“8 people waiting to enter in the Manager’s Office in Turkey. It looked like we were at the dentist’s. Everybody quiet waiting to be attended by the “big boss”.”
“In Australia, directing someone to do something in a certain way will often not work well in many instances. Success is more likely if the person understands the reasoning and has been part of the decision-making. In Australia, people expect a great deal of consultation and communication and this is an feature of our safety laws. I have worked in other cultures where the ‘norm’ is for supervisors to be very directive and the workers simply do what they are told. Sometimes this is best and necessary, sometimes it does not result in the best safety practice particularly when working with more educated/competent/experienced people.”
“Even though I don’t consider myself a “direct” person, upon moving to Canada, a number of people commented on my direct style of communication.”
“Irish are outgoing and pretty kind. When they see you with a map they try to help you. My first day in Dublin a woman asked me if she could help me because she saw me a little lost. However in Madrid nobody asks you.”
“It’s a hard for me to accept that after having reached an agreement about tasks to be done, these tasks are not completed at due time. This happens to me often in Turkey.”
“Work behaviour in Australia – must be diplomatic. People do not say the truth face to face. You must turn the problem around to not point someone directly and say exactly what you truly feel.”
“Business meetings are more distended in North America in my opinion. One day in Canada my team had to expose the planning and scope of our next assignment to the board members of the company. As it was at noon, they were all having lunch while we were explaining everything. It was like having a meeting in a buffet restaurant.”
“People from Turkey like to have face to face meetings and talk on the phone a lot more than others and sometimes I have had people call me more than 5-10 times a day.”
“In Canada, everybody has an opinion and each opinion is defended and presented without considering the hierarchy of the person.”
“When I worked in Zambia I found it surprising how relaxed individuals were keeping to programme timescales. Something as simple as someone saying that they would come and see you later in Scotland would mean later that day in Zambia it could mean later that week …”