Expatriate Cross Cultural Program

Why are Expatriate Cross Cultural programs important? Living and Working in another country is a formidable experience but it is also comes with a vast array of challenges and difficulties.  Coping with these challenges is vital as it determines if the expatriation will succeed or fail.

Expatriate Cross Cultural programs are designed to help international assignees and their families to settle quickly and easily in a new country.  Living abroad requires the need to learn and adapt to the main cultural values of the host country.  These cultural values have an impact on how individuals in the target country live: how they behave in public, what social codes and rituals they follow and which communication styles and interactions they use.  Cross cultural values also affect key working practices such as decision-making processes, hierarchy and time.  Deciphering all these cross-cultural differences is key to avoiding cultural incidents or faux pas as an expatriate.

Communicaid’s Expatriate Cross Cultural programs will help you to have a better understanding of your host culture.  Expatriate Cross Cultural programs will provide you with relevant cross-cultural tools will help you to analyse and interpret the values and behaviors of the target country and specific strategies will allow you to adapt quickly and efficiently.  With the insights you gain from an Expatriate Cross Cultural program, you and your family will experience a great expatriation.

Benefits

A Communicaid Expatriate Cross Cultural program will provide you with:

• In-depth cultural awareness and understanding of the impact of cultural differences
• The necessary foundation and cross-cultural tools to settle in your new country
• A better understanding of the cross-cultural challenges awaiting you on your expatriation
• The opportunity to enhance cultural sensitivity and competence for a more successful expatriation
• Practical tools to reduce cross-cultural misunderstanding and encourage positive cross-cultural relationships both in a professional and personal context

Who should attend?

A Communicaid Expatriate Cross Cultural program will be of benefit to you if:

• You are leaving for an expatriation
• You are facing cross-cultural challenges and difficulties settling into a new country
• You are following your partner to another county on an expatriation
• You are planning to go and live abroad for a long or short-term expatriation
  

Course Content

All our Expatriate Cross cultural programs are designed to meet the needs of our clients depending on their specific requirements and existing skills set.  An Expatriate Cross Cultural program typically includes:

• What is cross-cultural awareness and how can it be developed?
• Cross-cultural values and attitudes and their impact on expatriations (time, space, group dynamics, authority, tasks, relationships)
• Cross-cultural communication styles
• Socializing across cultures: key do’s and don’ts
• Working across cultures: understanding the impact of culture on the workplace and developing strategies to ensure a beneficial working atmosphere
• Developing cultural awareness: increasing self-awareness and other awareness
• Language issues: accents, specific vocabulary and other factors hindering communication
• Tips and strategies for living and working as an expatriate

Approach

Expatriate Cross Cultural program are available seven days a week, 365 days a year, either at one of our training centers in London, Brussels, Paris, Frankfurt and New York or at your offices in any location worldwide.  We usually recommend a one or two day course but can also offer a more flexible format to suit your schedule.

Suitably tailored cross-cultural awareness program materials will be used throughout your Expatriate Cross Cultural program and your trainer will provide a balance of structured input and discussion of case studies and scenarios relevant to your own particular context.

The most appropriate training format, content and approach for your Expatriate Cross Cultural program will be discussed during your diagnostic consultancy.

Expatriate Cross Cultural Program Trainer

Your Expatriate Cross Cultural program trainer will be assigned to you following the results of your diagnostic consultancy.  Detailed below is a sample profile of a member of our Expatriate Cross Cultural training team.

CR – Cross Cultural Specialist

BA American Studies, Manchester
MSc Strategic Training and Development, Surrey

CR has over twenty years international management and intercultural training experience with corporate and non-profit clients in both the US and UK.  She has worked with a number of major multi nationals across a wide range of sectors including engineering, energy, finance, pharmaceutical and petrochemical industries.  Her areas of expertise include diversity training, intercultural coaching, UK and US business training and cross border communication.

After graduating, CR moved to Chicago where she lived and worked for over ten years.  She spent the first four years as Training Manager with International Orientation Resources recruiting and supervising trainers in addition to delivering training herself.  She then moved to Bennett Associates where her projects included Train-the –Trainer, cultural adaptability, cross cultural awareness for international management and intercultural training for HR.  CR’s final position in the States was as Project Manager for the Anti-Defamation League developing materials and seminars for diversity training.

On her return to the UK in 1996, CR completed her Masters and has since worked as an intercultural and global diversity consultant delivering cultural transition training, diversity seminars and intercultural training in support of European mergers and acquisitions and international HR.  CR also regularly delivers workshops and seminars for a number of professional organisations such as SIETAR and CIPD. She has delivered training for key Communicaid clients including Smith & Nephew, L’Oreal and Cadbury.