Managing Mindsets

Applying the Cultural Advantage in your Business

MIJND HUIJSER & DANAË HUIJSER

With real-life cases presented by:

IRINA BRAUN

MICHAEL BRAUN

ELLEN GRÜNEFELD

DANAË HUIJSER

MIJND HUIJSER

FRIEDA KRUIDERINK

NOBUO NISHIKAWA

SUSANNE RIEGER

BARRY ROGERS

HAJO SPECHT

Ayn Press, the Netherlands

www.ayn-press.com

Published by Ayn Press, the Netherlands, 2011

E-book published 2013

www.ayn-press.com

Mijnd Huijser & Danaë Huijser

Managing Mindsets – Applying the Cultural Advantage in your Business

Cover photo: ©Mijnd Huijser 2010, Jantar Mantar, the astronomical observatory in New Delhi (India), built in the 18th century to predict the movements of sun, moon and planets.

Editing: Daniela Yarnold, Shirley Cunningham and Colin Fraser

©Mijnd Huijser & Danaë Huijser

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission from the publisher, except for brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

ISBN 978-90-821088-3-5

More books by Mijnd Huijser:

The Cultural Advantage – a New Model for Succeeding with Global Teams, Ayn Press, 4th print 2010 (first published in 2006 by Intercultural Press, also available as e-book)

Culturele Intelligentie – Thuis in de internationale arena, Business Contact 2005, revised edition (e-Book) – De international arena, Ayn Press 2013

The Profit of Peace – Corporate responsibility in Conflict Regions (co-author Karolien Bais), Greenleaf Publishing 2005

De winst van vrede – Multinationals in conflictgebieden (co-author Karolien Bais), Business Contact 2004

Zoveel hoofden, zoveel zinnen, Uitgeverij Thema 1998

Managing Mindsets

Applying the Cultural Advantage in your Business

A very special ‘thank you’

to Daniela Yarnold, Shirley Cunningham and Colin Fraser

for their comprehensive editing.

In spite of their busy practice as cross-cultural consultants,

they dedicated days of their valuable time to this book.

Mijnd Huijser & Danaë Huijser

The real-life examples get the reader thinking about how diverse international business cultures can be and what to do about it. But most of all, they get readers thinking about their own mindset – their own assumptions, biases and preconceptions. Engaging, inspiring and surprising. Enjoy!

Dr. Ron Meyer, Professor of Corporate Strategy, TiasNimbas Business School, Tilburg, the Netherlands, co-author of Strategy: Process, Content, Context

I am entirely cured from my disillusionment with the state of cross-cultural training. This book presses the right button on many issues from which classic cross-cultural theory shies away. Practitioners will feel at ease with its pragmatic approach.

Dr. Jehad Al-Omari, Management Consultant, author of Understanding the Arab Culture and The Arab Way

Managing Mindsets is a must for all managers in a multinational environment. The business cases are an eye-opener, and help to align management to different cultural, organisational, merger or post-merger situations.

Dr. Günther Böllert, Manager Talent Solutions, West Europe 3M Corporation

Just like the Model of Freedom — a favourite in our annual class ‘New Leadership’ — this book combines practicality with easy understanding. It incites readers to self-reflection and open-mindedness.

Remy Mols, Human Resource Manager, Shimano European Holding BV

Contents

Introduction

1 Models

We talk models, we mean practice

Part I Cross-cultural coaching

2 Time

Moving business from Salzburg to St. Petersburg

3 Appearances

Scandinavian shockwave in Singapore

4 Responsibility

A Tanzanian stands the touch with the Dutch

Part II Mergers and acquisitions

5 Matching

Check and mate in a French-British merger

6 Benchmarking

If it works at home, it’ll work anywhere

7 Trust

A German-Japanese joint venture hits the wall

Part III Organisational changes

8 Stability

Danish corporate values put to the test in India

9 Communication

A strategic change that came at a high cost

10 Innovation

Reconciling professional cultures in project teams

Part IV Social integration

11 Ethics

Pioneering international recruitment in Finland

12 Inclusion

Spanish public services attune to newcomers

13 Motivation

Dutch sports coaches team up with immigrants

Epilogue

14 Freedom

Annex I

Explanation of the Model of Freedom

Annex II

Culture Assessments Toolkit

Annex III

Contributors

Annex IV

The Model of Freedom Association

Introduction

The twelve cases in this book — real-life, but anonymous — show how mindsets can cause confusion if we do not understand culture’s ways. They are presented by ten cross-cultural experts, whose daily work essentially amounts to managing mindsets.

Authors Mijnd Huijser and Danaë Huijser, analyse each case, applying the Model of Freedom, a practical culture model that helps to understand and interpret cultural behaviour. Not only behaviour in national cultures, but also in professional and organisational cultures.

As a kick-off (chapter one), Mijnd Huijser explains how his model gradually emerged in working with professionals in the international arena. An extensive explanation and illustration of the Model of Freedom can be found in Annex I.

In the Epilogue (chapter fourteen) the authors argue that the Model of Freedom is not the ‘one and only way’ to deal with culture. Some models work well at an academic level; others focus on do’s and don’ts, or deliver a handy checklist. The Model of Freedom, however, has heuristic advantages for many business situations, because it focuses on behaviour. It does not explain why people hold to certain values, but categorises groups with similar values resulting in similar behaviours.

Part I Cross-cultural coaching

Part I deals with the application of the Model of Freedom in three case studies of cross-cultural coaching.

An Austrian top manager (chapter two) is about to be transferred to St. Petersburg to lead a new subsidiary of his company. Knowing that his leadership style might deviate strongly from what the Russians are likely to prefer, he wants to be ‘culturally prepared’. The coaching process exposes his biggest challenge ahead: keeping patience.

A Scandinavian manager (chapter three) is about to lose his job in Singapore, where he is leading the IT department of the Asian division. His performance is highly criticised, both in the Scandinavian and Asian offices. It appears that his Asian colleagues have a hard time recognising any authority in this very ‘Nordic’ manager with his laid-back presiding style and his informal communication.

A young and ambitious Tanzanian woman (chapter four) feels stuck in her position of financial specialist in a Dutch construction company. She ‘burns the midnight oil’ to keep the understaffed department running, but this goes unnoticed by her boss and she is scorned by her colleagues. Jointly, coach and client disentangle where cultural aspects are at play and where personality comes in.

Part II Mergers and acquisitions

Part II shows the unique strength of the Model of Freedom in three mergers and acquisitions case studies.

The final phase of an intended merger between a French and a British IT company (chapter five) is being marred by power plays and blame games. Intervention is urgently needed. It comes as a surprise for both parties that a merger is not only about technical issues and balance sheets, but also has cultural dimensions.

A new management team with five different nationalities (chapter six) is formed after the acquisition of a French enterprise by an American chemical company. The American CEO of this management team admits he doesn’t know ‘how to handle all these different cultures’. But that is not all; he also needs to lead a change from a ‘family’ culture to a ‘merits based’ culture.

A joint venture between a German and a Japanese company (chapter seven) eventually goes ‘down the tubes’. A possible success is nipped in the bud during the first meeting, when the opposing business styles of the Japanese and the German CEO create fateful misunderstandings and mistrust.

Part III Organisational change

Part III contains three case studies that deal with organisational change, in which applying the Model of Freedom leads to the right decisions.

The first concerns organisational change prompted by rapid growth (chapter eight). A Danish IT company, expanding both at home and in India, is afraid of losing the corporate values that once led to its success. Not surprisingly, some values appear to have different meanings when viewed through the Indian and Danish cultural lenses.

An American company moves its European headquarters from Amsterdam to London (chapter nine). The decision comes out of the blue; many employees resist moving and quit their jobs. Those who remain have a hard time adjusting. It is not unusual for organisations to implement a strategic change without considering the impact of cultural differences, which comes at a high cost.

How can creating cross-professional teams lead to innovation (chapter ten)? Although professional diversity does help the creative process, it is not always conducive for innovation, as consensus is more difficult to achieve. This case study is based on research on how to realise the potential advantages of cross-professional teams over mono-professional teams.

Part IV Social integration

The Model of Freedom has also proven to be a practical tool in non-profit organisations that aim for social integration, as is demonstrated in three case studies in part IV.

A hot topic in the Western world with an ageing workforce is the recruitment of foreign workers (chapter eleven). Finnish hospitals are attracting Filipino nurses to address the shortage in staff. Simply ‘dropping’ a workforce from a tropical Asian country into an arctic Nordic country would be inhumane and costly. The recruitment company prepares Filipino nurses and Finnish hospital mentors for this blend of cultures.

Chapter twelve brings us to Spain, to the town of Badalona, where the original inhabitants start feeling outnumbered by immigrants. The public administration acknowledges the social tensions, and wants its social workers, police and educators to be better equipped to handle cultural differences.

Sports can boost the integration of ethnic minorities (chapter thirteen). In a Dutch swimming club, immigrant children tend to drop out. A cultural awareness programme for the swimming coaches (mostly young volunteers) leads to subtle changes in their attitude, after which the memberships from other cultures rise substantially.

The cultural advantage

The cultural advantage often does not display itself automatically. Generally our experts are called in because of trouble or expected trouble. Yet, we should keep in mind that cultural diversity, when well managed, enriches the business world as well as society.

This book takes this appreciating perspective. It is a good thing to find solutions to problems; it is another thing to realise that these solutions may be limited by a cultural bias.