{"id":12549,"date":"2013-05-15T18:27:07","date_gmt":"2013-05-15T16:27:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/?p=12549\/"},"modified":"2017-01-21T00:19:08","modified_gmt":"2017-01-21T00:19:08","slug":"knowing-yourself-to-know-others","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/knowing-yourself-to-know-others\/","title":{"rendered":"Knowing yourself to know others"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The concept of time, varies widely between cultures. In the Nordics and in Western Europe, it is rigid and sequential. <\/p>\n<p>A meeting scheduled for Tuesday, week 28, at 2 pm, for example, will happen on Tuesday, week 28, at 2 pm. In the Middle East and India, it is a much more malleable concept: one can stretch and distort it. Meeting at 2pm really means, &#8216;at some point in the afternoon, God willing: there is no way of knowing for sure, those kinds of things are really out of our hands&#8217;. <\/p>\n<p>This is according to intercultural communications expert and author, Colin Moon, who did his keynote speech in the<a href=\"\/node\/18178\/\" target=\"_blank&gt; recently renovated&lt;\/a&gt; ceremonial hall, at &lt;em&gt;Bridging Cultures&lt;\/em&gt; event Wednesday. \n\n&lt;h2&gt;To thine own self be true&lt;\/h2&gt;\nProrector of University of Copenhagen, Thomas Bj\u00f8rnholm kicked things off by telling the audience a story, he had picked up while visiting Singapore Business School. He told the audience about GPS: good news, problems, and solutions. The good news, Bj\u00f8rnholm said, was that poverty was the lowest it's been, the middle class is the largest it's ever been, and overal the world is doing well. Amongst problems he mentioned global climate change, and the financial crisis: both issues affecting the whole globe.\n\nWhen it came time to offering a solution, he gave the audience a metaphor: a hundred years ago, every country was a ship, with its own captain. Today, we are all together, in a single bigger, better ship, but that ship is full of captains, all of whom are in their quarters, with nobody at the bridge. We need better cultural understanding, Bj\u00f8rnholm continued, if we are to steer our global ship.\n\nThose words set up the stage for the keynote speaker, Colin Moon: \">Iron-fisted autocrats and orchestra conductors<br \/>\nThe theme of self-knowledge was a recurring one, throughout Moon&#8217;s speech: When the question &#8220;What do you think is the most frequent error in cross-cultural teams?&#8221; was asked to a series of business leaders, the most common response was &#8220;Not being aware of one&#8217;s own norms&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Language, Moon continued, was another cultural barrier, in ways that are subtle and often misunderstood. After a long meeting, Danes will say, &#8220;isn&#8217;t it time to compromise?&#8221;. In the Danish mind, a compromise is something good: everyone gets a slice of the cake, and everyone is content. To American ears, though, &#8216;compromise&#8217; sounds a lot like &#8216;failure&#8217;, causing them to shiver and recoil in terror: What is the point of talking for hours on end, just to reach some conclusion that is a mix of everyone&#8217;s opinion and satisfies no one?<\/p>\n<p>Cultural differences, extend past language barriers, of course. Moon gave examples of flat and hierarchical organisations. When asked if the boss should have all the answers, only seven per cent of Swedes and 11 per cent of Danes thought that they should. Conversely, 77 per cent of Indians agreed with the proposition. Nordic bosses were more like orchestra conductors, giving direction, gently steering, and coordinating, Moon said, while in more hierarchical organisations, they are often seen as all-powerful autocrats, ruling over their underlings with an iron fist.<\/p>\n<p>Following the speeches, the embassador booths opened, serving food and drinks local to the embassies providing them, and the audience had a chance to mingle and experience some different cultures first hand.<\/p>\n<p>See the pictures below! Photos and captions by Victor Yakimov.<\/p>\n<p>universitypost@adm.ku.dk<\/p>\n<p><em>Stay in the know about news and events happening in Copenhagen by <a href=\"http:\/\/universitypost.dk\/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\">signing up for the University Post\u2019s weekly newsletter here<\/a>.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is a small splotch on the world map: If it is to thrive, Denmark must navigate in foreign cultures. The take-home message from a University of Copenhagen seminar for ambassadors, VIPS: &#8216;Bridging cultures&#8217;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":12553,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","expression-news_article"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Knowing yourself to know others<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/knowing-yourself-to-know-others\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Knowing yourself to know others\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It is a small splotch on the world map: If it is to thrive, Denmark must navigate in foreign cultures. 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is a small splotch on the world map: If it is to thrive, Denmark must navigate in foreign cultures. The take-home message from a University of Copenhagen seminar for ambassadors, VIPS: 'Bridging cultures'","use_post_excerpt":false},{"acf_fc_layout":"Byline","is_author":false,"contributors":[{"use_registered_user":false,"user":false,"contributor_name":"by","contributor_title":"&nbsp;","contributor_image":false}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"Content","content":"<p>The concept of time, varies widely between cultures. In the Nordics and in Western Europe, it is rigid and sequential. <\/p>\n<p>A meeting scheduled for Tuesday, week 28, at 2 pm, for example, will happen on Tuesday, week 28, at 2 pm. In the Middle East and India, it is a much more malleable concept: one can stretch and distort it. Meeting at 2pm really means, &#8216;at some point in the afternoon, God willing: there is no way of knowing for sure, those kinds of things are really out of our hands&#8217;. <\/p>\n<p>This is according to intercultural communications expert and author, Colin Moon, who did his keynote speech in the<a href=\"\/node\/18178\/\" target=\"_blank&gt; recently renovated&lt;\/a&gt; ceremonial hall, at &lt;em&gt;Bridging Cultures&lt;\/em&gt; event Wednesday. \n\n&lt;h2&gt;To thine own self be true&lt;\/h2&gt;\nProrector of University of Copenhagen, Thomas Bj\u00f8rnholm kicked things off by telling the audience a story, he had picked up while visiting Singapore Business School. He told the audience about GPS: good news, problems, and solutions. The good news, Bj\u00f8rnholm said, was that poverty was the lowest it's been, the middle class is the largest it's ever been, and overal the world is doing well. Amongst problems he mentioned global climate change, and the financial crisis: both issues affecting the whole globe.\n\nWhen it came time to offering a solution, he gave the audience a metaphor: a hundred years ago, every country was a ship, with its own captain. Today, we are all together, in a single bigger, better ship, but that ship is full of captains, all of whom are in their quarters, with nobody at the bridge. We need better cultural understanding, Bj\u00f8rnholm continued, if we are to steer our global ship.\n\nThose words set up the stage for the keynote speaker, Colin Moon: \" we cannot understand people from other cultures per cent. just try knowing your own culture yourself it might be impossible moon said.>Iron-fisted autocrats and orchestra conductors<br \/>\nThe theme of self-knowledge was a recurring one, throughout Moon&#8217;s speech: When the question &#8220;What do you think is the most frequent error in cross-cultural teams?&#8221; was asked to a series of business leaders, the most common response was &#8220;Not being aware of one&#8217;s own norms&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Language, Moon continued, was another cultural barrier, in ways that are subtle and often misunderstood. After a long meeting, Danes will say, &#8220;isn&#8217;t it time to compromise?&#8221;. In the Danish mind, a compromise is something good: everyone gets a slice of the cake, and everyone is content. To American ears, though, &#8216;compromise&#8217; sounds a lot like &#8216;failure&#8217;, causing them to shiver and recoil in terror: What is the point of talking for hours on end, just to reach some conclusion that is a mix of everyone&#8217;s opinion and satisfies no one?<\/p>\n<p>Cultural differences, extend past language barriers, of course. Moon gave examples of flat and hierarchical organisations. When asked if the boss should have all the answers, only seven per cent of Swedes and 11 per cent of Danes thought that they should. Conversely, 77 per cent of Indians agreed with the proposition. Nordic bosses were more like orchestra conductors, giving direction, gently steering, and coordinating, Moon said, while in more hierarchical organisations, they are often seen as all-powerful autocrats, ruling over their underlings with an iron fist.<\/p>\n<p>Following the speeches, the embassador booths opened, serving food and drinks local to the embassies providing them, and the audience had a chance to mingle and experience some different cultures first hand.<\/p>\n<p>See the pictures below! Photos and captions by Victor Yakimov.<\/p>\n<p>universitypost@adm.ku.dk<\/p>\n<p><em>Stay in the know about news and events happening in Copenhagen by <a href=\"http:\/\/universitypost.dk\/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\">signing up for the University Post\u2019s weekly newsletter here<\/a>.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"ArticleEnd"},{"acf_fc_layout":"OtherStories","headline":"","hand_picked_posts":false,"references":false,"category":false,"theme":false,"number_of_posts":"4","style":"default"}]},"taxonomyData":{"category":[{"term_id":43,"name":"Culture","slug":"culture","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":43,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":562,"filter":"raw"}],"post_tag":[],"post_format":[],"expression":[{"term_id":15,"name":"News Article","slug":"news_article","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":15,"taxonomy":"expression","description":"","parent":0,"count":11493,"filter":"raw"}],"translation_priority":[]},"featured_media_url":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/20130515-img_8663-2-1280x853.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12549"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12549\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34601,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12549\/revisions\/34601"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}