What are intercultural competencies and why are they important?

It's hard to find a corner of the globe where McDonald's, Microsoft and Coca-Cola are not recognizable brands. If your company is considering expanding outside of the United States, you could learn a few valuable lessons from these firms.

Any corporation that has successfully penetrated other markets realizes the benefits of understanding and addressing the unique differences of each market. This means translating your signage, marketing materials and documents into another language. Even more important and often overlooked, is the ability for your managers to walk into a new country possessing the intercultural competencies necessary to establish strong working relationships with subordinates, business associates and clients.

The brief definition of intercultural competencies is simply the skills and attributes professionals need to succeed in an international environment. What may seem like a simple concept is really quite complex and addresses much more than just knowing how to dress or how to exchange a business card.

To understand the crucial role intercultural competencies play in the success of your executives and managers overseas, let's first look at three examples of what can go wrong if a company simply ignores the local culture and assumes a successful U.S. formula can be applied to other environments. While all of these problems might not be applicable in your situation, any one of these issues can be quite detrimental to reaching your international business objectives.

Scenario one: Direct and indirect communication styles

Cultures can differ in preferred communication styles. One way to compare cultures is through direct and indirect communication styles. Direct communication styles found in the US or Scandinavia can be exemplified by these expressions, "Don't beat around the bush", "get to the point", or "first things first". In these cultures, speaking one's mind or being straightforward conveys honesty and trustworthiness.

On the other end of the spectrum, cultures like Asia, India, China, or South Europe value a more indirect communication style. Indirect communication cultures prefer avoiding conflict and are careful not to hurt another's feelings during a conversation or negotiation. To a culture that communicates indirectly, focusing narrowly on the task and on deadlines is seen as pushy, insulting, and harmful to establishing a sustainable business relationship.

Scenario two: The negotiation style:

For many Americans, the primary goal of negotiations is to reach a deal and sign a contract. However, other cultures emphasize preliminaries and negotiations as opportunities to strengthen social and business networks. Americans are continuously criticized for being too abrupt and never taking the time to sit down, drink coffee, and get to know their international counterparts. Unless you can remind yourself to adapt to the business styles of other cultures, you will inadvertently negotiate yourself out of opportunities.

Scenario three: Leadership Skills

Workplace customs vary across boarders, therefore creating the necessity for different management approaches to address cultural concerns. For example, in some cultures, employees expect to be told what to do. Empowering these employees to make their own decisions only leads to confusion and a decrease in productivity. In other cultures, asking employees their opinion can cause the employees to lose respect for their supervisor, who is expected to have all the answers.

Effective management requires motivating employees to do their best, a task that can only be accomplished if you are in tune to workplace expectations, traditions and protocol.

Preventing Problems with an intercultural mindset and skills

The above scenarios illustrate a few of the issues that can arise when intercultural competencies are not developed or are ignored. So what is the solution?

Individualized training tailored to helping your executives excel in a particular market increases the ability to reach business goals across cultures. A conceptual training plan focusing on the development of intercultural competence should include the following components:

Culture has often been defined using the iceberg analogy; there's much more to it than meets the eye. The surface culture is easy to see - dress, etiquette, manners and laws. Just as there's more to an iceberg than what is immediately visible, the deep cultural issues - values, attitudes, accepted ways of behavior, thought patterns, etc. - are somewhat hidden. These hidden elements are an essential ingredient to fully comprehending the mindset of the market.

The following questions can help you decide your need for intercultural competencies:

1. Are you familiar with cross-cultural aspects of doing business abroad?
2. Are you aware of your own and others cultural values and how they might impact cross-cultural interaction(s)?
3. Do you have proven international leadership skills?
4. Are you able to adjust your negotiation, communication, presentation, and team leading style etc. to avoid cross-cultural misunderstandings?
5. Are you attentive to non-verbal cues in intercultural interactions?