Lawrence

 by Lawrence

After the Fanfare of an Asia Trade Mission … now what?

The Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada has always touted that Canada needs to be more Asia Competent as it rightly states, “a number of Canada’s friendly competitors have taken important steps to improve their own strategic and economic positioning within the region”.  So it was with great interest that I followed Toronto Mayor John Tory’s recent trip to China and Japan.  A delegation of 35 spent went to Shanghai, Hong Kong, ChongQing, Tokyo and Sagamihara to drum up business, heighten awareness of Toronto and generally build relationships … an understated but essential means to successfully do business in North Asia.  Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s recent China mission and India mission netted $1.7B and $250 million in signed deals respectively.

 

Asia has to be top of mind for Canadians beyond trade missions.  This “out of sight, out of mind” approach has repeated itself far too often and is one of the reasons why Canada falls behind the United States, Germany, Australia and New Zealand in its Asia Engagement.  There was great enthusiasm with every trade, government and media delegate I met during my 20 years in Asia and every time, I had hope that the momentum would continue after the mission; that there would be additional questions, discussion, queries, requests for information and networking.  The words I heard afterwards were “there are other priorities right now”, “we’re continuing our due diligence”, “we’ll reach out if we have additional questions” … but the messages I heard were “Asia’s too far away”, “we don’t get it”, “engaging sounds really hard”.  I grew to be unsurprised by such responses … no one would argue that Canada has and continues to rely on traditional economic and political partners in the United States and to a certain extent, Europe, because they’re not far away, its’ cultures are relatively similar and engaging them isn’t as hard.

 

Two calls to action come to mind.  First, the Canadian media and other information outlets need to do a better job of heightening the attention of these trade missions and its results.  A Google search of Mayor Tory’s recent mission resulted in an article about the cost of the trip, a $3.5mill deal but nothing about the Mayor’s mission debrief on 27 April (a search on Premier Wynne’s missions netted better results).  Heightening the importance and awareness of these trade missions and deals is a first step towards building Asia Competence.

 

All participants on the trade mission should be held accountable for follow up.  What actions need to be taken to realize the return on the investment of time, effort and money of the trip?  How do we keep the conversation going? If we were to measure the progress, constructive engagement and goodwill gained on these trips a year from now, what would result?

 

I applaud the government and business officials who have taken the important step of proactively engaging with Asia, but now what?  After the fanfare of an Asia trade mission … we all have a responsibility to keep the momentum moving, keep Asia top of mind and build our Asia Competence.

 

Lawrence Chi is a coach for expatriates and cross-cultural consultant.  His mission is to grow expatriates professionally and personally and to make organizations more international.  Visit his website www.TheExpatCompass.com.

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 by Lawrence

The Successful Expat is Agile

High performing expats have the ability to demonstrate both humility and agility.  In fact, these characteristics are absolutely interdependent.  When an expat is faced with a new or uncertain situation in international management, they have to be open to admit to not knowing what they don’t know, change longstanding mindsets, and quickly change tact or behaviours.

 

This ability to pivot and change leadership styles may prove initially difficult in cultures that exhibit high power distance or strong uncertainty avoidance.  Teams in these situations generally prefer leaders who exert themselves over those that are unsure or flip-flop in a management situation.  This is when humility again plays an important role.  A leader who is open and transparent about their uncertainty and in fact, solicits advice from their team seeks what is best for the group and builds trust and relationships.

 

An effective expat has a high level of self-awareness and confidence to change their behaviours to adjust to their host culture.  A culture steeped in 5000 years of history such as China’s won’t change for foreigners’ preferred styles and losing sight of this often derails expatriate executives during international assignments.

 

International hotel executives are highly transient; their postings usually last a couple of years before they get promoted or posted to a property in another country.  One Food and Beverage Director, John, was selected to move from the United States to a hotel in China because of his long track record of success in the United States.  He had a brashness that served him well in past postings but his style was counter to all the mentoring and coaching he received during his on boarding.  John’s exact words were that “his job was to lead and to take the hotel’s Food and Beverage to the next level”.  He was blinded by his previous success and his American employees’ positive response to his maverick style; his Chinese staff didn’t know how to respond or were inadvertently offended, resulting in low morale and costly turnover in his team.  His inability to pivot and change his style eventually lead to his forced resignation six months later.  John had false underlying beliefs and wasn’t able to pivot these beliefs; he didn’t believe he was the one who had to change.

 

In another case, Steve, was relocated to China to save a business that was neglected for the longest time.  He is an American who had a long list of accomplishments and experiences with multiple consumer products companies in the United States and Europe but he had never been to, let alone operated in, China.  His remit was to save the business, so he was bold with his business goals and strategy and his team.  The initial implementation was bumpy and not well received by his team or his business partners.  He received coaching to deal in this new foreign business environment.  His big learning was to manage through relationships, not objectives.  This was a major paradigm shift for Steve as he was used to working in organizations that were driven by achieving goals.  Though it took time and with a couple of stop/starts, Steve heeded the advice and adjusted his style successfully.

 

Lawrence Chi is a coach for expatriates and cross-cultural consultant.  His mission is to grow expatriates professionally and personally and to make organizations more international.  Visit his website www.TheExpatCompass.com.

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 by Lawrence

The Humble Expatriate is the Successful Expatriate

Successful Expatriates have these Four Mindsets:

  • Curiosity;
  • Humility;
  • Agility and;
  • High EQ.

 

The second theme, humility, shares a number of behaviours with curiosity.  Humble individuals recognize that knowledge is infinite and an open mind is a prerequisite to understand different perspectives.  Humble individuals also seek first to understand before making themselves understood; they listen and ask questions to learn rather than pontificate.

 

There used to be an assumed practice that hiring Mandarin-speaking Asian nationals to serve as expatriates for organizations in China was the most effective.  This was predicated on the assumption that Asian cultures were similar to China’s and that speaking Mandarin made communication and management easier.  While this generally can be a predictor of success, the element to increase its probability still lies with the individual.

 

I was in a position to observe and work with a number of successful Asian nationals but also coach and mentor Asian nationals who were not effective.  The overseas Chinese who were most successful in their careers in China were extremely humble.  They saw themselves as part of the host country’s team, not as an outsider parachuted in to lead.

 

Ineffective overseas Chinese leaders separated themselves from their Mainland Chinese coworkers and business partners.  These individuals came from Asian countries that, at the time, had a higher level of commercial development than China.  On multiple occasions, these Asian expatriates operated under the notion that their Chinese counterparts did not know any better.  In our conversations, these professionals would be heard asking, “what can I learn from the Chinese?”.  The judgment behind this question blocked them from endearing themselves with local teams and business partners.  The majority of these Asian expatriates were unable to release these underlying beliefs or it was too late for them to do so; their careers in China never recovered.

 

The theme of humility reminds me of a highly successful senior executive that I recruited to China from the American Midwest.  Peter had travelled and worked elsewhere in the world, but had limited experience in China.  He became recognized as one of Shanghai’s most effective executives and was highly sought after by executive search consultants during his 15+ year tenure in China.  His success could have been foreshadowed in his first meeting with the executive team, when he declared early on, “I have as much to learn from you as you have from me.”  He admitted to me that he asked this question to all of his new teams, that it wasn’t intended for his China team.  He was quick to admit to his new team that this was his first assignment in China, that he was fascinated by the what he had heard about doing business in China and was eager to learn everything he could during his assignment.

 

The example of the transplanted executive illustrates both curiosity and humility.  His initial interactions with Chinese employees and customers were geared towards listening and learning rather than speaking and persuading.  His approach ultimately was the first important step to prevent judgment and towards establishing trust.  While this was clearly an expat success story in China, the lesson can be translated to success in other host countries.

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 by Lawrence

Four Mindsets of Successful Expatriates

Globalization of our world has made it a smaller place.  People need to have a high level of cultural sensitivity as they are travelling to and spending more time in new countries and cultures.  Expatriates may experience challenges with integrating into a new culture which lead to professional and personal challenges, productivity costs as well as hard costs for the sponsoring organization.

Successful Expatriates have these Four Mindsets:

  • Curiosity
  • Humility
  • Agility and
  • High EQ

The first theme, curiosity, was not the most obvious at first but over time, stood out as the most important.  The behavior of “seeking” is related to this concept.  Successful expatriates  go beyond their genuine curiosity about their next international assignment and will proactively seek out questions and answers.  When I speak to first time expatriates and their families prior to departure, successful cases will always have a battery of questions about the lifestyle, the city and history of the culture.  They also take the initiative to thoroughly prepare for their move by doing things such as researching details and customs, speaking to other expatriates, and trying food from the new culture.

In addition to seeking and asking questions, there are other behaviours that underline this theme of curiosity.  These individuals lean into new or uncomfortable situations and are the first to admit that they don’t know what they don’t know.  Underlying all of these behaviours exists a confidence, an open mind and a sincerity to understand and appreciate diversity to let go of preconceived notions and assumptions.

Clients who have successfully navigated cross cultural relationships have an intellectual wonderment about the “newness” of the international assignment on which they are about to embark.  While these individuals may have a strong affinity to their home culture, they also understand and more importantly, embrace, that there are multiple and different experiences to which they have not been exposed to yet.  They recognize that the scope of the world is beyond their set of blinders.

I had coached a newly stationed business head from Germany.  Upon his arrival, Gerhard and I spoke about his adjustment to China.  To his credit, Gerhard did not take his previous expatriate experiences in Europe for granted and was deliberate in structuring his integration in China.  Before we had our first meeting, I could tell that he was constantly looking around his new environs, exploring the city, talking to people.  We eventually came to the conclusion that for Gerhard to successfully lead a large Chinese team and business (with associated relationships with local nationals), he had to understand how they thought and what motivated their behaviour.  The best way to understand was to invest time and effort outside of the workplace to build professional and personal relationships, further explore the city through food, culture and local people.  His effort to understand, learn and immerse in the culture with such reckless abandon, courage and enthusiasm, endeared himself to his team and local business partners.

Stories around the other themes will follow in subsequent weeks.

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