Multicultural teams have become very common in recent years. With cross-border mobility becoming easier, the number of people moving from one country to another has grown significantly. This has also led to more people from different cultural and ethnic backgrounds marrying each other. Their children could be born and raised in different countries and have hybrid cultural identities. Globalization and advances in communication and transportation technology have lowered trade barriers and increased interaction between people.
Is global homogeneity a feasible and desirable vision? Philosophically this would be highly questionable. This would be immediately equated with the suppression of differences and diversity, which are inalienable human rights. It can be argued that it would destroy cultures and diminish creativity. There are enough instances in human history, for example the fate of Native Americans or the actions of the conquistadors in South America, where one culture has forcibly exterminated other cultures. Then there are dozens of other examples where aspects of the cultures have been mixed through interaction, for example India and the United States. Today, although genocides occur before our very eyes, for example in the Balkans or in some parts of Africa, the prevailing models of cultures influencing others are mutual interaction, where there is ample room to preserve one’s identity cultural. As of the 2000 census, “minorities” they have become the majority population in six of the eight largest metropolitan areas in the United States. Thus living and managing diversity has become the central theme of this century.
In fact, many studies have shown that diversity in human capital actually leads to greater creativity and efficiency in many cases. Studies have also shown that failure to successfully integrate diverse workforces has negative implications for organizational performance. This is expressed most publicly in legal actions, such as the recent discrimination lawsuits against multinational corporations such as Coca-Cola, Wal-Mart, Xerox.
The skills needed to manage with people from diverse backgrounds at work or outside the workplace can be very different because in the workplace we are in our job roles and there are many external constraints on our behavior. In fact, many people spend more time awake with their colleagues than with their spouse and children. So any problems that arise in this area will definitely spill over into private life.
Looking closely at the factors that affect the leadership or management of multicultural teams, we can identify five factors that operate at the team level:
- national culture
- Corporate culture of the organization.
- Nature of industry or functional culture (coal mining, marketing, accounting)
- Team development stage.
- personal attributes
national culture – There are extensive theories and much research on how national cultures affect team behavior. by Ger Hofstede Consequences of culture (1980) and Cultures and Organizations (1991) are two examples. National culture has many dimensions such as time orientation, communication style, personal space, competitiveness, and worldview. In general, we are also dealing with stereotypes and cultural biases here. Regional and personal life experience or character traits can override these attributed “national” cultural traits. In real life, this means that an Italian team member can be a shy and quiet person or a German can be a disaster with schedules.
corporate culture – Corporate culture is closely related to functional culture and is the result of a historical process in which the founder and successive leaders have left their mark. A large multinational organization would surely have a more structured, hierarchical and bureaucratic approach to managing its affairs, while an internet web design company with 5 young creative artists would be a completely different environment.
Nature of the Industry – Coal miners, web designers and international bankers seem to come from different worlds. Dress, language, etiquette, unwritten codes of behavior, accepted practices, and the skills needed on the job vary greatly across different industries. It is vitally important that the industry, organization or environment allows team members to display a sense of pride in their own professional identity.
Team Development Stage – If the team is recently formed without background or experience, the rules of the game must be learned by all. If the team has a history of efficient performance, new entrants can rely on established practice and older members to teach them the required skills. The stage of development of the team member also plays an important role here. If the team is in the formation stage, the rules of the game are still being negotiated and people are learning their own roles. Tea ‘veteran‘team member has carved out a secure role for himself, while the participant has to fight.
personal attributes – Last but not least, there are all the other factors such as personality, competency profile, the individual’s own life experience, expectations of rewards, recognition and satisfaction of teamwork, as well as history prior to teamwork.
The first three factors are static factors, meaning that their characteristics cannot be easily changed by individual action. Team members or even the entire team cannot change the national culture. People, teams and organizations have to learn to adapt to them. In fact, the efficiency of the team is directly related to how well this adaptation has been achieved. But the intervention can greatly affect the last two factors of the Stages of Team Development and Personal Attributes. A team can accelerate its progress from the formation stage to the maturity stage, and an individual can change personal attributes by acquiring new skills.
Superior sustainable team performance can only be achieved if team members learn to take into account the dimensions of the organizational culture and those of the national culture, such as time orientation, communication style, personal space, competitiveness and the world view. Only when they have successfully adapted their work practices to reflect the background realities of team members can teams see the added value that multicultural teams bring.