Overcoming Communication Challenges | The 2nd Pillar of Intercultural Teaming
Marco Blankenburgh
International Director @ KnowledgeWorkx | Intercultural Agility, Executive Coaching, High Performance Teams
When it comes to communication challenges on intercultural teams, we've discovered that what makes communication good or bad is about much more than the words or tone that is used. There are a myriad of barriers that can creep in. That’s why Overcoming Communication Challenges is the second pillar of the Four Pillars of Intercultural Team framework.
One of the trickiest one's I've seen are hidden linguistic barriers where people might operate perfectly business wise in English, but in their heads and in their hearts, they still operate in the first language. So, when they write an email message to their colleagues, or talk to them in person or in a conference call, they are continuously translating in their head. This can lead to all sorts of issues, where something might make complete sense in one language but not the other.
Another issue that arises is when people interpret words at their face value, as opposed to trying to figure out the intent behind the words.?This is why one statement we always make is:
“Every email in the world is actually read out of context.”
Let that idea sink in… It's true! Because I am writing the email, I know my state of being, where I am emotionally, what my backstory and thought patterns are. The person reading the email does not.
All of that context doesn't travel with the email. So, to make sure it is understood when it is received, you have to fill in the blanks and add that context in. That's why email is so often the place where tension arises, when it comes to intercultural communication.
Adding Context
So, if every email is read out of context and every WhatsApp or social media message is read out of context, how do we then deal with contentious messages, messages that show disagreement, and messaging that shows emotion?
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?I still remember one team I was working with where we started to get into this conversation.
They said, “If everything is out of context, then we need a communication protocol.”
That's a perfectly reasonable response. There might be certain things that you would put in a protocol in place. But, first, they as team members, needed to agree how they were going to start communicating with each other.
To do this on your team start by asking questions like:
By answering questions like these, you will be prepared to have the emotionally challenging tension filled conversations with the minimal amount of relational damage. You will also avoid unfortunate miscommunications by adding context to your communication. We call that scaffolding our communication.
If you want to read more about how to do this well on a virtual team, you can read our article on the Three Principles of Communication for Virtual Teams .
Media Consultant
1 个月I don't know if you have seen this elsewhere but when we had a virtual team in multiple countries (but close to the same time zone) we would often open a video link and leave it open hour on hour while we worked... like working in a physical office... so instead of having to make a call to ask something one could just say 'MJ what do you think about...?' Admittedly this worked a lot better for the extroverts than introverts, but dramatically improved performance as you felt like you really were working together. Like in a physical office other chat happened which was great for team building and did (though some people would think this weird) improve efficiency. Having worked in a TV newsroom it was kind of like that. I worked in another open plan office with introverts who liked to have office screens up and not interact and then we moved to having our own offices... I nearly died working there! That office was in the USA and I assumed this was American culture rather than personality type related. It's important to work out what is cultural and what is personality type.
Media Consultant
1 个月'When do I need to just physically get up from my desk and go and talk to my colleague if I happen to be in the same office?' I think this is less cultural and more personality type related -- indeed many personality type differences can be misinterpreted as cultural. An extrovert will almost always prefer face to face discussion against anything written. But then it also gets complex -- what I call the reverse heated blanket effect. Imagine being in bed with your partner with a heated blanket. One likes it hot the other likes it cold. Now imagine the controllers are misconnected so that you are controlling your partner's side of the bed and they are controlling yours. Sometimes when trying to communicate cross culturally and definitely cross personality type you can try to make the communication better but in the process make it worse at the reception end.
Media Consultant
1 个月'When are you going to pick up the phone?' This is SO CULTURALLY LOADED. When I worked in the USA I followed the normal European practice of not picking up the phone when in a meeting (it would go to voice mail which I could deal with later). My American colleagues really struggled with this and eventually started picking up the phone for me when it rang, answered it and passed it over. For me interrupting a face to face meeting for a mere phone call was rude. Not for them!
United Bible Societies - Chief Operating Officer
1 个月Having just spent a week with my global colleagues face to face, it reminds me anew how inadequate email is if we don't put in the effort of context and assumptions to make them worthwhile. #iremainimperfect!