Chapter 8: Work in a Wider Perspective

Overview

The problem with using our brains is that thinking requires a lot of energy, and in many ways it s easier to act first and think second. However, as we leave our teens and have to deal with some of the more uncomfortable consequences of acting on impulse, most of us learn that decisions based solely on instant gratification are seldom wise ones and realize that a period of reflection before we act can be a good idea. Faced with some of life s important decisions we may be forced to examine our priorities, our ethical standards, and/or the assumptions we learned as we grew up about what is normal or abnormal behavior. In all three key areas our native culture has a significant influence on our answers, for it provides the cornerstones on which we base our thinking.

These three key points naturally have a place in our working lives too. The first one, how we judge what is more or less important, is something we do all the time.

The book Funky Business: Talent Makes Capital Dance by Jonas Ridderstr le and Kjell Nordstr m claims that as social institutions in the West are dying ”families are getting smaller or splitting up; the state is less able to provide health care, education, and social benefits for its citizens ; religion is seen as irrelevant ”companies will have to provide their employees with the sense of belonging and the security that they previously found in their lives outside work. In this way jobs will become even more important in life, and presumably occupy even more time and energy. Some cultures already give a very high priority to work. In Japan, long hours in the office, and equally long hours socializing with coworkers and customers, mean that businessmen have little time with their families. Although there are signs that things are changing, vacations are often still taken with fellow employees , and loyalty to the company means that people rarely change employer by choice. In the U.S., on the other hand, there is a lot of mobility in the job market, but people are just as determined to better themselves through hard work. There, too, people work long hours and claim that they work sixty hours a week for the sake of their families.

Yet there are cultures, like those of Southern Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America, where people think that expressions like time is money and work before pleasure show that someone s priorities are wrong, and that the best way to be a good family member is to spend time with your relatives. Everyone knows that work is only part of the picture.

The second key point is about ethics ”whether a course of action is right or wrong. Any job for any company can involve the individual in ethical dilemmas. I know a teacher who came, like me, from England to Scandinavia to teach English. He was sent to a middle- sized town in the center of Sweden, but after finding out where he was expected to teach, he broke his contract and returned home. He was a Quaker, and his biggest client would have been the local armaments factory. His decision was based on an ethical stance and a matter of individual conscience.

But what about corporate ethics ”what are they based on? For example, what about the U.S. pharmaceutical company that tried (unsuccessfully) to patent turmeric, a locally grown spice, in India? In India most people know that if turmeric-based formulations are applied to wounds they will heal faster, and most Indian people would regard it as unnatural and indeed unethical to lay claim to knowledge that had been passed down from generation to generation, for they come from a culture where it is regarded as natural to share cultural property with other members of the community.

But I m sure that the CEO and directors of that particular American company would have been pained to have their attempt at patenting described as unethical. But if you belong to a culture, either national or corporate, that prioritizes the individual over the collective and that does not accept the idea of a common intellectual heritage; if something does not have a legal owner, it s up for grabs.

The third point, about what constitutes natural behavior, is not one we ask ourselves until faced with a situation that challenges our assumptions of normality ”and we are more likely to face such situations when dealing with another culture.

Companies and corporations can have conflicting ideas about what is natural. So if the boss of a German company, for example, asks if it is possible for a Mexican supplier to deliver 5,000 widgets to his warehouse on December 2 and the supplier says Yes, on December 1 the German manager will ensure there is enough empty shelf space available for tomorrow s delivery, for he comes from a culture where people are very proud of the fact that they say what they mean.

The Mexican manager, however, may be surprised to receive a phone call on December 3 asking why the widgets aren t there. Yes he had said it was possible for him to deliver, and indeed it was, but only if he made all his other long-standing customers wait, and of course he couldn t do that. And by the way, hadn t the German seen the TV reports about the hurricanes in the area, which meant that staff had had problems coming to work? The Mexican executive is shocked and angry when the German threatens legal action for breach of contract. That is no way to build a long- term relationship.

This stalemate is the result of each party making different assumptions about what is a normal, acceptable way to behave. And of course it doesn t occur to either of them that they need to explain or justify their actions to the other party, because everyone knows what normal, acceptable behavior means. I m afraid neither of them had read the rather depressing but wise words of Nancy Adler in International Dimensions of Organizational Behavior : Assume difference until similarity is proven. Those words should be written in gold above the doors of corporate headquarters around the world. It would save everyone a lot of trouble.

• MORAL What we regard as right, as important, and as natural in one country may be regarded as the opposite in another.