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Culture - Factor in Global Training Program
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Communicating the information to different people from different cultures and different nationalities can give rise to many problems. Many simple things that seem simple and straightforward to communicate become difficult when it comes to communicating in different environment. Giving training in one’s own culture is quite different from giving training in different culture. Being a good trainer is not the only requirement but understanding socio-economic and cultural backgrounds has now become an important part.
Values, norms, attitude are the building blocks of culture.
Values means what a group of people believes to be good, bad, right, or wrong. Norms means the social rules and guidelines that prescribe appropriate
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behavior. Attitude disposes a person to act in a certain way toward something in a certain situation.
A trainer giving training in different culture has to keep these things in mind before delivering content.
Instances: A good case that concerns attitude towards time in different cities:
People are very punctual in United States. People from US tend to come little early for any meeting, or when invited for dinner, party to someone’s home because in their culture it is considered to be polite to arrive on time.
In Great Britain, people tend to come late for any appointment. If called at 5 P.M., that means come at 5.30 or 6 P.M.
Even for Argentineans, coming on exact time is far too early.
For instance, In US, if the trainer gets late for a scheduled training session it is treated as a breach of etiquette. And it may result in loss of trainer’s respect and failure in transfer of training.
Age, Gender, and Professional Status – Different cultures give different regard to age, gender, and professional qualification. For example, in Japan, people give high regard to older people. Older people are regarded as having greater knowledge, skills, wisdom, and abilities. Respect in the sense that people are more willing to listen to and seriously consider the information. In such a culture, a young trainer might have to work harder to gain attention and face problems in executing the program and transfer of training.
Similarly, some countries are also biased about the gender. Like in Gulf countries, women’s role is limited to households only. In such a culture, it is not possible for women trainers to undergo training programs because people will not be as receptive as in other culture.
Same is with high professional status- the higher the qualification of the trainer, the more will be the importance attached to the information.
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