+ Until quite recently, Canadian immigration policy has been very welcoming and egalitarian in its philosophy, celebrating diversity, and offering opportunities to anyone. This has created a cultural mosaic, where individuals are encouraged to retain their cultural identities, complete with traditions, languages and customs, upon immigration.

+ Canadians pride themselves on not needing to be homogeneous to have a strong, peaceful nation.

+ Since Canada is so diverse, it is difficult to determine a single communication style that is effective throughout the country. For example, an ethnic Chinese who lives in a Chinese enclave in Vancouver will communicate more like someone from mainland China than will a fifth-generation Chinese-Canadian working in Toronto.

+ English and French are the country’s two official languages. Both languages appear on maps, tourist brochures and product labels. It is important to note that the French spoken in Canada is not the same as the language spoken in France.

+ Although Canadians are generally individualistic and make decisions based upon their own needs rather than those of the group, they place great emphasis on the individual’s responsibility to the community and to achieving a good quality of life.

+ Most Canadians see time as something that can be controlled, although they are not obsessive about letting the clock rule their lives.

+ For the most part, Canadians strive to be on time for social engagements, so deviations are more a matter of personal preference. Punctuality is expected in business.

- from RW3’s CultureWizard® Country Profiles

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+ Malaysia is a multi-ethnic society where Malays, Chinese, and Indians are the predominant ethnic groups. The different ethnicities retain their customs and way of life, which gives Malaysia an intricate cultural fabric.

+ Malaysians can broadly be categorized into two groups: the Malay (Bumiputra) and indigenous people (Orang Asli) and the immigrant groups (Chinese, Indian and others). The approximate breakdown of ethnic groups is as follows:

Malay 50.4%
Chinese 23.7%
Indigenous 11%
Indian 7.1%
Others 7.8%
(2004 est.)

+ The most important festivals of each ethnic group, Hari Raya (marking the ending of the Muslim fasting month), Chinese New Year and Deepavali (Indian Festival of Lights) for example, are public holidays and are open to celebration by all.

+ The country’s diversity is further reflected in the many religions that are practiced. The predominant religion is Islam, which is followed by virtually all Malays as well as by some Indians and members of other ethnic groups. Here is a breakdown of religions in Malaysia:

Muslim 60.4%
Buddhist 19.2%
Christian 9.1%
Hindu 6.3%,
Confucianism, Taoism, other traditional Chinese religions 2.6%
Other or unknown 1.5%
None 0.8%
(2000 census)

+ Hierarchy is respected in Malaysia. Older businesspeople should be greeted before younger ones and treated with deference and respect. Do not correct someone who is in a higher position or who is older than you, as this will cause both of you to lose face and may negatively affect your ability to conduct business.

+ Malaysian communication is guided by a desire to maintain face by not losing emotional control or causing embarrassment in public. In an effort to conceal uneasiness or avoid embarrassing others, Malaysians may smile at what appear to foreigners to be inappropriate moments. Try to “read between the lines” rather than take words and facial expressions at face value.

- from RW3’s CultureWizard® Country Profiles

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A radio show on Public Radio International (PRI) used Starbucks as an example of American abundance and excess. The show attributed its success to its positioning as a communal hub.

According to Temple University professor Bryant Simon, “what Starbucks identified was a very important shift and a very important need in American society. Throughout the post-WWII era, Americans moved to the suburbs, they became locked in their cars, for fear they would increasingly live behind gated communities.

“At the same time they were securing themselves, they began to feel as though they were missing something: a kind of community that we often associate with older city neighborhoods. Starbucks understood that desire. From the very beginning, they suggested that their stores, like the old coffee houses, were something called ‘third places’: a place between work and home where people would gather. Starbucks aggressively marketed itself as the place where community would be constructed, maintained, and renewed.”

The individualistic nature American culture developed in the latter half of the 20th century was certainly a step away from a more group-oriented past. Simon argues that their move to foster a community experience was only the means to a very profitable end.

“If Starbucks tells us again and again from its marketing…that this is what community is, it makes it harder to find truer versions of it some place else,” says Simon.

How would you define community, and where would you go to find it in the US?

Click here to read the article and listen to the radio show.

Joshua

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The growing pains of many businesses are highly documented by the media as they go from domestic to foreign markets. Because of the company’s enormous monetary value, which is frequently compared to Gross Domestic Products of entire nations, Wal-Mart’s missteps in many countries have been critically commented on by writers and journalists around the world. Cultural challenges have oftentimes been the hallmark of Wal-Mart’s experience around the world, as a recent Business Week article points out. Here are a few examples.

In Japan, there was cultural resistance to Wal-Mart’s discount model because Japanese consumers tend to see low prices as a sign of low-quality goods. Selling its products in bulk is also not cohesive with the Japanese lifestyle, where most people live in densely populated urban centers.

India’s retail industry is comprised of small businesses with only a small fraction owned by chain stores. Convincing Indian consumers to shop at wholesale hypermarkets like Wal-Mart will take some time while they find the framework to approach and accommodate the Indian lifestyle.

A picture from 2006 of a Wal-Mart in South Korea. Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images

“While [Wal-Mart's] strategy worked in North America, the results were so bad in Germany and Korea that Walmart withdrew from those countries in 2006,” according to Business Week. Past experience bore costly results, and a New York Times article from 2006 details these failures.

Have you worked for a company that has a successful model for entering foreign and emerging markets? What do you think it takes?

Read the Business Week article here.

Charlene

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With titles like Yes, I Can With Obama: 40 Magical English Phrases From Presidential E-mails and Learn English Grammar From Obama, Japanese publishers have found a niche to sell instructional books for learning the English language. According to the New York Times, President Obama’s easy to understand voice, accent and vocabulary in his speeches and addresses have made him a natural target for English-learners in Japan, where he is already very famous.

Alluding to Japan’s highly indirect norms of communication, a Canadian speech writer living near Tokyo tells the New York Times that “Japan has not been serious about communication…In a Japanese company or political party or anyplace where Japanese come together as a group, the process is consensus-forming, and the outcome has to be consensus, and the consensus is internal. In that, the audience often gets forgotten.”

This is an extremely insightful view into Japanese culture. Loyalty to the community-at-large is a hallmark of Japanese society, where decision-making is up to the group, rather than the individual.

Click here to jump to the article.

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In an effort to recapture the revenue growth the Indian offshore industry experienced before the world economic crisis, many are expanding their service offerings, according to the Wall Street Journal. Companies like InfoSys Technologies and Wipro are competing with big competitors like HP to expand their contracts with “end-to-end outsourcing packages.” Indian executives have expressed that there is a lot of learning involved in the expansion of their organizations, and a lot of it is done on the fly.

How will the persistent issue of client and vendor cultures, and their abundant variations, affect the quality of even larger contracts with companies around the world? Will Indian vendors be able to cope with their increased demands?

Click here to read the full article online.

Paul

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An article on short-term assignments in October’s Chief Learning Officer magazine proves how important it is to understand cultural differences in business today.

“To get an idea of the importance of cultural understanding for short-term employees, consider the following scenario.

“In July 1995, House Intelligence Committee member Bill Richardson was scheduled to meet with Iraqi president Saddam Hussein. The meeting was almost called off after Richardson unwittingly insulted the president by crossing his legs and thereby showing the soles of his shoes — a great affront in the Middle East. A similar scenario played out more recently when some Israelis were insulted by a press photo that depicted President Barack Obama speaking on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — with his feet up on his desk.

“Cultural differences exist everywhere — from Europe to Asia, from Africa to Australia. In Japan, there is a protocol to give and accept business cards, and not doing it properly insults the host. In Germany, it is common to serve fruit at the end of the meal. When Microsoft came out with Windows 95, the package jacket in India outlined eight areas of Kashmiri in green, indicating land under question of sovereignty. The Indian government was incensed, and Microsoft removed 200,000 copies of Windows 95 from the shelves.

“These types of situations occur routinely in today’s international business world, and without proper training around cultural protocol, professional relationships could be seriously — even irreparably — damaged.”

The writer’s central message is that “it’s vitally important that a short-term manager or executive not only comprehend these cultural differences, but adjust his or her management style to work with diverse people and develop specific training programs as needed. It’s a fundamental principal for success in a multinational world.”

Click here to read the rest of the article online.

Valerie

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Watch this humorous, but true-to-life publicity for HSBC that depicts a Chinese post-business dinner.

Sean

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“Are You Hard-Wired for a Global Career? (If so, you are in demand.)” is the title of a blog post on Paula Caligiuri’s professional career counseling website.

She has found that having an international career is one of the current population of college graduate’s top goals. Caligiuri describes the personality traits that make individuals successful in such a career, which include emotional stability and openness to different cultural modes of behavior.

Click here to see if your personality traits mirror those of the internationally and multiculturally predisposed on Caligiuri’s blog.

Sean

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The World Clock Meeting Planner is probably one of the easiest ways to coordinate a global virtual meeting. This should come in handy for anyone working globally.

Here’s its description: “Need to make a call to someone far away? Need to arrange a videoconference, telephone- or net-based meeting with several people spread around the globe? This utility should help you find a convenient time, so that no one has to be up during the middle of the night.”

Paul

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Read an article by RW3’s Sean Dubberke in this month’s MOBILITY Magazine about the extraordinary educational experiences that are attainable today. As practical experiences, says Dubberke, they best describe the modern, globally-minded professional. In any industry, it is crucial to know that an international education is more valuable than ever before.

Click here to read the article.

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Check out the latest CultureWizard Digest here!

* Extreme Individualism
* Why is Kraft so Successful in Asia?
* Banks, Money and Culture
* A Hospital that Emphasizes Culture

CultureLinks
+ Cupcake Craze Reaches Middle East
+ An Ode to American Diversity
+ Transcultural Literacy in Higher Education

CultureTips
+ Angola
+ United States of America

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