X-cultural Communication as presented at the University of Applied Sciences/ Communication Design faculty in Constance between 2004 and 2008. Doing business across cultures. According to Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture, 2007.

1. Business X-Cultur

2. Cultural Dimensions
Image credit: www.flickr.com/fuzzcat/26224888 >

4. Individualism/
Collectivism
Uncertainty Masculinity/
Avoidance Femininity
Culture
Time Power
Orientation Distance

5. Individualistic
or selfish?
Distinction
Minimizing
between male
uncertainty
and female?
Culture
Different
On time? levels of
power?

6. Universalism/
Particularism
Internal/
Individualism/
External
Collectivism
Orientation
Culture
Time Neutral/
Orientation Affective
Achieved/
Specific/
Ascribed
Diffuse
Status

7. Rules or
relationships?
In a group or
In control or
as an
part of it?
individual?
Culture
Past, present, Display
or future? emotions?
Prove or
How far to
receive
get involved?
status?

8. In detail:
Practical tips for doing
business across cultures

9. From:
Trompenaars &
Hampden-Turner, Riding
the Waves of Culture
Visit: www.7d-culture.nl >

10. Universalism
Particularism

12. Recognizing Universalists:
1. Focus is more on rules than on relationships.
2. Legal contracts are readily drawn up.
3. A trustworthy person is the one who honors their
word or contract.
1. Focus is more on relationships
than on rules.
2. Legal contracts are readily
modified.
3. A trustworthy person is the one
who honors changing
mutualities. Recognizing Particularists

13. Recognizing Universalists:
3. There is only one truth or reality, that which
has been agreed to.
4. A deal is a deal.
3. There are several perspectives
on reality relative to each
participant.
4. Relationships evolve. Recognizing Particularists

14. Doing business with Universalists:
1. Be prepared for “rational”, “professional”
arguments and presentations that push for your
acquiescence.
1. Be prepared for personal
“meandering” or
„irrelevancies“ that do
not seem to be going anywhere. With Particularists

15. Doing business with Universalists:
2. Do not take impersonal, “get down to
business” attitudes as rude.
3. Carefully prepare the legal ground with a lawyer
if in doubt.
2. Do not take personal, “get to
know you” attitudes as small talk.
3. Carefully consider the personal
implications of your legal
“safeguards”. With Particularists

16. Managing Universalists and being managed by them:
1. Strive for consistency and uniform procedures.
2. Institute formal ways of changing the way
business is conducted.
1. Build informal networks and
create private understandings.
2. Try to alter informally
accustomed patterns of
activity. Managing Particularists

17. Managing Universalists and being managed by them:
3. Modify the system so that the system will
modify you.
4. Signal changes publicly.
5. Seek fairness by treating all like cases in the same
way.
3. Modify relations with you, so that
you will modify the system.
4. Pull levers privately.
5. Seek fairness by treating all cases
on their special merits. Managing Particularists

18. Individualism
Communitarianism

20. Recognizing Individualists:
1. More frequent use of the “I” form.
2. Decisions made on the spot by representatives.
1. More frequent use of the
“We” form.
2. Decisions referred back by
delegate to
organization. Recognizing Communitarians

21. Recognizing Individualists:
3. People ideally achieve alone and assume personal
responsibility.
4. Vacations taken in pairs, even alone.
3. People ideally achieve in
groups which assume joint
responsibility.
4. Vacations in organized
groups
or with extended family. Recognizing Communitarians

22. Doing business with Individualists:
1. Prepare for quick decisions and sudden offers
not referred to HQ.
2. Negotiator can commit those who sent him or her
and is very reluctant to go back on an undertaking.
1. Show patience for time taken to
consent and to consult.
2. Negotiator can only agree
tentatively and may withdraw an
undertaking after consulting with
superiors. With Communitarians

23. Doing business with Individualists:
3. The toughest negotiations were probably
already done within the organization while
preparing for the meeting.
4. You have a tough job selling them the solution to this
meeting.
3. The toughest negotiations are with
the communitarians you
face.
4. You must somehow persuade them to
cede to your points which the
multiple
interests in your company demand. With Communitarians

24. Doing business with Individualists:
5. Conducting business alone means that this person is
respected by his or her company and has its esteem.
6. The aim is to make a quick deal.
5. Conducting business when
surrounded by helpers
means that this person has high
status in his or her company.
6. The aim is to build lasting
relationships. With Communitarians

25. Managing Individualists and being managed by them:
1. Try to adjust individual needs to organizational
needs.
2. Introduce methods of individual incentives like
pay-for-performance, individual assessment, MBO.
1. Seek to integrate personality with
authority within the group.
2. Give attention to esprit de corps,
morale and cohesiveness. Managing Communitarians

26. Managing Individualists and being managed by them:
3. Expect job turnover and mobility to be
high.
3. Have low job turnover and
mobility. Managing Communitarians

27. Managing Individualists and being managed by them:
4. Seek out high performers, heroes and champions
for special praise.
5. Give people the freedom to take individual
initiatives.
4. Extol the whole group and
avoid showing favoritism.
5. Hold up superordinate
goals for all to meet. Managing Communitarians

28. Neutral
Affective

30. Recognizing Neutrals:
1. Do not reveal what they are thinking or feeling.
2. May accidentally reveal tension in face and
posture.
3. Emotions often dammed up will occasionally
explode.
1. Reveal thoughts and feelings
verbally and non-verbally.
2. Transparency and expressiveness
release tensions.
3. Emotions flow easily, effusively,
vehemently and without
inhibition. Recognizing Affectives

31. Recognizing Neutrals:
4. Cool and self-possessed conduct is admired.
5. Physical contact, gesturing or strong facial
expressions often taboo.
6. Statements often read out in monotone.
4. Heated, vital, animated expressions
admired.
5. Touching, gesturing and
strong facial expressions
common.
6. Statements declaimed fluently and
dramatically. Recognizing Affectives

32. Doing business with Neutrals:
1. Ask for time-outs from meetings and negotiations
where you can patch each other up and rest between
games of poker with the Impassive Ones.
2. Put as much as you can on paper beforehand.
1. Do not be put off your stride when they
create scenes and get histrionic;
take time-outs for sober reflection and
hard assessments.
2. When they are expressing goodwill,
respond warmly. With Affectives

33. Doing business with Neutrals:
3. Their lack of emotional tone does not mean they are
disinterested or bored, only that they do not like
to show their hand.
3. Their enthusiasm, readiness to agree or
vehement disagreement does not
mean that they have made
up their minds. With Affectives

34. Doing business with Neutrals:
4. The entire negotiation is typically focused on
the object or proposition being discussed,
not so much on you as persons.
4. The entire negotiation is typically
focused on you as
persons, not so much on the
object or proposition being
discussed. With Affectives

35. Managing Neutrals and being managed by them:
1. Avoid warm, expressive or enthusiastic
behaviors. These are interpreted as lack of
control over your feelings and inconsistent with
high status.
1. Avoid detached, ambiguous
and cool demeanor. This will be
interpreted as negative evaluation, as
disdain, dislike and social
distance. You are excluding from
“the family”. Managing Affectives

36. Managing Neutrals and being managed by them:
2. If you prepare extensively beforehand, you will find it
easier to “stick to the point”, that is, the
neutral topics being discussed.
2. If you discover whose work, energy and
enthusiasm has been invested in which
projects, you are more likely to
appreciate tenacious
positions. Managing Affectives

37. Recognizing Neutrals:
3. Look for small
cues that the person is pleased or
angry and amplify their importance.
3. Tolerate great
“surfeits” of
emotionality without getting
intimidated or coerced and
moderate their
importance. Recognizing Affectives

38. Specific
Diffuse

40. Recognizing Specificists:
1. Direct, to the point, purposeful in relating.
2. Precise, blunt, definitive and transparent.
1. Indirect, circuitous, seemingly
“aimless” forms of relating.
2. Evasive, tactful, ambiguous,
even opaque. Recognizing Diffusers

41. Recognizing Specificists:
3. Principles and consistent moral stands
independent of the person being addressed.
3. Highly situational
morality depending upon the
person and context encountered. Recognizing Diffusers

42. Doing business with Specificists:
1. Study the objectives, principles and numerical
targets of the specific organization with which you are
dealing.
2. Be quick, to the point and efficient.
1. Study the history, background and future
vision of the diffuse organization with
which you expect to do business.
2. Take time
and remember there are
many reads to Rome. With Diffusers

43. Doing business with Specificists:
3. Structure the meeting with time, intervals and
agendas.
4. Do not use titles or acknowledge skills that are
irrelevant to the issue being discussed.
3. Let the meeting flow, occasionally
nudging its process.
4. Respect a person’s title, age,
background connections, whatever issue is
being discussed. With Diffusers

44. Managing Specificists and being managed by them:
1. Management is the realization of objectives and
standards with rewards attached.
2. Private and business agendas are kept separate
from each other.
3. Conflicts of interests are frowned upon.
1. Management is a continuously improving
process by which quality improves.
2. Private and business issues interpenetrate.
3. Consider an employee’s whole
situation before you judge him or her. Managing Diffusers

45. Managing Specificists and being managed by them:
4. Clear, precise and detailed instructions are
seen as assuring better compliance, or allowing
employees to dissent in clear terms.
5. Begin reports with an executive summary.
4. Ambiguous and vague instructions are seen as
allowing subtle and responsive interpretations
through which employees can exercise
personal judgment.
5. End reports with a concluding
overview. Managing Diffusers

46. Achieved
Status
Ascribed
Status

48. Recognizing Specificists:
1. Use of titles only when relevant to the
competence you bring to the task.
2. Respect for superior in hierarchy is based on how
effectively his or her job is performed
and how adequate their knowledge.
1. Extensive use of titles, especially
when these clarify your status in the
organization.
2. Respect for superior in hierarchy is seen as a
measure of your commitment to the
organization and its mission. Recognizing Diffusers

49. Recognizing Specificists:
3. Most senior managers are of varying
age and
gender and have shown proficiency in
specific jobs.
3. Most senior managers are male,
middle-aged and qualified
by their background. Recognizing Diffusers

50. Doing business with Specificists:
1. Make sure your negotiation team has enough data,
technical advisors and knowledgeable
people to convince the other company that the
project, jointly pursued, will work.
1. Make sure your negotiation team has
enough older, senior and
formal position-holders to
impress the other company that you
consider this negotiation important. With Diffusers

51. Doing business with Specificists:
2. Respect the knowledge and information of
your counterparts even if you suspect they are short of
influence back home.
2. Respect the status and
influence of your counterparts,
even if you suspect they are short of
knowledge. Do not show them up. With Diffusers

52. Doing business with Specificists:
3. Use the title that reflects how competent you are
as an individual.
4. Do not underestimate the need of your counterparts to
do better or do more than is expected.
3. Use the title that reflects your degree
of
influence in your organization.
4. Do not underestimate the need of your
counterparts to make their
ascriptions come true. With Diffusers

53. Managing Specificists and being managed by them:
1. Respect for a manager is based on knowledge
and skills.
2. MBO and pay-for-performance are effective
tools.
3. Decisions are challenged on technical and
functional grounds.
1. Respect for a manager is based on seniority.
2. MBO and pay-for-performance are less effective than
direct rewards from the manager.
3. Decisions are only challenged by people with
higher authority. Managing Diffusers

54. Past and
Present
Future

56. Recognizing the Past-oriented:
1. Talk about history, origin of family, business and
nation.
2. Motivated to recreate a golden age.
1. Activities and
enjoyments of the moment are
most important (not mañana).
2. Plans not objected to, but
rarely executed. Recognizing the Present-oriented

57. Recognizing the Past- and Present-oriented:
1. Much talk of prospects,
potentials, aspirations,
future
achievements.
2. Planning and
strategizing done
enthusiastically. Recognizing the Future-oriented

58. Recognizing the Past-oriented:
3. Show respect for ancestors, predecessors and older
people.
4. Everything viewed in the context of tradition
or history.
3. Show intense interest in
present relationships,
“here and now”.
4. Everything viewed in terms of
its contemporary
impact and style. Recognizing the Present-oriented

59. Recognizing the Past- and Present-oriented:
3. Show great interest in the
youthful and in future
potentials.
4. Present and past used, even
exploited, for future
advantage. Recognizing the Future-oriented

60. Doing business with the Past- and Present-oriented:
1. Emphasize the history, tradition and rich cultural
heritage of those you deal with as evidence of their
great potential.
2. Discover whether internal relationships will
sanction the kind of changes you seek to encourage.
1. Emphasize the freedom,
opportunity and limitless scope
for that company and its people in the
future.
2. Discover what core competence
or continuity the company intends
to carry with it into the envisaged
future. With the Future-oriented

61. Doing business with the Past- and Present-oriented:
3. Agree future meetings in principle but do not fix
deadlines for completion.
4. Do your homework on the history, traditions and past
glories of the company; consider what re-
enactments you might propose.
3. Agree specific deadlines and do
not expect work to be complete unless
you do.
4. Do your homework on the future, the
prospects and the technological potentials
of the company; consider mounting
a sizeable challenge. With the Future-oriented

62. Sequential
Synchronic

64. Recognizing Sequentialists:
1. Only do one activity at a time.
2. Keep appointments strictly; schedule in advance
and do not run late.
3. Generally, relationships are subordinate to
schedule.
1. Do more than one activity at a time.
2. Appointments are approximate and
subject to “giving time” to significant others.
3. Generally, schedules are subordinate to
relationships. Recognizing Synchronicists

65. Recognizing Sequentialists:
4. Strong preference for following
initial plans.
5. Time is tangible and measurable.
4. Strong preference for following
where relationships lead.
5. Time is like a wide ribbon and
intangible. Recognizing Synchronicists

66. Managing Sequentialists and being managed by them:
1. Employees feel rewarded and fulfilled by achieving
planned future goals as in MBO.
2. Employees’ most recent performance is the
major issue, along with whether their commitments for
the future can be relied upon.
1. Employees feel rewarded and fulfilled by
achieving improved relationships
with supervisors/ customers.
2. Employees’ whole history with the
company and future potential is the
context in which their current
performance is viewed. Managing Synchronicists

67. Managing Sequentialists and being managed by them:
3. Plan the career of an employee jointly with him/ her,
stressing landmarks to be reached certain
times.
4. The corporate ideal is the straight line and the
most direct efficient and rapid route to your
objectives.
3. Discuss with employee his/ her final
aspirations in the context of the
company; in what ways are these realizable?
4. The corporate ideal is the interacting circle
in which past experience, present opportunities
and future possibilities
cross-fertilize. Managing Synchronicists

68. Internal
Orientation
External
Orientation

70. Recognizing Internalists:
1. Often dominating attitude bordering on
aggressiveness towards environment.
2. Conflict and resistance means that you have
convictions.
1. Often flexible attitude,
willing to compromise and keep
the peace.
2. Harmony and responsiveness,
that is, sensibility. Recognizing Externalists

71. Recognizing Internalists:
3. Focus is on self, function, own group and own
organization.
4. Discomfort when environment seems “out of
control” or changeable.
3. Focus is on “other”, that is customer,
partner, colleague.
4. Comfort with waves, shifts,
cycles if these are “natural”. Recognizing Externalists

72. Doing business with Internalists:
1. Playing “hard ball” is legitimate to test the
resilience of an opponent.
1. Softness, persistence,
politeness and long, long
patience will get rewards. With Externalists

73. Doing business with Internalists:
2. It is most important to “win your objective”.
3. Win some, lose some.
2. It is most important to “maintain
your relationship”.
3. Win together, lose apart. With Externalists

74. Managing Internalists and being managed by them:
1. Get agreement on and ownership of clear
objectives.
2. Make sure that tangible goals are clearly linked to
tangible rewards.
1. Achieve congruence among various
people’s goals.
2. Try to reinforce the current directions and
facilitate the work of
employees. Managing Externalists

75. Managing Internalists and being managed by them:
3. Discuss disagreements and conflicts
openly; these show that everyone is determined.
4. MBO works if everyone is genuinely committed to
directing themselves towards shared objectives
and if these persist.
3. Give people time and opportunities to work
quietly through conflicts; these are
distressing.
4. MBO works if everyone is genuinely
committed to adapting themselves to fit
external demands
as these shift. Managing Externalists

76. Find More

77. ⁄ Harald Felgner & the Red Fez
⁄ A spectrum of projects, from international marketing to IT.
⁄ xculture.felgner.ch
⁄ twitter.com/haraldfelgner

78. Credits

79. /webel/63951310/ /teejaybee/758753661/
/23065375@N05/2235525962/
http://www.flickr.com
/srboisvert/45435603/ /colm/2467012869/
/nick777/565229268/
/fuzzcat/26224888/ /der_bobbel/2600591128/
/liewcf/894035077/ Paramount Pictures

80. ⁄ Many thanks to:
⁄ Fons Trompenaars & Charles Hampden-Turner
⁄ www.7d-culture.nl
⁄ All excerpts were taken from the excellent textbook:
⁄ Riding the Waves of Culture, 2nd Edition, London, 1997
⁄ Order your copy from Amazon US via bit.ly/7Q02P7