Informal Side of Organizations

How does it really work in organizations?

I attended another evening program at the Summer Institute for Intercultural Communication facilitated by Jaime Wurzel of Intercultural Resource Corporation (IRC). It was titled: Applying Intercultural Concepts to the Promotion of Positive Change in Organizations.

IRC produces videos that show how individuals from different cultures interact. They include A Different Place : The Intercultural Classroom which shows how individuals from a variety of countries interact with a professor and each other in a learning environment. He has also created the The Cross-Cultural Conference Room: An Interactive Seminar that shows how groups from the same company located in different countries react to the same case study. I have learned a lot about cultural differences each time I have seen the videos. They also come with extensive materials for processing the experience with groups.

The program I attended a few weeks ago showed The Multicultural Workplace, a video Dr. Wurzel produced with the Public Broadcasting System (PBS). The main character, Carlos, is shown interacting with various people in a work environment. His personal relational values are continuously creating challenges for him operating under the more individualistic organizational values. The more I learn about differences between values in cultures, the more painful it is to watch the video. Each person is acting from their own reality, with very little awareness of the effect on the other people.

Before showing the video, Dr Wurzel put forth the idea that institutions as a whole are crazy and dysfunctional. He proposed working toward institutions becoming reflective organizations. What I heard was the essence of this idea was to continually look under the surface for the assumptions driving actions. He raised the question of how can we look at the power reflected in the dominant assumptions of an organization? It’s a big question, especially since those in power in organizations often derive the most benefit from those dominant assumptions.

It’s not how we do things around here

But why? Here is where so many culture clashes seem to occur. Those who were brought up in a culture with similar values and norms to the organizational culture have the potential to thrive. Those from significantly different cultural norms and values may never quite understand the informal ‘how it works around here’. Especially when a stated norm is expressed with different behaviors.

In a workshop I attended in June, Donna Stringer from Executive Diversity Services talked about value differences and shared an alternative way to look at what matters.

In the business arena, is it a difference that makes a difference in the context? Does it affect one of these areas?

1. Cost
2. People or productivity
3. Legality
4. Safety

If not, how can you create flexibility to accommodate different ways of doing something?

When we are acting in a culturally competent manner:

• We see multiple possible interpretations for any behavior.
• It depends is the answer to any cross-cultural question.

So what is THE ANSWER.

Here’s an interesting thing that happened after watching the video. Carlos, who had been working for the organization for ten years was shown unsuccessfully interacting with co-workers and his boss. The audience was multi-cultural and multi-national, and all spoke English to some degree. The discussion was quite animated, some people thought it was unrealistic that someone could work for an organization for ten years without learning the informal aspects. Others talked about people they loved who had never adjusted to a culture they moved to. Emotions were high.

And then the conversation turned to looking for THE ANSWER. Some people seemed particularly annoyed that Jaime Wurzel was not providing the answer. Others seemed to blame the entire Intercultural profession for spending too much time helping people to understand why instead of what to do. One person wanted a list of things to tell a group of trainees.

Is it even possible?

Life is complex. So are organizations and the people who they are made up of. When you add the complexity of diverse cultures of any kind, the variables multiply to a level where one can only hope there are endless answers. In order to figure out which one might even have a chance, you need to look at many aspects of the complexity. An answer, if it is even possible to find one, needs to be discovered in the context of time, place, and players.

I don’t think anyone can give answers that can be randomly applied.

How do films help?

Jaime Wurzel is boiling down the essence of culture clashes, and serving them up to us in a format that allows us to feel what is happening. He knows the intercultural communication theory and research that offers some explanation for why it is so complicated. The learning is in the conversation and reflection after seeing the film. Each time we gain another bit of understanding of the other, or see a piece of ourselves, we have the opportunity to grow and challenge our own assumptions.

Jaime told us he had frustrating experiences being from Latin America and coming the US. But I didn’t have a sense of what that felt like until he showed us Carlos. My compassion grew. Along with my understanding and my curiosity about what else I am unaware of. A real person standing in front of me, showing me how the dominant assumptions of my culture have affected him. Powerful stuff.