Is It Time to Move Beyond Your Culture?

Go to any place in the world and people will tell you, “this is how we do things here.” Every place has its own culture, driven by such things as social expectations, family relationships, style of government, climate, economics, educational background, and more. Culture is a tricky thing, in that it may be hard to define but yet has a huge impact. How we grow up has a major effect on how we act as adults.

But what happens when that culture conflicts with the needs of modern circumstances?

Let’s take Asian cultures as an example. It is very common, across many cultures in Asia, for people to hesitate to speak up. The reasons for this vary, from a desire to avoid conflict (and so just keeping one’s feelings to oneself), to respect for elders (and so not disagreeing with anyone senior, whether in age or position), to a fear of making a mistake or losing face (and so not offering ideas or asking questions). These are all a natural part of many cultures in this part of the world, and they may have been helpful (or not) in the past. In the modern world, however, and especially in the modern business world, these cultural factors can cause problems and limit growth.

Consider this: there is no company on the planet that needs leaders and managers who are afraid to speak up. Not a single one.

With that in mind, employees who hope to become leaders need to reckon with their cultural upbringing. Many firms in Asia (especially western MNCs) have recognized that a combination of high growth and shrinking populations means they need to get the most value they can from their employees, which means the days of sitting against wall in meetings for 20 years until it’s your turn to talk are pretty much over. Leaders are realizing they can no longer afford to waste the talents of younger employees and people with diverse backgrounds. While it’s commendable that many senior leaders are willing to change their approach to their workforce, that changing perspective is wasted if employees — especially rising leaders — cannot overcome the expectations they were raised to have.

Part of the responsibility for making that change happen rests with the companies. Internal policies need to change to encourage the kinds of working behavior that firms need. Some of these changes could be formal, such as adapting performance reviews to reprioritize communication and taking initiative. Others could be informal, such as leaders in a meeting asking for inputs by starting with the most junior person and then working their way up the hierarchy, so juniors don’t feel they have to follow the ideas of seniors.

But another part of the responsibility lies with employees themselves, especially those who aspire to leadership roles. Basically, it comes down to this: if the expectations for how to conduct yourself in the workplace conflict with expectations you had as a kid, then it’s time to move beyond those expectations and do something different. We are not talking about changing your ethics or morality, but instead, changing the way you interact with others. Instead of the individual work you did in school, plan on being collaborative. Instead of always deferring to seniors, be ready to tell a client “our product doesn’t do that,” even if they are 30 years older than you. If you have a good idea or see a problem, don’t keep it to yourself, but instead tell somebody.

If something is necessary for business success, and your people keep saying “oh, in our culture we don’t do that,” then either you need to come up with a different business plan, or you need to help them get over the cultural obstacles that will hold them back.