February 2nd 2009

I was looking forward to this class, even though we had a full weekend of Global leadership! I could relate to most of the material that was discussed in this class. Having worked for Canadian and UK based companies and having lived here in US for a while, I could relate to the code switching part completely. I have had so many experience where I was not sure how to behave and I had to ask around and observe so that I could behave in a manner sensitive to the culture I was in.
I distinctly remember one incident when our manager had come from UK for training and one of my colleague was late for the meeting by 10 minutes which is not a big deal in India. My colleague did say sorry and explained the reason, but to her it was a great deal and she confronted my colleague in the meeting in front of everyone which was very awkward for all of us in the meeting and for my colleague. I use to wonder that while we were given training on the UK culture in our induction, why weren't these managers given some training on Indian Culture before they came!!! In that company it was all about us learning their culture and that's it. The video of Carlos and George also highlighted the fact the cultural sentivity should come from both the parties. I feel sometimes its also important to understand which culture has the authority in the sense if your manager is from UK, English culture has the authority and its important to understand his/ her culture more than him/her understanding subordinates culture.
However, I do feel that such extreme behaviour as showcased in the video rarely exsist these days because everyone is exposed to so many different cultures and there is a increasing sensitivity towards each others culture.