How to Develop Strong Relationships in a Multicultural Environment?

 

In a decade-long desperate attempt to understand the true culture lying in the most diversified Indian subcontinent, E.M. Forster produced A Passage to India, but failed to bridge between the Indian and the UK nationals. Rudyard Kipling went far enough or to be fairer, envisioned too much in his famous poem, The Ballad of East and West, to declare:

“Oh, East is East and West is West and never shall the twain meet,

Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat;

But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,

When two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth!”

So where we have traveled to in the ride of a century is nowhere but the vision of the 19^th century, the multicultural environment, as envisioned by the then time dreamers. With the wings of technological advancement, emergence of capitalism and open market economy, the world once polarized by distance, now has shrunk to a global village under a multicultural environment to which we do have no other option but to acclimatize.

In every aspects of our life be it academic, political or professional, we need to brace for the bigger challenges lying in a multicultural environment and to make it favorable by developing relationships we should give emphasis on some basic principles as described by Cherie Brown and George Mazza in their, Healing into Action, and avail some opportunities as follow:

1. Take the chance to welcome everyone in your world irrespective of their culture, age, nationalism, religion, language, social status or financial condition. Each person has to share the right of feeling secured in a diverse community with their personal beliefs and culture
2. In case of a cultural misinterpretation, do not blame others or make them feel ashamed: both ways lead things go awry instead of motivating. People are more likely to adapt a multicultural environment when they are appreciated, not condemned.
3. Give emphasis on the basic human nature instead of raising any controversial question regarding the historical background of a particular community, political situation or religious beliefs.
4. Treat everyone judging what personality they are guided by: altruist, egoist, extrovert, introvert, altruist or any other. You should not make an introvert asking him questions one after another or expect an extrovert to be a listener only.
5. Always try to work like a team involving each and everyone with their opinions while generating spirits and hopes in their hearts. Educate yourself with the cultural differences and make a balance in between, recognize the gaps, show positive attitudes toward it and come out with the desired goal.

It’s all simple in the end. We have crossed the borders, brought the farthest corners down to our doors. Now, what we must do is to conquer the cultural gaps just by changing our mind set of being critical to diverse cultural traits not belonged to us.

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Cultural Challenges in Corporate America

 

Culture, the Indispensable Part:

In the broader sense, both from the view points of Empiricism and Rationalism, we, the Homo sapiens, are nothing other than cultural products, encompassing everything in the life we live. Locke, Berkeley or Hume would go with the empiricists pointing out that knowledge comes along experiences while all our experiences are shaped by the culture embedded in the society. On the contrary, Plato, G.W. Leibniz or Noam Chomsky would rather support rationalists with their respective views that forms, moral principles or language are innate which sprout in certain circumstances with a catalyst we may call culture. It is needless to say, our culture, such a deep rooted thing, and an indispensable part as well, can be hardly wiped out from our life, even after living so many years in a multicultural arena, even after showing thumb to the thousands-mile physical distances in the world, reducing it to a Global Village. So, it is no wonder, the cultural forces, too powerful to handle even by the mighty medieval imperialists, will impact the corporate world led by America.

Communication Tools as Cultural Challenges in Corporate America

The chapter, Communications across Cultures in Management across Cultures: Challenges & Strategies by Richard M. Steers, Carlos J. Sanchez-Runde and Luciara Nardon, begins with a stunning quote by Richard D. Lewis:

“Whatever the culture, there’s a tongue in our head. Some use it, some hold it, and some bite it. For the French it is a rapier, thrusting in attack; the English, using it defensively, mumble a vague and confusing reply; for Italians and Spaniards it is an instrument of eloquence; Finns and East Asians throw you with their constructive silence. Silence is a form of speech, so don’t interrupt it.”

The language, verbal or gesture, may stand as a barrier as one the most powerful challenges in the global business. English as the only language spoken in the USA helped it emerge as the world’s strongest economy but as a pioneering leader in the global business, it also faces huge problem in its way through bringing people from the farthest corner of the world with various cultures under one roof. We can use a common language, but still our ignorance with regards to some body languages or expressions can cause misinterpretation leading to a business failure. 

Individual Attitude Learnt from Culture as a Silent Danger to the Corporate World

Our aesthetic beliefs, moral principles, attitude towards life, religion, cast, or race are the powerful driving forces we learn from our cultures. In India, one of the greatest impedimenta in promoting business is their cast discrimination; in UK there had been a history of blood shed in the name of Catholicism and Protestantism. The racial conflict, though we pretend to ignore, sometimes spark off even in popular sports. So these sorts of individual attitudes imprinted deep down our heart by the culture undoubtedly matter to handle carefully as a big challenge in the corporate world.

Apart from the above-discussed cultural challenges, our importance in maintaining time, socio-economic environment, living standards, professionalism in handling contracts- either in deeds or in words, etc. can also matter to a large extent in reaching the ultimate goal of a corporate group.

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How to Increase Performance and Productivity in a Multicultural Environment

 

Carrying out both a qualitative and ethnographic research, and studying over thousands of organizations in 11 countries for about 5 years, Christine Congdon and Catherine Gall have come out with their paper, Vision Statement: How Culture Shapes the Office, which mirrors the factors mattering the performance and productivity in a multicultural environment. Their study brings forth the six dimensions of culture which may help understand people’s expectations in a workplace and thus help an organization ensure the best performance from a group of people, diversified in their culture and united under a multicultural environment.

To increase both the performance and productivity in a multicultural environment, an organization or any globally operated business establishments must have a set a strategies based on the six cultural dimensions as follow: 

1. autocratic-consultative,
2. individualist-collectivist,
3. masculine-feminine,
4. tolerant of uncertainty-security oriented,
5. short term-long term, and
6. low context-high context

It’s no wonder, in a multinational company, you will meet people representing different cultural traits: people with the blue blood from Great Britain or the authoritarian trait being carried by the people from Germany might pose rather a conflicting environment with the people representing consultative, amicable or altruistic characteristics. You have to make a balance between these traits of binary opposition. People brought up in a dilapidated economy like those of in the third world countries usually have troubles with uncertainty about their future and feel comfortable with long-term secured jobs; on the other hand people from the countries with strengthened social securities can easily put aside things like future while giving emphasis on the present. Now you know how to approach to bring the best performance and productivity, judging the cultural background in terms with economic stability. Again, as a gift of industrialization of the 18^th century, there has been a rising conflict of feminism and anti-feminism, which developed to a cultural trait in certain communities. Still we can not ignore the negative attitude toward female bosses in many countries while in some Islamist countries there are some strictly maintained principles as to how you will deal with a female colleague especially if you are not an Arab.

For a better understanding regarding the performance and productivity in a multicultural environment, the essay, Meetings in Gulf Arab Countries, by Kemp and Williams can be taken for granted. As they realize from a closer observation, the Gulf Arab region offers an eclectic mix of different cross-cultural interactions and as for the business meetings, sense of timing, being late to be in the meeting place sometimes in an open space, regular disruptions, open doors, and haphazard seating- these all are treated rather flexibly in this cultural setting. For a successful business deal, you must not carry down your western-style meeting-culture when in an Arab-setting. Again the Arab culture is high context where communication is rather indirect with many interruptions and often dependent on external environment. So for designing a business operation in an Arab setting it’s worth considering these cultural dimensions to come out with the best performance and productivity.

This article along with others on cultural diversity & challenges is available in eBook or paperback in Amazon.  

Power Distance & Other Traits: Tools to Understand What Drives People from Different Cultures

 

Cultural Dimension, an Ultimate Challenge to Managerial Success in a Multinational Environment

A US businessman might feel intimidated with an Arab one standing so close to him in a conversation. After waiting for 30 minutes an annoyed German can even make a call or think otherwise about a scheduled meeting with a Mexican businessman to whom arriving at the just time is rather unusual. Again, a Canadian project leader, after outlining the parameters of a project may ask for any suggestion to his Indian project team, just to show his respect, but the members from the high power distance culture are likely to get surprised doubting on the leadership of the Canadian. These are all just the simple examples of how the ignorance of cultural dimension can lead to misinterpretation of a certain circumstance and thus propel a business prospect into a failure in a multicultural environment. So, the managerial success in this global village under diverse cultural traits can hardly escape to be on route to apprehend cultural dimensions.

As far as cultural dimension is concerned, the model provided by Geert Hofstede is probably the best known illustration of how cultures differ in determining the behaviorism of an individual. As Hofstede comes out with his exploration, cultures differ from each other on the dimensions of individualism versus collectivism, achievement versus quality of life orientations, uncertainty avoidance and power distance.

Power Distance Shaping the Behaviorism

Power distance refers to the way in which power is distributed and to the degree to which people accept large differences between the most and least powerful members of society in terms of privileges, wealth and well-being. In a high power distance culture, people readily accept a higher degree of unequally distributed power. In a low power distance society like that of Australia or Canada, the relationship between the bosses and subordinates is one of interdependence while in a high one social hierarchy are deeply embedded in people so much as to give leaders the inherent privilege in their position to give orders and to get the subordinates comfortable with solely depending on the decisions or directions given by their bosses. Management-by-objectives (MBO) system or other forms of participative goal setting is hardly seen or expected in a high power distance culture and the employees don not even think of arriving at their own solutions in dealing with a conflict, but in a low power distance culture, there is always a preference for consultation.

Cultural Traits Influencing the Drives

Sigmund Freud, one of the greatest psychoanalysts of all time, was probably the first one to show the clear-most orchestration of our mind, vivisecting it into three layers: unconscious level, subconscious level and the conscious level. As he points out, all our drives we aware or unaware of, derives out of the id in our unconscious layer. Our desires or drives than move up to the subconscious level and it is where the culture comes as a component to shape the safety bulb that determines which drive to pass into the conscious level or which one to be pushed back to the unconscious level. This is how all the drives undergo a censoring in the subconscious level and it is only then we come across knowing them from our conscious mind. So unconsciously we have our drives shaped by the cultural traits or norms we are exposed to and unconsciously every individual falls into separate cultural dimensions we need to apprehend for building a better relationship or forcing the best to spark off in a multicultural environment.

• This article along with others on cultural diversity & challenges is available in eBook or paperback in Amazon.   

To Be Happy or Not to Be....

 

“We look before and after,

And pine for what is not:

Our sincerest laughter;

With some pain is fraught

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought”

(To a Skylark, by Percy Bysshe Shelley)

So, the complex species that we are, we even search for sweet things in the tone of profound sadness. Though it stands antagonistic to that we call the happy state of mind we, for some reasons unexplainable sometimes feel like dive into the streams of some sad thoughts piled on deep down our heart that we love to get back to in our self-drawn lonely leisure. There won’t be found on earth a single one who never searches for happiness either consciously or unconsciously. But in a robotic and highly mechanized life we hardly stop by giving a mere think what actually happiness is as the binary opposition to sadness, or asking our souls if we are really happy or make people think we are.

 Outwardly we seem to be leading a happy life with what we are or things that we have. We never forget to play a smile around our face in our social interactions. We do partake in all our daily activities as per the routine work; even if we regularly take breaks in our weekends by making some trips to some interesting place, or excavating pleasures in a whole-night party. But, going beyond the surface we would discover, to our utter surprise or disgust, even our weekends have also been turned very much regular. Doing the same sort of things for over and over again easily turn our life monotonous; all our feelings thereby getting blurred. The taste of our life with all its colors starts fading away, no matter we see them or not. To a lot many people life gets stagnated and they keep acting their role on the stage of the world attuning themselves to the socially defined happiness, pretending to be happy, acting knowingly or unknowingly like a happy person.

 T.S Eliot raises the sort of question in the astonishingly thought-bearing lines I found my pleasure to quote here:

Everyone's alone — or so it seems to me.

They make noises, and think they are talking to each other;

They make faces, and think they understand each other.

And I'm sure they don't. Is that a delusion?

( The Cocktail Party )

Very few people try to understand or know how they actually feel and the rest don’t even try to give a think about their inner-self, nor do they ever ask themselves if they are alone in the crowd. However loneliness is not the thing that makes anyone unhappy keeping aside how it appeared to the life of Mariana in Tennyson’s poetic world. There are times we really feel happy staying alone far from the madding crowd. Again sometimes we feel sad; you can term it as a sign of partial or transcendental unhappiness, as Antonio once felt in the beginning of comedy, The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare. Antonio couldn’t figure out why he was feeling sad despite having everything one could ever aspire for: money, honor, friend, and favor- anything to rule over Shylocks of the society. For reasons guessable we may not let people know to save us from comments like: extravagant, flamboyant or even luxurious unhappiness. In a situation like that of Antonio we can’t but wear an air of smile disguising our temporary state of unhappiness.

 Apart from our happy smile to camouflage the Antonio’s sadness inside there are other moments as found better superb expression in one of the most popular Indian film titled Three Idiots. There were three bosom friends who excelled all others in everything except, as everybody including two of the friends believed, making a better impression in their class performance. When the final result appeared the two having found their name in the bottom of the list felt sad not because of being last but thinking the other friend had failed as his name was not appeared close to them. Their sadness got deeper when they finally came to know that the other friend’s name wasn’t listed last, as all were expecting, because he stood first. And they came to the bitter realization:

“It felt sad to know your closest friend got failed but the sadness gets deeper when you find him topped the merit list.”

No matter if you feel happy or not experiencing something like that, the fact is you can never ever let others read your face going beyond the surface meaning. As a reflex action you would mask your inner feelings with such a profound delicacy as to make people think how happy you are hearing such great news. This is not the ultimate truth applicable to each and everybody, but things may happen like this and it’s not all about mere guesstimate.

There goes a saying collected from the classical antiquity: “A man can never be called happy until he brings down his happiness down to his grave.” It’s not likely that you are always happy all through your life. Again it can’t be that you are always pretending to be happy to make people think what you are not. But there may be situations with the possibility to make you act like the happiest person and you deliberately do so sometimes responding to the appeal from the unconscious layer of your mind. And my point is that: stop by for a little while and give a short break to see if your life is just going on with the flow. Try to unearth the upper layer and ask if you are really happy with your life or just dragging it down the end losing the taste of it in the insatiable materialistic hunger. If so, bring about the changes, get back the colors and feel your life in vigor and drink it to the last drop.

I Stared into the Eyes of Death

 

“Do not mourn my Death, I did not die

I am the thousand truths against a splendid lie.”