Large European conglomerate’s Information Technology office in the U.S. doing a software upgrade and consolidation project for their office in Japan.
The Challenge:
Software consolidation and upgrade project that involved:
1. Three countries and three project teams
2. Four cultures (American, European, Indian Tech Staff and Japanese end users)
3. Different business cultures
4. Different decision making styles
5. Three time zones
6. 20 different team members and personalities
In technology there is a vast melting pot of workers and the potential for challenges are everywhere. There are people on projects that are used to working alone at a computer and now they have to work with others and on international projects such as this one, it is usually is a co-worker or consultant of a different culture.
For this project, I interacted with the technical staff in the U.S., the Japanese end users and their technical staff in Japan and management in Europe.
As I performed analysis and designed our approach, the project manager had to make sure that all communications were designed to address the individual reader or listener.
The Solution:
Using my understanding of Japanese cultural as the foundation in creating understanding among team members while delivering our technology expertise in the software development lifecycle.
Once the client realized that this was more than a technology project and the scope of potential communication problems, I was also asked to provide cross-cultural training classes for the rest of the team in the U.S. By doing this, I was able to assist all members of the team better understand each other, communicate more effectively and work smoothly together in performing the project work.
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