Ten Strategies for Effective Cross-Cultural Communication

There is a saying that goes: 
In the US everything is allowed unless it’s prohibited. Then you go to Japan or Germany and it says: Everything is prohibited, unless it’s allowed. Finally you go to Latin America or the Middle East: Everything is allowed, even if it’s prohibited.
Besides making jokes, dealing with cultural diversity is not always easy, especially when it comes to working together with people from very different cultures than your own. With the increasing pressure and opportunities of globalization, there are more and more professionals who dedicate 100% of their time to prepare their colleagues by offering them Intercultural Competence Courses to enable them to do business in other countries.
But we don’t have to go that far, it’s Intercultural Communication that I think it’s worth to have a look at.

Quite often, the different aspects of culture are compared with an Iceberg. Richard D. Lewis, a British linguist and cross-cultural communication consultant, describes the visible part as obvious differences like working hours or ways to greet each other which are easy to find out. These are the ones we like to discover while travelling.
But there are beliefs, values and assumptions or simply different ways of viewing the world which are located “below the water surface”. These are the “hidden” elements that can cause us so much difficulties to communicate. They are quite more difficult to bring to the surface and a lot of times they lead to misunderstandings, especially at work.

You might ask now: Does my culture really affect me and my way of communicating? Well, of course it does! It influences you more than you might think: Almost everything we do, for instance…
…How we give and receive information
…Make decisions
…Lead and manage
…Due authority
…Work in teams
…Use space and time
…Are influenced by our own culture!

One way to deal with it is learning with the help of stereotypes. Stereotypes? Yes, indeed: Stereotyping itself is nothing bad if you’re aware that you are stereotyping. Well, that’s my personal opinion.
Wikipedia defines it as “standardized and simplified conceptions of groups based on some prior assumptions”. It helps us to try to have some general ideas about a country or someone’s culture, since we are unable to study every detail and make surveys when we get to know a person. Since there are supposed to be more than 7.000 different cultures in the world, somehow the human brain has to simplify. But stereotypes are also made to forget them quickly!
At the end, you always deal with a person and his or her specific personality. Instead of looking at other cultures, why don’t we have a look at our own?
So, first step is to become aware of our own behavior! Things you might consider as “normal”, for others might be surprising, puzzeling, frustrating or even upsetting. When was the last time, you perceived a strange look on the face of your colleague whom you couldn’t interpret right away? For instance when coming late to a meeting, when blowing your nose loudly, when interrupting somebody else talking, when boring others with facts & figures or when you suddenly clap somebody on his/her shoulders?

There is no good or bad culture, they are just different! So the cross-cultural community has figured out some hints to deal with the cultural diversity, or with other words: Ten Strategies for Effective Cross-Cultural Communication:

* Be flexible
* Be honest
* Listen actively
* Lespect differences
* Avoid stereotyping
* Recognize the complexity
* Build self-awareness
* Distinguish perspectives
* Ask questions
* Think twice

So let’s leave the stereoptypes for the moments when joking. Actually, there are some really good ones … (Caution! Regarding from which culture you are, you might not find them funny!) Let’s see… “An Italian, a German and a Frenchman… 😉

Jutta
Emagister team

—————————————————————————-

Related courses
Communication skills courses
Interpersonal skills courses
Personal development courses