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one of the first days I was in Shanghai
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I went into a restaurant for dinner
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I came to China to study Chinese so I
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thought it was you know I had to
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practice
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I went to a restaurant I ordered some
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dumplings
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and then I ordered a glass of water with
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my meal
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a relatively short amount of time later
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I got my food
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and something I was not expecting
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I got a glass of hot water
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now my first reaction was doubt
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ironically for a foreigner I could read
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and write characters better I could
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speak and understand so I thought that
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the communication broke down somewhere
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probably in my terrible tone
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pronunciation
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then I thought the waiter had made a
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mistake
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I didn't say anything at the time
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because honestly I didn't know how and I
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didn't want to get into a conversation I
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probably would have not understood
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now I know very well that if you ask for
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a glass of water in China you got a
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glass of hot water
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in Europe you probably get a glass of
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cold or room temperature water
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a small but very important difference
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when you try not to burn your mouth at
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the first sip
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I'm Italian born and raised I'm speaking
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to you in English and I'm standing on a
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stage in Shanghai China
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and I'm not the one with the most
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cross-cultural experiences in this room
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many of you probably all of you are
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sitting next to someone who has a
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background that is very different from
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yours
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and that difference is really important
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why
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because diversity brings growth it
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brings impact
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think of all the people that you work or
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study with
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you probably have a lot of international
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colleagues
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now globalization covid-19 the internet
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era they have accelerated Global
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collaboration it is now unavoidable
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that means that professors students
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leaders teams and the global Workforce
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will interact with people they have very
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little in common with
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that's why we need to learn how to
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navigate cross-cultural experiences
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because working together is what moves
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us forward
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I have lived in China a third of my life
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and I have seen the Beauty and the
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complexity of the culture
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living and working in Shanghai has given
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me the opportunity to get in contact
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with people from all over the world
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and also be part of cultural
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interactions I would never have had in
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Italy
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I arrived here in 2010 for a six months
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Chinese course of Udan University
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as you can see I'm still here
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what brought me here was a part of me
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that was always drawn to this side of
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the world because my mom worked in Hong
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Kong in the mid 80s and so I I grew up
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hearing her stories of travel
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what brought me here was my intense
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dislike for math like Paul
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and so I chose the the University degree
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that was probably the furthest things
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away from numbers cross-cultural
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communication
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what brought me here was also my desire
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to prove myself to live and work in a
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different city in a different country
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my journey had his ups and downs and it
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still does but I am proud of all of it
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first because I get to stand here and
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share my story with all of you which is
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beyond my younger self wildest dreams
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but also because I grew as a person and
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I will never give that up for anything
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I got to experiences what differences
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look like
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and more importantly how people react to
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differences
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I have seen people doing everything they
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can to avoid dealing with others that
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don't share their same views
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so my mission going forward is to create
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more bridges for people to collaborate
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instead of rejecting each other
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I think we can agree that the world can
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be a more inclusive place
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now it sounds easy in theory but when
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you're working with people spread across
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three different continents from five
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different cultural backgrounds who speak
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seven different languages it gets a
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little bit more complicated than just
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saying you know be nice to each other
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the first step we're dealing with
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dealing with these complexities is
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understanding and acknowledging our
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differences
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because the truth is that we are
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different we come from different
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cultures we have different perspectives
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we enjoy a different level of privilege
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but often we're not aware of how
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different we are
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in my daily work I help global leaders
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and teams to collaborate and that means
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often working across cultures
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throughout the years I've seen a lot of
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different Frameworks and models that
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explain the the connections between
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differences in culture and while those
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can be helpful to understand differences
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in a in a big picture kind of way the
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reality is that people are way more
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complex
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most Frameworks divide people into
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cultural or national groups
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but that doesn't really work if we have
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to be realistic we can say that
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generally speaking normally people from
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this culture behave in this way as a
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group with exceptions
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and when my clients are struggling to
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work with their International
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counterparts that's not really very
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helpful is it
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so what are people struggling with
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specifically
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imagine a manager arriving in China for
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the first time to work with their with
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their local team manager from Europe
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they get into a meeting and they share
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what they think is a wonderful
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insightful presentation
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and the end of it they go
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now I want to hear from you
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do you have any questions
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the room is silent
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like this
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for a while
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despite the encouragement people don't
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really speak up or say anything so the
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manager and the team become increasingly
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frustrated and they end the meeting
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feeling it was a waste of time
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what happened
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well there might be a lot of factors
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that that influence this the situation
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but one of the things that definitely is
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is important is the difference in
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communication styles
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generally speaking East Asian countries
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prefer to to communicate in a in a high
00:06:52
context level of communication which
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means that communication is indirect
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people read between the lines
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and how something is said or not said is
00:07:04
more important than what you say
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now to be relevant to our example the
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hierarchy and the need to keep face is
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probably what was important here
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you don't say no or ask questions
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directly to your boss and any feedback
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is given in private after building a
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relationship
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on the other side generally speaking
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European countries adopt a more low
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context kind of communication where
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communication is straightforward task
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oriented and very direct
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to the manager here the importance is
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the ideas and speaking out initiative is
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encouraged if not expected
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so what happens when people that have
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different communication Styles so
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different when they meet
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well on one side you have the low
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context Style
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that gets labeled aggressive and maybe
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even rude
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on the opposite side you have the high
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context style that gets labeled passive
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and uncooperative
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the manager and the team are on
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different sides and there is no Bridge
00:08:12
now just because we can see the
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differences it doesn't mean that
00:08:16
differences are not there
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and just because there are differences
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it doesn't mean that we can do anything
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to deal with them
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It comes naturally for us to separate
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things and people into neat groups like
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us versus them and in-group or the
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people that you have a lot of in common
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with and an out group or the people that
00:08:38
you feel you have nothing in common with
00:08:40
because our brain likes structure
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it is easier for our brain to remember
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differences in neat little groups that's
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why we have so many stereotypes
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from years of research we know that our
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brain is a prediction machine
00:08:57
our brain likes things that follow a
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pattern
00:09:00
let me show you something
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show of hands if you can read this
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okay
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now it might look like gibberish at the
00:09:14
beginning but if you understand English
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and I truly hope you do otherwise you've
00:09:18
been staring at everyone making weird
00:09:20
sounds so far you can read this whole
00:09:22
slide
00:09:23
you can read this slide despite the fact
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that only the first and the last letter
00:09:27
in each word are in the right place in
00:09:30
all the other letters are in a random
00:09:31
order
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this is because your brain feels a space
00:09:35
using your knowledge of the language
00:09:38
it is easier for our brain to rely on
00:09:40
the information we have instead of
00:09:43
processing a lot of new data
00:09:46
in the same way for us it feels safer
00:09:49
to rely on the information we think we
00:09:52
have about others instead of being
00:09:54
uncomfortable with what we don't know
00:09:55
about them
00:09:58
so now that we know that there are
00:10:00
differences and then our brain is trying
00:10:02
really hard to take shortcuts what can
00:10:05
we do to move us forward
00:10:07
we can't pretend there are indifferences
00:10:09
and just throw our hands in the air we
00:10:13
can pretend that differences don't
00:10:15
matter either because that's not how we
00:10:17
find solutions to problems
00:10:19
so where is the Goldilocks zone The
00:10:21
Sweet Spot in the middle
00:10:23
hear me out
00:10:24
here's my revolutionary idea
00:10:26
let's talk about how we communicate
00:10:30
let's have conversations about how to
00:10:33
have conversations
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what does that mean
00:10:37
it means to be aware of our own
00:10:40
preferences
00:10:41
of how we communicate how we speak our
00:10:44
mind how hot we like our water
00:10:47
it means being aware that other people
00:10:49
have different preferences
00:10:52
it means asking questions about those
00:10:55
preferences
00:10:56
it means talking about what is necessary
00:10:59
for both sides to work together
00:11:01
and finally it means to make time to
00:11:04
work on that
00:11:06
simple but not easy
00:11:09
at this point you might ask why do I
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have to do all the work and other people
00:11:13
don't have to do anything
00:11:14
well
00:11:15
I'm sorry but you can't change people
00:11:18
you can't motivate people to do what
00:11:21
they don't want to do you can tell
00:11:22
someone else to communicate a different
00:11:24
way but if they're not motivated they
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just won't
00:11:27
one thing you can do is to take
00:11:30
responsibility of your communication
00:11:33
we can't change people but the good
00:11:35
thing about people is that we can have
00:11:37
conversations with them and conversation
00:11:39
can help us build those bridge to
00:11:41
connect us
00:11:43
so how can we have those conversations
00:11:46
well it's not a linear process because
00:11:49
it's not a process that has an end in
00:11:51
the beginning
00:11:52
it's a constant ongoing conversation a
00:11:54
flux if you will
00:11:57
so here are five things to remember
00:11:59
first don't assume ask all the questions
00:12:06
ask questions from a place of curiosity
00:12:08
acknowledging your own biases
00:12:10
preferences and privileges
00:12:13
when you ask questions ask questions
00:12:16
that are open like what why and how
00:12:21
listen to what people are saying and to
00:12:24
what people are not saying
00:12:26
and if you're not sure double confirm
00:12:28
because you probably might have missed
00:12:30
something
00:12:32
and lastly give people time to process
00:12:34
information because not everybody is
00:12:36
comfortable reacting to questions right
00:12:38
away
00:12:41
in conclusion
00:12:43
differences are here to stay
00:12:45
there are as many experiences as there
00:12:47
are people
00:12:48
you will interact with people from
00:12:50
different cultures backgrounds and
00:12:52
mindsets
00:12:54
it's your responsibility to be aware of
00:12:56
how you communicate and to facilitate
00:12:58
discussion so that others can share
00:13:00
their ideas
00:13:02
it's your responsibility to start
00:13:03
building those bridges
00:13:05
so after this talk are you going to be
00:13:08
brave and have the conversations that we
00:13:10
need to have
00:13:11
if all of us have one conversation that
00:13:15
creates one small Bridge we all have the
00:13:17
chance to make the world a little bit
00:13:19
less divided and a little bit more
00:13:21
impactful
00:13:22
thank you
00:13:24
thank you
00:13:24
[Applause]
