Sure, but I wanted to remark that it still probably requires him a conscious effort to be polite and to not sound like an asshole to a naturally polite american

Sure, but I wanted to remark that it still probably requires him a conscious effort to be polite and to not sound like an asshole to a naturally polite american. Something he often forgets when there's more important business to worry about. The word "please" was an exaggerated example, but if you'd hear two finns politely disagreeing with each other you would probably call it "vulgar" or even think that they hate each other. And besides, it's not exclusively american people he deals with. He probably gets along fine with e.g. Russians who have a culture that is more similar to his own.