Multicultural teamwork — it’s really not that difficult
Diversity is not why your team is underperforming.
Written for Coachademy by Mari Järvinen
This time I’m writing blog in a garden in Jerusalem, inspired to write about multicultural workplaces. This post will be a bit different than the ones so far, because I’m going to tell you about a real-life team to illustrate what I want to say. With their permission, of course. Long story short, this week I’ve been working with a team composed of Finnish, Swedish, Jewish and Arab (just to pick one word for each) members. In Jerusalem, a place that too often makes the headlines in some unfortunate context. In case you didn’t know, Finnish and Swedish work cultures (in general) are surprisingly different and I don’t think I need to even touch upon what the other pair may sound like. The words I used are just one way of describing the people in the team, but I’m using them to highlight the eye-catching elements of the constellation. Okay, so here’s this team that sounds like it’s a disaster waiting to happen and I’m an organizational psychologist — I must be here because they’re having issues and conflicts, right? Nope, none of the sort. This job is one of those great ones, where I get to come in before there are problems, to try to help a team build a solid foundation for working together in the future.
The team, in its current composition, is only a few weeks old and only one member of the team has worked in the organization for more than a year. So what kinds of issues create friction in the everyday setting? Let me give you some examples of we’ve discussed. “We should really look at the invoicing process because now many people are spending unnecessary time on it.”, “Which are the core responsibilities of each person working here?” and “When and how often do we need team meetings and staff meetings?” were questions that demanded answers. Does this sound familiar? Yes? Exactly. It’s like any other workplace anywhere in the world. Actually, it’s probably functioning better than many.
But what about the obvious challenges posed by having such a diverse team, in such a setting? Obviously, the context cannot be ignored and every once in a while, it affects daily life and work here in a profound way. But do the team members talk about religion or politics at work? No, because those things are fairly irrelevant to their teamwork. They matter, obviously, but the team chooses not to let those things affect their work. What is highly relevant, however, is a very clearly stated will to work together and work towards a common goal. I’ve seen many highly dysfunctional teams, even those where all the elements were there to make it easy to work together. Similar backgrounds, ages, genders, and so on. But they, in turn, are irrelevant if there’s no will to truly work together, just as differences are irrelevant if you choose to work together.
Despite the all the research out there showing us clearly that diversity is very useful and even makes us smarter, it is still very common for people to prefer working with others who are similar to themselves regarding some salient attributes such as nationality, gender or other background factors. One reason is that it may take more effort to truly listen to and understand someone who’s different from us in some way. It’s natural to generalize and to be drawn to the familiar, but in a work context, it’s also lazy and something that should be discouraged. It’s useless to use phrases such as “Our team is dysfunctional because we come from different cultural/religious backgrounds” or “I just can’t see eye to eye with N.N. because he/she is *enter nationality/gender/profession/background/other attribute*. They’re excuses. Excuses for not wanting to make the effort to try to listen, try to work together, try to figure out how it can be done. Of course, there will always be people who get on our nerves or are difficult to work with, but I dare say that the real reason for that cannot be reduced to some generalization about culture or background. Even in the most homogeneous teams, we’re all different and we all need to figure out how to work together.
Let’s get back to the team I’ve been working with in Jerusalem. As can be expected, it’s not always unproblematic to communicate in such a diverse team, across languages, and surrounded by an equally diverse society. But it’s a matter of choice whether or not these challenges become insurmountable. Today a new trainee arrived, speaking only Arabic and reading no language, and the only team member who was available to give him his first instructions does not speak Arabic. What happened? When there’s a will, there’s a way — and this time it was Google Translate, which can read out loud what you have asked it to translate. Obviously not a long-term solution to the situation, but enough to get the job done today.
In this great TED Talk, Margaret Heffernan talks about creating a culture of helpfulness and social connectedness, which is what sets apart so many successful teams from those that are not. She also mentions that the Swedes have a special term for hanging out around the coffee machine and talking to each other. It’s called ‘fika’, which means more than a coffee break, it means collective restoration. This, by the way, is one thing that the team in Jerusalem does every day, except that they hang out in the garden under a palm tree and not by a coffee machine. Maybe they’re on to something?
So what is the “take home message” from all of this? If you’re working in a multicultural team, make sure you make a conscious effort to avoid getting stuck in stereotypes, generalizations or assumptions about people. It simply doesn’t bring much to the table. You need to listen, ask questions, try to understand, offer your own point of view in a considerate and constructive way. If there’s a problem, focus on addressing what a person is saying or doing instead of what you perceive them to be. Because that is what you’re seeing — your own perception. If you’re a team leader or a manager, make sure everyone can voice their opinions and that diversity is utilized and not ignored or used as an excuse to underperform. Focus on work, goals, tasks, and how to get those done in the best possible way. Challenge yourself and others to look beyond the obvious characteristics that become the source of generalizations. Research tells us diverse teams have more potential to excel than homogeneous teams — why waste those opportunities?
