8E5T PRACTlCE

Knowing w hat makes

groupstick is as important
as understanding individuals.
Successful managers learn
to cope with different
national,corporate,and
vocational cultures.

Cultural
Intelligence
by P. Christop her Ea rley and Elaine Mosakowski

y o u SEE THEM at intcrna tio na l air-

port s like Heat hrow: posters ad-
vert ising th e global bank HSBC th at
show a grasshopper and t he message
"USA -Pesl. China- Pct. Northern Thai-
land - Appctizer,"
Taxonomists pinned down the seico-
tiñe definition of the family Ae rididae
more than two centuries ago. Bu! cul-
ture is so powerful it can affect how
even a lowly insect is perceived. So it
should come as no surprise that th e
human actions, gestures, and speech
pattems a person encounters in a for-
eign business setting are subject to an
even wider range uf interpretations, in-
cludin g ones that can make misunder-
slandings likely and cooperation im-
possible. But occasionally an outsider
hasa seemingly natural ability to inter-
prel someone's unfamiliar and ambig-
uous gesto res in iust the way that per-
so n's compatriotsand colleagueswould,
even to mirror them. We call that cul-
tura/ intel/igence or CQ. In a world
where crossing boundaries is routine,
CQ becomes a vita lly irnportant apti -
lude and skill, and not just for intern a-
tion a! bankers and borrowers.
Cornpanies, too, have cultures, afien
very distinctive; anyone whojoinsa new
company spends the ñrst few weeks de-
eiphering it s cultural code , Wilhin any
largo eompany the re are sparring sub-
culture s as weH: The sales force can't
la\k to the engineers,and the PR peop\e
lose patience wit h the lawyers. Depart-
ments, divisions, professions, geograph-
ical regions-eaeh has a constellatíon of
manners, meanings, histories, and val-
ues that wiHconfuse lhe inte rloper and
cause himor her to stumble. Unless,that
is, he or she has a high CQ.
Cultural intelligence is related 10
ernotional íntelligence, but il pieks up
where ernotional intellígence leavesoff.

OCTOBER 2004 139

BE ST PRACTICE • Cultural I nt el l igen ce
--'-------
A person with high emot io nal intelli-
gence grasp s what makes us hu man and
at the sarne time what rnakes each of us
different from one another. A perso n
with high cultural intelligence can some-
how tease out of a person's or gro up' s
behavior those features that wou ld be
true of all people and a ll groups, t hose
pecu liar to th is person or thi s group, and
those th at are ne ithe r uni versal nor idio-
sync rat ic. The vast realm t hat líes be-
tween those two poles is culture.
An American expatriare manager we
know had his cultural intelligence teste d
while serving on a design team that in-
cluded twoCermanengineers. Asother
tearn members floated their ideas, the
engineers condemned them repeatedly
as stunted or immature or worse. The
manager concluded that Cerrnans in
ge ne ral are rude and aggre ssíve.
A modicum of cu ltural intelligence
would have helped the American realize
he was mistaken ly eq uating t he me rit
of a n idea wit h the merit of the person
presenting it a nd t ha t the Germa ns
were able to make a sharp distinction
Cultural intelligence: an outsider's seemingly
natural ability to interpret someone's unfamiliar
and ambiguous gestures the way that person 's
compatriots would.
between the two. A manager with even
subtler powers of discernment might
hav e t ried 10 determi ne how much
of the two Germans' behavior was ar-
gua bly German and how mu ch was
exp lained by the fact t hat t hey were
engineers.
An expatriate manager who was
mere ly emotio nall y int e lligent would
probably have empathized with the team
memberswhose ideaswere being criti-
cized, modulated his or her spontaneo us
P. Cbristopher Earley is a profe ssor and
the chai r of th e depa rtm ent of organi-
zaliana/ beliavio t al London Business
Schocl. Elaine MosakolVski is a professor
01marwgeme11l al the University o/ Ca/-
orado at Boulder.
140
reaction to the engineers ' conduct, and
pro posed a new style of discussion t hat
prese rved candor but spared fee lings, if
indee d anyon e's feeJings had been hu rto
But without being able to tell how much
of th e e ngineers ' beh avior was idiosyn-
crat ic and how much was culturally de-
termined, he o r she would no t have
known how to influence their actions
or how easy it wou ld be to do that,
One critical element that cultural in-
telligence and emotional intell igence do
share is, in psychologist Daniel Go le-
man's words, "a prope nsity to suspe nd
judgme nt -to th ink before act ing." For
some o ne richly en do wed with CQ, t he
suspension might take hours or days,
while someo ne wit h low CQ might have
to take weeks or months. In e íther case,
it involvesusing your senses to registe r
all the ways tha t t he pe rson alitie s in-
teract ing in front of you are different
fro rn t hose in your hom e culture yet
simila r to o ne anothe r. On ly when con-
duct yo u have actually observed begins
10 sett le int o patte rn s ca n you safe ly
beg in 10 ant icipate how t hese peo ple
will react in the next situation. The in-
ferencesyou draw in thismannerwill be
free of t he haza rds of ste reotyping.
The people who are socia lly t he most
successful amongtheir peersoften have
the greatest difficulty making sense of,
and then be ing acce pte d by, cultura l
strangers. Those who fully embody th e
habits and norms of their nati ve cultu re
may be t he most aJien whe n t hey ente r
aculturenottheir own.Sometimes, peo-
pie who are so mewhat detached frorn
their own culture can moreeasily adopt
the mores an d even t he body langu age
of an unfamiliar host. They're used to
being observersand making a conscious
effort 10 fit in.
Alth o ugh so rne aspects ofcult ural in-
telligence areinnate, anyonereasona bly
alert, motivated, and poised can attain
an acceptable level of cultur al inte lli·
gen ce, as we have learned from survey-
ing2,000 managersin 60 countries and
training many others. Civen the num-
ber ofcro ss-funct íonal assignments, job
transfers, new employers, and distant
post ings most corporate managers are
likely 10 experienc e in the course of a
career, low CQ can turn out to be an in-
herent disad vantage.
The Three Sources
of Culturallntelligence
Can it really be that so rne ma nagers are
socially intelligent in thei r own settings
but ineffective in culturally novelones?
The experience of Peter, a sales man-
ager at a California medical devices
gro up acqui red by EJi Lilly Pharmaceu-
tica ls, is not unusu al, At the devices
company, t he atmosphere had bee n
mercenary and competitive; the best-
performing employee s cou ld make as
mueh in performancebonusesasin sal-
ary. Senior managers hounded unpro-
du ctive sa lespeo ple to perform better.
At Lilly's Indianapoli s headquarters,
10 which Peter was tran sferred, the sales
staff received bonuses th at accounted
for o nly a small percentage oftotal com-
pen sation. Furtherrnore, criticism was
restrained and eonfrontation kept to a
minimum. To mot ívate people, Lilly
management cncouraged them. Pete r
eommented, "Baek in L.A., I knewhow
to hand le myself and how to manage
my sales team. l'd pu sh t hem and con-
fro nt th em if they we ren't pe rforming,
and th ey'd respondoIf you look at my
evaluations, you'l l see that 1 was very
successfu l and people respe cted me.
Here in IndianapoJis, th ey don 't like my
style, and they see m to avoíd the cha l-
lenges that I put 10 th em. I just can't
seern to get thin gs done as well he re as
I did in Californ ia:'
Pete r's probl ern was threefold. First,
he didn't compreh end how mu ch the
land scape had changed. Second, he was
unable to make his behavior consi s-
tent with that of everyo ne aro und him.
And third, when he recogni zed that the
arrangement wasn't working, he be-
carne disheartened.
HA RVARO BUSI NE SS REVIEW
 Cultur a l I nt ell ige nce • BEST PRACTICE

Pet er's three difficu lties correspond

to the t h ree cornpo ne nts of cu lt ura l in-
telligence: the cog n itive; the ph ysieal;
a nd the e mo t ionaVmot ivatio na l. Cul-
tural int elligen ce resides in the body an d
the heart, as we ll as the head . Although
most managers are not equallystrongin
all three areas, each faculty is seriously
hampered wit ho utthe ot he r two.
Head. Rote leamin g about t he be -
liefs, customs, and taboos offoreign cu l-
tures, t he a pp roac h corpo rate training
p rogra ms te nd to favor, will ne ver p re-
par e a person for evcry sit uat ion t hat
arises, no r will it p revent terrible gaffes .
However, inquiring about the meaning
of sorne custom will often prove un -
availing because natíves maybe reticent
abo ut explaining th em selves to st rangers,
o r th ey m ay have litt le pract ice loo king
atthe ir ow n cultu re ana lytica lly.
Instead , a newcom er need s to devise
wha t we ca ll learn ing st rategies. Al-
th ou gh mo st people find it difficult to
discover a po int of ent ry into a!ien cu l-
tures, whose very coherence can make
them seern like sep árate, parallel worlds,
an ind ivid ua l wit h high cognitive CQ
notices c1ues to a culture's shared under-
sta nd ings.These can appear in any forrn
and any context but somehow índlcate
a lin e of interp retati on wort h pursuing.
An Irish manager at an international
advert ising ñrrn was worki ng wit h a
new c1ient, a Germ án construction and
engineering company. Devin's experi-
ence with executives in the Gcrman re-
tail clot hing industry was that th ey were from hisbehavior,just ashe haddone in ture; your actions and demeanor must
reaso na bly flexible abo ut deadlines and the ot her two cases. Unfortunately, the prove that you have already to some
rece ptive to highl y imag inative pro pos- client sent a new representative to every exte nt e n te red t hei r world . Whet her
a ls for an adve rt ising ca mpa ign. He had meeti ng. Ma ny ca rne from d ifferent it's the way you sha ke hands o r order a
also warked with exec utive s of a Briti sh businessunitsand had grownup in dif- coffee, evidence uf an ability to mirror
construction and engineeringcompany, ferent cou ntries. Instead ofequat ing the the cu stoms a nd ge stures ofthe people
who m he fo und to be str iet about dead· first representative's behavior with the around you will prove that you esteern
lines and intent on a media campaign c1ient'scorpo rate culture, Devin looked them well e nough to want to be like
that stressed the firm's tech nical exper- for consistcncíes in the various individ- them . By adopti ng people's habits and
tise and the cost savings it offered. ua ls' t ra its. Event ua lly he deterrn ined mannerism s,youeventually come to un-
Devin was unsure how to proceed, that they were a ll pu nctual , deadlinc- derstand in t he mo st e leme nta l way
Should he assurne that the Gennan co n- oriented, and tolerant of un con ven- what it is Iike to be them. They, in turn,
structio n com pa ny wou ld take after t he tion al advert ising me ssages. From t hat, become more trusting and open. Uni-
Ge rrna n clot hing retailer or, instead , the he wa s ab le to infer m uch about th e ve rs ity of Michi ga n professor Ieffrey
British construction company? He re ~ characte r oftheir employer. Sanchez-Burks's research on cultural
solved to observ e th e new c1i ent' s re p- Bod y. Yo u will not d isa nn your for- barriers in businessfound that job can-
resentative close ty and d raw gene ral con- eign hosts, gue sts, or col leagues simply didates who adopted sorn e of the man-
c1usions about the ñrm and its culture by showing you understand the ir cul- nerisms uf recruiterswith cultural bac k-

OCTOBE R 2004 141

B E S T P R A CT I C E • C ult u ra l l nt elliqe nce
grounds different fro m their own were
mo re likely to be made an offer.
Thi s won't happen if a person suffers
from a deep -seated reservation abou t
th e called-for beh avior or lacks the phys-
ical poise to pull it off. Henri, a French
manager at Aegis, a media corpo rat ion,
follo wed the nationa l custo m of greet -
ing his fcrnale clients with a h ug and a
kiss on both cheeks.Altho ugh Melanie,
a Brit ísh aerospace manager, und er-
stood th at in Franee such fa miliarity was
de rigueur in a professional setting, she
couldn't suppress her discomfort when
it happened 10 her, an d she recoiled. In-
ability to receive and reciprocare ges-
tures that are culturally characteristic
reflects a low level of cultural int el li-
gence'sphysical compone nt ,
In another insta nce, a Hispan ic com -
munity leader in Lo s Ange les and an
Anglo-Amer ican bu sine ssma n fell into
conversation at a charity eventoAs the
form er mo ved closer, th e latter backed
away.1t 100k nearly 30 minutes of waltz-
ing around the room for the cornmu-
nity leader to realizethat "Anglos"were
not comfortable standing in such clase
ph ysieal pro xim ity.
Heart. Adapti ng to a new cult ure in-
vol ves overcorning obstacles and set-
backs. Peopl e can do t hat only if th ey
beli eve in th eir o wn e fficacy. lf they
pe rsevered in t he face of cha lle nging
situations in the past , their confidence
grew. Confidence is always rooted in
m astery of a part icul a r ta sk o r set of
circumstances.
A person who doesn't believe herself
capable of under standing people from
unfamiliar cultures will ofien give up
afte r her cffo rts meet with ho stilit y or
incomprehension. By contrast,a pcrson
with high moti vat ion will, upon con -
fronti ng o bstacles, sctbae ks, or even fail-
ure, reengagewith greater vigor.1h stay
moti vated , high ly efficaeio us peopl c do
notdepend on obtaining rewards,which
may be uncollventional or longdelayed.
Hyong Moo n had expe rience lead ing
racially mixed teams of designers at
G M, but when he head ed up a product
design and development team that in-
cluded re pre sen tatives from the sales,
product ion, marketing,R&D ,engineer·
142
ing, and finance departments, things
did not go smoot hly.The sales manage r,
for exarnple, objected to the safety e n-
ginee r's atternpt to add feature s such as
side-irnpact air bags because they would
boost th e car's p rice exce ssively. The
People who are somewhat detached from their
own culture can more easily adopt the mores and
even the body language of an unfamiliar host.
conflict became so intense and so pub-
lic t ha t a senior manager had lo inter-
vene, Although many managers wo uld
have fe lt chas te ned aft er t hat , Moo n
st ruggled even harder to ga in con t rol,
wh ich he eventually d id by co nvincing
t he sa les manage r t hat t he ai r bags
could make th e car more marketab le.
Although he had no experience wit h
cross-funct ional tea rns, his successes
with sing le-fu nct ion tea m s had given
him t he co n ñde nce 10 pe rsevere. He
co m rne nte d, "I'd see n the se type s of
disagreements in oth er teams, and l'd
bee n able to he lp tearn rnernbers ove r-
com e t he ir di fferences, so I kne w 1co uld
do it again."
How Head, Body,and Heart
Work Toget her
At t he end o f 1997, U.S.-based Merrill
Lyneh acquired Uk-based Mercury Asset
Management. At thetimeoft he rnerge r,
Mercury was a decorous, understated,
hie rarehica l compan y known for do ing
busi ness in the manner of an earlier
generation. Merril1, by contrast, was in·
formal, fast-paced, aggressive, and en-
t repreneu ria!. Both companies had em-
ployee s of many nat ionalitie s. Visiti ng
Mercur y abou t six mont hs after the
merger announcement, we weregreeted
by Chris, a Mercllry personnel manager
dressed in khak is and a kni! shirt. Sur -
p rised by th e deviation fm m h is usua l
unifoml of gray or navy pinstripes, we
asked h im wh at had happen ed . He told
us t ha t Merrill had instituted casual Fri-
days in its own offices and then ex-
tended thepolicy on a volllnteer basisto
itsUK sites.
Chri s understood the po licy as Mer-
rill's atternpt to reduce hie rarchical dis-
tinctions both with in and betwee n the
co m panies, The intention, he t ho ug ht,
was lo draw the two enterprises close r
logeth er. Chri s also identified a liking
for casua l dress as probably an Ameri-
can cultural trait,
Not a ll Mercury manager s were re-
cept ive to the change, however. Sorne
we nt along with cas ua l Fridays fo r a
few week s, t he n gave up . Ot he rs never
dotfed t he ir more forma l attire, view ing
the new po licy as a victory of careless-
ness over prudence and an atte rnpt by
Merr ill to impose its ident ity on Me r-
cury, who se professional dign ity would
suffer as a result. In sho rt. t he Me rcu ry
resistersdid not understand theimpulse
beh ind th e change (head ); they coul d
no t bring t hern se lves to alter t he ir ap-
pearance (body): and t hey had been in
the Mercury environment for so long
that t hey lacked the motivation (heart)
to see the expcrim ent through.To p ut it
even more sim ply, they dreaded being
mistaken for Merrill executives,
How would you behave in a similar
silua t io n? The exhibit "Diagnosing Your
Cultural Inte lligence" allows you to as-
se ss th e th ree faee ts of yo ur own cu l-
lural int e lligence and leam where your
relative strengths and weaknesses lie.
Attaining a high ab sol ut e sco re is not
th e ob jecti ve.
Culturallntelligence Profiles
Most m an age rs fil at least o ne of lhe fo l-
lowin g six pmfiles. By answe ring t he
questionsin the exhibit, you can decide
which one describesyou best.
Tite provincial can be quite effective
wh en wo rkin g with people of sim ilar
backgrou nd but run s into trouble when
ve nturing fart her afieId. A yo u ng engi-
neer at Chevrolet's truck division re-
ceived positive evaluationsof histech-
IIARVARI> BUSI'llESS REVIEW
 Cultura l I nt e ll ige nce • UEST PRACTICE
Diagnosing Your Cultu ra l Intellig ence
These state rnents reflect different facets of cultural intelligence. For eaeh set,
add up you r scores anddivide by fourlo produce an average. Our work with
large grou ps of managers shows that for purposes of your own development,
it is mast useful to think about your three scores in comparison to ene anot her,
Generally, an ave rage of lessthan 3 would indicare an area calling for impr ove-
rnent , while an average of greater than 4.5 reflects a true CQ strength.
Rate the exten t lo which you agree wlth each statement,using the scale:
1 = strong ly disagree, 2 = disa qree, 3 = neu t ral, 4 = agree, 5 = strong ly agree .
Befare I int eract with people from a new cultu re, I ask
myselfw hat I hopetoachieve.
lf l encounte r someth ing unexpected while workinq in a
new culture, I use thisexpe rienceto figure out new ways
to approach otber cultures in the future.
I plan how l'rn going lo relate to pea pie from a different
culture before I meet them.
When I come into a new cultural sltuation, I can
immediately sense whether somethlng isgoing well
+ or something iswrong.
Total - - + 4 = D Cognitive CQ
lt's easyfor me to change my bodylanguage(for
example, eyecontactor posture) to suit peopíe from
a different culture.
1 can altermyexpression when a cultural encou nter
req uiresit.
I modify my speech style (for example,acce ntor tone)
to suit peoplefrom a different culture.
+ I easily change the way I act when a cross-cultural
encounterseems to require it.
D
Total - - + 4 = Physical CQ
1 haveconfidence that I candeal well with people from
a differen t culture.
I am certain that I can befriend people whose cultural
backgrounds are different from mine.
I can adapt to t he lifestyle of a different culture with
relative ease.
I am confident that I ca n deal with a cultural situation
+ that's unfamiliar.
Total +4 = D Emotional/
motivational CQ
OCTOBE R 2004
nical abilit ies as we lI a s his interper -
sonal skills. Soon he was asked lo lead
a team at Sat urn, an autonomou s d ivi-
sion ofGM . He was not ab le lo ad jusl lo
Saturn's highly partlcipat íve approac h
to tea m work - he mistakenl y assumed
it would be as o rderly and defercntial as
Che vy's. Eve ntua lly, he wa s se nt back
to Chevy's truek divisi ón.
The ana/yst rncthodically deciph ers a
foreign cultu re's rule s and expectation s
by re sort ing lo a var iety of el aborare
leam ing strategies. The most co rn rno n
form of ana lyst rea lizes pretty q uickly
he is in alien terri to ry but then ascer-
tain s, usually in stages, thc na tur e of the
patterns al work a nd how he sho uld
interaet with them. Deirdr e, for exam-
pie, works as a broadcast d irecto r fo r a
London-based co m pa ny. Her principal
responsibility is ne got iat ing contracts
wit h broadeast media owner s, In june
2002 , he r company decided t hat alI units
sho uld ado pt a single negot iat ing st rat-
egy, and it was De irdr e's jo b to m ake
sure this happened . Instead of forcin g
a sho wdo wn wit h t he m an ager s wh o
resisted, she held o ne-on-one rneetings
in which she probed th eir rea so ns fo r
resisting, gol th em togethe r to sha re
ideas, and revised the negotiating strat-
egy lo incorporare approac he s they had
fo und suecessful. The revíscd st rategy
was m ore cultura lIy flexible than th e
ori gin al proposal - and th e m an age rs
chose 10 cooperare.
The natural relies entirely 0 11 his in-
tu it ion rat her than on a systc ma tic
learníng style. He is rarely steered wron g
by fir st im p re ssions, Don a ld , a brand
manager for Unilever, cornment ed , "As
part of my job, I need lo judge peo ple
from a wide vari ety of cult u ral ba ck-
gro u nd s and u nde rsta nd the ir need s
qukkJy. W hen I come into a new situa-
tion , I watch everyon e for a few rnin -
ut es and t he n I gel a gene ral sense of
what is go ing on an d how 1need to act.
l'm not really su re how I do it , but it
seems to work," When facing arnbigu-
ou s mult icultu ral situations th at he m usl
lake co nlro l of, t he na tural may falte r
becau se he has ne ver had 10 improvise
leam ing st rat eg ies or eope with fcelings
of disorientation.
143

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The ambassadar, like many political a very powerful cornponent of his cul-
ap po in tees, m ay not kn ow m uch about t ura l intelligence. Sorne of it may be
the cultu re he has just ente red, but he derived frorn watching how other ma n-
co nvincingly co m mun icates h i s cer- agers have succeeded in com pa rab le
tainty that he belongs t here. Among the sit uations. The ambassador rnust have
ma nage rs of muItinat ional co m pa nies the hum ility to know what he doe sn't
we have st udied, t he ambassador is t he know - t hat is, lo know how 10 avoid
mosl com mon type. His confide nce is u ndere stimating cultural differen ces,
Confidence Training
Helm ut was a manager at a Berli n-based high-t ech com pany who partic-
ipated in our cult ura l-i nte lli gence tr aining program al l ondan Business
School. Three mon ths earlier, he had been assign ed to a large manu-
fact uri ng facilit y in sout hern Germany lo supervise the completion of
a new plant and guide th e local staffthroug h t he launch. Helm ut carne
fro m nor th ern Ger many and had never wo rked in southern Germany;
his di rect repo rts had been raised in southern Germ any and had worked
for the local busi ness un it for an average of seven years.
Helmu t was good al develop in g new learn ing strategies, and he wasn't
bad al adapt ing his behavior lo his surroundings . But he had low confi-
dence in his abil ity to cope with his new colleagues. To hi m, southern
were essentially foreig ners; he found t hem "loud, brash, and
Germ ans
cliqu ish."
To capi ta lize on his resourcefulness and bui ld his confidence, we
placed Helm ut in hete roge neous groups of people, whom we encou r-
aged to engage in f reewheeling d iscussions. We also encouraged hi m
to express his emotions more ope nly, in t he manner of his sout hern com-
patriots, and to rnake mor e di rect eye contac t i n th e cou rse of role-play-
ing exercises.
Helm ut' s resourcef ulness mi ght have i mpel led him to take on more
am bit ious tasks than he could quite handle. lt was important he get his
footing first, so t hat sorne subsequent reversa! wou ld not paralyze him.
To enhance his m oti vati ona l CO. we asked him to list ten activi ties he
t houg ht wo uld be part ot his dai ly or weekly rout i ne when he returned
to Mun ich.
By t he tim e Helmu t ret urned to t on don for his second training ses-
sien, he had pro ved to him self he could manage simple encounters like
getti ng a coffee, shoppi ng, and havin g a dri nk with colleagues. So we
suggested he mi ght be ready for mo re challengi ng tasks, such as provid-
in g face-to-tace perso nnel appraisals, Even t hough Hel mu t was skilled at
analyzi ng people's behavior, he dou bted he was equa l to thi s next set of
hurdl es. We encou raged hi m to view his analytic skills as giving him an
i mportant advantage. For exarnple, Helm ut had not iced t hat Bavarians
were ext roverted only wi t h peopl e fam ili ar to t hem . With strange rs they
could be as formal as any Prussian . Reali zin g t his allowe d him to re·
spond f1exib\ y to either situation inste ad of being put off balance.
By th e t im e he was asked to lead a quality-i mp roveme nt tearn, he had
concluded that hls leadership style must unfold in two staqes-scorn-
manding at t he outset, th en mor e personal and in clu sive. On hi s thi rd
~AESS
visit to Lond on , Helrnut reported good relations w ith t he quality lm-
provemen t team, and th e mernbers corroborated his assessment.
HARV ARD BUS IN ESS REVIEW

even though doing so will inflict a de-
gree of discomfort.
The mimic ha s a high degree of con-
trol ayerhis actions andbehavior, if not
a great deal of insight into the sign ifi-
can ee of th e cultural cues he picks up.
Mimicry definitely puts ho sts and guests
at ease, facilitates comrnunication, and
builds trust. Mimicry is not, however,
the same as pure írnitat ion, which can
be int erpreted as moekin g. Ming, a man-
ager at th e Shangha i reg io na l power
authority, relates, "When Ideal with
foreigners, I try to adopt th e ir style of
spe a king and inte ract ing. I find that
sim ple things Iike keeping th e right d ís-
tance from the other person or making
eye contact or speaking English at a
speed that matches the other person's
puts them at ease and makes it ea sier to
make a connection. Thi s really ma kes
a difference to newcomersto China be-
cau se they often are a bit threatened by
the place:'
The cnameteon po ssesses high level s
of all t hree CQ components and is a very
Cultural lntellige nce • BEST PRACTICE
uncommon rnana gerial type . He or she
even may be mistaken for a native of
the co unt ry. More important , charne-
leons don 't gene rate an y of th e ripples
that un assimilated foreigners inevitably
do . So rne are able to achieve result s that
natives cannot, due to their insider's
skills a nd outsider's perspective. We
fo und that only abo ut 5% of th e man-
age rs we surveyed belonged in thi s re-
mark able category.
One ofth em is Nigel, a British entre-
preneur who has started businesses in
Australia, France,andGennany. The son
of diplomats, Nigel grew up all over the
world. Most of his child hood, however,
was spe nt in Saud i Arabia. After severa l
successes of his own, sorne venture cap-
italists asked him to represent th em in
dealings with the founder of a money-
losing Pakistani sta rt-up,
To th e founder, his co m pany existed
chi efly to ernploy members of his ex-
tended famil y and, seconda rily, the cit i-
ze ns of Lahor e. Th e VCs, natu rally, had
a different idea. They were ti red of
losses and want ed Nigel to per suade th e
founder to close down the business.
Upon relocating to Lahore, Nigel re-
alized that the interests of famil y and
community were not aligned. So he
called in several cornrnunity leaders,
whoagreed to meetwith managersand
try to eonvince th em that th e larg er
community of Lahore would be hurt if
potential investors carne to view it as
full ofbusinesspeopl e unconcemed with
a company's solvency. Nigel'sSaudi up-
bringing had made him aware of lslam ic
pr incipies of pe rsonal respons ibility to
the widercommunity, while his British
origins tempered what in another per -
so n's hands might have been the me -
cha nica l application of those te nets,
Throughout the negot iation s, he di s-
played an authoritati ve style appro pri-
at e to the Pakistani sett ing. ln relativel y
sho rt order, th e manage rs and th e fam -
ily agreed to term ínate operations.
Many managers, of course, are a hy-
brid oftwo or more ofthe type s. We dis-
covered in our survey of more than
BEST PRACTICE • Cultural lntelligence
2,000 managers that even more preva-
lent than the ambassador was a hybrid
ofthat type and the analyst. One exam-
piewas a fema le African-American rnan-
ager in Cairo named Brenda, who was
insulted when a small group of young,
well-meaning Egyptian males greeted
her with a phrase they'd leamed from
rap music.
"1 turned on my heel, went right up
to the group and began upbraiding
them as strongly as my Arabic would
allow,"she said. "When I'd had my say,
1 stormed off to meet a friend."
"After 1had walked about halfa block,
I registered the shocked look on their
faces as t hey listened to rny words, I
then reaJized they must have thought
theywere greeting me ina friendly way.
So 1went backto talk to the group.They
asked mewhyIwasso angry, I explained,
they apologized profusely, and we all
sat down and had tea and an interesting
talk about how the wrong words can
easily cause trouble. During our con-
versat íon, I brought up a number of
examples of how Arabic expressions
uttered in th e wrong way or by the
wrong personcould sparkanequivalent
reaction in thern, Afier spending about
an hour with them, 1 had sorne new
fr ie nd s,"
Brenda's narrative iIIustratesthe como
plexities and the perils of cross-cultural
interactions. The young men had pro-
voked her by trying, lneptly, to ingrati-
ate themselves by using a bit of current
slang from her native land. Forgetting
in her anger that she was the stranger,
she berated them for what was an act
of cultural ignorance, not maJice. Cul-
tu rally uninformed mimicry got the
young men in trouble; Brenda's - and
the men's-cognitive flexibility and will-
ingness to reengagegot them out of it.
Cultivating Your
Culturallntelligence
UnJike other aspects of personal íty, cul-
tural intelligence can be developed in
psychologicallyhealthy and profession-
allycompetent people. Inour workwith
Deutsche Bank, we introduced a pro-
gram to improve managers' work rela-
tionships with outsourcing partners in
146
India. We developed a two-and-a-half
day program that first identified a par-
ticipant 's strengt hs and weakne sses
and th en provided a series of steps,
which we outline below, to enhance
their CQ.
Step 1. The individual examines his
CQstrengths and weaknesses in order to
establish a starting point for subsequent
developmentefforts.Our self-assessment
instrument is one approach, but there
are others, such as an assessment of a
person's behavior in a simulated bu si-
ness encounter and 360wdegree fced -
back on a person's past behavior in an
actual sit uat lon. Hughes Electronics,for
example, staged a cocktail party to eval-
You will not disarm your foreign hosts simply by
showing you understand their culture; your actions
must prove that you have entered their world.
uate an expatriate manager's grasp of
South Korean social etiquette. Ideally,
a manager will undergo a variety of as-
sessments.
Ste p 2. The person selects training
that focuses on her weaknesses, For ex-
ample, someone lacking physical CQ
might enroll in actingelasses. Someone
lacking cognitive CQ might work on
developinghis analogical and inductive
reasoning-by, for exarnple, reading sev-
eral business case studies and distilling
their common principies.
Ste p 3. The general training set out
above is applied. If motivational CQ is
low, a person might be given a series of
simple exercises to perform, such as
finding out whereto buya newspaperor
greeting someone whohas arrivedto be
interviewed. Mastering simple activities
such as greetings or transactions with
local shopkeepers estab lishes a solid
base from which to move into more
demanding activities,such as giving an
employee a performance appra isa l.
Step 4. The individual organizes her
personal resources to support the ap-
proachshe haschosen.Arethere people
at her organization with the skills to
conduct thistraining, and does her work
un it provide support for it? A realistic
assessment of her workload and the
time available for CQ enhancement is
important.
Step S.The person enters the cultural
sett ing he needs to master. He coo rd i-
nates his plans with others,basingthem
on his CQ st rengths and remaining
weaknesses. If his strength is mimicry,
for example, he would be among the
first in his trainin g group to venture
forth . If his st rengt h is analysis, he
would first want to observe events un-
fold and then explain to the others why
they followed the pattem they did.
5tep6.Theindividual reevaluates her
newly developed ski115 and how effec-
tive they have been in the new setting,
perhaps after collecting 360-degree
feedback from colleagues individually
or eavesdropping on a casual focus
group that was formed to discuss her
progress. She may decide lo undergo
further training in specific areas.
In the sidebar" Confidence Tra ínin g,"
we describe how we applied these six
steps to the case of Helmut, one offive
Germán managers we helped at their
employer's behest as they coped with
new assignments withinand outside of
Germany.
Why can sorne people act appropri-
ately and effectively in new cultures or
among people with unfamiliar back-
ground s whiie others flounder? Our
anecdotal and empirical evidence sug-
gests that the answerdoesn't Jie in tacit
knowledge or in emotional or social in-
telligence. But a person with high CQ,
whether cultivated or innate, can un-
derstand and master such sit uations,
persevere, and do the right thing when
needed. ~
Reprint R0410)
Toorder, see page 159.
HARVARD BUSINESS REVI EW
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