Don’t Sweat the Small (Cultural) Stuff.

When it comes to cultural differences, handle the big issues first. The small stuff will likely sort itself out after that. Just like life.

I just got off the phone with a client who wanted me to deliver a conference keynote on working with a particularly large country in Asia.

“Our teams need to know how to manage the cultural differences. Every day they encounter them, so if you can run through the list of important things they need to know in about forty-five minutes, that would be great.”

Of course I can do this. It’s my job. And, if all my years of doing this work are any indication, it will be an exciting, incredibly interesting, fun and informative keynote. Attendees will walk away with important new information about how to work more effectively in this country, which is what the client wants and, yes, very much needs. What they don’t know is that the really important work, the “big” work, is only just beginning.

Big issues are big because, well, they’re hard. Complicated. Difficult to figure out. So much easier to learn an etiquette rule (three “air kisses” in the Netherlands please), or a taboo (never flash the “OK” sign in Brazil), and you can kind of believe you’re learning what you need to know about another culture. So much harder to figure out best strategy for negotiating in China, how to manage conflict in Dubai, how to unify a team in Greece. Understanding…