Interculturality and Change Management
Change management is no longer a specific job role but a routine for all managers.
But what if the context is different from what we are used to?
Culture is a set of symbols, customs, and common beliefs that help individuals understand their own reality and context. People have by their nature the tendency to protect their beliefs and to make their reality the only possible and authentic truth. If this were not the case, we would not see conflicts of any kind.
To understand and relate to diversity requires open-mindedness. It is necessary to come out of one’s own reality and break down established biases and perceptions in order to welcome the other, whoever they may be and without judgment.
People need help to grow beyond what they know and understand. With this in mind, it is the duty of a leader to inspire team members to remove their resistance through sensitivity training so that, when interpretating and developing of the project, the work truly exemplifies team work.
3 key learnings to face the leadership challenges in multicultural and change management contexts.
- Acting globally brings to a vision of the future that has no choice but to be concurrent with mutual understanding. Societies and cultures are, of course not rigid. We are all part of constructing the social reality based on our collective and individual consciousness. Society is the result of a process in which individuals play an active role in creating the world in which they live. Therefore, culture, by its very nature, is fluid and undergoes changes over time by adapting to new situations and experiences. People are highly connected and interdependent. There is a lot of individual transformation happening that provides opportunities to interpret experiences more broadly and create new forms of alliances and solidarity. This generates constant individual transformation and provides opportunities to interpret experiences more broadly and create new forms of alliances and solidarity.
- Knowledge is not always about gaining a “better” understanding but a “different” understanding that takes cultural-historical traditions and social situations into account. Language facilitates every form of experience that gets you closer to this understanding. That’s why learning the local language is so essential to cultural communication.
- Human evolution happens through integration and melting pot.