Germany – understand-culture

Nicaraguans

It was many years ago. In New Jersey. I met with a close friend – Michael – who I know from our days as students at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. We don‘t see each other often, but when we do, we catch up very quickly. Michael went on to law school at Georgetown, then into the healthcare field. He is successful, has a solid marriage and four well-rounded daughters.

After our undergraduate degree I moved to Germany for a year, Michael along with eight other close friends went to Nicaragua in order to do development work organized by the Jesuits. They all took a summer-long crash course in Spanish, then moved in with Nicaraguan families in different villages.

When we met in New Jersey we discussed my work. Michael was very curious, but at the same time skeptical that cultural differences existed, or at least significant ones. I was quite surprised by his skepticism, since he had lived in a culture which was clearly different than the American. “I don‘t believe there are real differences, John. People are people.”

I threw a couple of examples out between Germans and Americans. He remained unconvinced. Perhaps the examples were too simple. We ate our sandwiches, sipped from our milkshakes, then it occurred to me that Michael is a trained attorney. I said: “Ok, let‘s take the law. Do you think that how conflicts are fundamentally resolved are the same in Germany and in the U.S.?” He was sure about the answer to that question. The law is the law, right?

Testing his patience, I went into some detail focusing on hearings. “Do you think when a team lead in a company resolves a conflict between team members that the German and the American team lead respectively will take the same approach?” A no-brainer for Michael: “Certainly.”

I went on to explain that Germans have a very strong tendancy to avoid an open hearing with the two conflict parties. Argument vs. counter-argument in front of next level management would only heighten the tension, making a resolution that much more complicated. Instead, the conflict resolver in the German cultural context is far more likely to interview each party separately and on a one-on-one basis.

“Americans, on the other hand”, I continued, “expect a fair hearing. The conflict resolution actually starts off when the conflict parties, in the presence of each other, make their case before the team lead, who, in the American business context, sees her-/himself as the judge.” Self-defense is only possible, if one knows what they are being accused of.

Michael had listened very carefully, raised his eyebrows, didn‘t respond at first, instead looked at me and reflected. Then he said: “I didn‘t know that about the Germans.” No, how could he? He had spent his entire life, with the exception of one year in Nicaragua, in the U.S. And he had studied law in the U.S.

Michael is a close friend. An intelligent, self-critical, reflective person. I‘ve known him for more than thirty years. And he had lived in a culture much different than the American. How could his operating assumption be that there are few, if any, significant cultural differences between Germany and the the U.S.? I encounter this time and again, and it always surprises me.

Knead the dough this way

I’ve never had any kind of formal professional experience with or training in processes. I studied the liberals arts. History was my major. I’m non-technical. I can barely chang a lightbulb.

When my son, Daniel, was a young I dreaded the Christmas gifts we gave to him, the toys which needed to be put together, and then explained. At one Christmas I mentioned this to my mother. She laughed and said that my father was the same. I felt relief. I’m not as bad a father as I had feared. For my father was very capable man, more capable than I will ever be. And that’s ok.

The technical world never quite caught my interest. The natural world, though. Gazing at the stars during a warm, clear summer night in suburban Philadelphia in the 1970s. Climbing trees. Jumping in and out of streams. Running with the wind. Racing on paths through the woods on my bike. Jumping waves during the summer at the Jersey Shore. Smelling and feeling the freshly cut grass on the football field, as a twelve year old, on a Saturday morning during the last days of Indian Summer.

It’s all still very much in me. Yet, little to no interest in how it all came to be, how it works, how it continues to develop. Even though it is our world. We live in it. Technik – the technical world – what man creates, is of even less interest to me.

Processes are mission critical in the technical world. When large numbers of people are involved, when the work is complex in nature, when many steps need to be taken to get the job done, coordination is essential. Well thought through processes guaranty uniformity, quality, efficiency. That is the logic, at least.

It wasn’t until I began supporting Americans and Germans with their integration that I began thinking about processes. For who in their everyday lives invests time in thinking about how they do what they do in concrete steps?

Usually we focus on the results, the outcomes, of what we do. We think more about people, our interactions, our conflicts, than about work steps. It’s people who make our lives either easier or more difficult. So we think.

The less mechanical-mechanistic an activity is, the less process-driven (or -influenced) it is. People don’t behave like machines, not like objects. People have been neither created nor programmed by people.

In many of my management seminars I ask the German and American participants which factors are critical to the success of their companies. I can see them now in my mind’s eye. In breakout groups with their flipcharts. The Germans in one corner of the room, the Americans in the other.

It’s early Spring. We’re in a small town southwest of Nuremberg. A lovely little village with a stream running through it. Or seminar location no more than 100 meters from the town square. Everywhere evidences of German history, of the Middle Ages. I’m in my element.

Americans and Germans of today, working together, hoping to combine their inherent strengths as two cultures, in order to succeed. My job is limited, but focussed and not unimportant: to support them in their dialogue. To initiate, nudge, even jolt that dialogue. To formulate the questions. Questions which guide, steer, lead us in our imagination.

I walk over to the Germans. As always they’re deep in discussion. Deep dive. The way the Germans are. Success Factor #1 People. #2 Processes. Then innovation, quality, financial stability, etc.

And the Americans? “Processes” are nowhere to be seen on their flipcharts. Not mentioned. In other words, process is not a success factor. Instead they’ve written down: leadership, market knowledge, customer relationship management, speed, financial engineering, flexibility, product portfolio.

These folks – Germans and Americans – clearly differ. In fact, greatly differ. And, I believe that Germans cite people as the top success factor for reasons of political correctness.

I suspect that if it were acceptable in German society – and in German labor law – they would not put people ahead of processes but the other way around. That sounds rather harsh. The German economy is, however, technical. They produce physical products. Mechanical engineering. The Germans build machines. Machines which other companies use in order to make products for end users.

So often I hear it in their discussions. I listen in. Germans and processes. Concrete. Focused. Penetrating. Discussing time and again the how. They don’t focus on the results but moreso on what needs to be done in order to reach those results. It’s all about how they apply their craftsmanship.

It’s winter. Christmas-time. I’m at one of the German Middle Ages Christmas markets. The guilds have their stands: smith, tanner, potterer, candle-maker, baker. They’re family names, too. Smith. Tanner. Potter. Baker. Shoemaker. Nomen est omen. Name is omen.

They are what they do. What they do is who they are. I and the other visitors stand there transfixed. It’s cold, windy, raw. The guildsfolk are dressed up as they would have been back then, centuries ago. They speak an antiquated German. Thou instead of you. Seeth instead of see. The stalls of the craftsmen are warm, however, due either to their fires or the psychological sense of security their craft gives them, and us.

The work, their craft, our work gives us stability, security, a job to do, a place to be. Like the others, I look with fascination at the face and the hands of the craftsman. The simplicity. Calm. Almost reflective. To be one with one’s work. A deeper calm. A part of, at one, with the world. An integral part. Geborgen: safe, secure, sheltered.

The eyes and hands of the crafstman, the Meister, perfectly coordinated, in agreement. The steps of the process centuries-old: tested, improved, tested, improved, taught, learned, tested, improved. It becomes a part of a people’s flesh and blood. Becomes a part of their seeing, sensing, doing.

„If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right“, my mother would say time and again. Maybe the many unsoliticed pieces of advice the Germans have given me over the years were not that bad after all. Maybe they’re not the chronic know-it-alls, we Americans think they are. Maybe that’s just being German.

Don’t hold the hammer like that way, but like this. That’s not the way you knead the dough, but like this. Work the leather like this to make it smoother. Success in Germany means to do things in a certain way, and not in another way. All this so that the customer says: “Yes, that’s the way it should be done. That’s the right way to do it.”

Like in the Middle Ages

Who has the say about processes is often a bloody battle. It’s about power. Central functions groups go to battle against each other. The also go into battle with and against line management.

Nabelschau. Navel-gazing. It’s a German tendancy, often more than just a tendancy. Instead of concentrating on winning the battle in the market, against the external competition, Germans invest a great amount of time in debating and defining which box goes where on the organizational chart, as well as who owns the box, who is put in the box. Org charts and processes are the battlefield – one of them – where Germans fight their fights. It can distract them from their work.

2000. A German DAX30 company with a critical presence in the U.S. I was interviewing a high-level American manager. He had done a three-year delegation in Germany, spoke some German, was clearly an intelligent and reflective person. He said:

“The Germans are constantly fighting internal turf wars, like battles for territory. It’s like in the Middle Ages. The one person sits high up in his castle and looks into the distance at the lands possessed by his neighbor in the next castle, scheming about how he can take some of his land. And the other guy in his castle? He’s thinking the same thing.”

And it often really is so in German companies. Prestige, influence and power are directly linked to – based on – size. Compensation, too, is typically based on the size of one’s organization. Literally, how many people you have “under you.” So the wars for power are fought over size, structure and processes. How the work is done.

Durability. Continuity. Taxis.

Durable products are those which last a long time. They have longevity. If improved continually they survive in the market. They develop continuity. For Germans continuity is a sign of quality, reliability, durability, in sum excellence.

German advertising, regardless of the form, stresses that continuity. Automobile manufacturers present their newest models as the natural (logical) extension of their predecessors (Vorgänger), the improved version. Rarely do they take leaps of fancy, diverging from what has been. The same goes for many other products, whether household appliances, machine tools, or business-to-business products and systems.

And this thinking is found in German companies, in how they present themselves.

“You can rely on this product.”

Especially the famed German Mittelstand (small- and medium-sized companies) stress time and again with pride that they are an inhabergeführtes (literally owner-run) Familienunternehmen (family company). Invariably this statement is followed by the company‘s year of foundation – gegründet 1905 (founded). On many company websites you can read a chronology of the company (family) history.

The message is clear: you can rely on our product, and rely on us, because we have been working on it for decades, some companies many decades, constantly improving it, incrementally and in a very focused way.

Long-lasting (durability) is a value in and of itself. It signals experience, stamina, focus, survival. Not sentimentality, but real value in dollars and cents, or in Euros and Euro cents. The German logic says that it pays to invest in a long-lasting product, even if the upfront investment is higher than in a less durable product.

Quality and durability

I still take notice of the fact that most taxis in Germany are Mercedes Benz, followed by VW and some Japanese models. Mercedes Benz, top of the line. Every now and then I ask the driver: „Your fares are reasonable. Perhaps a bit higher than in the U.S., but not significantly so. How can you earn a profit if you have to finance this expensive car?“

The answer is always the same: quality and durability of the automobile in general, and of the engine in particular. „I can put well over a couple of hundred thousand kilometers on it, keep my repair costs low, and it still has resale value.“ In dozens of German cities over more than two decades, that is the answer I get each and every time.

Its evident also in how they define competence. Germans tend to work in the same discipline over a long period of time, whether it is engineering, supply chain, manufacturing, or a central functions such as personnel or legal. They believe in developing depth and breadth of expertise, in maintaining continuity in approach.

Continuity and incremental improvement

The Germans as a people seek permanence. Quite literally. They move far less frequently than Americans, for example. They are rooted, strive to maintain those roots, to deepen them, are often resistant to change. They are aware of how mobile American society is, often marvel at it, recognize the advantage of having a high degree of flexibility, but seldom would choose it for themselves. They would not want it for themselves or for Germany.

Continuity. Constant incremental improvement. A focus on the long-term. These are deep-seated German beliefs, therefore characteristics of German products. Can it be any other way? Can the products which a national culture produces be, in their core characteristics, different than the culture itself, the people? German products are German.

Skype call

Das, was möglich ist, streben wir an.“ Literally: That which is possible we strive for. In a deeper sense: We always strive for the optimum.

„So gut wie möglich, nicht so gut wie nötig.“ Literally: As good as possible, not as good as necessary. In a deeper sense: As good as humanly possible or as good as we can possibly to do it, and never only as good as it needs to be, or not just as good as the customer has ordered it.

I look at my talking points on the topic of product philosophy. German logic: Products have intrinsic functionality. The optimal is oriented (aimed, pointed at) the ideal. American logic: For the buyer, the optimal is the product which offers the best value; for the seller, the optimal is the product which is most profitable. Two different worlds, is my impression. Germans and the ideal. Americans and the transaction.

Technical miracles. Practically no cost.

I think of Skype calls from my computer. On the computer screen I see my mother in suburban Philadelphia, far away from Bonn, Germany. What a technical miracle. In my early years in Germany, 1988 in then West Berlin, we would talk once a month by phone. A collect call via the German telepone operator. Today, any time during our overlapping waking hours from my computer or smartphone, as long as I have access to the web. And at practically no cost.

I see my mother‘s face on the screen. The camera on my laptop is above, at the top. But I can‘t look at her and into the camera at the same time. We can‘t look each other in the eyes. I move my eyes up and down, to look into her eyes, and to allow her to look into mine. Both at the same time is not possible, however. It‘s either or.

That‘s my image for how I believe Germans see the customers. Germans who serve customers, who have customers in the forefront of their minds. Germans in R&D, in product development, in sales or marketing, or Germans in services, or those responsible for strategy.

Germans want to serve the customer.

Yes, they are looking at and listening to the customer. On the screen. Just about fully focused. Taking in, understanding, preparing themselves to respond to the customer‘s needs, problems, wishes, challenges. But they – the Germans – also look time and again upwards, above, beyond, I think towards the ideal.

In other words, they listen not exclusively to the customer, but also, in addition to, the customer, above and beyond, towards the ideal. Yes, Germans want to serve the customer. And the strength of the their economy is proof that the German people knows how to listen to, understand and serve customers.

But they aim higher, strive for further, confident that doing so will guaranty that their customer‘s needs will be satisfied, almost as a byproduct, automatically. In fact, I have always sensed that Germans serving their customers, their markets, resist limiting what they can do by mere customer requirements. They are constantly alternating between looking at the person on the computer screen during the skype talk – as a metaphor – and looking into the camera, above the screen so to speak, and searching for the ideal.

American engineers as problem-solves and businesspeople

And yes, there is the danger that in doing so they do not fully listen to the customer, that their response to the customer is not exactly what the customer wanted or expected, that the customer feels not listened to, not understood, not served. And yes, there is the danger that they over-serve their customers, providing more that was requested or needed, or what the customer is willing to pay for.

And the American approach? Different. Not totally so, but often in a nuanced way. Americans, too, are capable and willing to aim for the ideal, to look beyond the customer. At the same time they feel more comfortable with staying focused on looking at the screen, listening very carefully to how the customer defines their needs and wants, to allowing the customer to define what the ideal is.

Whereas the German is engineer is part inventor and part artist – at it is the German engineer who is at the heart of German products – the American engineer is part pragmatic problem-solver and part businessperson (even salesperson). This difference is true not only for the engineers on both sides of the Atlantic, but for both cultures in general.

Go beyond what I was requesting

Americans fear that their German colleagues don‘t fully focus on the customer. Their German colleagues, in turn, fear that the Americans focus only on the customer. It becomes more complex, and difficult to reconcile and manage, depending on from which business culture the customer comes, whether Germany, the U.S. or another.

Recently I recognized that my website needed to be modified. I identified those changes through input from users and from a few trusted advisors. I then defined them in terms of scope, budget and schedule. In each of my talks with web agencies here in Bonn the tendancy was strong to go beyond what I was requesting, what I needed. The Germans, all very capable, wanted to go deeper, broader, more systematically. I had to slow them down, remind them of the defined limits.

Perhaps they wanted to convince me to give them a bigger mandate, a bigger contract. Perhaps, but not necessarily. More likely, they were looking beyond me on the computer screen, in the skype call, figuratively speaking. Each time I had to pull them back.

„That‘s too much for now. It exceeds scope and budget, and will take too long.“ But, maybe they‘re right. They‘re the experts. It is I who need them, as much as they need me.

Over-Engineering

Denk mit. Think with. From the German verb mitdenken. Germans expect this of team members. They expect it, also, of the products they develop.

A friend describes the technology built into his new high end German sedan. He was in a rush. Found a parking spot. Hopped out. Grabbed a few things out of the trunk. Walked a few steps and the trunk popped back open. He goes back and reshuts the trunk. A few more steps and it pops open again. Strange. He moves some things around in the trunk only to discover that he had left his car keys in the trunk the first time. Mitdenken. Nice.

Another friend flies over to Germany. A German colleague picks him up at Frankfurt Airport. They hop in a rental car. Another high end German sedan. A couple of turns and they’re on the autobahn. His colleague looks over at him with a grin on his face then presses the gas pedal to the floor. Soon they’re up to 180 km per hour, over 100 mph.

Mitdenken. About maintain control.

Traffic is only mildly heavy, but they’re quickly approaching a truck. In fact, they’re right in line to ram the truck from behind. The still-grinning German colleague keeps “the pedal to the metal.” My friend in the passenger seat – at this point pale in the face, sporting a few new gray hairs, and clutching tightly to his seat belt – mentions nervously, that the truck seems to be coming closer. Grin. The powerful German luxury sedan comes within a certain, safe distance of the truck, but no closer, even though the gas pedal remains all the way down. Mitdenken. A little scary.

Then there is the highly sophisticated German control system which makes manned monitoring of the most sensitive, and dangerous, parts of a complex manufacturing site no longer necessary. “The controls system will do the work better than people.” Although understood, trusted and implemented in Germany, the Americans feel wary of handing over final decisions and judgement to a machine. It reminded them of the computer-driven, automated trading systems once used on Wall Street which had led to some rather irrational market fluctuations. Mitdenken. More than a little scary.

Americans like intelligent products. Intelligent means keeping the user in control while making everything easier, faster, less expensive. Over-engineering is technology with questionable added value. It is technology which goes beyond the needs and desires of the customer. It is technology which is often not robust.

“It takes all kinds of people“

The topic is process, or process philosophy. What role does time play? Do Germans and Americans have the same understanding of long- , mid- and short-term? A rhetorical question. No need to think long about it. The differences are obvious in so many areas.

Wasn‘t it Herr Wiedeking, the Vorstandsvorsitzender (not CEO) of Porsche, a few years back who suprised the financial world by stating that Porsche would supply their numbers just twice a year, making a clear statement about short-term thinking?

Aren‘t the two cultures of different ages in general? Back when the so-called Indians (the indigenous peoples of North America) were saving the first generations of European settlers to the „New World“ from starvation the Germans had a centuries-old history.

The speed in the U.S. is faster

In a previous story we discuss the older, deeper-seated German historical consiousness. The Germans think in longer time stretches than Americans, which can be both a strength and a weakness. The terms Permanenz and permanence have different meanings. Think about how often Americans pick up and move within the U.S., buy and sell houses. How often they identify, evaluate and engage business partners such as suppliers, only to disengage them just as quickly.

The speed at which Americans make acquaintenances and friends (meet, get to know, befriend) is much faster than in Germany. Or think of the financial world again. To make an investment, then hold or sell is not the same as in the U.S. The clocks aren‘t the same. Long-term in the U.S. is mid-term in Germany. Mid- is short-term. American short-term doesn‘t even exist in Germany.

In the American business culture it is almost always better to make a suboptimal decision quickly than to make an optimal decision late or too late. Suboptimal, but timely, decisions can be corrected or improved upon in time. Usually.

Combine inherent strengths

Not long ago I was executing a seminar at a location in Germany for a German client. It was in the Lichthof (atrium) of a beautiful building erected at the turn of the 18th to the 19th century. Big, open space. Very high ceiling made of glass. Sunlight shining in. Inspiring. During the session on decision making a German manager was walking by, one who had done a long-term (three years) in the U.S.

He stopped, listened, saw the sceptical expressions on faces of his German colleagues and walked over and stood next to me (we had worked together on a few projects), then said to the group: „It‘s really not that complicated. The Americans make decisions quickly, often too quickly. So what? The bad decisions they revise just as quickly. That doesn‘t bother anyone in the least. It‘s nothing to be embarrassed about. We should be able to do that, too.“ Some nodded in agreement. Others just shook their heads in dismay.

My goal is not to make Americans out of Germans or the other way around. It wouldn‘t work anyway. And it would be rather dumb. The world needs Germans, their way of thinking, their character traits. The world also needs Americans, their ways of thinking and their character traits. Our goal is to understand the inherent strengths of the two peoples, in order to combine them.

The first step is, however, to identify and understand them, in each of their respective national cultural contexts. Perhaps there is a step even prior to that: to accept the fact that there are such things as national cultural characteristics (yes, traits). German, American, French, Mexican, Chinese, Brasilian and so on and so forth.

Just as there are in Bavarians, Franks, Rhinelanders, as well as Hamburgers, Brandenburgers, Saxons and Anhaltiner. And let‘s not forget the Berliners with their Berliner Schnautze. As my mother would say: „It takes all kinds of people to make the world go around“.

“Decision Making Philosophy“?

Is it even possible to translate into English the German word Entscheidungsverständnis? Decision making philosophy, is what most Americans would say. But, that’s puffy, cloudy. Americans us the term ‘philosophy’ often to mean ‘way of thinking’.

Literal, and more exact, would be ‘understanding of the decision to be made’, from Entscheidung, decision + verständnis, understanding of. The verbs are entscheiden, to decide, and verstehen, to understand. Only very few Americans, however, would use that kind of formulation, ‘understanding of the decision to be made’.

In any case, the American colleagues in the breakout (group work in a management seminar) did not ask themselves about their Entscheidungsverständnis. Instead, they rather quickly defined what kind of used car they were looking for (the question posed to them in the exercise). There were three, perhaps four key factors. That was enough. They moved on immediately to the next assignment in the exercise.

Germans believe that the best path to an optimal decision is first of all to nicht vom Zaun brechen, which is translated literally into “not break out or through the fence”, meaning to think first, then decide, then act. To reflect. Because decisions mean change, they are inherently involve risk. A good Entscheidungsverständnis minimizes risk. It should not be a surprise, therefore, that Americans often give Germans the impression that they tend to move forward too aggressively, impetuously, forcefully.

Americans can come across as not having understood, much less thought through, the complexity of the situation. Especially when it comes to decisions which have far-reaching consequences, the aggressive, impetuous and forceful American approach unsettles their German colleagues. They fear that the Americans are actions are naive, even irresponsible.

Mit dem Kopf durch die Wand – literally with the head through the wall, or forcing things – is how Germans can see Americans. Objectively this is the case quite often. Subjectively certainly very often. The Americans in the breakout group write their flip-charts quickly, but just as quickly tear them down and rewrite or toss them into the corner. Americans like to decide and move fast, change situations and create new ones. They take the initiative in order to ‘stay ahead of the power curve’, to ‘set the agenda’.

Difficult, complex and controversial events

But, is this unfamiliar to the Germans? Haven’t they had their own experiences with the advantages and disadvantages of such national cultural character traits? The German people has a highly developed historical consciousness. Many of their experiences as a people were painful, have made a deep impression on them.

When the Germans raise their Zeigefinger, their index finger pointing out something important (yes, often in a know-it-all way) it is in most cases because they do know better (at least for themselves, from their perspective). At a minimum they see a situation which they have experienced themselves. And as Germans they are seldom reluctant to point out these (their) lessons to other people.

I had hardly gotten into a conversation with a good German friend of mine. We were talking about everyday topics, nothing terribly deep. A friend of his joined us, a journalist, a women he had known for many years. She – let’s call her Beate – switched the topics of the conversation to politics, her area of focus. Wasting no time she brought up the most difficult, complex and controversial events. Back then I was a member of the professional staff of the Christian Democrats in the Bundestag, the majority party under then-Chancellor Helmut Kohl. Beate had returned from Southern Africa just a few months before. I had not known her or of her. In the years after that conversation I would see her in television, hear her on the radio, read her articles in newspapers. Very intelligent. Very well-informed. Very active mind.

I was tired. It had been a long week. The initial topics of my chat with my friend were light, casual, pleasant. Beate wanted, however, to get serious. She started off describing the monumental mistakes the Clinton administration had made in Somalia. With her experience in Africa, and in Somalia, it was clear that the American approach would be a total failure.

I tried to steer the conversation back to the lighter topics. Beate just could not let go, however. Puffing away at her cigarettes I was engulfed in smoke and getting dizzy. She fired question after question at me about American foreign policy. Time and again I sent signals communicating: “Please, not now, another day. We don’t even know each other. Do I have to answer personally for my country’s actions abroad?” Beate made everything so complex. She was giving me a headache. It was a very unpleasant evening.

A factory in the Eastern part of Westphalia

I think of my fellow American, the soldier, dead and dragged by a rope naked through the streets of Mogadischu, his body mocked, derided and spat upon by the population. I think of his parents, his siblings and friends, especially of his mother. I think no less sadly of the man (the picture of him) in the second Iraq War, a father carrying on each should the bodies of his dead boys, each around five years old. We see him from behind.

Those little boys can’t move, they won’t ever move. I imagine their father’s heart as he heaves his boys on his shoulders, his heart as he lays them in simple wooden boxes, then lowers those boxes into the earth, his heart when he then goes home. He’ll never hear their voices again. My son, Daniel, was nine years old back then. Evenings, after dinner, he climbs up on my back. Piggyback we call it in English. I carry him up the stairs. Abendroutine, evening routine. Pajamas. Brush teeth. Wash face. Hop in bed. I read to him. Abendroutine here in Bonn, Germany. A German boy with an American father. Safe, secure, happy and healthy.

I see in my mind’s eye a factory somewhere in the Eastern part of Westphalia. The niece of my German wife’s grandfather. He was from Herford, not far from Hanover, a pilot in the Luftwaffe. Early in the Second World War in France, a part of the occupation forces. Then in the East, fighting the Russians. Prisoner of war. He returned to Germany in 1949, a broken man. My wife’s grandmother said of her husband that he had believed in German victory up until the very end.

She told the story only once of his niece. She must have worked in an armaments factory. I never asked. Tears worked their way carefully down her cheeks as she talked, her eyes fixed on a far-off point. Allied bombing one day. Direct hits. The mother of the young woman, the sister-in-law of my German wife’s grandmother, ran to the factory. Everything destroyed. She found her daughter. Her tender, youthful body ripped open by a steal beam.

Yes, it was a very unpleasant evening with Beate, but primarily because we’re far more different than we realize. In fact she is a very nice, intelligent, hard-working German journalist, who, like all of us, would like the world to be different, better. A woman who adopted a young African girl and is raising her alone. Beate is a fighter for the right cause. And there are others, like the late Peter Scholl-Latour, who in the months leading up the Second Iraq War was in the German media doing his best to warn of its risks: explaining, seeking, describing, questioning. Out of concern.

Long, detailed discussions about decision-making

Scholl-Latour was a prolific journalist and author about the Middle East. His early years, however, were spent first fighting in the Indochina (Vietnam) war, then covering it as a journalist when the U.S. had entered it in a serious way. Not a know-it-all but a concerned German, whose fears were based on experience and knowledge. One who is trying to say to his friends (to Americans): “Dear Friend, don’t do it. Think about what you learned forty years ago. Don’t repeat that mistake, please.”

To be called naive in the German context is very serious. It means a significant deficit in intelligence. It means not being in touch with reality. Naivité in the U.S. context, however, can be interpreted as positive. Young. Fresh. Optimistic. Full of initiative. Ready to learn. Willing to make decisions. Amerikaner sind wie große Kinder. Americans are like big children. How often I’ve heard this in my years in Germany. I understand how and why Germans make such a statement.

Inward oriented

The intense German focus on processes unsettles Americans time and again. It limits, cramps their flexibility. In the U.S. processes are seldom viewed as an effective alternative to agility, speed, creativity. Americans believe that the core skills of good management cannot be forced into processes, cannot be performed by processes. For them processes are tools which offer support.

In my early years here in Germany as an American I was put on the defensive when asked about my processes, my approach, how I do my work. Or at least I felt defensive, perhaps because I was not prepared to respond.

Then I went into the opposite direction. When asked about my work and its value for my customers, I would go into great detail about how I do the work, my thought and work processes, and spend too little time explaining the value of it all.

Intensity bangs into bafflement

My first website did little more than simply show my four-step process, in the sense of: „Do you want to know who I am, what I do, what value it could have for you and your company? Just take a look at my methodology.“ As you can imagine, the site did not attract much attention.

Well, you can also imagine what happens when Germans and Americans come together to discuss internal work processes. Intensity bangs into bafflement. Precise questions get imprecise answers. Impatience meets impatience. Each side shaking their heads about the other.

We Americans see long, detailed discussions about processes as a form of German navel-gazing. It‘s all well and good to do some thinking about the how, every now and then, but not too often, and certainly not for too long. The more you spend analyzing internal things, the more quickly you distance yourself from external things, such as the market, customers and their needs, from reality.

Proud but not arrogant

It was a discussion I had with Egon in the summer of 1991. In Bonn. He was married to a classmate of my German wife. Very intelligent guy. Mathematician in the Max Planck Institute. Friendly, courteous, sensitive, analytical. His wife, a linguist, outgoing, lively, funny.

Our conversations were always fascinating. Serious topics. Intellectual substance. We were eating in an Italian restaurant. A warm day with a lovely breeze wafting up from the Rhine River. The windows of the restaurant wide open. The long, black container boats on the Rhine, but also the private boats darting about, all waving their large German flags, black red gold. Germany had become reunited in October the year before. For a brief moment the Germans felt they could show feel, and show, patriotism.

Poets and thinkers

In the summer, especially in the early hours when the sun shines, Bonn has an almost Mediterranean flair. The air is clear, fresh, sweet. The water‘s surface reflects the rays of the sun in a soft, inviting way. If you look across the Rhine into the distance, starting to the North, then pan to the East, then South, you can see the transition from the Lower Rhine (flatland) to the Middle Rhine, to the Seven Mountains, pointing to the south, where the Rhine snakes to and through the towns of Koblenz, Mainz, into the Palatinate, on to Northern Baden, where the river becomes the border between Germany and France.

We discussed German history. I should have noted down what Egon had said. Only some of the details can I recall. But his thesis seemed more than plausible. Time and again over the years the conversation came back to me.

The Germans, Egon said, were in their history always a bit boxed in, geographically, and politically. They turned inward. The land of Dichter und Denker, of poets and thinkers. A land of people who reflect. Whereas the British, French, Dutch, Spanish and the Portugese looked, and went, outward.

They are Seevölker, literally sea peoples, maritime nations. They had overseas colonies, traded across the oceans, became naval powers. Many of their finest, the most talented, looked outward, went out, chased adventure and ventures outside of their countries. In Germany, the best looked inward, worked inward, stayed within.

German logic, very confusing

So many people on the German side. Especially in central functions. Who have so much time on their hands. Producing so many powerpoint presentations. Conduct so many long-winded discussions. Going into such great detail.

The Americans call them bureaucrats, who create processes, in order to justify their jobs in the company. “Make work.” German bureaucracy is there, say Americans, “to feed the village.”

Germans and Americans come together to discuss their collaboration, including to discuss their processes. They don’t know each other, are wary of each other, want to defend and protect their work, how they work, demonstrate that their processes are effective.

In many cases – perhaps most – people are convinced that their processes are good, and that they live them. But many Americans have a cliché-view of the Germans. They strike the table with their fist and say: „We will do it this way and not that way!“ And German behavior can at times appear to support that cliché.

The truth is, German colleagues are also convinced that their approaches work. And why not? Unfortunately, many of them are not proficient enough in English, and they, too, are unsure of themselves, perhaps feel the need to force their point across, strongly, vehemently. I don’t have a problem with that. But, many Americans do: „totally inflexible Germans with their inflexible German processes.“

In addition to these tensions you have the fact that Germans tend not to document their processes. Often they refuse to do so. When they do document, however, the formulation is usually general, with little detail.

Why? For one, the written word in the German culture has a high degree of binding character. Germans are very reluctant to tie their hands via detailed processes and procedures which then obligate them to do their work in specific ways. Another reason is that many Germans don’t want to share their knowhow. They don’t want it to be transferrable.

This is not so much about “information is power”, but far more about job-security. And then, of course, they see very little value in taking the time to carefully and clearly write things down. Their thinking is: Institutional knowledge is there. Folks know what they are supposed to do, when, how and why.

And, Germans develop competences differently than Americans. First learn, then do. They work in specific areas for a longer period of time, developing deep-dive knowledge and experience. And they get a sense for the what other departments close to theirs do.

Depth and breadth. Continuity and consistency. Kaminaufstieg – move up within the smokestack or the silo – is the term they use. They build expertise, become experts. And experts, Germans would say, don’t need document how the work is done. They have it in their heads.

Documented or not documented, either way it remains a mystery to Americans when Germans “stick to the letter of the law” (process discipline) and when they permit themselves to ignore the process (process deviation).

On the one side stubborn, dogmatic Germans and their inflexible processes. On the other, little to no process documentation, and doing things they way they simply want to. And when they do deviate from the process they may not even bother informing their boss. Very confusing.