The first step to working across cultures is to understand yourself. By recognising how your culture affects your behaviours, you can recognise where to adapt when working with another culture
Cultural Dimension Theory - Hofstede framework
Japan:
- Long-term quality
- Craftsmanship
- direct consumer engagement
America:
- Marketing
- Short-term finance
- distributor relationships
To learn more about culture - https://www.theculturefactor.com/country-comparison-tool
Tips for developing your Cultural Intelligence:
- Understand yourself and cultural assumptions or “common sense”
- Understand the culture you will work with and look for gaps using the Hofstede framework
- Over-communicate clarity. Ambiguity multiplies across cultures
- Separate behaviour from identity. Misunderstanding is not due to personal flaws or national stereotypes
- Focus on building trust (recognising that cultures build trust in different ways)
- Don’t focus on differences. Look for similarities to build bridges!