[00:00:00]
Speaker: Welcome back to yet another episode of the Commercial Leader podcast. My name is Bram Lagrou. today we're unpacking the challenge that we sometimes have as leaders influencing and communicating with people from different cultures and different countries. How often does it happen when a multicultural team works together and has a disconnect or misunderstandings?
How often does it happen when you were successful as a leader in one country, and then you move places and go to another, country, and suddenly whatever worked prior doesn't work again now in this new place? This is all predictable in advance why some things work and why they don't, and also the issues are preventable, but we gotta understand [00:01:00] what we're doing and prepare for it.
Now, I'm very mindful that as I'm saying this, that is the way that I was raised back in Belgium, that that actually is sneaking in in the way that I'm putting my point forward, which is Belgium is a country that is very much principles first driven, which is it wants to understand before it takes action.
And this is basically where sometimes a clash happens in, for example, the country that I made my home, which is Australia, which is an application first country. The difference is now is that in Australia, people like to just start the doing and wanna know instantly what's in it for them, what's the conclusion, what should they do, and then give it a go, which is very different from a country like Belgium.
This is actually already sharing the first lens that I wanna come in from today, which is about principles first countries versus application first [00:02:00] countries. There's sometimes a disconnect between people from these two places that have been trained in certain ways.
If you're coming in from a country that is applications first, like the US, to a lesser extent UK, and many other Anglo-Saxon countries, there's a bias towards action without too much planning. So the old adage of proper prior planning prevents poor performance, is obviously one that comes more from a principles first country like Germany, which is very big on engineering and tech and doing things well and knowing what you're talking about and understanding the data.
everything that we talk about in science, or where, organizations say it's science-backed methodology, it's all coming in from a principles first. Understand, get the facts, let the facts inspire action. It's a very different way of acting. And so you can imagine if [00:03:00] you're dealing with other people that coming in from the other angle than you, you'll very easily find yourself scratching your head and not understanding why what you're presenting to them is taking on.
let's just say that you go by the adage because you're an American or you're an Anglo-Saxon, like an Australian, and you go by the idea that you just gotta give things a crack. Just go and try it out. If you have an idea, just give it a crack. Give it a go. You can imagine if you then suddenly have some team building exercises, that those people from the Anglo-Saxon countries will instantly try to figure things out on the go without really discussing it much in advance.
Those other people from other cultures now, France, Germany, Russia, Belgium, and most of continental Europe, Slovakia and the likes included, Czech Republic, they'll be more inclined to first debate, discuss, and then assign roles, and then take the action. [00:04:00] Once again, cross-cultural teams will thrive or fall over to the extent that we're actually matching these tendencies in a good way.
So if any time this resonates, I highly recommend to explore the work by Erin Meyer, which is about the culture map. I personally thought that it was very helpful to learn more about it and actually see where different cultures, different countries rank on that first pillar, which is principles first versus application first.
Now, you can imagine if you are a leader that presents to a board or where you are presenting to your peers from other divisions and departments, and you're presenting a case that requires goodwill and buy-in from your peers. If your peers are a cross-cultural combination of people, the way that you [00:05:00] will present your case will either be one where you're, explaining the reasoning, the data, and what basically the situation looks like before you draw your conclusions, versus some other people, by the time that you actually present your case, they'll already completely lost in terms of their attention because they first of all wanted to hear you say what the conclusions are before you walk them through the reasoning and the why and the how.
So notice now, just go check in again in your day-to-day situations. Where did a pitch, whether internal or external, fall over because it wasn't thought through how to present a case? Secondly, we all say that we need to treat people with respect. And guess what? The way that I interpret respect might be [00:06:00] quite different to you because we had a different cultural upbringing.
Example, this brings me also now to the second pillar or the second lens that I wanted to briefly touch with you on, today, which is all about whether you're coming from an egalitarian or an inclusive sort of upbringing or from a more hierarchical sort of culture where ranks and authority really decide how much or how little you contribute in a team environment openly.
Example, let's just say that you are starting to work with a new team, and there's a mix of both of those lenses. Some people come from a place where they've been taught to let the more senior people speak up whilst they are taking notes and are just doing their work in the background.
That is basically hierarchical. If [00:07:00] now you're coming in from an angle where you were brought up in the Nordic countries or the Nordic regions like Norway or Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark and the likes, you're very egalitarian raised, which means that even a junior is invited and expected to contribute to a group discussion, no matter how junior they are.
And even the CEO might be very willing to listen and have an open door policy to have these people come in their room. Notice now there's a big disconnect because if I'm, let's say, coming in from a very hierarchical position, I might feel very uncomfortable pushing back on an idea that a very senior person raised in a group meeting because that would be disrespectful for me towards the senior leader This is the challenge that we all face as senior leaders.
Working with cross-cultural teams and where we sometimes also do business [00:08:00] with people from other countries, either as a supplier or a colleague. And once again, have you thought it through before you walk into the room, what will be respectful and therefore what will land well? What will be well-received?
How people will feel respected, and how people will feel validated. Because these things are highly predictable, and issues that might occur in circumstances like this are easily preventable. The two Ps that I always like to reference when we're talking about people working together. So we have so far unpacked the first pillar or the lens of principles first versus application first.
It's smart to think things through when you're working with other people, whether they're coming from the one or the other, and that includes yourself, too. The second pillar [00:09:00] then was about egalitarian versus hierarchical. Where are people coming from? How were they raised? And therefore, what can you expect?
If you'd like people to contribute to a group context because you're coming from an egalitarian road, notice that is a way that you got trained, but not everybody will buy into that. Some people will find it very awkward to step in without having the current seniority behind them Last but not least, we also of course have then the angle of communication.
How people communicate as a bias, what is their tendency like, and how they wanna be communicated to. This is where I find that DISC is always a great third lens to use as part of our preparation. Because if we wanna become influential as leaders and find the right messaging angle, put the right [00:10:00] information in front of people, present it in the right pace, with the right words, then we know whether or not our pitch, our requests, our asks will be well accepted or not.
It's again very practically relevant. I always profess that great athletes, they prepare for key moments where they can win a medal or set a record. And so higher performance in a sports context is of course also the same in a business environment, where some things we do will work and other things will backfire.
And if they backfire, how costly are they? Let's be honest, if a pitch internally doesn't land, it slows down the implementation. If change is required, the buy-in from different stakeholders and different [00:11:00] departments and different levels, obviously every time when people don't like the sound of it or don't understand how it will work, all of this will slow down and sabotage the outcomes down the track.
if we're now looking to source products from overseas and we're negotiating with a potential supplier, understanding what makes these people tick will decide whether you will do a good deal or a not good deal, and that's all making money or losing money. So there's always a commercial angle that we've gotta be mindful of with our capability of communication.
Communication that considers all three lenses, not just the one, and certainly does not come in from a "This thing is how we do it, and this works all the time everywhere" [00:12:00] sort of angle. One of my previous guests on the podcast, he mentioned the colonizers type approach, which is basically, that what they do is gonna land well with everyone.
And obviously, that doesn't work that way. We now know that it's highly predictable what patterns you can expect elsewhere. And so one way of approach, for example, theory first and then application, or planning first and then the doing, versus doing first and then learn by trial and error through a pilot program, and from there, improve the model gradually over time.
These two approaches, well, none of them are good or bad. None of them are the right one only. There's reason for both of them to exist and coexist. The question though is how well do you engage the strength of both in the cross-cultural work that you do today? [00:13:00] I'd be keen to hear more of your thoughts on this particular topic.
My suggestions in closing of this, episode of The Commercial Leader Podcast is to prepare for impactful meetings by considering the three lenses. The first lens being, is it an application first versus a principles first country that the people that you're dealing with are coming from? Second lens then is, is it egalitarian versus hierarchical?
Because that's how much people will be comfortable in contributing, for example, to group discussions. And then the third one here is obviously DISC. How do people communicate? How do they wanna be communicated to? And that sets you on a high road to have great stakeholder engagements internally and externally across the board, and more importantly, across the globe.
I look forward to hearing from you. Any thoughts or questions, let us know. Otherwise, I look forward to seeing you back in the [00:14:00] next episode. My name is Bram. Thanks for tuning in.
