In the article we were given to read, it discussed the way in which combining people of different cultural backgrounds to form business teams can be difficult. Some of the examples that were given were German and American companies, German and British companies, and American and Japanese companies working together. They contrasted how German companies are very job and quality focused where as American companies are job and cost focused, as well as stress the importance of knowing who you are working with rather than blindly trusting your partner. The German and British companies run into the same issue as the German and American teams. According to the article, the British also stress the importance of small talk and getting to know your partners before becoming a productive, highly focused team. The way Japanese companies were described was that they do not separate the two issues, the personal and job focused concerns.
Articles, or any other form of media, like this sometimes frustrate me. I recognize and accept that there are different cultural norms. But it is the generalizations that are made that drive me crazy. That every German behaves in this manner. Every American, British, and Japanese behave another specific manner. That frustrates me. While it may be a vast majority that behave in this way, making claims like this bother me. It came up this summer at the camp I was working out. At this camp, there is a scholarship program for inner city kids who couldn’t afford to come to camp without the scholarships provided. We had a training session on how to deal with these inner city kids. I found this absurd. Yes, they have a different background than a suburban raised child, but the core of it is that they are still children. They have all the basic needs of any other child. They all need us to be sensitive to their needs. The same idea carries over to when people of different backgrounds come together to form teams. We are all humans and have things that we need. We need each other to be sensitive to one another. Respect and accept that we are all different. Accept that truth, learn from that truth, and move on with the job at hand. Cooperation takes respect and if we respect each others differences and accept them, cooperation and productivity can start instantly. If we can get off our own high and mighty pedestal and put the needs of other people before our own, unnecessary disputes will arise far less. I make this statement not to say, let people walk all over you and ignore the cultural differences, but to not make differences the reason things don’t work, like the case where the German and American companies failed to put out a product and lost $20 million. Make note of the differences each culture holds close to them and learn from those differences. Why does one thing for one company hold so much importance? How can combining the things that we find as a necessary component to team work, and the things that our culturally different teammates find necessary make for the most productivity?
I know what you mean about generalizations.
ReplyDeleteThe sentence "Make note of the differences each culture holds close to them and learn from those differences," is brilliant! If we all learned from other cultures and apply what we learned, we would be using global competency and thus, creating a better engineering working field.