182 Living in China with Terence Clarke

Hi, I'm Terry Clark and I'm with Chris on the Culture Matches Podcast. Build your cultural competence. Listen to interesting stories. Learn about the cultural fails and how to avoid them. Get the global perspective. Here, at Culture Matters on International Business. Your host, Chris Smith, has a plan, a plan for people who are looking for a solution. He makes you understand cultural diversity better by interviewing real people with real experiences. Every episode, he interviews a prominent guest who will tell you his or her story and share international experiences making you more cultural complement. And now here's your host, Chris Smith. Hi, Terry or Terrence or Mr. Clark or Dr. Clark or something. I don't know. How are you? I'm very well, Chris. I'm not a doctor yet. Although I'm thinking of doing a doctoral degree, but I'm not a doctor yet, but I'm very well. Thank you. And thank you for having me on your amazing podcast. You're more than welcome. Happy to have you here. I have a couple of questions. Like I said in the pre-recording, I don't really prep a lot. I prefer both of conversation, but tell us a little bit more about yourself. Where do you come from? Where are you now? And what is your so-called cultural frame of reference? Okay. Well, the cultural frame of reference for me is a bit messy. So I'm born in Northern Ireland, went to the UK when I was eight. Then I went to Hong Kong when I was 21. And I've been in Asia ever since then, but I'm currently based in Shanghai. Approaching 50. So you can see how long I've been out here. Cultural wise, my culture a bit odd. My grandmother was Indian. You wouldn't think it's a look at me. My grandfather was Irish. So a real mix. And I've been out in Asia for a very long time now. So I work and have my life in Chinese, as well as English, and I train, and I coach in English in Chinese as well. And I work all over Asia. So my cultural reference and my cultural point is messy, but in a good way, I would say. It gives me quite a good understanding of all sorts of facets of different cultures. Okay. It's there's the saying that you can take an Indian out of India, but you kind of take India out of the Indian. And that goes with every culture. If I if I if I lined that up with you, what is your culture? Not your passport, because your passport is not necessarily a culture. Oh, yeah. It's also a very difficult question to answer, to be honest. I mean, I have an English passport and Irish passport. I have a Chinese permanent ID card, which are quite difficult to get. So which not a not citizenship. And I've been here a long time and the way I work with a mix of Eastern West. So it's really difficult when I'm with Irish people, I'm very Irish. When I'm with English, people are very English. So I think we adapt ourselves with the situation you're in. And if you think about leadership and at work, you also adapt yourself to your different your team members or to your boss, et cetera. So so very good question, but I can't answer it because I actually don't know. Okay. All right. And maybe it's better. It's better a question to be asked to people around you, who? Okay. Yes. This is something that I get a lot. And in terms of I mean, I've lived in in the US, in Belgium, now in France, I'm Dutch myself. And I mean, I've grown to know that I am as Dutch as they come. Really. But other people tell me this, you're so Dutch. This is so Dutch what you're doing. Okay. Yeah. And can you before we go to China and Asia and stuff, is can you say something about the difference, a cultural difference between Ireland and the UK, or in your experience, evidently? That's a very good one, right? Because if you look, actually, if you look all the way back to genetics, the Irish and the British, the Irish and the English, there's some differences there. There's some similar admixture, you know, some sacksins from Vikings from Celts. If you could see me, I'm blue-eyed and sort of red-beard. I'm very Celtic in terms of where I'm from. Difference with the British and the English, or the English and the Irish? Well, there's still a little bit of animosity I would say to vent, depending on where you're from in the countries. I guess very similar, very similar, I think very similar. But I would say that the Irish, maybe I'm a bit more biased here. A bit more friendly, a bit more welcoming to people, a bit more go with the flow type of thing. That's just in my experience. So, you know, I've been working for over 25 years. I've run huge teams. I've hired thousands of people. I've coached and trained now for 2,000 hours. So talking from a lot of experience without trying to be biased. It's always difficult when you ask people about their own culture, because you're a little bit biased about it, right? It's like when somebody says, "Oh, we want an American trainer to do an American culture," and I would always say, "No, no, let's send somebody else who's maybe lived in America rather than an American." Exactly, exactly. So it's difficult for me to answer that question, because half the family is Irish, half the family is English, and back in Europe. So it's a difficult one. A lot of similarities, a lot of differences, even with the food, the way that people would respond to a problem. I find that my family in Ireland are quite negative, I have more of a negativity bias. So everyone has a negativity bias, right? All of us, it's an evolutionary survival thing within our brains. But I would say that the family in Ireland are a bit more negatively skewed, I would say. Okay. All right. Okay, then jumping all the way from the UK and the Ireland itself to Asia. Why Asia? How do you get there? I mean, by plane, evidently. But why Asia? Why not South America? Or the US or Africa? So at the time, I was working in the UK, the inland revenues, so the IRS, I guess you would say in the US. And my father was in Hong Kong, and he was managing a bar in Wanchai, and he said, "Come for a month." Before you had been on the independence, they're giving back the end of the lease. After that, after that, yes, after that. And he said, "Come for a month, and I'd never been on a plane in my life. I'd never been on a plane." When we went from UK to Ireland, we took a ferry, which was overnight, right? Right. And he said, "Come for a month." And I went, "Okay." And I remember my manager at the time, Martin was his name. He said, "You're not coming back." I said, "Of course I am. This is a government job. It's going to be like secure." So I got on that plane, and he's right. I didn't go back. I just fell in love with Hong Kong when I arrived there. The sights, the sounds, the fast pace of everything, coming from the UK, where it's in relation to Hong Kong, at that time, everything's much slower, right? Decision making. And I was just like, "Wow." So I ended up staying, ended up building a small business, international trade type of thing. And then I decided, everyone spoke Cantonese. There wasn't a lot of Mandarin at the time, but I saw Mandarin as more and more being spoken. So I should learn this language. I think there's more opportunity maybe in the mainland. So I went back to school, back between Hong Kong and the UK, and then with uni, university, they sent me to Shanghai. I was supposed to be there for one year out of four, and then I ended up staying. I just thought, "This place is amazing." I just ended up staying, and then I actually, my second week, I found a job with a Dutch guy, actually. I was sitting in Starbucks saying, "Oh, I'm not really enjoying the university. I'd like to do a job." And he said, "Hey, come up to my office tomorrow." I ended up working for him. Okay, cool. All right. Yeah. And the rest of this has been here ever since. What I said, I want to talk about your business as well, which is coaching, or you've talked a lot about cross-cultural adaptation. Maybe the segue from what you just told us and to more the business side is what were your biggest adaptation problems if any? Or what was the easiest? I mean, it swings both ways. You mean in terms of living in another country? Well, I mean, you go there and you never come back. That's not very evident. I mean, the switching countries is the second most stressful event that a human being can experience. Sure. Sure. I just thought of it as an adventure back then. I thought there's more opportunity here than in the UK. But yeah, thinking back, obviously the language. I mean, you probably speak a few languages yourself, Chris. So, Dutch, English, French, Spanish at least. Yeah, at least. So, you grow up on mainland Europe and learn speaking more than one language is very normal. Everybody does it. So, I grew up in the UK. We did two and a half years of French just to pass the exam. So, when you are learning those languages in Europe a lot of them are similar. Maybe the same language family. So, it's a little bit easier to learn where Chinese is not related to anything. So, I came in there. I mean, the biggest barrier with Chinese is you panic when you see the characters and the reading and the writing. But actually, the grammar is much simpler than any European language. I'm not saying it's an easy language, which with the grammar is much simpler. So back then it was like, oh, got it. go and learn this language, not themes in English when you come in, maybe the signs at the airport, right? So the biggest barrier was language. Yeah. But then you learn, it's trial by fire, right? So you learn by doing, you've got no choice, right? Unless you're a very high level executive and you come over and you've got assistance and things like this, I wasn't high level executive when I came over. So I had to do that myself. So there's languages, the number one, people's concept of time, right? So people's concept of time, so different meaning times. So for me, I would always be like 10 minutes early. That would be on time for me. But people here would be exactly on time. And I'm like, hey, you're late. In my head, you're late. Why are you setting everything up now? But they're on time, right? Also the indirect communication, a lot of people still fall up fall down on that. Whereas you and I Chris, you would say, right, we're going to have this call at eight o'clock. We're both here at eight o'clock. Yeah. Right. There's no, there's no hidden meaning. But we, I find here in Asia, most Asian cultures, the indirect communication can trip people up. You know, we have a thing in Chinese, where they say, I once, I won't say it in Chinese, but they say, I'll think about it. It always means no, always, right? Literally always, right? And there's also a fear here of, and it's a cultural thing, it's a hierarchical thing of not wanting to say no, or the hidden meaning and things. So that's something that's the biggest adaptation. And also, I mean, I hate to say it when I started working in factories and things, I just traveled to factories, taking buses and things. Right now, we've got an amazing high speed rail network. Right. So we can get everywhere very, very quickly. At the time, I was taking five hour bus rides, you know, I'm six feet tall. I didn't fit in the bus at that time. My knees are in my face. Five hours going to factories. There's the same issue, the quality, the delivery, all this sort of stuff. And end up losing my temper. Yeah. Because that's shouting, right? And I was young and dumb, right? But I had a boss a few years later called Chris. And he took me to what American guy, he took me to one side and it's a lesson that stayed with me forever. You need to learn to respond and not react. And that's stayed with me for like over 20 years. Because I would always react. And it doesn't work here. Shouting doesn't work. Right. And you also have to be aware here, another shock is that a contract might be flexible. Whereas for me, from the UK, a contract, right? So it might be a bit flexible. People don't always do as they say they will just from that fear of wanting not wanting to say no. And also a big shock can be. And I see, because I do cross-cultural training for people coming into China and the other way around as well. Chinese going overseas is the speed that decisions are made here. So we would say that it's a collective culture and generally collective culture's decisions are made by consensus. But here it's much more quicker than you might find in the Middle East, for example, but it's also by consensus. But it's much faster. And and it's like here it's like, oh, that works. Let's try it. Now often without all the all the information so it can maybe it's too fast. So when I a few years ago, I was dealing with it was in property and I was running as part of the China business for a big London real estate company. And they just couldn't understand the speed that we did things here. They just couldn't understand it. They wanted to do it the way in London. So take six weeks. Okay, well, you've lost that sale or you've lost that you've lost that opportunity. So that's a bit of a shock. But one of the things I really love about living out in Asia is the speed that we do things with the right information. Just get anything's done quicker. That's it's a big shock. It's a big adaptation. So it's an interesting description of what you what you use. I use an adapted model of Hofstata for to explain culture and basically what you said in your in your explanation here is typically it follows exactly the whole pattern in terms of and the difference between the UK and the Middle East and relatively compared to China. You you talk a lot where is my because this is a question I wanted to ask you. You talk about a lot about cross-cultural adaptation. Okay, look at it from the literal sense or do you have your own definition around that? I think that there's got to be a literal sense as one part of it. But I also have my own model called the triple A model because it's easy. You know, there's a lot of models in coaching and training. I think the simple are the best. And also I try to talk about talking three's the power of three is the human brain. Confocus on three things at once, you know, less than seven three is perfect to focus on things. And the triple A model is awareness appreciation and adaptability. So if you think when I first okay when I went to Hong Kong it's 21 years old it was just after the handover and I would say that 99% of the Western people there did not speak Cantonese. Because they didn't need to. Yeah, it's British. Why should I speak Cantonese? Of course. And it's changed over time. That's just an example we're giving you know, a lot of people speak Cantonese Mandarin now. And that was this being aware but not appreciating it and not adapting yourself because you didn't need to. So in the in the model it's being aware that there's a difference. Right, just you know you come into a different country when you come into China, you know, I was just helping another coach come in from Malaysia last week and China is basically cashless now. Right. So we use an app called Ali pay and an app called WeChat. Now Ali pay last year came out with an international version because they realized so many people were coming and they couldn't pay for things so you can link your international bank card to that. Yeah. But nobody tells you this. So I told her this and then it worked perfectly for her but she wasn't even aware of that to be there, right? Because nobody tells you so it's been aware of these differences and also the differences around if you think about Hofstad around time around power distance around communication direct versus indirect it's understanding these things. Then the appreciation is okay just because it's different doesn't mean it's wrong. And I should understand that I'm not in my own country and a lot of people come in they don't get training they don't have anything they read a guidebook. If you read a guidebook now it says for China still give name cards. I haven't used name cards for five years. We just we just like exchange our information on WeChat which is like WhatsApp right? But people will still tell you to bring bring your name cards. Now if you're dealing with a government yes bring your name cards to or it's a big official meeting bring your name cards. So it's it's adapting yourself and then it's coming to adapting so you don't speak the language is actually a problem it's not a billion people's problem or a hundred million people's problem whichever country you're in right it's your problem. And there's many many free translation apps there's many ways of doing things you don't like that food then eat something else. You see too many people coming in I mean what I try to say is when when you go into a new culture is be a five year old. And why is it to be a five year old be a child because you have to ask your mom or your dad or the people around you how to do things. So if you don't know adapt and ask. Yeah right. You know China's done it well a lot of countries around Asia around the world doesn't a great job you know you go to Thailand on the on the sky train everything's in English and Thai right if you go to Japan now Japan's got these amazing the ticket booth live translation for them guys selling the ticket and you in many languages live translation it comes up on the screen so that's the adaptation and we have to adapt ourselves we can't be that close-minded where allowing from this country and this is how we do it at home. Yeah you know you've lived over the world Chris and it's just an amazing experience go and try then if you might not like it at first try the food try to speak the language try to take the public transportation don't put yourself in this expat bubble. You can't if you want but your life will be so much richer. I agree. I'll you agree. Just have to get this salsa dancing down which I'm still not good. I just spent three months in Colombia this way and how's your dancing? No and like I said I still I need some practice still. You talk Terrence you talk about or Terri you talk about you coach leaders as well that's what you that's what this comes from your LinkedIn profile. What is the the most common field of improvement you find that the people of the I guess the expats that you get in front of you. What is their thing that they need to improve the most common thing that happens? Or is it good country? Is it the America's more like this and the Germans more like that or I don't know? Well yeah without without generalizing a lot of the cultural norms that we we have as our stereotypes are quite accurate I would say. Without generalizing what I find in our most people coming particularly to Asia is it's not seen as a hardship posting anymore. So it used to be a hardship posting they used to get huge you know huge packages etc that's sort of gone away. So when they come into China particularly they have to be because when I do the cross culture we also talk about general I have somebody that comes in and talks about you know general life cost of schools and things like that. You know the cost of schooling here is is ridiculous you know it's like and in a very good school it could be $30,000 okay US right. So it's it's while the cost of living here is very cheap some things are crazy right. So that's That's one thing, but in terms of the leadership, it's leading across culture and understanding the different ways of communication. So even if you're in a multinational and the language of that multinational is English or French or whatever language it is, you're still dealing with a different culture. So the way that you are setting goals or setting tasks or discussing will be very different to the way you do back home. So I always encourage people. Or leaders or managers coming in to really make sure you're asking enough clarifying questions because people will just say yes, yes, yes, I can do it. And maybe a week later they come back and say actually I wasn't very sure. And you've lost that week. So I would ask more questions and don't assume that just because somebody says yes, that they understand or they agree with you. So that's a sort of a bigger, a bigger barrier of improvement. So I say to people at leaders, what's got you to hear now before is your skill. Or whatever now you need to behave your change. When you're coming into a different culture, it's not your skills change is your behavior change. Understanding the attitudes to work. Understanding attitudes to public holidays, to families who socializing with your team, you have to understand all of these things that are very different and they're very different from back home. You know, at the base of things we're all humans, right? So we all have the same things. We all know Maslow's hierarchy of needs, etc. So we all have these, but we have them in different ways. So it's the biggest change is understanding. If you're coming from France and you're here, you're not getting a month off in August. If you're all posted here, you're not getting a lot of people shocked, you're not getting it because we don't do it here, right? Maybe if you're between both countries, okay, you're not getting it, right? Here, people are going to send you messages outside of working hours and you are expected to reply to them, right? And here as well, you are expected to work very long hours because it's in the culture. It's not about your productivity. It's not about productivity. It's about being seen in the office. Yeah. So these are some of the biggest shocks, but it's about how to communicate. That's the biggest challenge for a lot of people. This is again a nice segue to my other question. You talk about that you're offered techniques to managers, to leaders, to people that you coach. How are some of the techniques that you use? Or name the technique? The technique I got. Sorry? Our name's three. So in terms of just for the adaptability, we talk a lot about the AAA model. We try to adapt that at work. We try to find ourselves keeping journals or even writing on the phone when maybe you're going to react to something rather than respond to something because it can be very different. I was coaching somebody in a man actually, a Brazilian in a man in the Middle East a couple of weeks ago. He was just finding it very difficult that everybody just kept agreeing with him in the meetings and then nothing was getting done. He was starting to get more and more frustrated. I said, "Well, why are you getting frustrated?" He said, "I don't know." The technique there was to try and maybe even after the meeting, think back on what was triggering you. Just write it down. Very simple things. There's no rocket science. It's been aware of ourselves because you were talking, you were saying earlier about outside in view, someone from the outside looking at you and you have to take that step back and really look at what you're doing. I really am a strong believer in mindfulness when you're stressed, really strong believer in it. I found mindfulness about six years ago and it's just been amazing for me. When you're stressed and you're in this new environment, well, probably you have no one to talk to, right? You don't really go and talk to your colleagues if you're the leader here. Not something you do. I've done it. Yeah. These techniques are sort of sent to yourself and understand. Then I really encourage people to go and take some lessons in the language at least. It helps you think. I think differently. When I'm speaking Chinese, I think differently. I'm sure you're doing the different languages you speak. You think differently, right? You're probably not aware of it, but you think differently. So problems differently. Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to think. I'm trying to digest what you just said. Yeah. Yeah. And I just kept coming back from Colombia for having been there for three months. They're very apologetic there. It's always, it's as Lociento and with the school pame. I grazie. I grazie. And I seem to do that now in English as well, which is kind of strange. And then I say, thank you to something of before I would say it. Which is enough here. So that's an interesting realization on this site. Yeah. You've adapted yourself, right? For some extent. I find myself saying some Chinese things sometimes. You know, if there's something goes wrong, we were saying Chinese. Yeah. Like this. And I find myself doing that in English all the time. Even when I'm back in the UK and people are like, what are you doing? But you're thinking in a different way, you know? So in, in Colombian, is that a apologetic way of speaking? Is it just a way of, is it a way of deferring to someone else? Or is it just a part of speech or is it genuine apologies? I guess in English, you would say, well, thank you. Or thanks. Okay. And in Spanish, they would say, well, thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. Right. Much appreciated. It was very kind of. And, and, and, and if you hear, when I heard that first, is what's, you give me a glass of water and you expect this? I mean, you understand what I'm trying to say here. So that's, that is interesting to see. And, and then I think it makes sense to copy that behavior. You see that? Yes. And copy that behavior. If more people do this. Well, I think that's a really good point about copying. I think it's down to our mirror neurons, right? And once we adapt to being somewhere that we, we do it subconsciously or unconsciously. Yeah. Because we're just here. So for example, for me, it's like, you know, when I speak, when I speak Chinese now, right? Okay. Generally, if you, you're new, someone in China, you say, Neha. So hello, you say that one word and people generally go, oh, I need your way. So, it's not very, well, your Chinese is, it's fluent, right? They're genuinely shocked because a lot of people believe Chinese are the hardest language in the world. But they're also like, oh, this person's trying to speak. And then you say, just hello and then people start speaking to you in a panic mode. But I think for me, and a lot of people I know have been here for a long time, we just talk and nobody goes, there's no reaction. We just talk. It's like, because we're here. And I think you just give that you're part of the society and you're comfortable. So people don't react. They just talk to you as if it's normal. It's like, you know, a Chinese person comes up to me and they're born in the UK and they speak to me in an English accent. And so, here I'm from London. They're like, okay, just carry on talking. Yeah. You know, it's, but I think you just, you adapt yourself to where you are, I think. You know, it's like in London last week, I went to a Sichuan restaurant and it's supposed to be very, very, very spicy food. And it's, no, it was for England. You're a thing. Because I'm used to that. Yeah. And that's a bit bland, you know, so you adapt to these things. But the techniques are really, actually, let's go a bit deeper. So watching the humour is something I always say to people because what's funny for you is not funny for someone else. Oh, yeah. Learn a bit of the language. Learn the gestures. You know, because when we're training people from the Middle East, some of the hand gestures are very different that would be acceptable elsewhere, you know, like so. The okay symbol is not okay all over the world, right? Pointing with your finger is not okay all over the world as well. Really being conscious of your eye contact, right? So eye contact for people from the UK is very different from people from, particularly from China, right? Learning some of the language and just trying to. Thought you were all into it and try it and if you don't like it fine but try it first. Yeah. I hate chicken feet. I hate them, the texture. But I tried them many years ago and I know I don't like it. Yeah. So I think it's a bit respectful if you just try something and if you don't like it, unless it's against your beliefs or something, that's fine, right? But I'm trying to be genuine with people, you know, really ask genuine questions, learn about people. I think that's really important and really learn the customs around work. You know, because, you know, we have a horrible thing in China where you'll have a long, a week's holiday and the government swaps the first, the Saturday and the Saturday. So actually when you go back, you're still working seven days and it's something that people say, but you need to adapt to it. Little things like this are really important. So what describes your typical professional coaching? How do you approach? How do you do this? Have a newbie over to go to China first time in China or they're confused, they come to you and they need help. Yeah. So what I always try to. So I work with corporates and I work with individuals. So culture is part of what I coach, but also leadership and communication, etc. I work with people of all levels. So I do a lot of work within nationality. schools here with the parents and with the teens and also fresh grads coming out of university here because they're sort of lost. They're not trained or taught any of those soft skills that we need now, so emotional intelligence, social intelligence, you know, active listening. It's just not taught. And I think these are the skills we're going to set people apart in the future of AI. People that can actually communicate. I think that's what's really going to set people apart. So I do a lot of that work in terms of the cultural coaching with corporates. So with people coming in, it's either groups or individual one-to-one or families and also with Chinese executives going outwards as well. So we work with both sides there. And then of course individuals would come to us as well. You know, everything's word of mouth on LinkedIn, website and stuff, but nearly everything's word of mouth. And you know, the set programs, you know, if someone's going to the Middle East, we have a, we're depending on the country. Someone's going to Malaysia, someone's going to Thailand, someone's going to Vietnam for Europe. So we have tailored programs for that right there. It's usually one-to-one or groups. And then with individuals, it's really about what are their challenges? So typical coaching. So what are their challenges? I'm working around there. So you know, I'm ICF PCC. And it's a really great framework, but I also do something that's called sports coaching where we, I give my advice as well because I've lived here for so long and I've lived in these different cultures. So it's a mix of those, depending on what the what the client wants. And then the corporate site, look, here's the program. This is what we want to talk about. And maybe the, you know, the head of learning development or the HR might change some bits in it. But it's pretty tight. Pretty tried to test it. You know, we've done it with some of the big banks, the airlines, the Chinese airlines to some of the big Chinese software companies into that companies as well. So it's pretty much tailored to what they want. You know, we've got the set, but we tailor it, depending on where they want to go. Okay. So I had last year a Chinese new energy company. It was very interesting. And they wanted in one day or so one session they wanted. And you'll, you'll know why I'm sort of rolling my eyes. They wanted in they wanted Indonesia, India, Turkey and Japan all in one session. Yeah. So of course, that was a challenge. And this was all delivered in Chinese as well. To people that had never even been on holiday outside of China. So never mind even worked out outside of China. So that was interesting, you know, adapting that there. So there's challenges there because you want to give people as much information as you can. But the way that if I'm doing a, you know, a big group thing or even one to one, I don't lecture. It's got to be it's got to be interactive. Extend adults learn, right? Yeah. And helping people find their own, their own answers to things. Well, look, this is the answer to this. This is how you make a payment in China. You can only use this app basically this app, right? So there's things there. But what would you do around gift giving, you know, things like this? You know, when people go to the Middle East, would you give somebody some perfume in the Middle East? Oh, yes. Have you checked if that perfume has alcohol in it? Oh, oh, would you give someone a leather wallet? Ah, in China. Oh, you know, somebody's just about to retire. Would you give them a clock to celebrate their many years? No, because that's so that sort of signifies death. You know, even the color of flowers and all these little nuances, we try to talk about them as much as possible. But the example I had last year, very difficult in a six hour session to talk to 40 people about four different countries. And 40 people, yeah, that's a lot as well. Yeah, absolutely. Well, that's what you'll find if you ever come to China to do training, they're very local companies will try and push as many people into the training as possible. Yeah. So you have to be, you have to be really aware of that. Prepare the one who wants to come here to train. Yes. They say it's value, they say it's value for money, whereas I would argue back actually because we're so interactive. Yeah. We need fewer people so we can actually so they get the best out of it. Yeah. Different mindset from cultural mindset there as well. Yeah, true. Oh, I understand. And I, well, and I agree, also coming from a European background or European culture like that. I'm looking at the time of this recording, we're over 30 minutes already, which is fine because I like the conversation. And I want to thank you. And I want to sort of drift towards the my final question, my two final questions is in terms of your advice to becoming more cultural competent, what three tips could you give or have given already maybe to become more culturally competent? Well, I mean, I'll go back to my model, the triple in model, because you can put a lot into that simple model, right? Yeah. So it's, it's awareness appreciation and adaptability. So be aware that everything's not the same as in your own country and it's not going to be appreciate it. You might not like it. You know, it's, you know, you might not like the way the public transport works. You might not like the food exactly, but appreciate it, understand it and adapt yourself for you, what you have to, especially if it's in the workplace, you will have to adapt yourself, even if you're in a multinational, you will still have to localize the way meetings are done, the way conversations are had. So, you know, I train a lot of multinational here. And, you know, the biggest shock is in Asia, people don't turn their cameras on on a, on a teams meeting or a Zoom meeting. They just don't turn them on. So when I go into train, like the Asian, the Asian sort of participants, it's like, well, you understand that when you have your camera off, one, you're not building trust. Yeah. Two, if you think about communication around 55% of communication is body language. So, you can't even see the person. Everyone's using English in a different way. English belongs to the world, right? So the way I speak English is different to where you speak English, Chris. And it's different to somebody the way from Beijing, Beijing speaks English, even if they're fluent. Yeah. So when you turn off this camera, you're taking away all this communication and understanding. And I always reiterate this when I'm doing any sort of training that workshops turn on your camera and the results afterwards and you go back and check on people that are like, wow. So the communication is so much better now. I have much better relationship. And the meetings are quicker. Yeah. Because you're able to see each other. Yeah. Simple things like this. Yeah. Makes good sense. All right. My last question, almost my last question, is how can people get in touch with you if they want to? So I'm on LinkedIn as, oh, I might, what am I on LinkedIn as? I'll find that. Don't worry. You'll find it. So basically, I'm on LinkedIn. I'm on threads. If you go into any social media, just at Coach Terry C. And my website is upskill.consulting. So upskill.consulting. I'm all over social media as at Coach Terry C. And on LinkedIn, I think it's just my full name. Terrence Clark basically. So everywhere you can't, you can't miss me. That's good. And then the final one, which it is on your LinkedIn profile, does a drinking straw have one or two holes? Did you not see the answer? I saw somebody said it was a stop Terry. Stop. Stop Terry. Stop. Yeah. He was, he was not sure. And somebody said to. So that's the, so the answer is I'll give you the answer now. I think do we have time? Right. So mathematically speaking, a drinking straw has one hole from a maths perspective. It comes from topology. So that studies the properties of shapes. A straw is considered topologically equivalent to a circle with depth. And a circle has one hole. But some people argue a straw has two holes one at each end because it's more intuitive. But also straws are made by extrusion. So air goes into them. So it's actually one hole here. They pump the air in its met stretched and made. So I would say one hole no matter what. I'm going to put that forward toward my daughter. She's doing a double bachelor in in the Netherlands. She's doing math and science. So something for her to figure out. Yeah. So just a fun question. I know. I know. So I put it forward as well. So maybe we can change the world with this. Who knows? All right, Terry. It's been a pleasure talking to you. Thank you for your time. It's about nine o'clock where you are. I think it's Shanghai. Yeah. Close to. Yeah. And so I'm pretty sure we'll be in touch in the future. Fantastic, Chris. And thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. And this was a really even I've got this terrible jet lag. This was a really great, really great conversation. It's like giving me some energy. So thank you so much. You're welcome. Take care. Okay, take care. Bye bye. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Culture Matters podcast on international business. We hope you enjoyed our deep dive into the world of navigating cultural differences in the workplace. If you found value in today's conversation, we'd love for you to spread the word. Share this episode with your colleagues, friends, and anyone who could benefit from a little more cultural awareness in their life. And don't forget your feedback is what keeps us going. Please take a moment to leave us a review wherever you get your podcast. It helps us reach more Our listeners like you and keeps the conversation around intercultural management growing. My name is Chris Smith and keep embracing diversity and making a difference. Until next time, that's it for this episode. Culture matters, making you understand cultural diversity better by interviewing real people with real experiences. Your host Chris Smith has a plan, a plan for people who are looking for a solution. [Music]