Your People In the World

There's a lot to learn about optimum personal performance in the international marketplace of the 21st Century. Cultures can clash in many different, sometimes subtle, ways. Expensive time can be lost and damaging, unseen ill will can grow if we don't foster the right sort of awareness. The hazards of misunderstanding, always present in human communication, are multiplied in the intercultural environment, and manners, language and knowledge of geography are only parts of the problem. People need a framework for recognizing, collecting and applying what they will be learning throughout their careers in this new world.

There are thousands of cultural variations around the globe and no one can learn everything. Crucial to this framework is knowing about cultural differences and keeping an open, positive attitude. The key to building this framework is recognizing where your own cultural assumptions are; the goal is being able to choose when to 'do as the Romans do,' that is adapt to the local culture, on the one hand and, on the other hand, when, and how much to assert values from your own.

Building the Framework

The task of building the framework begins with some obvious factors. We want people to know geography and history. We want them to have multiple language skills ' for use and perspective. We want to be able to avoid major errors of etiquette with foreigners, and we want our people to know about the plain practical differences such as currency, and which side of the road to drive on.

All this knowledge is valuable in and of itself, but it also should be feeding people's general sense of how their own cultural backgrounds fit into the world picture. And for this we want them to keep their eyes, ears ' and minds ' open.

It is this general sense that people at all levels need to build, and build on, during their entire careers. A consciousness of this need allows each experience abroad, and with foreigners at home, to become a building block for cosmopolitan world market professionalism.People can be trained to look out for relevant information; the learning itself is going to be in their life experience.

Recognizing the Boundaries

Recognizing the boundaries of your own cultural background is not as easy as it may sound and, ironically, Americans may need more help with this than anyone else; not because there's anything wrong with us, but because our culture is so large and homogeneous to begin with, and because so much of that culture has been exported or imitated around the world. Milton Bennett, a founder of the Intercultural Communication Institute in Portland, OR, has observed that we 'tend to view many of our own values as universal, rather than ' as part of our own ethnicity.'

A Chicago Bulls jersey in the Middle East or Africa is no longer surprising, and Seinfeld in German on television may score a lot of viewers, but this does not mean people in other countries have absorbed the entire American ethos. For instance, the game of 'football' is a famous symbol of cultural differences that are in fact much deeper and more subtle. In the rest of the world, football is played with a spherical ball, by nimble players in shorts and jerseys; only in the U.S. is 'football' a hugely complex system featuring physical crashes of armored titans over an object shaped like a large yam.

Less visible than football are seriously different attitudes toward work, personal relationships, initiative, money and fairness, among other things. Can a vacation be cancelled because of an unexpected court order? Does the partner want to hear about opinions different from his/her own? How is individual achievement balanced against group achievement?

Intercultural Competence

The number of such questions is infinite. Raising them and talking about them builds in our organizations the desirable characteristic Nina Jacob, calls 'intercultural competence' in her book, Intercultural Management. There is a very substantial body of academic research focused on these questions to complement direct and shared personal experience.

For a group of young initiates, a basic workshop, fitting examples into the framework, can be a strong beginning. For people with experience but no specific training, sharing 'war stories' in a similar forum can lead not just to growth ' for everyone involved ' but also to self-assessment of areas where knowledge or sensitivity need to be improved.

Conclusion

Whether people are just setting out on their first working trip out of the United States, or are veteran 'road warriors,' they can use this framework, with growing awareness of their own culture at its core, as a durable set of tools to deliver confidence in the present, and continuous development of their savoir faire for the future.

Who could object to accumulating more savoir faire?

---

Jonathan R. Fiske, a practicing attorney, grew up in an American foreign service family in Asia, Europe and Africa. After traveling in the U.S. Navy, he enjoyed a career with Rotary International culminating in eight years as head of its branch office in Zurich, Switzerland. The only American, with a 44-person staff there, he was responsible for Europe, Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East.

There's a lot to learn about optimum personal performance in the international marketplace of the 21st Century. Cultures can clash in many different, sometimes subtle, ways. Expensive time can be lost and damaging, unseen ill will can grow if we don't foster the right sort of awareness. The hazards of misunderstanding, always present in human communication, are multiplied in the intercultural environment, and manners, language and knowledge of geography are only parts of the problem. People need a framework for recognizing, collecting and applying what they will be learning throughout their careers in this new world.

There are thousands of cultural variations around the globe and no one can learn everything. Crucial to this framework is knowing about cultural differences and keeping an open, positive attitude. The key to building this framework is recognizing where your own cultural assumptions are; the goal is being able to choose when to 'do as the Romans do,' that is adapt to the local culture, on the one hand and, on the other hand, when, and how much to assert values from your own.

Building the Framework

The task of building the framework begins with some obvious factors. We want people to know geography and history. We want them to have multiple language skills ' for use and perspective. We want to be able to avoid major errors of etiquette with foreigners, and we want our people to know about the plain practical differences such as currency, and which side of the road to drive on.

All this knowledge is valuable in and of itself, but it also should be feeding people's general sense of how their own cultural backgrounds fit into the world picture. And for this we want them to keep their eyes, ears ' and minds ' open.

It is this general sense that people at all levels need to build, and build on, during their entire careers. A consciousness of this need allows each experience abroad, and with foreigners at home, to become a building block for cosmopolitan world market professionalism.People can be trained to look out for relevant information; the learning itself is going to be in their life experience.

Recognizing the Boundaries

Recognizing the boundaries of your own cultural background is not as easy as it may sound and, ironically, Americans may need more help with this than anyone else; not because there's anything wrong with us, but because our culture is so large and homogeneous to begin with, and because so much of that culture has been exported or imitated around the world. Milton Bennett, a founder of the Intercultural Communication Institute in Portland, OR, has observed that we 'tend to view many of our own values as universal, rather than ' as part of our own ethnicity.'

A Chicago Bulls jersey in the Middle East or Africa is no longer surprising, and Seinfeld in German on television may score a lot of viewers, but this does not mean people in other countries have absorbed the entire American ethos. For instance, the game of 'football' is a famous symbol of cultural differences that are in fact much deeper and more subtle. In the rest of the world, football is played with a spherical ball, by nimble players in shorts and jerseys; only in the U.S. is 'football' a hugely complex system featuring physical crashes of armored titans over an object shaped like a large yam.

Less visible than football are seriously different attitudes toward work, personal relationships, initiative, money and fairness, among other things. Can a vacation be cancelled because of an unexpected court order? Does the partner want to hear about opinions different from his/her own? How is individual achievement balanced against group achievement?

Intercultural Competence

The number of such questions is infinite. Raising them and talking about them builds in our organizations the desirable characteristic Nina Jacob, calls 'intercultural competence' in her book, Intercultural Management. There is a very substantial body of academic research focused on these questions to complement direct and shared personal experience.

For a group of young initiates, a basic workshop, fitting examples into the framework, can be a strong beginning. For people with experience but no specific training, sharing 'war stories' in a similar forum can lead not just to growth ' for everyone involved ' but also to self-assessment of areas where knowledge or sensitivity need to be improved.

Conclusion

Whether people are just setting out on their first working trip out of the United States, or are veteran 'road warriors,' they can use this framework, with growing awareness of their own culture at its core, as a durable set of tools to deliver confidence in the present, and continuous development of their savoir faire for the future.

Who could object to accumulating more savoir faire?

---

Jonathan R. Fiske, a practicing attorney, grew up in an American foreign service family in Asia, Europe and Africa. After traveling in the U.S. Navy, he enjoyed a career with Rotary International culminating in eight years as head of its branch office in Zurich, Switzerland. The only American, with a 44-person staff there, he was responsible for Europe, Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East.