X-cultural Communication 5: Doing Business Across Cultures

Business X-Cultur

Cultural Dimensions Image credit: www.flickr.com/fuzzcat/26224888 >

Culture

Individualism/ Collectivism

Masculinity/ Femininity

Power Distance

Time Orientation

Uncertainty Avoidance

Culture

Individualistic or selfish?

Distinction between male and female?

Different levels of power?

On time?

Minimizing uncertainty

Culture

Universalism/ Particularism

Individualism/ Collectivism

Neutral/ Affective

Specific/ Diffuse

Achieved/ Ascribed

Status

Time Orientation

Internal/ External

Orientation

Culture

Rules or relationships?

In a group or as an

individual?

Display emotions?

How far to get involved?

Prove or receive status?

Past, present, or future?

In control or part of it?

In detail: Practical tips for doing

business across cultures

From: Trompenaars &

Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture

Visit: www.7d-culture.nl >

Universalism

Particularism

Recognizing Universalists:

Recognizing Particularists

1.  Focus is more on rules than on relationships.

2.  Legal contracts are readily drawn up. 3.  A trustworthy person is the one who honors their

word or contract.

1.  Focus is more on relationships than on rules.

2.  Legal contracts are readily modified.

3.  A trustworthy person is the one who honors changing mutualities.

Recognizing Universalists:

3.  There is only one truth or reality, that which has been agreed to.

4.  A deal is a deal.

3.  There are several perspectives on reality relative to each participant.

4.  Relationships evolve. Recognizing Particularists

Doing business with Universalists:

With Particularists

1.  Be prepared for “rational”, “professional” arguments and presentations that push for your acquiescence.

1.  Be prepared for personal “meandering” or „irrelevancies“ that do not seem to be going anywhere.

2.  Do not take impersonal, “get down to business” attitudes as rude.

3.  Carefully prepare the legal ground with a lawyer if in doubt.

2.  Do not take personal, “get to know you” attitudes as small talk.

3.  Carefully consider the personal implications of your legal “safeguards”.

Doing business with Universalists:

With Particularists

Managing Universalists and being managed by them:

Managing Particularists

1.  Strive for consistency and uniform procedures.

2.  Institute formal ways of changing the way business is conducted.

1.  Build informal networks and create private understandings.

2.  Try to alter informally accustomed patterns of activity.

3.  Modify the system so that the system will modify you.

4.  Signal changes publicly.

5.  Seek fairness by treating all like cases in the same way.

3.  Modify relations with you, so that you will modify the system.

4.  Pull levers privately. 5.  Seek fairness by treating all cases

on their special merits.

Managing Universalists and being managed by them:

Managing Particularists

Individualism

Communitarianism

Recognizing Individualists:

Recognizing Communitarians

1.  More frequent use of the “I” form.

2.  Decisions made on the spot by representatives.

1.  More frequent use of the “We” form.

2.  Decisions referred back by delegate to organization.

Recognizing Individualists:

Recognizing Communitarians

3.  People ideally achieve alone and assume personal responsibility.

4.  Vacations taken in pairs, even alone.

3.  People ideally achieve in groups which assume joint responsibility.

4.  Vacations in organized groups or with extended family.

Doing business with Individualists:

With Communitarians

1.  Prepare for quick decisions and sudden offers not referred to HQ.

2.  Negotiator can commit those who sent him or her and is very reluctant to go back on an undertaking.

1.  Show patience for time taken to consent and to consult.

2.  Negotiator can only agree tentatively and may withdraw an undertaking after consulting with superiors.


With Communitarians

3.  The toughest negotiations were probably already done within the organization while preparing for the meeting.

4.  You have a tough job selling them the solution to this meeting.

3.  The toughest negotiations are with the communitarians you face.

4.  You must somehow persuade them to cede to your points which the multiple interests in your company demand.


With Communitarians

5.  Conducting business alone means that this person is respected by his or her company and has its esteem.

6.  The aim is to make a quick deal.

5.  Conducting business when surrounded by helpers means that this person has high status in his or her company.

6.  The aim is to build lasting relationships.

Managing Individualists and being managed by them:

Managing Communitarians

1.  Try to adjust individual needs to organizational needs.

2.  Introduce methods of individual incentives like pay-for-performance, individual assessment, MBO.

1.  Seek to integrate personality with authority within the group.

2.  Give attention to esprit de corps, morale and cohesiveness.



3.  Expect job turnover and mobility to be high.

3.  Have low job turnover and mobility.



4.  Seek out high performers, heroes and champions for special praise.

5.  Give people the freedom to take individual initiatives.

4.  Extol the whole group and avoid showing favoritism.

5.  Hold up superordinate goals for all to meet.

Neutral

Affective

Recognizing Neutrals:

Recognizing Affectives

1.  Do not reveal what they are thinking or feeling. 2.  May accidentally reveal tension in face and

posture.

3.  Emotions often dammed up will occasionally explode.

1.  Reveal thoughts and feelings verbally and non-verbally.

2.  Transparency and expressiveness release tensions.

3.  Emotions flow easily, effusively, vehemently and without inhibition.



4.  Cool and self-possessed conduct is admired. 5.  Physical contact, gesturing or strong facial

expressions often taboo. 6.  Statements often read out in monotone.

4.  Heated, vital, animated expressions admired.

5.  Touching, gesturing and strong facial expressions common.

6.  Statements declaimed fluently and dramatically.

Doing business with Neutrals:

With Affectives

1.  Ask for time-outs from meetings and negotiations where you can patch each other up and rest between games of poker with the Impassive Ones.

2.  Put as much as you can on paper beforehand.

1.  Do not be put off your stride when they create scenes and get histrionic; take time-outs for sober reflection and hard assessments.

2.  When they are expressing goodwill, respond warmly.


With Affectives

3.  Their lack of emotional tone does not mean they are disinterested or bored, only that they do not like to show their hand.

3.  Their enthusiasm, readiness to agree or vehement disagreement does not mean that they have made up their minds.


With Affectives

4.  The entire negotiation is typically focused on the object or proposition being discussed, not so much on you as persons.

4.  The entire negotiation is typically focused on you as persons, not so much on the object or proposition being discussed.

Managing Neutrals and being managed by them:

Managing Affectives

1.  Avoid warm, expressive or enthusiastic behaviors. These are interpreted as lack of control over your feelings and inconsistent with high status.

1.  Avoid detached, ambiguous and cool demeanor. This will be interpreted as negative evaluation, as disdain, dislike and social distance. You are excluding from “the family”.

Managing Neutrals and being managed by them:

Managing Affectives

2.  If you prepare extensively beforehand, you will find it easier to “stick to the point”, that is, the neutral topics being discussed.

2.  If you discover whose work, energy and enthusiasm has been invested in which projects, you are more likely to appreciate tenacious positions.



3.  Look for small cues that the person is pleased or angry and amplify their importance.

3.  Tolerate great “surfeits” of emotionality without getting intimidated or coerced and moderate their importance.

Specific

Diffuse

Recognizing Specificists:

Recognizing Diffusers

1.  Direct, to the point, purposeful in relating.

2.  Precise, blunt, definitive and transparent.

1.  Indirect, circuitous, seemingly “aimless” forms of relating.

2.  Evasive, tactful, ambiguous, even opaque.



3.  Principles and consistent moral stands independent of the person being addressed.

3.  Highly situational morality depending upon the person and context encountered.

Doing business with Specificists:

With Diffusers

1.  Study the objectives, principles and numerical targets of the specific organization with which you are dealing.

2.  Be quick, to the point and efficient.

1.  Study the history, background and future vision of the diffuse organization with which you expect to do business.

2.  Take time and remember there are many reads to Rome.


With Diffusers

3.  Structure the meeting with time, intervals and agendas.

4.  Do not use titles or acknowledge skills that are irrelevant to the issue being discussed.

3.  Let the meeting flow, occasionally nudging its process.

4.  Respect a person’s title, age, background connections, whatever issue is being discussed.

Managing Specificists and being managed by them:

Managing Diffusers

1.  Management is the realization of objectives and standards with rewards attached.

2.  Private and business agendas are kept separate from each other.

3.  Conflicts of interests are frowned upon.

1.  Management is a continuously improving process by which quality improves.

2.  Private and business issues interpenetrate. 3.  Consider an employee’s whole

situation before you judge him or her.


Managing Diffusers

4.  Clear, precise and detailed instructions are seen as assuring better compliance, or allowing employees to dissent in clear terms.

5.  Begin reports with an executive summary.

4.  Ambiguous and vague instructions are seen as allowing subtle and responsive interpretations through which employees can exercise personal judgment.

5.  End reports with a concluding overview.

Achieved Status

Ascribed Status



1.  Use of titles only when relevant to the competence you bring to the task.

2.  Respect for superior in hierarchy is based on how effectively his or her job is performed and how adequate their knowledge.

1.  Extensive use of titles, especially when these clarify your status in the organization.

2.  Respect for superior in hierarchy is seen as a measure of your commitment to the organization and its mission.



3.  Most senior managers are of varying age and gender and have shown proficiency in specific jobs.

3.  Most senior managers are male, middle-aged and qualified by their background.


With Diffusers

1.  Make sure your negotiation team has enough data, technical advisors and knowledgeable people to convince the other company that the project, jointly pursued, will work.

1.  Make sure your negotiation team has enough older, senior and formal position-holders to impress the other company that you consider this negotiation important.


With Diffusers

2.  Respect the knowledge and information of your counterparts even if you suspect they are short of influence back home.

2.  Respect the status and influence of your counterparts, even if you suspect they are short of knowledge. Do not show them up.


With Diffusers

3.  Use the title that reflects how competent you are as an individual.

4.  Do not underestimate the need of your counterparts to do better or do more than is expected.

3.  Use the title that reflects your degree of influence in your organization.

4.  Do not underestimate the need of your counterparts to make their ascriptions come true.


Managing Diffusers

1.  Respect for a manager is based on knowledge and skills.

2.  MBO and pay-for-performance are effective tools.

3.  Decisions are challenged on technical and functional grounds.

1.  Respect for a manager is based on seniority. 2.  MBO and pay-for-performance are less effective than

direct rewards from the manager. 3.  Decisions are only challenged by people with

higher authority.

Past and Present

Future

Recognizing the Past-oriented:

Recognizing the Present-oriented

1.  Talk about history, origin of family, business and nation.

2.  Motivated to recreate a golden age.

1.  Activities and enjoyments of the moment are most important (not mañana).

2.  Plans not objected to, but rarely executed.

Recognizing the Past- and Present-oriented:

Recognizing the Future-oriented

1.  Much talk of prospects, potentials, aspirations, future achievements.

2.  Planning and strategizing done enthusiastically.

Recognizing the Past-oriented:

Recognizing the Present-oriented

3.  Show respect for ancestors, predecessors and older people.

4.  Everything viewed in the context of tradition or history.

3.  Show intense interest in present relationships, “here and now”.

4.  Everything viewed in terms of its contemporary impact and style.

Recognizing the Past- and Present-oriented:

Recognizing the Future-oriented

3.  Show great interest in the youthful and in future potentials.

4.  Present and past used, even exploited, for future advantage.

Doing business with the Past- and Present-oriented:

With the Future-oriented

1.  Emphasize the history, tradition and rich cultural heritage of those you deal with as evidence of their great potential.

2.  Discover whether internal relationships will sanction the kind of changes you seek to encourage.

1.  Emphasize the freedom, opportunity and limitless scope for that company and its people in the future.

2.  Discover what core competence or continuity the company intends to carry with it into the envisaged future.

Doing business with the Past- and Present-oriented:

With the Future-oriented

3.  Agree future meetings in principle but do not fix deadlines for completion.

4.  Do your homework on the history, traditions and past glories of the company; consider what re-enactments you might propose.

3.  Agree specific deadlines and do not expect work to be complete unless you do.

4.  Do your homework on the future, the prospects and the technological potentials of the company; consider mounting a sizeable challenge.

Sequential

Synchronic

Recognizing Sequentialists:

Recognizing Synchronicists

1.  Only do one activity at a time.

2.  Keep appointments strictly; schedule in advance and do not run late.

3.  Generally, relationships are subordinate to schedule.

1.  Do more than one activity at a time.

2.  Appointments are approximate and subject to “giving time” to significant others.

3.  Generally, schedules are subordinate to relationships.

Recognizing Sequentialists:

Recognizing Synchronicists

4.  Strong preference for following initial plans.

5.  Time is tangible and measurable.

4.  Strong preference for following where relationships lead.

5.  Time is like a wide ribbon and intangible.

Managing Sequentialists and being managed by them:

Managing Synchronicists

1.  Employees feel rewarded and fulfilled by achieving planned future goals as in MBO.

2.  Employees’ most recent performance is the major issue, along with whether their commitments for the future can be relied upon.

1.  Employees feel rewarded and fulfilled by achieving improved relationships with supervisors/ customers.

2.  Employees’ whole history with the company and future potential is the context in which their current performance is viewed.

Managing Sequentialists and being managed by them:

Managing Synchronicists

3.  Plan the career of an employee jointly with him/ her, stressing landmarks to be reached certain times.

4.  The corporate ideal is the straight line and the most direct efficient and rapid route to your objectives.

3.  Discuss with employee his/ her final aspirations in the context of the company; in what ways are these realizable?

4.  The corporate ideal is the interacting circle in which past experience, present opportunities and future possibilities cross-fertilize.

Internal Orientation

External Orientation

Recognizing Internalists:

Recognizing Externalists

1.  Often dominating attitude bordering on aggressiveness towards environment.

2.  Conflict and resistance means that you have convictions.

1.  Often flexible attitude, willing to compromise and keep the peace.

2.  Harmony and responsiveness, that is, sensibility.

Recognizing Internalists:

Recognizing Externalists

3.  Focus is on self, function, own group and own organization.

4.  Discomfort when environment seems “out of control” or changeable.

3.  Focus is on “other”, that is customer, partner, colleague.

4.  Comfort with waves, shifts, cycles if these are “natural”.

Doing business with Internalists:

With Externalists

1.  Playing “hard ball” is legitimate to test the resilience of an opponent.

1.  Softness, persistence, politeness and long, long patience will get rewards.

Doing business with Internalists:

With Externalists

2.  It is most important to “win your objective”.

3.  Win some, lose some.

2.  It is most important to “maintain your relationship”.

3.  Win together, lose apart.

Managing Internalists and being managed by them:

Managing Externalists

1.  Get agreement on and ownership of clear objectives.

2.  Make sure that tangible goals are clearly linked to tangible rewards.

1.  Achieve congruence among various people’s goals.

2.  Try to reinforce the current directions and facilitate the work of employees.

Managing Internalists and being managed by them:

Managing Externalists

3.  Discuss disagreements and conflicts openly; these show that everyone is determined.

4.  MBO works if everyone is genuinely committed to directing themselves towards shared objectives and if these persist.

3.  Give people time and opportunities to work quietly through conflicts; these are distressing.

4.  MBO works if everyone is genuinely committed to adapting themselves to fit external demands as these shift.

Find More

⁄  Harald Felgner & the Red Fez ⁄  A spectrum of projects, from international marketing to IT. ⁄  xculture.felgner.ch ⁄  twitter.com/haraldfelgner

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⁄  Many thanks to: ⁄  Fons Trompenaars & Charles Hampden-Turner ⁄  www.7d-culture.nl ⁄  All excerpts were taken from the excellent textbook: ⁄  Riding the Waves of Culture, 2nd Edition, London, 1997 ⁄  Order your copy from Amazon US via bit.ly/7Q02P7