3 ms·
No data point for how many countries you've worked in or what company (e.g. American company in Belgium). More details please.
by gardenhedge 3y ago
No data point for how many countries you've worked in or what company (e.g. American company in Belgium). More details please.
- t43562 3y agoI admit it cannot be scientific and cultures differ a lot. In the absence of science, all I've got is that I end up getting told a lot of things and complained to a lot but those people totally shut up in meetings and it's left to me sometimes to bring up those ideas if I think they have to be voiced. When those suggestions don't fit with the group-think I take the dismissive rejections or even mockery and the originators of the idea don't open their mouths. On the incredibly rare occasions that they do get some traction I immediately say - actually that's X's idea. So IMO it regularly takes confidence to speak out and be heard. I've worked in South Africa (only as a student on some projects but it counts), Zimbabwe, UK, Germany and the US. Companies were everything from Finnish to Japanese to American to British and people were from all over the world - Britain, India, Poland, Romania, Ukraine, Zimbabwe and South Africa and the US. In some places like Zim there's a culture of respect to older people and things are more formal - so you are taking a big risk by disagreeing or expressing an opinion which might turn out not to be popular. Americans do tend to get heard and listened to because they put themselves forward. IMO you can learn from them or be beaten by them in that respect because they will not learn to be meek.