Chapter 6: The Head or the Heart PDF

6 The Head or the Heart Two Types of Trust and How They Grow . G erdau S.A., a household name throughout Brazil, is the fourteenth-largest steelmaker in the world, with operations in fourteen countries, including the United States and India. It was founded by Joo Gerdau, a German immigrant who m...

6 The Head or the Heart Two Types of Trust and How They Grow . G erdau S.A., a household name throughout Brazil, is the fourteenth-largest steelmaker in the world, with operations in fourteen countries, including the United States and India. It was founded by Joo Gerdau, a German immigrant who moved to southern Brazil in 1869, and bought a nail factory in Puerto Alegre in 1901. He passed the business on to his son, Hugo Gerdau, who in turn passed it on to his son-in-law, Curt Johannpeter, in 1946. Recently, working with a group of Gerdau executives, I heard Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. firsthand the interesting backstory of one of Gerdau’s recent acquisitions from Marina Morez, who headed up the discussions for the Brazilian Gerdau team, and from her American counterpart Jim Powly. The acquisition was a success, but the path there was full of interesting twists and turns. “The meetings started well,” said Morez, an exuberant woman in an elegant beige pants suit. “We traveled to Jacksonville, Mississippi, and Jim’s team gave us a very friendly welcome. We got right down to business that morning.” During three days of intense and sometimes difficult negotiations, the group proceeded steadily through the agenda, ordering in sandwiches for lunches 163 Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 163 3/17/14 11:46 AM 164 erin Meyer and taking only short pauses throughout the day. At around seven each night, the exhausted group split up, the Americans heading home and the Brazilians retiring to their hotels. At the end of the two days, the American team felt great about all they had accomplished. The discussions, they believed, were efficient and productive. The short lunches and tight scheduling signified respect for the time the Brazilians invested in preparing for the negotiations and traveling to an out-of-the-way location. The Brazilians, on the other hand, were less upbeat and felt the meetings had not gone as well as hoped. “Despite having spent two days together, we didn’t know whether we could trust them,” explained Morez. “They were certainly organized and efficient. But we didn’t have a sense as to who they were beyond that. We didn’t trust the Americans to deliver on their promises, and we wondered if they would make good partners.” Powly, who seemed to tower over the rest of us even when seated, continued the story. “Next, I brought the American team to Brazil to continue the discussions.” Although the days were packed with meetings, the meals were long—lunches were frequently well over an hour, and dinners stretched into the late eve- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. ning. The Brazilians took this opportunity to share good food and conversation with their American colleagues. “But we were uncomfortable,” Powly remembers: As the first lunch stretched on, we started looking at our watches and shifting around in our chairs. We were worried about how we were possibly going to complete what we needed to accomplish. We wondered in the middle of these socializing marathons if the Brazilians were really taking these negotiations seriously. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 164 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 165 What the Americans didn’t understand was that these lunches and dinners symbolized something critical for the Brazilians. “For us, this type of lunch is supposed to send a clear message,” Morez explained. “Dear colleagues, who have come such a long distance to work with us, we would like to show you that we respect you— and even if nothing else happens during these two days besides getting to know each other at a deeper level and developing a personal connection and trust, we will have made very good use of our time together.” The sense of discomfort felt by these two groups begins to show how differently Americans and Brazilians develop a sense of trust for one another. Of course, trust is a critical element of business in every country in the world. Whether your home is a small village in the Malaysian mountains or a glass-walled apartment atop a London skyscraper, you can’t be successful if your colleagues, customers, partners, and suppliers don’t trust you. But as the Gerdau merger story suggests, the means by which trust is built among business associates differ dramatically from one culture to another. Powly and Morez managed to complete their deal without ever discovering the source of their discomfort. Nestlé’s Karl Morel, Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. who found himself in a similarly challenging situation, required more explicit advice to improve his effectiveness when negotiating a joint venture in China. An acquisitions expert from the German-speaking region of Switzerland, Morel led a negotiation team for multinational food giant Nestlé. The team traveled to Shanghai to explore a potential joint venture with a company specializing in packaged Chinese delicacies. The initial meetings with eight Chinese executives proved to be a baffling experience for Morel. While he and his colleagues Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 165 3/11/14 9:26 AM 166 erin Meyer tried to be friendly and transparent, providing all the business details the Chinese asked for, the Chinese seemed closed and secretive. “They were impenetrable. They were tough as nails and unwilling to budge on any of their demands. That first week was one uphill battle after another,” Morel recalls. Fortunately, after the first frustrating week, Morel and his colleagues met with a Chinese business consultant who pushed them to rethink their approach: When we contacted the Chinese consultant, we were desperate. We had spent months identifying the best possible group to partner with, flown 5,000 miles to Shanghai, and invested a full week in meetings, but we didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. The consultant told us that our approach was wrong, that we were going too fast. We argued that we had been very detailed, open, and patient. But the consultant was clear about what we were doing wrong. He told us that we were not going to get what we wanted from the Chinese executives unless we developed guanxi with them. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. Guanxi? Morel and his team had never heard the word. The consultant explained: What I mean is that you should take the time, energy, and effort to build a personal connection with them. Build trust as a friend from the heart. Forget the deal for a while. Go out. Enjoy some meals. Share some drinks. Relax. Build an emotional connection. Open up personally. Make a friend. A real one, the kind with whom you are willing to let your guard down. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 166 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 167 Morel and his colleagues took the consultant’s advice. They invited their Chinese counterparts for a dinner one evening over a weekend, bringing together people from several hierarchical levels of both organizations. The evening was a great success. “We went to a restaurant on a barge in the river,” Morel remembers: There was live guitar music and huge amounts of food from the Tianjin area of China, where the owner of the other company came from. It was an excellent dinner, during which we had time to socialize. We focused on having fun, and we stopped talking about business. The group toasted each other several times in a sign of mutual respect and emphasized how glad we all were to begin a long-term relationship. We laughed a lot—and a few of us drank a lot. We restarted the meetings the following Monday, and the Chinese willingness to cooperate had changed considerably. They were now very enthusiastic and open, and we began to work well as a team. We were able to make very good progress during our second week in China. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. Both the Swiss and the Chinese recognize the importance of trust in business relationships—but they make very different unconscious assumptions about how trust is created. TrusT froM The head, TrusT froM The hearT Make a quick mental list of five or six people you trust—people from different areas of your life. The list may include personal connections like your mother or your spouse, but may also include a Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 167 3/11/14 9:26 AM 168 erin Meyer business partner, a client, or a supplier. Then consider for a moment how the trust you feel for each person was built. What events led you to trust them? You might notice that the type of trust you feel for one person is very different from the type of trust you feel for another. The differences can be complex, but one simple distinction is between two forms of trust: cognitive trust and affective trust. Cognitive trust is based on the confidence you feel in another person’s accomplishments, skills, and reliability. This is trust that comes from the head. It is often built through business interactions: We work together, you do your work well, and you demonstrate through the work that you are reliable, pleasant, consistent, intelligent, and transparent. Result: I trust you. Affective trust, on the other hand, arises from feelings of emotional closeness, empathy, or friendship. This type of trust comes from the heart. We laugh together, relax together, and see each other at a personal level, so that I feel affection or empathy for you and sense that you feel the same for me. Result: I trust you. Throughout the world, friendships and personal relationships are built on affective trust. If you were to consider why you trust Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. your mother or your spouse, you would likely use descriptive explanations linked to affective trust. But the source of trust in business relationships is a little more complicated. Roy Chua, a professor at Harvard Business School, surveyed Chinese and American executives from a wide range of industries, asking them to list up to twenty-four important members of their professional networks, from both inside and outside their own workplaces. Then participants were asked to indicate the extent to which they felt comfortable going to each of these contacts to share their personal problems and difficulties as well as their hopes and dreams. “These items showed an affective-based willingness to Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 168 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 169 depend on and be vulnerable to the other person.” Chua explains. Finally, participants were asked to indicate the extent to which the contact could be relied on to complete a task that he or she has agreed to do as well as to have the knowledge and competence needed to get tasks done. These items captured a more cognitive-based willingness to depend on the other person.1 The survey revealed marked differences between the American respondents and the Chinese. Chua found that Americans, in business, draw a sharp dividing line between cognitive trust and affective trust. “This finding makes sense given culture and history,” Chua explains. The United States has “a long tradition of separating the practical and emotional. Mixing the two is perceived as unprofessional and risks conflict of interest.” Chinese managers, on the other hand, connect the two forms of trust. As Chua puts it, “Among Chinese executives, there is a stronger interplay between affective and cognitive trust. Unlike Americans, Chinese managers are quite likely to develop personal ties and affective bonds when there is also a business or financial tie.” One consequence is that, for a Chinese manager working with Americans, the culturally based preference to sep- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. arate cognitive trust and personal trust can indicate a lack of sincerity or loyalty. During a research project I worked on with my longtime collaborator Elisabeth Shen, we interviewed Jing Ren, a thirty-five-yearold Chinese sales manager, who was taken aback to learn how little a personal relationship meant when working in the United States. “In China,” Ren says, “if we have lunch together, we can build a relationship that leads to us working together. But here in Houston, it doesn’t work like that.” Ren hadn’t been looking to develop a friendship when he bumped into Jeb Bobko at the gym: Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 169 3/11/14 9:26 AM 170 erin Meyer I was working out on the rowing machine when I asked him what time it was. We started talking, and I learned that he was preparing for an upcoming monthlong trip across China. We had a great first connection, and he invited me to his house for dinner several times with his wife and children, and I invited him back. I got to know him and his family well. We developed a great relationship. Just by chance, his organization was a potential client for us, and I have to say that initially I thought that was great luck. But when we started discussing how our organizations would work together, I was taken aback to find that Jeb wanted to look at every detail of the contract closely and negotiate the price as if I was a stranger. He was treating me as if we had no relationship at all. In Ren’s culture, personal trust fundamentally shifts the way the two parties conduct business. By contrast, American managers make a concerted effort to ensure that personal relationships do not cloud the way they approach business interactions—in fact, they often deliberately restrict affective closeness with people they Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. depend on for economic resources, such as budgeting or financing. After all, in countries like the United States or Switzerland, “business is business.” In countries like China or Brazil, “business is personal.” Task-based versus relaTIonshIp-based culTures Of course, China and Brazil are not the only cultures where affective and cognitive trust are mixed together in business relationships. On the Trusting scale, countries are rated from high task-based to high relationship-based (Figure 6.1). The further a Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 170 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map FIGURE 6.1. US Denmark Germany Netherlands Finland Australia Task-based UK Poland TRUSTING France Italy Spain Austria 171 Mexico Brazil Saudi Arabia Russia Thailand India Japan Turkey China Nigeria Relationship-based Task-based Trust is built through business-related activities. Work relationships are built and dropped easily, based on the practicality of the situation. You do good work consistently, you are reliable, I enjoy working with you, I trust you. Relationshipbased Trust is built through sharing meals, evening drinks, and visits at the coffee machine. Work relationships build up slowly over the long term. I’ve seen who you are at a deep level, I’ve shared personal time with you, I know others well who trust you, I trust you. culture falls toward the task-based end of the scale, the more people from that culture tend to separate affective and cognitive trust, and to rely mainly on cognitive trust for work relationships. The further a culture falls toward the relationship-based end of the scale, the more cognitive and affective trust are woven together in business. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. As you look at the Trusting scale you see the United States positioned far to the left while all BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) fall far to the right. When it comes to building trust, the center of gravity in the global business world has fundamentally shifted over the past fifteen years. Previously, managers working in global business may have felt themselves pulled toward working in a more American manner, because the United States dominated most world markets. Building trust in a task-based fashion was therefore one of the keys to international success. But in today’s business environment, the BRIC cultures are rising and expanding their reach. At the same time, countries in the southern hemisphere Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 171 3/11/14 9:26 AM 172 erin Meyer such as Indonesia and Saudi Arabia are growing in global weight. All of these countries lie markedly toward the relationship-based end of the Trusting scale. Today if you are a manager aiming for success at an international level and your work brings you to the BRIC cultures or really anywhere in the southern hemisphere, you must learn how to build relationship-based trust with your clients and colleagues in order to be successful. On the other hand, for those who work frequently in North America, you may be skeptical about the accuracy of the United States on the left-hand side of the Trusting scale. Are Americans really so task-based? What about the client breakfasts, the golf outings, and the team-building activities and icebreaker exercises featured at so many American-style training programs or conferences? Don’t these suggest that Americans are just as relationship-based as the Brazilians or the Chinese? Not really. Think back to those icebreaker activities—those two-to-three-minute exchanges designed to “build a relationship” between complete strangers. What happens when the exercise is completed? Once the relationship is built, the participants check it off the list and get down to business—and at the end of the pro- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. gram, the relationships that were so quickly built are usually just as quickly dropped. What’s true in the training or conference center is true outside of it. In task-based societies like the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, relationships are defined by functionality and practicality. It is relatively easy to move in and out of networks, and if a business relationship proves to be unsatisfactory to either party, it’s a simple matter to close the door on that relationship and move into another. By contrast, icebreaker exercises in relationship-based societies are rare. Relationships are built up slowly, founded not just Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 172 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 173 on professional credibility but also on deeper emotional connections—and after the relationship is built, it is not dropped easily. As an example, consider what happens when the boss fires someone on your team. Will you continue your relationship with the person who has been fired even though he is no longer part of your company? Responses to this question vary dramatically from one culture to another. A Spanish executive working in an American firm told me: I couldn’t believe the way my American colleagues reacted when one of our team members lost his job. That guy was our friend one day and out of our lives the next. I asked my teammates—all of whom I respect deeply—“When are we going to have a party for him, meet him for drinks, tell him he is on our minds?” They looked at me as if I was a little crazy. They seemed to feel, since he was underperforming, we could just push him off the boat and pretend we never cared about him. For a Spaniard, this is not an easy thing to accept. If a Spanish manager finds the American attitude strange, Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. a Chinese manager is likely to find it unthinkable. John Trott, a Canadian working in pharmaceuticals and living in Shanghai, explains, “In China, business relationships are personal relationships. The loyalty is to the individual and not to the company. If someone leaves the company, the personal relationship would be much stronger than the severance between that person and the organization.” The ramifications for someone managing a Chinese team are immediately apparent. If you fire a salesperson, the client who had a relationship with him may also choose to leave. Likewise, if you fire a sales manager who has strong affective trust with his team members, the best are likely to follow him to his new company. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 173 3/11/14 9:26 AM 174 erin Meyer This difference between the way Americans react to a firing and the way those from relationship-based cultures react underscores the reality that Americans are, in fact, highly task-based— no matter how many “relationship building” exercises they may perform at conferences or seminars. peach vs. coconuT: frIendly does noT equal relaTIonshIp-based Just as it is easy to misinterpret the reason for an icebreaker activity, it’s easy to mistake certain social customs of Americans that might suggest strong personal connections where none are intended. For example, Americans are more likely than those from many cultures to smile at strangers and to engage in personal discussions with people they hardly know. Others may interpret this “friendliness” as an offer of friendship. Later, when the Americans don’t follow through on their unintended offer, those other cultures often accuse them of being “fake” or “hypocritical.” Igor Agapova, a Russian colleague of mine, tells this story Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. about his first trip to the United States: I sat down next to a stranger on the airplane for a nine-hour flight to New York. This American began asking me very personal questions: did I have any children, was it my first trip to the U.S., what was I leaving behind in Russia? And he began to also share very personal information about himself. He showed me pictures of his children, told me he was a bass player, and talked about how difficult his frequent traveling was for his wife, who was with his newborn child right now in Florida. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 174 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 175 In response, Agapova started to do something that was unnatural for him and unusual in Russian culture—he shared his personal story quite openly with this friendly stranger, thinking they had built an unusually deep friendship in a short period of time. The sequel was quite disappointing: I thought that after this type of connection, we would be friends for a very long time. When the airplane landed, imagine my surprise when, as I reached for a piece of paper in order to write down my phone number, my new friend stood up and with a friendly wave of his hand said, “Nice to meet you! Have a great trip!” And that was it. I never saw him again. I felt he had purposely tricked me into opening up when he had no intention of following through on the relationship he had instigated. Kurt Lewin2 was one of the first social scientists to explain individual personality as being partially formed by the cultural system in which a person was raised. Authors Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner later expanded on Lewin’s model to ex- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. plain how different cultures have different layers of information that they divulge publicly or reserve for private relationships.3 These models are frequently referred to as the peach and coconut models of personal interaction. In peach cultures like the United States or Brazil, to name a couple, people tend to be friendly (“soft”) with others they have just met. They smile frequently at strangers, move quickly to firstname usage, share information about themselves, and ask personal questions of those they hardly know. But after a little friendly interaction with a peach person, you may suddenly get to the hard Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 175 3/11/14 9:26 AM 176 erin Meyer shell of the pit where the peach protects his real self. In these cultures, friendliness does not equal friendship. When conducting a workshop in Brazil, one of the German participants who had been living in Rio de Janeiro for a year explained, People are so friendly here. It is unbelievable. You might be buying groceries or simply crossing the street. People ask you questions, speak about their families, and they are constantly inviting you over for a cup of coffee or suggesting that they’ll see you tomorrow on the beach. At the beginning I felt so happy to receive so many invitations of friendship. But it didn’t take long for me to realize that all those people who invite me over for coffee keep forgetting to tell me where they live and those constant suggestions that we’ll meet on the beach the next day simply never materialize. Because the beach is, of course, many miles long. In Minnesota, where I was raised, we learn at a very young age to smile generously at people we’ve just met. That’s one charac- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. teristic of a peach culture. A Frenchwoman who visited with my family was taken aback by Minnesota’s “peachiness.” “The waiters here are constantly smiling and asking me how my day is going! They don’t even know me. It makes me feel uncomfortable and suspicious. What do they want from me? I respond by holding tightly on to my purse.” On the other hand, coming from a peach culture as I do, I was equally taken aback when I came to live in Europe. My friendly smiles and personal comments were greeted with such cold formality by the Polish, French, German, or Russian colleagues I was Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 176 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 177 just beginning to know. I took their stony expressions as signs of arrogance, perhaps even hostility. In coconut cultures such as these, people are more closed (like the tough shell of a coconut) with those they don’t have friendships with. They rarely smile at strangers, ask casual acquaintances personal questions, or offer personal information to those they don’t know intimately. It takes a while to get through the initial hard shell, but as you do, people will become gradually warmer and friendlier. While relationships are built up slowly, they tend to last longer. When you travel to a coconut culture, the receptionist at the company you are visiting will not ask, “What did you do this weekend?” and the hairdresser who is cutting your hair for the first time will not remark, “An American married to a Frenchman? How did you meet your husband?” If you are a peach person traveling in a coconut culture, be aware of the Russian saying “If we pass a stranger on the street who is smiling, we know with certainty that that person is crazy . . . or else American.” If you enter a room in Moscow (or Belgrade, Prague, or even Munich or Stockholm) and find a group of solemn-looking managers who Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. make no effort to chat, do not take this as a sign that the culture does not value relationship building. On the contrary, it is through building a warm personal connection over time that your coconut-culture counterparts will become trusting, loyal partners. The point, of course, is that different cultures have different social cues that mark appropriate behavior with strangers as opposed to cues that indicate a real friendship is developing. People from both task-based cultures and relationship-based cultures may be affable with strangers, but this characteristic does not in itself indicate either friendship or relationship orientation. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 177 3/11/14 9:26 AM 178 erin Meyer sTraTegIes for buIldIng TrusT across culTural dIvIdes As a general rule of thumb, investing extra time developing a relationship-based approach will pay dividends when working with people from around the world. This is true even if you both come from task-based cultures, such as the United States and Germany. Once an affective relationship is established, the forgiveness for any cultural missteps you make comes a lot easier. So when you work internationally, no matter who you are working with, investing more time in building affective trust is a good idea. But knowing exactly how to build affective trust may not always be so obvious. One productive way to start putting trust deposits in the bank is by building on common interests. Wolfgang Schwartz, from Austria, used this simple way of connecting with people to great success during two decades of work in Russia. “When I retired and left Moscow,” he said, “I was replaced by a younger Austrian colleague, Peter Geginat, who had an extraordinary track record in Austria but knew nothing about how people outside of Austria Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. work. His task-based approach was effective for Austria, but not at all suited for Russia.” Geginat worked diligently for months to close an attractive deal with a potential client. He invested countless hours in making his presentation outstanding, his brochures polished, and his offer generous and transparent. Yet the client dragged his feet, and, six months into the process, his interest seemed to be dwindling. At this point, the young Geginat called Schwartz up and asked for advice, given the latter’s success during all those years in Russia. Schwartz came to Moscow and met directly with the client: Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 178 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 179 The first thing I noticed when I saw him was that he was about my age—we both have white hair. So I spoke of my family, and we spent the first half hour talking about our grandchildren. Then I noticed he had a model of a fighter plane on his desk. I also flew planes in the military, and I saw this as an incredible opportunity. We spent the next hour talking about the differences between various military planes. At this point, the Russian client signaled that he had to leave. But he invited me to go with him to the ballet that evening. Now, in truth, I dislike the ballet. But I’m not stupid. When an opportunity this good comes along, I jump on it. The evening went beautifully and ended in a drink with the client and his wife. At 10:00 a.m. the next day, Schwartz met again with the client, who said, “I’ve looked through your proposal, I understand your situation, and I agree with your terms. I have to get someone else to sign the contract, but if you would like to take the plane back to Austria today I will fax you the signed contract this afternoon.” When Schwartz arrived at his office in Austria the next Monday morning, the €2 million down payment was already in his account. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. Schwartz was able to accomplish more in twenty-four hours with a relationship-based approach than his task-based colleague was able to accomplish in six months. You might protest that Schwartz was remarkably lucky. Just by chance, he happened to have several things in common with his Russian client, from grandchildren to fighter planes, and in fact, Schwartz did end his account by exclaiming, “It was my white hair that saved me!” But Schwartz found these similarities because he was looking for them. If you are working with someone from a relationship-based culture and opportunities for a personal connection don’t jump out Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 179 3/11/14 9:26 AM 180 erin Meyer at you, it is worth the investment to look a little harder—as Italian Alberto Gaiani found when he worked with a team of young software engineers based in Mumbai, India. “I couldn’t imagine what we could possibly have in common,” Gaiani told me. “I was well aware from past experiences that, in order to manage a team of Indians effectively, it is absolutely critical to develop a good relationship with them.” But Gaiani had two challenges. The bigger challenge was the fact that he couldn’t travel because of budget cuts. The smaller was his personal background, so strikingly different from that of his Indian team members. As Gaiani explained, I am forty-six years old with four children. My life is homework and diapers and weekend trips to grandma’s house. But one thing I do love is music. I listen to music in the car, in the shower, while I’m working. Classical, rock, you name it. So then it occurred to me, why not use Indian pop music to make a connection? I Googled “Indian pop music what’s hot.” Then I spent two hours listening to the top songs that came up on YouTube and getting a feel for the rhythms and beats. For the song I liked the Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. best, I sent my Indian staff a link. “Do you know this song?” I asked them. “Do you love it like I do?” They responded with a resounding “NO, we don’t like that song—are you kidding?” “This is my twelve-year-old sister’s favorite song! You can do better than that!” one of them told me. And then they sent me links to the songs they liked. I created a great dialogue with them over something that was very interesting to all of us personally. The time it took for Gaiani to investigate which songs were hot in Mumbai paid off in myriad intangible ways. As he says, “In the past I have often had the experience with Indian employees such Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 180 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 181 that, if you don’t develop a good personal relationship with them, they will tell you everything is okay even if the entire project has gone up in flames. Once the relationship is built, loyalty and openness comes with it.” What makes Gaiani’s example particularly powerful is that he managed to do all this relationship building without ever meeting with his staff face-to-face. This, of course, is the reality that many of us face today. We work with people in countries on the opposite side of the planet, knowing very little about their cultural context. This makes relationship building more difficult, but no less important. shoWIng your True self: The relaTIonshIp Is The conTracT Picture this situation: You are on a business trip, and after a full day of formal meetings, a potential client has invited you out to dinner. As drinks are served and delicious smells roll out of the kitchen, how do you feel? Careful to maintain your professional composure. You want to be cer- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. tain that you don’t drink too much or let down your guard and make a bad impression. You are friendly, attentive, and trying to connect with the client, but careful to put your best foot forward at all times. Or Ready to let go. You have been focused on business all day long— now is the time to have some fun, develop friendships, show who you are outside of a business setting, and get to know others beyond their work personas. You share drinks, open up, and relax without concern. As my roots are in a task-based culture and I worked for the first several years of my career in the United States, my assumption was that the first scenario—caution—is the most proper Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 181 3/11/14 9:26 AM 182 erin Meyer answer. My strong belief was that when among people who could have any impact on my business success—not just clients but colleagues and other associates—I should always show the best “me” possible. The ditzy, forgetful “me” who loses her keys and forgets her purse at restaurants—not to mention the fun-loving, noisy “me” who often talks more than she listens and has lots of accidental-bad-mother stories to report—should be reserved for family and friends. But time and experience have taught me that the second scenario, show your nonprofessional self, is often the better approach when working with relationship-based cultures. I initially learned this lesson when working with Repsol, the Spanish oil giant. Ricardo Bartolome, who worked on a global team in the company’s Texas office, gave me this valuable insight: One of the aspects I find so difficult about working with Americans is that, although they are very friendly, sometimes surprisingly so, they don’t show you who they really are in a business relationship. They are so politically correct. They don’t dare complain or show negative emotion. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. In Spanish culture, we put a strong value on the importance of being authentico, and we perceive Americans as not authentic. You can work with an American supplier for years and hear all about his family, his weekends, his children, but everything is wrapped up in a package of positivity that we Europeans feel is impenetrable. My colleagues call Americans superficial and fake, but I don’t see it that way. I think they are just very, very careful to not show business counterparts who they really are. In either case, it makes it hard for us to trust them. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 182 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 183 Bartolome’s comments got me thinking about the downside of maintaining a “professional” demeanor in all my interactions with business acquaintances. Another mind-shifter for me was a conversation with Ted Krooner, an American whose work brought him frequently to Latin America. Krooner complained: I just get so exhausted on those trips to Mexico. After a long day of meetings, we go out to a restaurant and then out for more drinks. I can hang on for an hour, or an hour and a half. But the evenings drag on and on. They are drinking and laughing, really having a great time . . . but I feel like my head is about to hit the table. I just can’t concentrate any longer. I sympathized with Krooner, having felt the same way during my own evenings with business associates in Latin America. But as I reflected on his words, I began to recognize in Krooner what I hadn’t really understood about myself. Krooner felt exhausted after a night of partying because “he couldn’t concentrate any longer.” But his relationship-based colleagues had left concentration behind when they entered the restaurant. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. The best strategy in this situation is to join the crowd. When working in a relationship-based culture such as Mexico, the moment you switch from boardroom to restaurant or bar is the moment you need to begin acting as if you are out on the town with your best friends. Don’t worry about saying or doing the wrong thing. Be yourself—your personal self, not your business self. Dare to show that you have nothing to hide, and the trust—and likely the business—will follow. Of course, a focus on keeping a professional persona isn’t the only reason task-based people find it hard to adjust to Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 183 3/11/14 9:26 AM 184 erin Meyer relationship-based cultures. Investing hours in building affective trust can seem time-consuming and wasteful. In the words of a Danish oil executive who had recently moved to Lagos, Nigeria, “Who has time? Of course we all know that relationship building is key in Nigeria, but I’m very busy. If I spend the time and energy necessary to build affective trust with my Nigerian suppliers, I simply won’t have time to get my job done.” It’s an understandable complaint—and it raises an obvious question: Why do people in cultures like Nigeria, India, or Argentina invest so much time in relationship building? Is it simply that they are inefficient or prefer socializing to working? There is, in fact, a very clear, practical benefit to investing in affective relationship building—especially when working in emerging markets. This brings us back to the business value of trust. Suppose you are the Danish owner of a business that designs women’s purses. You sell two hundred purses wholesale to a shop that has just opened on the other side of Copenhagen. You give the retailer the purses, and he promises to pay you next week. How do you know you are going to get your money? Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. The answer, of course, is that the shop owner signed a contract promising to pay you. If he doesn’t pay, you can take him to court. Having a signed agreement in a culture with a consistently reliable legal system makes it possible to do business easily with people you don’t trust or even know. Now imagine the same situation—only this time you are Nigerian and designing women’s purses in Lagos. The legal system in Nigeria is less reliable than the one found in countries such as Denmark, the United Kingdom, and the United States. You can sign a contract, but there is no way of enforcing it if the payment doesn’t come through. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 184 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 185 The only way you feel assured that you’ll be paid in countries like Nigeria is the trust you have in the other person. Perhaps he has done business with your brother for years and your brother vouches for him; perhaps you’ve worked with his cousins or close friends on other projects; or perhaps you’ve had time to get to know him personally and you’ve concluded that he is trustworthy. You believe you can do business with the shopkeeper because your relationship with him (direct or indirect) provides a safety net that replaces the role of the legal system in more developed countries. For this reason, investing time in establishing trust will often save time (and many other resources) in the long run. And a similar way of thinking continues to exist in relationship-based cultures that are also blessed with solidly reliable legal structures, such as Japan and France. So if you find yourself wondering in exasperation, “Why do I have to spend so much time dining and socializing with potential clients? Why can’t we just get down to business and sign a contract?” remember—in many cultures, the relationship is your contract. You can’t have one without the other. Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. consIder Meals carefully: lunch May be your TIckeT How you organize and conduct your lunches and dinners when collaborating with people from other cultures can communicate volumes—often unintentionally, as I found out from an e-mail I received from Guillermo Nuñez, an Argentine executive with a global wine distributor: Last year, I had a strange experience when some of my colleagues and I visited one of our bulk wine customers in Norway. I was Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 185 3/11/14 9:26 AM 186 erin Meyer giving a presentation to these Norwegians about our Argentinean office, and explaining the challenges that we had crossing the fjords with our container boats. Up until that point, I thought that the presentation was going well. Then one of the Norwegians interrupted me, in a very polite way, just to inform me that they had ordered some sandwiches and drinks to have during the meeting. I was really surprised. This signaled to me that they were not interested in what I was saying. Never in my thirty years of working across Latin America had something like this happened to me. I was confused about what to do. Should I continue to talk although they clearly were interested in eating their sandwiches? I did finish my presentation, but I felt completely stupid speaking while they were eating their lunch. After the meeting, I spoke to my Norwegian-based colleague about what I’d felt had been a disastrous hour. He told me that I had misunderstood and that the situation was very normal. He explained that Norwegians often do this just to optimize time. He said it was a sign of respect for our time, which they would Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. like to invest wisely. Nuñez actually assumed that his colleague from Norway was simply trying to spare his feelings. Not until he attended a program I conducted and spoke about cross-cultural trust building did he discover that his lunchtime “disaster” was really just a case of crossed signals. The good news is that strategies for improving trust are quite simple, often requiring only a few minor adjustments in your expectations and behaviors. The first strategy is easy. If you are from a task-based society and are hosting people from a more relationship-based society, put Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 186 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 187 more time and effort into organizing meals to be shared. During these meals, spend time getting to know your collaborators personally rather than discussing business. And if you are visiting a relationship-based culture, don’t mistake a long lunch for a waste of time. If you use this time to develop a personal connection and a little affective trust, it may end up being the most important part of the business trip. For those from relationship-based societies who are hosting taskbased guests, don’t throw out the socializing altogether. Go ahead and organize a one-hour lunch, which they will most certainly appreciate. But if the meal is likely to stretch on to ninety minutes or longer, explain this in advance. And feel free to invite your task-based colleagues out in the evening—but if one of them chooses to go back to the hotel to get some rest or catch up on e-mails, don’t take offense. This is a normal and appropriate response in a task-based culture. Sharing meals is a meaningful tool for trust building in nearly all cultures. But in some cultures, sharing drinks—particularly alcoholic drinks—is equally important. I once conducted a training program for a German couple moving to Japan, assisted by Hiroki, a wise and entertaining Japanese Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. culture specialist. The German asked Hiroki how to get his Japanese colleagues to tell him what was really going on: “They are so formal and quiet. I worry if I am not able to build the necessary trust, I won’t get the information I need from them.” Hiroki thought quietly for a moment and then responded with only a small trace of humor in his eyes: “Best strategy is to drink with them.” “To drink?” the German client questioned. “Yes, drink until you fall down.” When Hiroki said this, I thought back to my first-ever ride in the Tokyo metro, when I saw several groups of Japanese businessmen Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 187 3/11/14 9:26 AM 188 erin Meyer stumbling through the station as they traveled home after a long evening of well-lubricated socializing. I now realized they were following Hiroki’s advice—quite literally. If you look at Japan on the Trusting scale, you will see that it is a relationship-based culture, though not as far to the right as China or India. During the day, the Japanese generally take a taskbased approach—but the relationship building that happens in the evening can be critical to business success. In Japanese culture, where group harmony and avoiding open conflict are overriding goals, drinking provides an opportunity to let down your hair and express your real thoughts. Drinking is a great platform for sharing your true inner feelings (what are called honne rather than tatemae feelings) as well as for recognizing where bad feelings or conflict might be brewing and to strive to address them before they turn into problems. Under no circumstances should the discussions of the night before be mentioned the next day. Drinking alcohol is therefore an important Japanese bonding ritual not only with clients, but also within one’s own team. Many Japanese use drinking to forge connections, as captured by the bilingual expression nomunication, stemming from the Japanese Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. verb nomu (“to drink”). Japanese salespeople frequently woo their clients over drinks, knowing that although explicit deal making is never done during this type of socializing, a deal is rarely won without it. Of course, drinking to build trust is not just a Japanese custom. Across East Asia, whether you are working in China, Thailand, or Korea, doing a substantial amount of drinking with customers and collaborators is a common step in the trust-building process. Many people from task-based cultures don’t get it. “Why would I risk making a fool of myself in front of the very people I need to impress?” they wonder. But that is exactly the point. When you share a round of drinks with a business partner, you show Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 188 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 189 that person you have nothing to hide. And when they “drink until they fall down” with you, they show you that they are willing to let their guard down completely. “Don’t worry about looking stupid,” Hiroki reassured our German manager, who had begun wringing his hands nervously. “The more you are willing to remove social barriers in the evening, the more they will see you as trustworthy.” Alcohol is not the only way to build a business relationship. If you don’t drink, you can certainly find other ways to partake in the fun; in Japan, a round of karaoke or a trip to the spa can do wonders. And in Arab cultures, where alcohol is avoided, you can forget beer and relax instead over a cup of tea. choose your coMMunIcaTIon MedIuM: phone, e-MaIl, or WasTa Of course, in today’s global business world, not all relationships provide the opportunity for face-to-face sharing over a meal or a drink. A lot of trust building must take place long-distance. Most of us send an e-mail or pick up the telephone without giving cul- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. ture much thought. However, putting a little effort into the choice can help tremendously when you need to build trust with your globally-dispersed colleagues. If you are working with people from a task-based society, go ahead and choose the medium that is the most efficient, if that is your preference. E-mail, telephone, face-to-face meetings—all are acceptable, so long as the message is communicated clearly and succinctly. But when starting to work with those from a relationship-based society, begin by choosing a communication medium that is as relationship-based as possible. Instead of sending an e-mail, make Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 189 3/11/14 9:26 AM 190 erin Meyer the extra effort to pick up the phone. Better still, if you have the budget as well as the time, take the trip. And don’t pack your day with task-based meetings and expect to escape to your hotel in the evening. Organize your time in order to communicate as much as possible in informal settings. Once you have built a good trusting relationship, you can move to a more task-based medium like e-mail. E-mail can be particularly problematic when you are trying to make a connection with a person you don’t know. In task-based cultures, it is quite common to e-mail people you’ve never met. However, in relationship-based cultures, people often don’t respond to e-mails from someone with whom they have no prior relationship. One strategy, if you need to contact someone you don’t know, is to use what in Arabic is called wasta, which translates loosely to mean something like “connections that create preference,” “relationships that give you influence,” or “who you know.” Dana AlHussein, a Jordanian manager working for L’Oréal, explains the concept: Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. A good personal relationship is the single most important factor when doing business with people from the Arab world. If you don’t have a relationship, don’t resort to e-mailing strangers out of the blue. Use your network to find a wasta—someone who has a relationship with the person you need to contact, and ask that person to make a quick call introducing you personally. A friend of a friend can work wonders in establishing a first step to a personal connection. If you take this approach, you are likely to find your e-mails answered rapidly. Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 190 3/11/14 9:26 AM The CulTure Map 191 Furthermore, whether using phone, e-mail, or working face-toface, think carefully about the amount of time you will devote to social talk before getting down to business. In just about every culture, when you make a phone call, you are likely to start with a period of social talk. What differs from culture to culture is how many minutes you spend chatting before moving to business. As a general rule, the more relationship-based the society, the more social conversation surrounds the task. While an Australian may invest a minute or so in personal talk with a colleague, a Mexican is much more likely to spend several long minutes on the social preliminaries before getting down to business. In strongly relationship-based societies, such as many African and Middle Eastern cultures, the balance of social talk to business talk may tip heavily to the former. Sheldon Blake learned this well after years of working among Saudis in Jeddah: If I need to discuss business with a Saudi Arabian client or contact who I haven’t spoken to in a while, I will make a call today just to reestablish the social connection. It would be embarrassing, and Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. my counterpart would likely feel it abrupt or inappropriate, for me to call to discuss business, given that we haven’t spoken in a while. After we have had a good chat and have reestablished a social connection, then I can call again a few days later and this time introduce the business task. This is considered a respectful approach in the Saudi culture. When in doubt, the best strategy may be to simply let the other person lead. Relax, put your feet up, and start the call with the idea that you might spend several long minutes just catching up before the business talk starts. And then let the other person decide when Meyer, E. (2014). The culture map : Breaking through the invisible boundaries of global business. PublicAffairs. Created from eastcarolina on 2023-08-10 03:28:43. 9781610392501-text.indd 191 3/11/14 9:26 AM 192 erin Meyer enough is enough. Initiate the social, ignore your gut reaction, and listen for their cues. As with phone calls, the standard amount of social content included in an e-mail also differs from one culture to another. If you come from a culture where a lot of social content is the norm, your task-based colleagues may feel as if you are hemming and hawing down the page. If you come from a culture where people jump right to business content, your e-mails can come across as rude or even aggressive. Just as when you are on the phone, follow the other person’s lead. Research suggests that the more you mimic the other person’s e-mail style, the more likely your collaborator is to respond positively to you.4 Jaroslav Bokowski, a Polish manager who worked in the IT department of the French multinational Saint Gobain, gave me this simple and effective example as to how to follow this rule: When I went to present at a conference in India, I noticed that, when the Indian organizers e-mailed me, there was always a short and friendly yet formal preamble, such as, “Greetings of the day. I hope this mail finds you in best of health and spir- Copyright © 2014. PublicAffairs. All rights reserved. its.” Well, in Poland, we certainly wouldn’t begin an e-mail in this manner, but I thought “Why not?” and responded in kind. When you are working face-to-face, socializing before getting down to business may come more naturally then when communication via phone or e-mail. But when you are busy and trying to figure out how to spend your pre