"You Don't Know What You Don't Know"

A bit about cultural competence in the business sector today from Wall Street Journal. I'll just quote the fun bits..

"Tom Bonkenburg, director of European operations for St. Onge Company Inc., a small supply-chain consulting firm in York, Pa., headed to Moscow in 2008 to develop a partnership with a large firm there.

But when he met the company's Russian branch director, "I gave my best smile, handshake and friendly joke... only to be met with a dreary and unhappy look," says Mr. Bonkenburg, who had already helped St. Onge land clients in 30 countries. It got worse, Mr. Bonkenburg says: The more he turned on the charm, the gloomier his counterpart became. The potentially lucrative partnership, he figured, was surely blown. Later, however, Mr. Bonkenburg received an email from the Russian, thanking him for a great meeting. Mr. Bonkenburg later learned that Russian culture fosters smiling in private settings and seriousness in business settings. "He was working as hard to impress me as I was to impress him," Mr. Bonkenburg says. Fortunately for St. Onge, the Russian was prepared for American business joviality."

Some were lucky to use a local talent..

"Last Spring, Dakar Sushi-owner George Ajjan wrote to a Senegalese government official—using the French language but in an American English tone—to request a business license for the restaurant. "I'm direct and I shoot to kill," Mr. Ajjan says of his usual correspondence. To proofread his French grammar, Mr. Ajjan gave the letter to a Senegal native who noticed that the tone was too jarring. If not rewritten in a more deferential voice, the request would likely get denied, his friend explained. "It wasn't just about translating, but about adapting phrasing to make sure you are in line with what people expect," says Mr. Ajjan.

Some were miffed, even in their native English..

"After Ron Gonen expanded his New-York based company, RecycleBank, into England last year, he encountered an unexpected language barrier. The company, which sets up rewards programs for individuals based on the amount they recycle, was offended when the press called the program a "scheme." "I would try to tell them that it was not a scheme, that it was a service," says Mr. Gonen, the firm's co-founder and CEO. "But then they'd turn around and say, 'Right, so it's a scheme.'" Because the press coverage was otherwise positive, Mr. Gonen soon pinpointed the miscommunication: The word "scheme" holds no connotation of deceit in Britain, as it does in America.


Some were outright unlucky..

"The price tag hit seven figures at Toronto-based AlertDriving, a firm that provides online driving training courses to companies with vehicle fleets. Between 2005 and 2007, AlertDriving, incorporated as Sonic e-Learning Inc., expanded into more than 20 countries before realizing that the product had cultural flaws. The dialogue in the lessons had been poorly-translated and the driving instruction failed to address geographic nuances. For example, AlertDriving teaches that the center lane is the safest on a multi-lane highway, but that is untrue in Dubai, where the center lane is used exclusively for passing. According to Gerry Martin, AlertDriving's chief executive, it took years to realize that the foreign clients were unsatisfied because "in some cultures, like Japan, criticism is considered disrespectful." Once the company got the negative feedback, it "had to redo what already was in the market," says Matthew Latreille, AlertDriving's director of global content development. The company spent about $1 million over 18 months revamping its existing product line, honing language dialects and local driving habits."

Thank G-d no one got "killed in translation".

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Culturally Inept Business Cards

I don't mean to be unkind, but I have just finished checking business cards for a few people working at a local government department who would not listen to common sense. So they had the phone numbers left in Arabic script (which is the script we use in the West, just to make things more confusing) instead of having them transliterated into Hindi numerals, while translating their addresses into Arabic.

I assume that the Arab clients who will want to do business with them by mail will write the address on the envelope in Arabic, and our posties - who speak Aussie, not even English - will be able to decipher the squiggles and deliver them to the nominated offices.

Where does my state government get their cultural consultants from? I'll tell you: Hon. Minister is going on a trip to petro-country, and needs to have his cards translated. He asks around what language the "petro-countrymen" use and is told by a blondie secretary who Googles it that it is "Arabian" (we had someone assure us that Yugoslavs speak Yugoslavian, so what the heck). So he tells her to find an Arabian agency whatever to do it. "Do it" not "translate it", mind you. She phones down the ladder until the buck stops at the new recruit straight out of the mind-boggling achievement of having passed Year 12 plus the Public Service Test (i.e. she/he knows who Brad Pitt is), who grabs the yellow pages, phones around with the question "Can you do our Business Cards into Arabian?" and finally lands an agency.

The agent, a bit more knowledgeable but not "Arabian" speaking, gets the cards and finds a translator. The job gets done properly, with addresses left in English. Then the cards get sent to the department's "cultural consultant" - a "new Aussie" from back home who, since he is working for the public service, must be on the lower rungs of IQ, otherwise he would be managing his own business (like me). The question posed to him is "Has everything been translated?" Of course not, and being given the BIG job of holding a red pen, he promptly rewrites the address in Arabic, not thinking why it is there in English in the first place. Not to be outdone, the Minister's secretary who needs to boost her ego gives one cursory look at the card and unable to understand ANYTHING says, "Geez, where are the phone numbers? Leave them in English so we know how to ring them over there.." or something that is meant to be as witty.

Back to the agent, back to the translator, who explains why the address needs to be in English. But to no avail. The agent who explains it back to the Blondie has an accent and she is accent-deaf with the attitude of "whatever".

And we end up with the bewildered postie stamping "Address illegible" on some important documents which are probably worth a few million petro-dollars.

Whatever!