!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> Streamline Training & Documentation: Learning How to Raise Intercultural Consciousness

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Learning How to Raise Intercultural Consciousness

At the 2001 Salzburg Seminar on International Leadership, Michael Hoppe, a Senior Program and Research Associate at the Center for Cultural Leadership, presented a paper detailing how the findings from the field of adult development can be used as a guide in preparing employees for assignments that involve working with colleagues from other cultures.

(click to enlarge)
[source]

Hoppe adopts Robert Kegan's adult development model:1
[P14] Kegan proposes five levels of consciousness that describe our evolving ways of knowing (See Table 1 [in above graphic] for an overview). They are differentiated by degree of complexity of thought and degree of openness to self and others. The model’s major premise sees us develop along these lines as we actively interact with the mental and emotional demands of our lives, whether at home, at school, at work, or in our communities. Thus, the levels are ... seen as ... a reflection of our learning as we engage with our surroundings. It is for this latter characteristic that Kegan’s model seems to be particularly relevant to the global leadership discussion.

[P15] The levels of primary interest here are levels three through five, since they concern themselves with adult years. In particular, levels three and four capture most of the adults that Kegan and others found in their studies, even though level five appears to describe the embodiment of a global leader. Yet, ... each level carries with it some unique assets and potential liabilities in an international arena.
Hoppe offers examples of the developmental activities "that could help develop the capacities Kegan's model calls for before people are given major international responsibilities." The activities (here, slightly edited) are divided into four areas of leadership capacity:

Exploring assumptions, disembedding oneself from one's own culture, going against the grain

Training activities:
Cross-cultural simulations
Diversity/cultural training
Keeping a journal

On-the-job activities
Working with foreign nationals
Short-term expatriate assignments
Functional rotation

Off-the-job activities
Interdisciplinary studies
Semester abroad
Learning a new skill

Relationship-building, learning from others, diversity

Training activities
Outward Bound
How to give and receive feedback
How to engage in dialogue, the art of questioning

On-the-job activities
Establishing peer networks
Mentoring (mentor or mentee)
Worksite change partnerships

Off-the-job activities
Intercultural studies
Tutoring non-native speakers
Volunteering at a nursing home or hospice

Systems thinking, dialectical thinking, spanning boundaries

Training activities
Case studies
Organizational learning
Exercises in creative thinking

On-the-job activities
Headquarters apprenticeship
Start-up assignments
Strategic planning taskforce

Off-the-job activities
Political science studies
Volunteering in community governance/on boards
Public speaking club

Collaborating, networking, negotiating

Training activities
Experiential exercises
Process consultation and facilitation
Negotiation techniques

On-the-job activities
Seeking fix-it assignments
Joining cross-functional product team
Joining company sports team

Off-the-job activities
Getting trained as a mediator
Holding office in a professional association
Volunteering for the United Way

Hoppe acknowledges that the examples of developmental activities listed above "have a U.S. flavor." Leadership development activities for someone from outside the U.S. should "be chosen to reflect the resources and opportunities of the organization or society" in which the particular indiividual lives.

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1 Robert Kegan, In Over Our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life (Harvard University Press, 1994).

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