The Cultural Moonwalking Bear Strikes Again

Last Thursday we held the first session of Christine’s Unite Your Brain: How to Effectively Use Visuals in Training, Teaching & Coaching telecourse*.

At one point, Christine explained how she’s used her VisualsSpeak image set to help groups develop a strategic vision. (I was interested in this process because I’d like to use VisualsSpeak with our SIETAR-NC group this year.)

Christine explained that one of the steps in the process is to ask a group to create two group images: one that represents where they see the organization today, and another that represents where they see the organization down the road. In other words, she’s asking about the present and the future.

This is pretty much the route I’d take if I were the facilitator, and I bet if you’re from the U.S. (and probably other parts of the world) you would do.

But Christine mentioned something that I found interesting, and not at all surprising:

Not everyone approaches developing a strategic vision using a present and future framework.

Here’s a short clip (about 2 minutes) from the class, in which Christine talks about her experience using this present and future framework with cross-cultural groups:

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This is one example that shows why we need to 1) be aware of our own cultural perspectives, and 2) consider other cultural perspectives. (Always got to be on the look out for those cultural moonwalking bears!)

It also illustrates that even when we know that cultures differ, we can still find ourselves in situations where we haven’t anticipated a difference. In these situations, it’s easy to be caught off-guard by a difference or overlook it completely (which can lead to further problems down the road).

Especially if we’re working in an education or business context where everyone is speaking the same language and drawing on the same general educational or business principles and practices.

Would you use a present/future approach to strategic visioning?

Or would you use one of the approaches Christine mentioned in the clip (e.g. considering the past, telling a story based on a core value)? Or something different still? If you’ve done strategic visioning with a cross-cultural group, what kind of experience have you had? What kind of variation in approaches and preferences do you see within cultural groups?

(So many questions from a 2-minute audio clip…just imagine what’s in the other 58 minutes of the class!)

*If you’re wondering what Christine’s telecourse is all about, click here to learn more. I’ve also organized a course on marketing for interculturalists (the world needs to know what we do!) that starts on Wednesday – click here to learn more about the marketing course.

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