FAQAren‘t we all just people?

Yes, in the sense of sharing primary needs: food, water, shelter, clothing, etc. Yes, in the sense of wanting security, good health, self-expression, freedom, a good future for our children.

But once you get past those primary needs and desires, how we think and act is driven by culture, by national culture, in the broadest sense. Parents, family, friends, community, education, work, ideas, books, media, government, language, literature, our historical consciousness, sports, politics. The list can be extended.

An American engineer is an American first, then an engineer. A German tax attorney is a German first, then a tax attorney. An American Roman Catholic priest is an American first, then a Roman Catholic priest. A German mother is a German first, then a mother.

If you are an engineer only after you have applied for a few years what you were trained, that could be at age 25 or even older in the U.S. In Germany, if you continued studies on through to Ph.D., you could be 30 years or even older. Up to the point of actually applying the skills of an engineer, the German, the American, have lived within their respective cultures for quite some time. They are pretty much formed as human beings.

In most cases German mothers were raised by German mothers, who in turn were raised by German mothers. Same goes for American mothers and their mothers. Well, if a German woman has her first child at age 27, and she has lived in Germany until then, she is German, will have a German definition of what it means to be a good mother, to raise a child properly. Do German mothers raise children the same way American mothers do? I wouldn‘t bet my bottom dollar on it. Imagine implanting an American mother into a German family with children aged 9, 7 and 2. Or vice versa. How well do you think that would work? For the children, for the mothers?

Here‘s another way to look at it. Imagine we did a one-day offsite workshop. Four Germans. Four Americans. All engineers. On the German side, an engineer from BASF (chemical), SAP (software), Siemens (electrical) and Volkswagen (mechanical). On the American side, an engineer from DuPont (chemical), Microsoft (software), General Electric (electrical), Ford (mechanical).

In the morning session we split up the engineers based on national culture, then ask the participants questions which reveal their thinking on fundamental issues: persuasion, decision making, leadership, motivation, conflict resolution, processes, product philosophy, customer collaboration. Within the two groups folks would see differences. Chemical engineering is not mechanicl engineering is not software engineering is not electrical engineering. Seattle is not Detroit. Walldorf is not Wolfsburg. And they most likely are not.

Then imagine that we add more colleagues to each of the two groups so that we get more intra-diversity. Engineers from Northern and Southern Germany. Men and women. Old and young. Catholic, Protestant, non-believer. Introverts, extroverts. Manager, specialist. Grew up in the country, grew up in a city. Big family, small family. And we did the same on the American side. All engineers, but in those four industries, lots of bandwidth. Again, both the Germans and the Americans would see differences within their national cultures, within their national cultural engineering worlds.

Now, what happens when we bring them all together during the afternoon session? Would their responses to the foundational topics be the same or similar along the lines of age, gender, intro/extrovert, religion, etc. or along the lines of national culture? In other words would a 40 yr. old, male, Protestant, somewhat introverted German chemical engineer at BASF, who grew up in Mannheim and was educated in Karlsruhe, as an only child, share the same process philosophy with his American counterpart at DuPont, who is 40 yrs. old, male, Protestant, somewhat introverted, who grew up in Philadelphia in a family with two children, and was educated in chemical engineering at Penn State University? Or would that German chemical engineer be more likely to share the same process philosophy with his German colleague, who happens to be female, 28 yrs. of age, Roman Catholic, raised in a family with five children on a farm in Upper Bavaria, an avid mountain climber, and is an electrical engineer with Siemens in Munich?

These are rhetorical questions. But, I think they reveal realities. They invite us to reflect. Many of us know the experience of having serious differences of opinion with our native colleagues. But, the minute we‘re in the larger context, the German-American or French-American or Indian-American, as in that fictitious offsite workshop, we quickly realize just how American we are. The differences, the shades of gray, within a national culture fade away very quickly once another logic, method, tradition, way of thinking, approach, enters the equation.

So yes, we are all just people, but people in context, people in tradition, people in belief systems, people in cultures, in national cultures.