Is managing an international team, mostly like any management role?

Managing an international team!

What a big title! International team management is a task that even after reading manuals, getting diplomas and certifications of management, always have the “je ne sais quoi” that you find only in the concrete experience along the years.

Mostly like any job, right?

But International team management is becoming increasingly important as organizations expand their operations globally and seek to capitalize on opportunities in different markets. Or simply also because some places welcome more and more talent from all over the world, and as such you may face to have more and more member of your team coming from different culture.

All along my career and in my recent consulting missions, several companies and brands asked support for this subject from the set up to the concrete application to their management team. It often comes down to several points, actually 6 major points developed later in this article, which are needed to be placed in the context of each company.

Based on my previous experiences, I faced most cases reaching up to managing a team of 400 staffs in multiple countries, culture, religion, languages… and now covering clients, prospects, team members or sales agents on the 5 continents with the obvious multi-cultural aspects.

First of, let’s not confuse here skills / competences and knowledge of management. It is like a driving license. You pass all theoretical tests, know all signs on the road and rules… but yet, if you don’t practice how to drive a car in real, you’ll be facing risk.

Management is the same, and on top of that, international team management also has its specificity.

Too many time in some companies, I have seen people being promoted to become manager as they were good seller for example. In addition of knowledge, as I just mentioned, management requires skills as well as some charisma and leadership. And we will see that it requires a combination of additional skills such as negotiation, networking, sourcing information, being expert in coaching, as well as having high level of energy…

So let’s define international team management, which is the process of leading and coordinating a group of individuals from different countries, cultures, and backgrounds towards achieving common goals. It involves managing a team that may be spread across different countries, time zones, and languages, and dealing with the challenges that come with such diversity.

The Diversity by the way,

Having a team with diverse cultures can bring both advantages and disadvantages to an organization. Let's take a closer look at both:

A major advantage is the ability to increase creativity and innovation. Diverse teams bring a variety of perspectives, experiences, and backgrounds that can lead to more creative problem-solving and innovative ideas. Some points might be common in some part of the world but might sound “out of the box” for another part.

It also allows to enlarge knowledge and skill set and as such to bring a wealth of knowledge and skills that can be applied to different situations, allowing the team to be more versatile and effective.

A diverse team can adapt more quickly and easily to changes in the market, as they bring a wider range of experiences and knowledge, thus to enhance adaptability of the team.

Multiple culture already in a mixed environment are more open minded. As such, they can communicate more effectively with customers or contacts from different cultural backgrounds, which can lead to stronger relationships and increased efficiency of the company.

A team that values diversity and inclusion can create a more positive work environment, leading to increase employee engagement and retention.

These being clearly positive, there are also some downsides and disadvantages of multicultural team.

Language barriers and cultural differences can lead to misunderstandings and communication breakdowns. You may all speak similar language to communicate, usually the English/American language. But often, it is no one’s mother tongue, and the power of words and their meaning may take different sense in people’s mind, becoming a source of miscommunication.

Cultural differences can also lead to conflicts and misunderstandings that can impact team dynamics and productivity.

Diverse teams can take longer to make decisions, as team members may have different opinions and perspectives.

Team members from different cultures may have different attitudes and beliefs about change, leading to resistance or pushback. Even with the best intentions, team members may have unconscious biases or stereotypical views that can impact their interactions with others.

So, having a team with diverse cultures can bring many advantages to an organization, such as increased creativity, broader knowledge, and improved customer relations. However, it can also present challenges, such as communication difficulties, conflict, and bias. The key is to create a culture that values diversity and inclusion, promotes open communication, and fosters respect and understanding among team members.

Well, easy to say!!!

But let’s see 6 important steps that have been a must for success, in any place in the world and various culture I had the opportunity to manage a team.

As a first step here we go with the sets of unique skills that International team management requires. These followings are likely to match overall managerial skills. And again, I remind about the knowledge of “how to” deal with cross-cultural communication, understanding of cultural differences, flexibility, adaptability, and the ability to build strong relationships with team members from different backgrounds. The goal of international team management is to create a cohesive team that can work together effectively, despite their differences, to achieve the objectives of the organization.

All regular management rules apply, include setting clear expectations, establishing effective communication channels, building trust and rapport, providing training and support, recognizing and respecting cultural differences, and leveraging the strengths of each team member. It also involves managing conflicts and resolving disputes that may arise due to differences in cultural values and beliefs.

Leadership is also a critical skill required to manage an international sales team. The manager should be able to inspire and motivate the team members to work towards the company's goals. The manager should also be able to lead by example, setting the tone for the team and fostering a culture of teamwork and collaboration.

This first step, as I mentioned is the base and common to any management. It is just common sense as you can read.

But from this first step, they key point is to, pardon my French: Shut up and Listen/observe your staff’s context!

The international scale of your team forces you to turn around these clear skills and knowledge listed above, that you must have of course, but towards a focus onto the listening, patience, observation and understanding your staff motivation in their context.

As such, you will develop Cultural Awareness. You need to develop a firm understanding of the various cultures you’ll interact with. In addition to learning at least some of their languages, habits… you should familiarize yourself with their beliefs, traditions, and social norms.

It might be intuitive for you to see these motivation, or you may need to learn from them…. in any case, you’ll have to know what drives them in order to enable you to leverage the best out of them.?And your observation and understanding of these into their cultural mindset and framework, will allow you to hold a serious advantage managing your team towards success.

In order to succeed first part, the second step is actually to have specific communication skills to exchange with your team.

Once again, your team might be in different time zones and speaks different languages. Emails, video calls… Communication is a key element in the success of an international sales team, as it enables effective collaboration among team members who are miles apart.

Effective communication also fosters a positive working relationship between the manager and team members, and it ensures that everyone is on the same page when it comes to the company’s goals.

As mentioned above in the first point, strong cultural awareness can ensure the message you communicate and the actions you take are always propelling you closer to your goal.

Whatever the point you try to communicate, you need to find the way how they picture it in their mind. Sometimes a simple question asking them what they understood from it, or to ask them how would they do for something... feedback to you their understanding. Never, big NEVER take for granted what goes intuitively in your country as it might NOT be the same in their culture.

That leads us to the third step which is another vital requirement to manage an international team which is to be present physically. A good manager must be able to help his team by navigating the different cultural nuances of their team members and clients, and, to understand these, nothing better than to meet in person.

For sure, Technology obviously can fit in the gap to get people closer, ease information exchange via emails, video calls and so on.

BUT Go visit the markets or offices in person! Seeing, scenting, feeling… in person! Not mentioning that communication can easily be blurry by simple email where the same word or sentence could be read in different ways depending on each person. So these physical visits/meetings can make all the difference in winning or losing the upper hand on a deal or on a team management… towards success.

Plus, being physically there, will allow you, through your observations, to see new angles, new other team members under your direct staff/client which you don’t speak to usually as you don’t want to risk to bypass your direct contact. And it may give you opportunities to identify eventual issues or new angle for solution…and finally to also simply BOND with the team, clients or partners too, by the way,?to a whole higher level of relationship.

Indeed, you will have a tremendous advantage of being part of their day to day, and having the opportunity to view from their “googles” giving you the huge advantage to place yourself into their context more deeply, enabling you to lead and take decision more accurately or simply to bring support in the best way.

The fourth step is Lead by Doing, often the difficulty of having such multicultural team, often spread around, is to actually show guidance and support. Every time an opportunity comes up, you may, in a humble way, lift up your sleeves and go for it. Don’t get me wrong as this does not mean to brag about what you can do, so don’t show off.

"lead by doing" is a management style that emphasizes hands-on leadership and actively participating in the company process alongside your team. This approach involves leading by example, rather than simply delegating tasks and monitoring progress from afar.

By "doing" alongside your team, you demonstrate your commitment to the success of the company and the results of the team, and you also gain a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities your team faces. This can help you identify areas for improvement and provide more effective guidance and support. Based on your observation and listening skills mentioned above, you have a crucial advantage as you may introduce these “doing” wisely in each multicultural approach of your various teams. Of course, you remain who you are, but you show maybe different way of “lead by doing” adapted to the team you may be with at that time.

In addition, leading by doing can inspire and motivate your team by showing them what is possible and setting a high standard of excellence. This approach can also foster a culture of collaboration and teamwork, as you work alongside your team to achieve shared goals.

Overall, the "lead by doing" management style can be a powerful way to build a strong, motivated, and high-performing team.

As a fifth step, Emotional Intelligence is an essential skill for managing an international team because it allows a manager to understand and navigate the cultural differences and interpersonal dynamics that come with working across borders and time zones where team members may have never met face-to-face.

Self-motivated, self-awareness and self-regulations are needed to understand your own strengths, weaknesses, emotions, beliefs, and motivations, and leverage them to reach your goals.

These are the ground to have empathy for one another. With a high emotional intelligence, you will be capable to understand others’ personal experiences and emotions. This will certainly help you a lot when facing the need to motivate your team members whatever their culture is, especially important in global business, where cultural or language barriers can make it difficult to form a connection with others.

And the sixth step, would be to place all these 5 steps within the Time management which is yet another essential skill for managing an international team. The manager should be able to manage their time effectively, juggling different tasks and priorities from different time zones. The manager should also be able to help team members manage their time effectively, ensuring that deadlines are met, and clients are satisfied but trying to be in line with local time respecting work/life balance.

In conclusion, managing an international team is not given to anyone as it requires a set of unique skills, especially effective communication, adaptability, listening, observation, leadership, and time management are essential skills that a manager should possess. And all these must be with the googles of the multicultural mindsets to secure to develop long-term relationships with your team member, but also customers and suppliers.

Last but not least, all these allowed me to realize a systematic common point to most problem that my staff brought to my guidance for solution. Whatever the road taken to find the solution to a problem, my management talent was simply in a humble way, to bring a combination of guidance matching their cultural understanding avoiding as such eventual self-limitation, keeping at sight goals, leading towards success. This humble talent comes along with negotiation skills which is not developed in this article and could be a full article of its own, but are definitely part of your success, and you must learn these in order to balance all these steps listed above using the art of negotiation to keep your team focused on goals.

In a simple word, I humbly adapted ways of guidance upon culture and mindset of my staff enabling them to figure out and to reveal solutions independently that they already had deep inside from beginning somehow.

Managing an international team requires all basics of management indeed, but ignoring its specificity or considering that cultural differences will blend by themselves would be a big mistake. These specific steps of skills, experience and mindset listed above are from my experience and helped me to overcome reach goals and to elevate my team members. Of course, some may suggest additional steps or approach from a different angle for some parts. Or you may also add more theoretical or academical models to my hands on style. And I invite you to share these which may help to improve everyone’s management to lead to success!