Close WindowPrint Article

In Effective Cross-Cultural Interactions, Internal Realities Influence External Realities How do you view people of a different culture: as a reflection of their society's values, attitudes, norms and expectations; or as having fixed, permanent personality and intelligence traits? Your view of people from other cultures significantly affects the quality of your interactions with them, and could have considerable impact on the success of your cross-cultural encounters. One's "culture" is a combination of his/her external realities - geography, education, and society's long-term imposition of its collective values, attitudes, norms and expectations. Society at large usually expresses these values and norms recognizably, thus giving rise to the concept of "American culture" or "European culture" (although we know that we can never really talk about cultures that broadly…!) These values and norms may strengthen, modify or disappear altogether to be replaced by new ones when new situations - such as national demographic changes, international crises, availability of resources, etc. - arise that make it necessary to do so. A society's response to changing conditions can be thought of as the culturally-relevant mechanism it uses to maintain and perpetuate its external realities. Excluded from our definition of culture are personality and intelligence. Too often, when people talk about cultural differences they include these internal realities in the discussion, with the result that they often make critical, subjective, personal value judgments of worth, when they should really limit themselves to objective descriptions and observations of behavior. This is where much of the difficulty in cross-cultural transitioning occurs: people make assumptions that behavioral motivators are driven by personality or intelligence when, in fact, they are typically value and attitude driven. Values and attitudes are learned and practiced over time. It surprises many people to learn that whereas personality and intelligence are largely factors which won't change significantly over time, behaviors are learned expressions of underlying values and beliefs. Since behaviors are learned they can be unlearned and replaced with new, more effective behaviors. The underlying values, however, do not need to change. When we understand this and learn that the majority of our behaviors result largely from what we have been taught, it then becomes easier to imagine learning new behaviors to express ourselves more effectively. It also becomes easier to imagine coming to appreciate and tolerate the behaviors of people from other cultures. We might even decide that certain behaviors are actually valuable and beneficial to us and we adopt them. Personality and intelligence, per se, have little to do with this evaluative process. Isn't it interesting that we can effect changes in our external realities best when we can include among our internal realities attributes like flexibility, tolerance, curiosity, acceptance, assertiveness, compassion and self-confidence? When you meet someone from a culture different than yours, how do you experience that person? Do you imagine him/her as a combination of values, attitudes, beliefs, behaviors and norms that are present in the society at large? Or, do you attempt to "figure out" that person's personality and take exception if you don't like it? Do you see that person as having learned the behaviors he/she exhibits and thus able to learn others; or as a more or less permanent personality incapable of change? Your answers to these questions significantly affect your ability to interact with people from cultures different to your own. If you are willing to begin thinking of your cross-cultural encounters as the intersection of learned behavioral styles and permanent value systems, then you are ready to learn to identify the styles and adapt your own behavior to compliment the style of the person you meet. Learning to recognize the different value systems will also give you great insight into why people pay attention to the particular things that they do. These value systems influence how people solve problems; communicate; choose a job, profession or hobby; and socialize. If you can understand someone else's internal realities, you can allow for and appreciate them and thereby influence their external realities. For more information on cross-cultural issues and how they affect your business, and details on education and training in this area contact Transition Success Consulting online at: www.TransitionSuccess.net. Virginia Cutchin, Director Transition Success Consulting Virginia@TransitionSuccess.net www.TransitionSuccess.net