As organizations and their teams become more international we need to take culture into consideration, if we want to lead effectively. Erin Meyer, a researcher and seasoned human resource director, has created a framework of eight different scales to assess where one places themselves in the greater cultural context of their colleagues and organization. By understanding where you are relative to others, and the cultures you are operating in, you will be able to tweak your leadership style to create better outcomes. These are the eight scales. 1. Communicating This scale measures where our culture places itself in terms of low or high context communication. Low context means our communication is precise and explicit, while high context means that communication is more layered and reading between the lines is required to truly understand the message. 2. Evaluating measures the preference for direct or indirect criticism. And although you might expect congruence between low context and high context cultures and their preferences, in actuality it is more layered. Even though the French are high context communicators in comparison with Americans, the French prefer a more direct and blunt approach to criticism than Americans do who prefer feedback to be more soft, subtle or diplomatic. 3. Persuading measures the best tactic to convince others. Some cultures like Germany prefer using principles first, before presenting opinions or factual observations. While, in the United Kingdom managers who need to persuade, use the opposite tactic beginning with the conclusion or an executive summary. 4. Leading measures the level of respect and deference of authority. Scandinavian countries are closer to the egalitarian side where hierarchy is flat, while countries like Japan or Nigeria rank as being quite hierarchical. 5. Deciding measures whether reaching a decision involves building up agreement amongst everyone involved or whether it’s simply the boss who makes the decisions and delivers them down the ladder. Here too, there is no congruence with egalitarian and hierarchical cultures. For example, Germany, which is a more hierarchical culture, requires a lot of consensus to make decisions. 6. Trusting Trust can be gained through work or through personal connections. Cultures like the US and Germany rely on the business-related activities to build trust while places like China or India secure trust by getting to know each other at a deeper and more personal level. 7. Disagreeing Does confrontation improve or harm group dynamics? In South East Asia, people avoid confrontation as they feel it will break group harmony while in places like The Netherlands, open confrontation is appropriate and will not negatively impact the relationship. 8. Scheduling While all businesses follow a timetable, in some cultures like Switzerland that timetable is stricter and more linear, while in other places like Italy and Saudi Arabia adaptability and flexibility are valued over organization. So, which cultures do you interact with? Where do you place yourself in each scale? And, how will you change your leadership style based on this? For this and other perspectives on growing your leadership visit www.thnk.org Narrated by Michelle Martin (www.thnk.org/community/people/michelle-martin/) Animation by Sarah Nguyen (www.thnk.org/community/people/sarah-nguyen/) Written and Directed by Rod Ben Zeev (www.thnk.org/community/people/rod-ben-zeev/) Executive Produced by Mark Vernooij (www.thnk.org/community/people/mark-vernooij/)

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