Cultural Intelligence in Business & Military Operations

Companies have Cultures. So do, nations, societies & organisations. Understanding someone's culture helps us to understand them better and to improve our interactions with them.

In 2014, while attending an Army Training Course, my dissertation on, “Cultural Intelligence & its Utility in Military Operations” was awarded a Book Prize. The research undertaken for the same gave me an opportunity to explore some fascinating aspects of Cultural Intelligence. I shared some of the observations from the non-classified portion of my research work in a 3-part series I wrote on LinkedIn, earlier. This article is a compilation of those three articles plus a little more.

In 2008, an article in the Harvard Business Review declared Cultural Intelligence (CULINT) as, "The essential factor of our times, without which, no one is going to be even remotely successful in the 21st century”.?

Today Coca-Cola is sold in all but two countries in the world - Cuba and North Korea. Virtual meetings and conference calls happen across borders around the clock. In today’s ‘Flat’ worlds’ & ‘Zoom' universes, cultural awareness & the ability to adapt to different cultures are essential prerequisites for success.

Two of the pioneer researchers in the field of Cultural Intelligence, David Thomas & Kerr Inkson in their book, ‘Cultural Intelligence – Living & Working Globally’, defined it as, “Being skilled and flexible about understanding a culture & learning increasingly more about it.”.

Three Essential Facets of Cultural Intelligence are:-

• Cultural Intelligence is malleable & not fixed. It changes based on a person's interactions, efforts, and experiences. Hence, it is possible to enhance one’s Cultural Intelligence.

• Cultural Intelligence is an individual capability that is more specific than general mental ability or personality.

• Cultural Intelligence is not specific to a particular culture. Instead, it focuses on the more general capability to function effectively in culturally diverse situations in any location or country.

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Cultural Intelligence is measured in CQ - Cultural Quotient. The concept of CQ was first introduced by two business researchers, Christopher Earley and Soon Ang, in their 2003 Standford University publication, ‘Cultural Intelligence: Individual Interactions Across Cultures’. However, their work failed to raise the buzz that Daniel Goleman’s, “Emotional Intelligence”, had done back in 1995.

In a sense, CQ is Cultural Intelligence quantified & it measures the capability to function effectively in a variety of national, ethnic & organizational settings. Every person has a specific CQ that can be assessed & enhanced.

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While Intelligence Quotient (IQ) is important in most work situations, it does not necessarily provide effectiveness in being responsive to the emotions of others which is done by one's Emotional Quotient (EQ). Likewise, IQ does not necessarily enable effectiveness in situations characterized by cultural diversity where CQ can help.

CQ complements IQ by focusing on specific capabilities that are important for achieving effectiveness in culturally diverse settings. Though Cultural Intelligence is related to EQ, it picks up where EQ leaves off. People with higher CQs are better able to successfully blend into any environment & use more effective business practices.

Measuring CQ

CQ is measured on the same scale that was created by Linn Van Dyne and Soon Ang for measuring individual IQ. A person’s CQ is measured by assessing him/her in terms of these four distinct CQ capabilities:-

• CQ Drive (Motivation) : Interest in & confidence in functioning effectively in culturally diverse settings.

• CQ Knowledge (Cognition) : Knowledge of how cultures are similar/ different.

• CQ Strategy (Meta-Cognition) : Making sense of culturally diverse experiences.

• CQ Action (Behavior) : Capability to adapt behaviour to different cultures.

?There are various tools including those available online, for effectively measuring CQ, including one’s own CQ, or that of one’s team members. Some of these tools are available on the website of the Michigan-based, Cultural Intelligence Center.

?Benefits of CQ

CQ is not merely an academic virtue but has practical utility in most if not all walks of life. It is a critical capability that enhances employee, manager, and organizational effectiveness. It also enhances interpersonal interactions in a wide range of social contexts. Research shows that people with higher CQs are consistently more effective. They have an edge in the crowded job market and enjoy greater personal satisfaction and less burnout in all kinds of multicultural situations. A few examples are listed below:-

• Leadership.?????????Leaders with high CQs have repertoires of strategies and behaviours for orienting themselves when they encounter unfamiliar behaviours and perspectives. They can discern whether a seemingly bizarre behaviour is explained by culture or is unique to a particular person or organization. Such discernment is critical in, for instance, cross-border negotiations, understanding new markets, unifying dispersed leadership teams and developing global marketing plans.

• Multi-National Companies.??????Executives with high CQs often succeed in adapting to the tastes of culturally diverse markets while retaining their brands’ own identities. Companies that adopted CQ assessment and training are likely to increase their revenues & expanded internationally faster as well as attract and retain top talent.

• Human Resource Professionals. HR managers with high CQs tend to display a better sense at handling employees, especially when the latter come from diverse backgrounds.?

• Health Care. ?????????Hospitals run by health workers with higher CQ generally tend to be more effective at treating patients who are immigrants / foreign nationals, reducing the danger of misdiagnosis and consequent lawsuits.

• Diplomacy.?The use of Cultural Intelligence and other methods of soft power has often proved to be a primary tool of statecraft as opposed to the more coercive forms of national power. Political scientist Joseph Nye writes in his book, ‘Soft Power - the Means to Success in World Politics, "A country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics because other countries – admiring its values, emulating its example, aspiring to its level of prosperity and openness – want to follow it”. This in some ways explains why countries like Turkey or Ukraine aspired to become members of NATO, besides the military & economic motivations.

?CULTURAL INTELLIGENCE IN THE MILITARY DOMAIN

The precursor to the planning of any military operation is a process referred to as the Intelligence Preparation of the Battlefield (IPB). My dissertation had proposed the hypothesis that Cultural Intelligence is an essential part of the IPB process. There are numerous occasions in Military Histories wherein Cultural Intelligence was either successfully used by the victors or woefully neglected by the vanquished.?

Cultural Intelligence did not gain prominence in the military domain until the late 20th century (when low-intensity & counter-insurgency operations became common). Many great military commanders in the past neglected it at their own peril. One such great General was Napoleon Bonaparte of France.

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In 1808, Napoleon occupied Spain ousting the Spanish royal family. However, during the subsequent occupation, the population of Spain rebelled against the French & initiated what was for the first time classified as “Guerrilla war,” or “little war”.

?The “Ulcer of resistance”, was most intense in a Spanish territory called the Navarrese Diamond - a diamond-shaped area stretching 100 X 75 miles on the French-Spanish border, where, unknown to Napoleon and his generals, an almost hysterical hatred for the French bubbled beneath the surface.

The reasons for this hatred were many - The strong Influence of the Catholic Church amongst the populace; Their economic dependence on the smuggling of French goods into Spain; & the long tradition of disobedience to any central authority.

Napoleon's cultural miscalculations based upon an incorrect analysis of the Navarrese psyche resulted in a protracted struggle that engaged three-fifths of his Army. 5 years later, a defeated French Army retreated from Spain. Clearly, their lack of Cultural Intelligence about Spain and especially about the Navarrese, cost the French dearly. Napoleon later confessed, “The Spanish ulcer destroyed me”.?

In his 2004 research paper, Col W Smith of the United States Marine Corps writes, "Napoleon's ‘Spanish Ulcer’, had a cause. The requirement of winning popular support for his new Spanish regime was compromised, thus highlighting the perils of forgetting ‘the people’ in the strategic calculus".??

Ironic for a General who had won many a battle in the Napoleonic Wars by emphasizing the importance of Battlefield Intelligence & Reconnaissance-Pull!

?Lessons from Sub-Conventional Operations

In sub-conventional operations such as Counter Insurgency Operations (COIN), the military aim of the operations may be somewhat different from that of conventional wars. Opponents may not be ‘enemies’ in the traditional sense of the word and besides winning tactical battles, one may also need to win the hearts and minds of the affected population.

?Military commanders may sometimes fail to plan and take into consideration socio-cultural facets typical to the population within the purview of their unit’s operational environment. However, in sub-conventional warfare, studying the cultural domain is generally as important as studying the opponents who try to capitalize on a situation by exploiting the grievances of the indigenous population.

?Lessons about the extreme importance of Cultural Intelligence in COIN operations can be culled from the experiences of most armies around the world. However, here I will restrict myself to just instance which is already widely known & readily available as open-source information.?

?Coalition Forces in Iraq’s Sunni Triangle.??At the end of the 2nd Gulf war in Iraq, the consolidation and stabilisation operations conducted by the US-led coalition forces in Iraq in general and the ‘Sunni Triangle’ in particular, faced critical challenges. Although, it would be unfair to pin this multicausal setback down to just one factor, yet, the lack of Cultural Intelligence, was definitely one of the key factors.?While the coalition military planners did possess macro-level details about the ethnic and religious divisions in the area, very little professional analysis was conducted by them to anticipate the probable response of various segments of the 25 million Iraqis towards the coalition’s stabilization and support efforts.?Cultural Intelligence gaps were the context for several broad assumptions that later proved to be invalid. Whereas planners left no stone unturned in the intelligence preparation of the battlespace concerning the Iraqi forces, there was very little analysis of the Iraqi people which would have helped to answer questions such as, “What is it about the Iraqi society that's so remarkably different from a western society”?

?In June 2010, during his confirmation hearing before taking command of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus told the US Congress, “The decisive terrain in counterinsurgency is ‘the human terrain.’ Effective counterinsurgency requires protecting and eliciting cooperation from the population—the human terrain—which, in turn, requires a keen understanding of the population’s social and cultural characteristics. U.S. military needs a standing capability to provide a baseline of socio-cultural knowledge that can be rapidly expanded in wartime.?The literature reviewed suggests that culture, and its study (e.g., cultural intelligence preparation of the battlefield), is vital to the success of any military operation.” (General David Petraeus, ‘Address to US Congress’, June 2010).

?Thus, Cultural Intelligence is an essential element of successful military operations & incorporating it in the IPB process reduces the potential for strategic gaps by preparing a military force to avoid the "Navarrese Diamonds" & "Sunni Triangles" of the future. In order for any military force to truly understand the dynamics of its area of operations and to alleviate latent causes of potential conflicts therein, programs designed to study the cultural domains of that area are therefore of vital importance.

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