadership & Management in Sub-Sahara Africa Conferences
Contents copyright Romie F. Littrell

---

From: David Kent <dkent@GGU.EDU>
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Sent: Saturday, 16 June 2012, 8:44
Subject: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

Miguel is absolutely right and it is also amazing to me how this "urban myth" has such staying power. I have seen it in several textbooks (whose authors will go un-named! ;-).

David H. Kent, PhD
Chair, Department of Management
Ageno School of Business
Golden Gate University
536 Mission St.
San Francisco, CA 94105

Tel. (415) 442-6523
Fax. (415) 442-6579

>>> Miguel Olivas-Lujan 06/15/12 8:24 AM >>>

Excellent points, Romie!  Just a couple of updates from a native Spanish speaker who lived in Mexico during the years that both the "Chevy Nova" and the "Nova" branded gas by Pemex could be found easily in the streets:

 

1. Pemex's "Nova" gas has been discontinued and "Magna" has been the cheaper brand (low-octane, around 87) for a decade or two (one credible version is that "Nova" still had lead on it, but the enactment of more stringent regulations at the end of the 20th Century made Pemex switch to the lead-free "Magna"; see a picture of a contemporary gas pump here: http://www.mexadventure.com/MexicoTravel/Fuel.cfm; I'm sorry I could not immediately find an exact date in which "Magna" substituted "Nova" but I feel pretty confident that this happened before I started my doctoral-level education at the end of the 1990s).  Still, the argument that Mexicans had no compunction about filling their tanks for decades, with a brand of gas named "Nova" is absolutely valid.
2. As a "Romance language", Spanish has inherited many words from ancient Latin, "nova" (i.e., new) being one of them.  In elementary school, many children learn that an "estrella nova" (literally a "new star") is a night luminary that suddenly experiences very visible activity (see http://www.astromia.com/glosario/nova.htm for a Spanish-language basic website explaining this term in some detail; want to see more sites with similar content?  Check http://www.bing.com/search?q=estrella+nova+astronomia&go=&qs=n&form=QBRE&pq=estrella+nova+astronomia&sc=0-13&sp=-1&sk=; a related term is a "supernova", which also experiences very visible activity, but to a much greater scale).  

One could argue that a vehicle is not the type of product that one would want to see shining and exploding like a so-called "new star", but -getting back to the main point-these words again support the fact that the word "nova" is not a term that native Spanish speakers would confuse with the sentence "No va" (yes, it is a full sentence with an implicit subject, for those of you English grammarians that are not used to considering a conjugated verb as a full thought)!!  Bad choice of name for a car?  Arguably, but I absolutely loved the analogy with the word "Notable" in English below!!!  If the word "Nova" was ever an issue, it must have been for non-native speakers of Spanish! 

 

Can't tell you how many times I've rolled (or just closed) my eyes after hearing this "classic example of poor cross-cultural marketing" in a wide variety of contexts (classroom, cocktail conversations, etc.).  Unfortunately, this is not the only example of "perpetuating falsehoods" in our disciplines, but if we clear this one this decade, perhaps we have made some progress...

 

If your professional interests motivated to reading all of this note, I wish you, dear colleague, a great weekend!!!

 

Miguel

_____________________________

Miguel R. Olivas-Lujan, Ph.D.   .:.   Professor   .:.   Administrative Sciences

Clarion U of Pennsylvania   .:.   840 Wood St.   .:.   Clarion, PA 16214

Tel: +1.814.393.2641   .:.   Fax: +1.814.393.1910

Call for chapters on Social Media in Management 

Guest Editor, JMP SI on "Hispanics and Latin Americans in the Workplace" 

Series Editor, Emerald's Advanced Series in Management 

Let me know your thoughts on Dr Olivas' blog 

 

 

From: Romie Littrell <littrellaom@YAHOO.CO.NZ>
Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2012 13:37:22 -0700
Subject: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

A False Claim:   The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish.

Summarised from: www.snopes.com, Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2012 by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson.

I'm still seeing publications and comments with the incorrect and misleading legend of "The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish. I become increasingly concerned about the diligence and responsibility of authors of textbooks and articles. As snopes.com points out, the 'Chevy Nova legend lives on in countless marketing textbooks, is repeated in numerous business seminars, and is a staple of newspaper and magazine columnists who need a pithy example of human folly. Perhaps someday this apocryphal tale will become what it should be: an illustration of how easily even "experts" can sometimes fall victim to the very same dangers they warn us about.'

Part of the fiction is that GM executives were baffled until someone finally pointed out to them that "nova" translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish. The embarrassed automobile giant changed the model name to the Caribe, and sales of the car took off. Actually Caribe is a Volkwagen model, not a Chevy. The truth is that the Chevrolet Nova's name didn't significantly affect its sales: it sold well in both its major Spanish-language markets, Mexico and Venezuela. (Its Venezuelan sales figures actually surpassed GM's expectations.)

From snopes.com: The original Chevrolet Nova (initially the Chevy II) hit the U.S. market in 1962. (This car should not be confused with the smaller, front wheel drive vehicle which was produced in 1985 as a joint venture between General Motors and Toyota and also assigned the Nova name.) Between 1972 and 1978 the Chevrolet Nova was also sold in Mexico and several other Spanish-speaking countries, primarily Venezuela. Shortly afterwards the great "Nova" legend arose, a legend which a little linguistic analysis shows it to be improbable:

First of all, the phrase "no va" (literally "doesn't go") and the word "nova" are distinct entities with different pronunciations in Spanish: the former is two words and is pronounced with the accent on the second word; the latter is one word with the accent on the first syllable. Assuming that Spanish speakers would naturally see the word "nova" as equivalent to the phrase "no va" and think "Hey, this car doesn't go!" is akin to assuming that English speakers would spurn a dinette set sold under the name Notable because nobody wants a dinette set that doesn't include a table.

Although "no va" can be literally translated as "no go," it would be a curious locution for a speaker of Spanish to use in reference to a car. Just as an English speaker would describe a broken-down car by saying that it "doesn't run" rather than it "doesn't go," so a Spanish speaker would refer to a malfunctioning automobile by saying "no marcha" or "no funciona" or "no camina" rather than "no va."

Pemex (the Mexican government-owned oil monopoly) sold (and still sells) gasoline in Mexico under the name "Nova." If Mexicans were going to associate anything with the Chevrolet Nova based on its name, it would probably be this gasoline. In any case, if Mexicans had no compunctions about filling the tanks of their cars with a type of gasoline whose name advertised that it "didn't go," why would they reject a similarly-named automobile?

This legend assumes that a handful of General Motors executives launched a car into a foreign market and remained in blissful ignorance about a possible adverse translation of its name. Even if nobody in Detroit knew enough rudimentary Spanish to notice the coincidence, the Nova could not have been brought to market in Mexico and/or South America without the involvement of numerous Spanish speakers engaged to translate user manuals, prepare advertising and promotional materials, communicate with the network of Chevrolet dealers in the target countries, etc. In fact, GM was aware of the translation and opted to retain the model name "Nova" in Spanish-speaking markets anyway, because they (correctly) felt the matter to be unimportant.

Additional information from snopes.com:
http://www.novaresource.org/history.htm
Debunking several urban legends: Ricks, David A.   Blunders in International Business. Cambridge, U.S.A.: Blackwell, 1993.   ISBN 1-55786-414-4   (p. 35).

 

Hope for the USA? "If something is unsustainable, it will stop."--Herb Stein, an economic adviser to Richard Nixon
Romie F. Littrell, BA, MBA,PhD, FIAIR, An fánaí fiáin
AUT Business School N.Z., romie.littrell@aut.ac.nz
http://www.romielittrellpubs.homestead.com/
Facilitator, Leadership & Management in Sub-Sahara Africa Conferences
Contents copyright Romie F. Littrell

 

--

Gerhard Fink
Jean Monnet Professor

E-Mail: gerhard.fink@wu.ac.at

View my research on my Author pages:

http://ssrn.com/author=92836

http://wuvienna.academia.edu/GerhardFink

 

Outstanding Paper Award Winner

Emerald Literati Network Awards for Excellence 2012:

Maurice Yolles, Gerhard Fink and Daniel Dauber "Organisations as emergent normative personalities: part 1, the concepts"

published in Kybernetes, Vol. 40, Nos. 5-6, pp. 635-669, 2011.

See also: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1924056

View my research on my SSRN Author page: http://ssrn.com/author=92836

 

 

I agree. Gazi Islam's reminder of the Mead-Freedman-Clifford debate is very important and telling. It reminds us that social research cannot escape bias -- when we study culture, we learn as much about ourselves as our "subjects."  All research is "interested" -- we just need to be aware of this as we interpret it.

Best, Mary-Yoko Brannen

Mary Yoko Brannen, Ph.D.

Professor of Strategy & Management

Bd de Constance - 77305 Fontainebleau Cedex, France

email: mary-yoko.brannen@insead.edu

Office: +33 (0)1 60 98 34 33

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On Jun 18, 2012, at 1:07 PM, Cecile G. Betit wrote:

Thank you so much Gazi Islam for this thoughtful post. 

 

Students of comparative culture understand myth within that context to have a powerful impact on daily life and belief.  Students of evolutionary development place the mythic within a stage of consciousness.

 

The contrast that you draw in Mead and Freeman is a helpful one.  You offer excellent and wise advice regarding use of the Nova case.

 

Thank you so much for the post. 

 

Best,

Cecile Betit 

 

 

From: International Management Discussion List [mailto:IMD-L@aomlists.pace.edu] On Behalf Of Gazi Islam
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2012 3:27 PM
To: IMD-L@aomlists.pace.edu
Subject: Re: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

Hello All,

Although there seems to be an overwhelming consensus about the use of real examples in teaching culture (a consensus with which I agree), I think it is worth pushing a bit about what we consider realism in these examples. This is particularly true considering how quick some of the posts have been to equate "myth" with "falsehood", which is surprising considering the importance of "myth" to the study of culture.

 

Clearly, the Nova example IS a real example.  The question is, "an example of what?"

 

An analogy comes to mind that might be useful, regarding the Mead-Freeman debate about the "true" aspects of Samoan culture.  To very briefly summarize, Margaret Mead had empirically studied Samoan culture, "scientifically" contrasting the ease with which gender and sexual relations were carried out in Samoa, in contrast to the anxiety-riddled West.  60 years later, Derek Freeman fiercely attacked Meads analysis, "scientifically" showing (in what Clifford called "170 pages of empirical overkill") Samoa to be anxiety riddled and violent, in contrast to Mead's  idyllic vision.  In the attempt to critique U.S. Puritanism, it seemed, Mead had spun a myth and overlooked the facts.

 

In other words, Freeman uncovered Mead's analysis to be a Nova, so to speak.

 

However, in Clifford's (1986) lovely discussion of this debate, he questions the motives of BOTH Mead and Freeman.  If Mead was so eager to show the non-Western world as an idyllic paradise of natural order, Freeman was bent on proving it to be a Hobbesian war against all, reinforcing a sociobiological view of culture.  Nobody in this debate was innocent of having a bias. 

 

The point is that we learn more by contrasting the two myths against each other than we do from wondering what Samoa is "really" like.

 

Wouldn't it be interesting to show how the Nova example, as well as the animosity here directed against it, were both countermoves in a kind of battle of myths, rather than simply a banal case of one side getting it wrong and the other side having all the facts? The relevant question is not "did the Nova brand hurt sales" (after all, the point of the example really isn't about GM's sales), but something like "why does this case resonate so universally as a cultural myth?"  The Nova is a story we have told ourselves about ourselves for years, to millions of students.  It shouldn't be so off-handedly dismissed, I think.

 

Ok, again, thanks for putting such great food for thought on the listserv!

Gazi Islam

 

---

Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2012 17:27:53 +0000
From: D.Dauber@WARWICK.AC.UK
Subject: Re: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU

Dear colleagues:

 

with great interest I follow this discussion. My personal teaching approach has always been to use actual problems reflected in my or other colleagues' research. Indeed, most of my students work with real data (qualitative and quantitative) to explore relationships and concepts as well as develop a solid understanding of theories and their limitations. I am strongly of the opinion that students most benefit from real-life cases and provide them with practical tasks that enable them to put their (sometimes very theoretical knowledge) into practice. I assume most of you would agree that employability of students is not determined on whether specific theories are known by hard, but rather whether conceptual knowledge enables students to systematically approach problems and whether they acquired the competencies necessary to solve them. This might most likely be achieved by referring to real data. 

 

Therefore, I can only agree to what Gerhard Fink said. There is enough data available that can serve as a very real AND interesting platform for teaching. Thus, I would assume that the need for examples which provide 'idealized' scenarios is questionable, since real-life is most of the time not ideal.

 

Looking forward to other's opinion.

 

Best regards,

 

Daniel Dauber

 

Nikos, 
I share your view. It does not make sense to invent 'cheap examples', while a the same time numerous cross-cultural encounters take place where serious conflict may emerge from different types of culturally determined patterns of behaviour. 

In my research team we can refer to more than 1000 interviews in international business context in 13 countries. With open coding seven important categories of patterns of cultural dependent behaviour were identified: 1) patterns of communication styles; 2) time related behaviour; 3) rule adoption and rule obedience; 4) loyalty versus performance orientation; 5) conflict management styles (styles of criticizing); 6) knowledge transfer and integration; 7) separation of private life and business (Fink & Meierewert 2001, Fink et al. 2004, Fink et al 2005, Fink & Lehmann, 2007, Fink & Holden 2010). 

Fink, G., Holden N. J., 2010. Resistance to the transfer of management knowledge in international ventures: steps towards a pathologic interpretation. In: Jan Ulijn, Geert Duysters and Elise Meijer (eds.), 2010. Strategic Alliances, Mergers and Acquisitions, The Influence of Culture on Successful Cooperation, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, Northampton, MA, USA, pp. 255-278.
Fink, G., Kölling, M., Neyer, A.-K., 2005. The Cultural Standard Method, Europainstitut der WU Wien, Working Paper 62. http://epub.wu.ac.at/450/
Fink, G., Lehmann, M., 2007. The people's twist: The cultural standard of loyalty and performance in former socialist economies. In: Pauleen D, (ed.). 2007. Cross-cultural perspectives on knowledge management. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited. pp 135-154.
Fink, G., Meierewert, S. (eds.), 2001. Interkulturelles Management – Österreichische Perspektiven. Wien: Springer Verlag.
Fink, G. and Meierewert, S. (2004): Issues of time in international, intercultural management: East and Central Europe from the perspective of Austrian managers, in: Journal for East European Management Studies, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2004, p. 61-84.
More was published in German, Czech, and Hungarian language.

There is no need to invent 'presumably good' examples, which basically are not making sense in comparison with  results derived from serious research, which delivers empirical evidence about conflict emerging in management interaction due to different unwritten, yet culturally determined  rules of behaviour. 

Best wishes
Gerhard Fink

Nikos Bozionelos schrieb:

Hello to everyone

From my perspective, I cannot see any absolution or justification in consciously providing false information to learners. Students' interest can be stimulated in many ways, and certainly one does not have to resort to actions that are ethically questionable. Besides, there are many true facts about culture and cultural differences that are inherently fascinating.

 

Nikos Bozionelos PhD CPsychol

Associate Editor for Career Development International - a Thomson Scientific indexed Journal

Professor in OB & IM

Durham Business School

Durham University

Ushaw College

Durham DH7 9RH

United Kingdom

Tel:  (44) 191 3345512

Fax: (44) 191 3345201

Personal web-page of Nikos Bozionelos - http://www.dur.ac.uk/nikos.bozionelos/index.html

---

From: International Management Discussion List [IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] on behalf of Betty Jane Punnett [eureka@CARIBSURF.COM]
Sent: 17 June 2012 22:50
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Re: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

Great discussion! As one of the authors/lecturers who has perpetuated some of the intercultural myths, let me say that when I teach this 'stuff', I preface it by saying that we don't know the 'truth' of the examples, but that I believe they are helpful in getting the students to see the possibility of making mistakes internationally and interculturally. Students like these examples, and the key is to get them interested in the whole concept of cultural differences, so that they then want to go to a deeper level of understanding. A simulation like Bafa Bafa is not 'real' but it gets students' interest and that's the key. So let's not be too hard on the myths, but let's correct them wherever we can.

 

BettyJane Punnett

Professor, International Business & Management

University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus

Barbados

For Information on Managing: A Developing Country Perspective (Punnett, 2012, Routledge) go to http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415590693  

check MailScanner has detected a possible fraud attempt from "urlblockederror.aspx" claiming to be www.healthyweightvillage.com for a healthier lifestyle

to learn more about Punnetts www.Punnetts.com

 

From: International Management Discussion List [mailto:IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Romie Littrell
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2012 6:36 PM
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Naming names: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

This excellent article names names:  Frank B. Tipton, (2008),""Thumbs-up is a rude gesture in Australia": The presentation of culture in international business textbooks", Critical Perspectives on International Business, Vol. 4 Iss: 1 pp. 7 - 24, Emerald Publ.

Hope for the USA? "If something is unsustainable, it will stop."--Herb Stein, an economic adviser to Richard Nixon
Romie F. Littrell, BA, MBA,PhD, FIAIR, An fánaí fiáin 
AUT Business School N.Z., romie.littrell@aut.ac.nz 
http://www.romielittrellpubs.homestead.com/ 
Facilitator, Leadership & Management in Sub-Sahara Africa Conferences 
Contents copyright Romie F. Littrell

---

From: David Kent <dkent@GGU.EDU>
To: IMD-L@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU 
Sent: Saturday, 16 June 2012, 8:44
Subject: Re: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

Miguel is absolutely right and it is also amazing to me how this "urban myth" has such staying power. I have seen it in several textbooks (whose authors will go un-named! ;-).

David H. Kent, PhD
Chair, Department of Management
Ageno School of Business
Golden Gate University
536 Mission St.
San Francisco, CA 94105

Tel. (415) 442-6523
Fax. (415) 442-6579

>>> Miguel Olivas-Lujan 06/15/12 8:24 AM >>>

Excellent points, Romie!  Just a couple of updates from a native Spanish speaker who lived in Mexico during the years that both the "Chevy Nova" and the "Nova" branded gas by Pemex could be found easily in the streets:

 

1. Pemex's "Nova" gas has been discontinued and "Magna" has been the cheaper brand (low-octane, around 87) for a decade or two (one credible version is that "Nova" still had lead on it, but the enactment of more stringent regulations at the end of the 20th Century made Pemex switch to the lead-free "Magna"; see a picture of a contemporary gas pump here:http://www.mexadventure.com/MexicoTravel/Fuel.cfm; I'm sorry I could not immediately find an exact date in which "Magna" substituted "Nova" but I feel pretty confident that this happened before I started my doctoral-level education at the end of the 1990s).  Still, the argument that Mexicans had no compunction about filling their tanks for decades, with a brand of gas named "Nova" is absolutely valid.
2. As a "Romance language", Spanish has inherited many words from ancient Latin, "nova" (i.e., new) being one of them.  In elementary school, many children learn that an "estrella nova" (literally a "new star") is a night luminary that suddenly experiences very visible activity (see http://www.astromia.com/glosario/nova.htm for a Spanish-language basic website explaining this term in some detail; want to see more sites with similar content?  Check http://www.bing.com/search?q=estrella+nova+astronomia&go=&qs=n&form=QBRE&pq=estrella+nova+astronomia&sc=0-13&sp=-1&sk=; a related term is a "supernova", which also experiences very visible activity, but to a much greater scale).  

One could argue that a vehicle is not the type of product that one would want to see shining and exploding like a so-called "new star", but -getting back to the main point-these words again support the fact that the word "nova" is not a term that native Spanish speakers would confuse with the sentence "No va" (yes, it is a full sentence with an implicit subject, for those of you English grammarians that are not used to considering a conjugated verb as a full thought)!!  Bad choice of name for a car?  Arguably, but I absolutely loved the analogy with the word "Notable" in English below!!!  If the word "Nova" was ever an issue, it must have been for non-native speakers of Spanish! 

 

Can't tell you how many times I've rolled (or just closed) my eyes after hearing this "classic example of poor cross-cultural marketing" in a wide variety of contexts (classroom, cocktail conversations, etc.).  Unfortunately, this is not the only example of "perpetuating falsehoods" in our disciplines, but if we clear this one this decade, perhaps we have made some progress...

 

If your professional interests motivated to reading all of this note, I wish you, dear colleague, a great weekend!!!

 

Miguel

_____________________________

Miguel R. Olivas-Lujan, Ph.D.   .:.   Professor   .:.   Administrative Sciences

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From: Romie Littrell <littrellaom@YAHOO.CO.NZ>
Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2012 13:37:22 -0700
Subject: Perpetuating falsehoods: The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish

 

A False Claim:   The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish. 

Summarised from: www.snopes.com, Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2012 by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson.

I'm still seeing publications and comments with the incorrect and misleading legend of "The Chevrolet Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish. I become increasingly concerned about the diligence and responsibility of authors of textbooks and articles. As snopes.com points out, the 'Chevy Nova legend lives on in countless marketing textbooks, is repeated in numerous business seminars, and is a staple of newspaper and magazine columnists who need a pithy example of human folly. Perhaps someday this apocryphal tale will become what it should be: an illustration of how easily even "experts" can sometimes fall victim to the very same dangers they warn us about.'

Part of the fiction is that GM executives were baffled until someone finally pointed out to them that "nova" translates as "doesn't go" in Spanish. The embarrassed automobile giant changed the model name to the Caribe, and sales of the car took off. Actually Caribe is a Volkwagen model, not a Chevy. The truth is that the Chevrolet Nova's name didn't significantly affect its sales: it sold well in both its major Spanish-language markets, Mexico and Venezuela. (Its Venezuelan sales figures actually surpassed GM's expectations.) 

From snopes.com: The original Chevrolet Nova (initially the Chevy II) hit the U.S. market in 1962. (This car should not be confused with the smaller, front wheel drive vehicle which was produced in 1985 as a joint venture between General Motors and Toyota and also assigned the Nova name.) Between 1972 and 1978 the Chevrolet Nova was also sold in Mexico and several other Spanish-speaking countries, primarily Venezuela. Shortly afterwards the great "Nova" legend arose, a legend which a little linguistic analysis shows it to be improbable: 

First of all, the phrase "no va" (literally "doesn't go") and the word "nova" are distinct entities with different pronunciations in Spanish: the former is two words and is pronounced with the accent on the second word; the latter is one word with the accent on the first syllable. Assuming that Spanish speakers would naturally see the word "nova" as equivalent to the phrase "no va" and think "Hey, this car doesn't go!" is akin to assuming that English speakers would spurn a dinette set sold under the name Notable because nobody wants a dinette set that doesn't include a table.

Although "no va" can be literally translated as "no go," it would be a curious locution for a speaker of Spanish to use in reference to a car. Just as an English speaker would describe a broken-down car by saying that it "doesn't run" rather than it "doesn't go," so a Spanish speaker would refer to a malfunctioning automobile by saying "no marcha" or "no funciona" or "no camina" rather than "no va."

Pemex (the Mexican government-owned oil monopoly) sold (and still sells) gasoline in Mexico under the name "Nova." If Mexicans were going to associate anything with the Chevrolet Nova based on its name, it would probably be this gasoline. In any case, if Mexicans had no compunctions about filling the tanks of their cars with a type of gasoline whose name advertised that it "didn't go," why would they reject a similarly-named automobile?

This legend assumes that a handful of General Motors executives launched a car into a foreign market and remained in blissful ignorance about a possible adverse translation of its name. Even if nobody in Detroit knew enough rudimentary Spanish to notice the coincidence, the Nova could not have been brought to market in Mexico and/or South America without the involvement of numerous Spanish speakers engaged to translate user manuals, prepare advertising and promotional materials, communicate with the network of Chevrolet dealers in the target countries, etc. In fact, GM was aware of the translation and opted to retain the model name "Nova" in Spanish-speaking markets anyway, because they (correctly) felt the matter to be unimportant.

Additional information from snopes.com:
http://www.novaresource.org/history.htm
Debunking several urban legends: Ricks, David A.   Blunders in International Business. Cambridge, U.S.A.: Blackwell, 1993.   ISBN 1-55786-414-4   (p. 35).

 

Hope for the USA? "If something is unsustainable, it will stop."--Herb Stein, an economic adviser to Richard Nixon
Romie F. Littrell, BA, MBA,PhD, FIAIR, An fánaí fiáin 
AUT Business School N.Z., romie.littrell@aut.ac.nz 
http://www.romielittrellpubs.homestead.com/ 
Facilitator, Leadership & Management in Sub-Sahara Africa Conferences 
Contents copyright Romie F. Littrell

 

 

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Gerhard Fink 
Jean Monnet Professor

E-Mail: gerhard.fink@wu.ac.at

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Outstanding Paper Award Winner

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Maurice Yolles, Gerhard Fink and Daniel Dauber "Organisations as emergent normative personalities: part 1, the concepts"

published in Kybernetes, Vol. 40, Nos. 5-6, pp. 635-669, 2011.

See also: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1924056

View my research on my SSRN Author page: http://ssrn.com/author=92836

 

 

 

 

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Daniel Dauber, Dr.

d.dauber@warwick.ac.uk

Research papers available at: http://ssrn.com/author=1588580

 

Outstanding Paper Award Winner

Emerald Literati Network Awards for Excellence 2012:

Maurice Yolles, Gerhard Fink and Daniel Dauber "Organisations as emergent normative personalities: part 1, the concepts" Kybernetes, Vol. 40, Nos. 5-6, pp. 635-669, 2011.

See also: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1924056

 

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