Solution of Cross Cultural Project Management

Successful Strategies for Global Projects By Alicia Trelles-Duckett on stately 23, 2012 720 No doubt installations in different geographies come with their own inherent set of challenges. Currency fluctuations centralized versus resultal anaesthetic procurement languages time zones. And those ar even before considering difficulties due to the specific applied science being deployed, or the source of spare parts, or foundation in the coun exploit. This discussion aims to introduce a technique which can assistant you increase the acceptance of your initiative in former(a) geographies, as headspring as resolve any disagreements quickly and with much improved team up spirit.No, it is not the traditional Project Management methodology I bequeath not start extolling here the virtues of the Project Charter. The magic section in international projects, as I feature disc everyplaceed passim 18 years of winningly deploying such, is treating our colleagues from other countries i n a personal manner which puts them at ease. Notice that this recommendation goes well past the tired rare adage Treat those from other countries with sensitivity. That much is obvious, and we would certainly try to conduct ourselves thus.The recommendation is to approach colleagues from another geography with a conduct they would find in their own nation. In other words, if you are relations with Brazilians, try to act Brazilian as you collaborate with them if you are operative with a Finn, try to act Finnish. So how do we overhaul a good picture of what playing Australian or acting Japanese might entail? Fortunately, theres excellent research on intercultural cooperation we can consult. Fons Trompenaars Riding the Waves of Culture, or Nancy Adlers International Dimensions of organizational Behavior are some of the scoop books on the intercultural topic.My personal favourite in the intercultural arena, as relevant today as when its first magnetic variation was published in the UK in 1991, is Cultures and Organizations Software of the Mind by Dr. Geert Hofstede. The ground-breaking component part of Dr. Hofstedes research is that, through thousands of surveys of IBM professionals in dozens of countries, he is fitting to bring forth at a numerical value for certain elements or dimensions which make up Culture. So for example, we learn that Malaysia, on average, has the highest score (104) for exponent Distance, meaning that as a group they are uite pleasant accepting power inequalities in society. At the other extreme, Great Britain and Canada have low stacks (35 and 39 respectively), which translate into a limited habituation of subordinates on their bosses. In other words, British and Canadian employees (as a group) are not afraid to approach their bosses or disagree with them. Another utilitarian discussion centers around the topic of collectivistic cultures (where the interest of the group prevails over the interest of the individual) com pared to individualistic cultures (in which the interests of the individual prevail).It comes as no surprise that the clownish with the highest individualism score is the USA (91), closely followed by Australia (90). At the other extreme, the countries with the lowest individualism scores are Ecuador (8) and Guatemala (6). Personally, I have leveraged his findings to arrive at the following communication paradigms, in order to make my counterparts in other geographies more at ease as we negotiate and organise project milestones. It has proven a huge advantage, as the largest difficulties in technology projects are not about the technology. They are about people.With colleagues from Latin the States (Venezuela, Panama, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia) and certain Asian countries (Pakistan, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia) with large acceptance of power, form clear definitions what constitutes in-scope vs. out-of-scope sieve the benefit to the whole project/company Stress checkpoints fo r scope curb Lively exchange, having fun, yet sticking to the rules With collegaues from Northern/Western Europe/Australia/ unfermented Zealand, which exhibit large individualism, Have all the facts, be decisive realize the contribution of these colleagues Relaxed approach, not stressing hierarchy Sell/negotiate work deliverables Stress value of the project to their particular unit How would you know a countrys Individualism (IDV) or Power Distance (PDI) scores? The best source would be Dr. Hofstedes book. Alternatively, ITIM International has kindly published the scores in the website http//www. geert-hofstede. com/ I hope you find these recommendations useful and that they make you successful in your next international project. For more resources, see the Library topic Projec http//managementhelp. org/blogs/project-management/2012/08/23/successful-strategies-for-global-projects/