> When one is working as part of a team (in a professional context), it’s one’s responsibility to ensure the delivery of one’s message doesn’t “clash” with othe

> When one is working as part of a team (in a professional context), it’s one’s responsibility to ensure the delivery of one’s message doesn’t “clash” with others I think communication involves mutual responsibility, for both sender and receiver. When it goes wrong, sometimes the sender has failed to meet their responsibility, sometimes the receiver, sometimes both, and sometimes it is just one of those regrettable misunderstandings which is neither's fault. > etiquette and guidelines on what constitutes acceptable forms of behaviour and communication It is impossible to craft guidelines which explicitly cover every possible circumstance. Guidelines may reduce the incidence of cross-cultural misunderstandings (although one may be sceptical about how effective they really are in doing that), but they can’t possibly eliminate them. > It’s also a topic one can bring up with their therapist for additional tips and guidelines. I remember my father telling me about how, in the early 1990s, he got a job with a US-based company, and he started going on regular business trips to the US. He was rather struck by how some of his American colleagues would talk at work about having therapists - the way they’d talk about it, it sounded like they just assumed everyone had one (which is how you’ve talked about it here). Judged by the standards of Australian culture, it was rather odd - if someone felt they needed to see a mental health professional, they’d be unlikely to tell random people at work about it, and talking to work colleagues in a way which assumed they did have that need could cause offence. My father didn’t take offence, he was just amused by the strange ways of Americans-but someone else could have.