Culture, clarity and connection

I have had the opportunity over the last few weeks to spend time in various cities across South and East Asia. I find travel an incredible opportunity to observe, to learn. As the initial excitement wears off, and I shake off the jetlag, I love soaking up the difference in culture from my own. The different ways of doing, the different rules, the different foods! I love to understand how the different tax systems work (don’t judge, I know it’s weird). I love to understand how different countries tackle the same challenges that Aotearoa has. I love to learn new things about the history, chat to the people, understand their viewpoints. And among all of this, I learn new things about myself too.

So, where to start?

I have tried to simplify down my pages of notes on my phone into a few key themes…bear with me.

It is said that the way to define organizational culture can be as simple as the way that an outsider feels when they experience that culture. The way they feel when they walk in, the way they are greeted, the way the people of the organization speak to each other, the norms and habits and behaviours they exhibit. I found that experiencing a culture other than my own was the perfect demonstration of exactly that.

The last few weeks I have bounced around a few countries, all with varying degrees of westernisation. The cultural norms and behaviours have changed with each. For example, I got used to walking to the right-hand side of the foot path and standing to the right on escalators in Hong Kong. It seemed that just as I had gotten used to this norm, then I was in Singapore and the custom was the reverse – walking and standing on the left! Hong Kong, we were informed by a local, is so strict on the small things, for example, if you didn’t clean up your dog waste from the sidewalk you were fined. Compare that to walking around West Lake in Hanoi and literally having to dodge the dog waste (among other things) on the sidewalk! Learning the cultural norms was as much about the locals sharing their knowledge as it was about observing them for all the unconscious norms that each country held.

It got me thinking. When it comes to your organization, how does an outsider feel when they visit you, or when they join your team? Are your cultural norms obvious, are they ‘translated’ from the locals, are they written or unwritten? Is there clarity? Are they norms you take pride in?

It became really clear to me that some of the cities that we visited were 100% clear on who and what they wanted to be. They knew what their vision was, they had a strategic direction, buy in, and an action plan. Singapore for example, set their initiative to be a Garden City back in 1967. Prior to that, their 166-year-old Botanic Gardens were established, and this remains today, a total of 200 acres in the middle of the city dedicated solely to gardens! The ‘Green Plan’ was rolled out in Feb 2021, with the goal of galvanizing a whole-of nation movement to drive a City in Nature, an Energy reset, Sustainable Living, Green Economy and a Resilient Future. This alignment across the city is evident when you look at the absence of litter, the design of skyscrapers complete with built in gardens, and the well-maintained parks and gardens throughout the city. Also in the small things… the fact that it is illegal to sell chewing gum. A decision made specifically to reduce the mess that chewing gum was making in their city. Now, when it comes to a political view – I will only say this – the continuity of governance has allowed this strategic direction to come to life in a real way. It has allowed for strategic decisions rather than back and forth and tit for tat decision making that is much more short-term in nature. From a business perspective, it has shown on a grand scale how a strategic vision communicated well, with buy in and an action plan can really come to life across a whole nation!

And finally, in the interest of keeping this a digestible length…these last few weeks have simply shown me that regardless of our ethnicity, the language we speak, the colour of our hair, whether we walk on the right or the left…we share a common humanity and it’s some of the most simple moments of connection that stand out to me on reflection.

I giggled when Anne our tour guide in Hanoi told us about how her dream was to travel, but her parents were very protective and called her at home every three days – so when she visited another country, she had to be back within the three days, so they didn’t find out!

I have been reminded that the world is still recovering from Covid-19 in many ways, and in a very real sense when Michael from Hue told us about how he had gone from being a well sought after MC pre-covid and now is a driver for tours to make ends meet for his three kids.

And when Vu from Hoi An told us about his previous role as a civil engineer in Ho Chi Minh, but that once he got married, he came home to his hometown and his family – it rang pretty close to home.

We might look a little different, we might sound a little different, we might drive on different sides of the road sometimes and walk on different sides of the sidewalk. But at the end of the day – we are all human.