Career Management

Cultivating cultural affinity

If you don’t have international working experience your chances of being considered for leadership positions by world-class companies are slim. Yet merely completing an overseas tour of duty isn’t enough. Recruiters are looking for something harder to quantify but infinitely more valuable – a global mindset.

Leadership demands the ability to see things differently and make tough decisions and most executives would pride themselves on being open to new ideas and alternative viewpoints. But operating effectively internationally requires “intercultural competence” – the ability to appreciate the differences and similarities between cultures and what these mean for business globally.

Trevor O’ Hara is managing partner of the Renarc Group which specializes in helping companies develop global organizations and leaders. His consultancy is one of very few specializing in this area. The basis of developing global skills and talent is an initial assessment and Renarc Group uses a wide number of global-specific assessments including the Intercultural Development Inventory designed to identify the intercultural competence of individuals.

This means isolating a global mindset – not the same as international experience. “There are people who are naturally culturally attuned and yet have had surprisingly little international experience,” he says. “Equally you may have someone with twenty years’ experience who is the least culturally attuned person.”

O’Hara believes that demand for executives with the experience and mindset for global operations far exceeds supply and Spencer Stuart consultants agree that their clients are looking for candidates with a very specific blend of skills. So what is the global DNA recruiters are looking for?

Do you speak international?

It would be easy to think that the growth of the Internet and the economic and cultural influence of the US has made English the lingua franca of business, however there are many places where English is neither spoken nor well-received so the ability to speak a foreign language is important for any international executive.

“Language skills are very important,” says Reinhold Thiele, leader of the European Industrial practice and a consultant in the Board Services practice at Spencer Stuart Munich and Zurich. “Candidates who don’t speak at least two languages other than their mother tongue are today almost a no-no for senior positions.”

Speaking the language of the country in which you are living or working is not only good etiquette but also key to being able to operate autonomously at an executive level. It shows you are prepared to work at communication and understanding another culture.

Using a language everyday for work will expose how much you really know – executives may be in for a shock if the last time they spoke a foreign language was at school. Many recruiters will test language ability. “The first thing to make sure of is that if a candidate being recruited for an international assignment puts down on their CV that they are fluent in a language, that they really are fluent,” says O’Hara. “That means testing their ability – both spoken and written.”

More than just words

Learning another language demonstrates a willingness to learn new skills and explore other cultures – part of the DNA sought by recruiters for international roles. But language skills are not the same as a global mindset. While broad language capability is seen as a good thing, this needs to be combined with intercultural sensitivity. Having a true appreciation for the cultural differences and treating people respectfully against those differences is of the utmost importance.

Speaking another language is the first step to understanding another culture, a process that requires a certain frame of mind and attitude. “One element is intellectual curiosity and a general interest in other cultures,” says leader of Spencer Stuart’s European Consumer Goods & Services Practice, Edward Speed.

When talking to candidates Speed wants to know how far they are willing to travel, not only on holiday or on assignment but also in other senses, such as reading. “What do you read first,” he asks. “The first three pages of the newspaper or the overseas section?”

Revealing differences

In the final analysis, your willingness to engage different cultures will be an important factor. Candidate’s attitudes to cultural difference are studied closely by recruiters and may be evaluated using psychometric tests that reveal whether executives are quite as open-minded as they think.

O’Hara says that the Intercultural Development inventory and other tools used by Renarc can often reveal in a very powerful way, just how comfortable business people are about cultural differences. What can appear on the surface as willingness to interact with other cultures can turn out to be anything from cultural denial at one end of the scale to complete integration at the other. For organizations prepared to pay large salaries to people for doing business in global-facing assignments, it is crucial to know beforehand just how inter culturally sensitive their executives really are.

Statements like “Business is business the world over”, “technology doesn't care about culture,” or “I can be successful in any culture without any special effort,” show a candidate trying to ignore or minimize cultural differences rather than deal with them.

Candidates with an advanced global mindset show themselves capable not only of accepting, but adapting to cultural differences. They agree with statements like “More difference equals more creative ideas,” or “I always try to study a new culture before I go there”.

They also understand that problems occur unless working styles are adapted to new situations. This can be reflected, says O’Hara, in a statement like, “To solve this dispute, I'm going to have to change my approach. I know they're trying really hard to adapt to my style, so it's fair that I try to meet them halfway.”

What these psychometric tests also demonstrate is that international experience doesn’t automatically grant a global mindset. It may be there before you go abroad – or never develop after years traveling. On top of language skills and the right family circumstances, what matters most in an international role is being able to demonstrate a flexible approach to change and be truly open-minded.

As Mark Broer, consultant for the Life Sciences Practice Spencer Stuart London, explains, the best candidates “understand and recognize that there are real differences in cultural behavior”. “If you need to explain that to people, in a way something is already wrong”.