Americans teams maintain short lines of communication. Informal feedback is given constantly and in both directions. Team lead and individual members want to know at any given time „where they stand.“
figures of speech
Fauler Kompromiss
Fauler Kompromiss. False or rotten compromise. Germans believe that there can be no lasting resolution unless the parties compromise. This is the case in coalition governments, in negotiations between employers and labor, in person relationships.
Often, however, the media and the public speculate whether certain resolutions to a conflict were true compromises or faul, fake or rotten. They wonder if one party got the better of the other and that an imbalance is being covered up.
No Agreement
Germans seldom reach agreement when the demands of the conflict parties are in stark opposition to each other and the negotiations have become confrontational. An agreement is made when both parties take a cooperative approach. One-sided demands work against that.
If one party to the conflict is clearly stronger than the other and attempts to take advantage of the weaker party, the German conflict resolution approach will try to compensate for the imbalance.
Etwas vom Tisch fegen. Literally to brush something off of the table; to ignore something; to treat someone or something as unimportant, irrelevant; to push to the side; to conceal.
Easy, intuitive
Every B2C consumer, every B2B client, in every business culture, prefers products and solutions which are easy to use, user-friendly, intuitive. The term used in the past was „fool proof“, meaning even a person of low intelligence can use it. „Fool“ is a mean-spirited term which, thankfully, is rarely used.
But, what do Americans mean by „easy to use, user-friendly, intuitive“? Is it the same in all business cultures? How easy should „easy“ be? Intuitive for what level of intelligence?
Americans value, admire, and most tellingly honor with their money, products which are both sophisticated and user-friendly. In general, they consider it to be a high art form to make the complex simple. See Apple products.
America has many different types of people, backgrounds, mentalities, levels of education and sophistication. Also the largest single market. For products to be successful they have to be easy to use, user-friendly, intuitive.
The American product philosophy: ease of use. The American approach to persuasion: break down complexity into its component parts. Decision making: isolate individual decisions, focus on the essential. This is a pattern.
“The same product forever?”
Americans rarely want to own a product for an extended period of time. Most are updated, changed, modified on a regular basis, giving them a kind of newness. These include: computers, electronicc, automobiles, and clothing styles.
Even houses are torn down so that new ones can be built in their place. To the extent that a person views themself as a product, some even alter their own physical appearance via cosmetic surgery: lift, tuck, tighten, remove, add.
Americans simply don‘t want to own, use or be seen with the same product for all too long. They want what is new, better, the „next best thing“, whether it is truly better or not.
Think of mobility in the U.S. Large percentages of Americans in a given year move from one place to another. Job mobility has always been a part of the American economy, now more than ever involuntarily.
Americans own cars for shorter amount of years than in most Western cultures. Fashion cycles are short, the trends are frequent. America is the land of fads, crazes, rages. It‘s a very large and diverse market, culture. It is a consume and consumer oriented economy.
Durable is important to Americans, but for a shorter period of time.
The wound a word opens
“A broken bone can heal, but the wound a word opens can fester forever.” Jessamyn West – librarian and blogger.
“It is typical of women to fester and ferment over disappointments, slights, annoyances, angers, etc.” Laura Schlessinger – American author on relationships.
“Too often, a problem is allowed to fester until it reaches a crisis point, and the American people are left asking the question: what went wrong and why?” Darrell Issa, Member of the U.S. Congress.
Definition of processes
Ein Prozess ist ein Satz von in Wechselbeziehung oder Wechselwirkung stehenden Tätigkeiten, der Eingaben in Ergebnisse umwandelt. A process is a set of activities which are interrelated, interdependent, influence each other mutually, and turn inputs into results.
The Bavarian Ministry for Commerce defines a process as: „The sequence of all activities which are linked with each other and convert inputs – based on customer requirements, legal boundary conditions, market demands – into a desired outcome.“
Simply put, a process is a set of work steps, which are sequenced logically, that have a beginning and lead to a specific desired outcome.
„New and improved!“
New and improved! Personal care products seldom change dramatically from year to year in the way that a car manufacturer might add new features or modify the design. Companies redesign the packaging or make some small adjustment and rebrand the product as „new and improved!“ This plays to the American belief that new is inherently good, tapping into the cult of youth, that new equates young with fresh and desirable.
Some products celebrated for their durability are more resistant to rapid change than things like electronics or cars. American-made tools are generally designed to be strong and durable since replacement is expensive and breaking a tool is inconvenient. Durability in the long-lasting, rugged sense is the more desirable quality.
Although old buildings are torn down and replaced with new construction, American building codes specify much more stringent standards than in other parts of the world. What results is high quality – albeit expensive – buildings that endure. Like in many European cities, American historic districts showcase the place’s commitment to the durability of its construction products.
Navel-gazing
Useless or excessive self-contemplation; self-absorption, self-centeredness, self-concern, self-interest, self-involvement, self-preoccupation, self-regard. Navel-gazing.
Too much self. Too little other. Self being the process, how the work is done. Other being those who should benefit from the work to be done, the output, the product or service.
The deeper Germans discuss and debate how the work is done – process – the more their American colleagues fear a turn from the outward to the inward. The link is lost between process (how the work is done) and the results.
Americans often have the sense that their German counterparts believe that process can solve any problem, address any challenge, even those which do not lend themselves to process. Leadership. Decision making. Business relationships. Process works with the measurable, the quantifiable, but less so to the immeasurable, the unquantifiable.
For Americans, process is a tool. Apply where applicable.
Try anything once
The idea that people should try everything once is deeply ingrained in American thinking. In fact, Americans are so hesitant to choose a definite course of action without trying all of the alternatives, that Winston Churchill once said “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing – after they’ve tried everything else.”
Many famous Americans possessed of a try everything once spirit. American actress Mae West once said “I’ll try anything once, twice if I like it, three times to make sure.” In 1920, G.B. Manly offered to take American humorist Will Rogers on an airplane ride. After the ride, Rogers remarked: “Try anything once. Try some things oftener. When you goin’ again?”
American President Franklin D. Roosevelt also had the willingness to try anything – something which is now said to have greatly attributed to his ability to help America out of the Great Depression. FDR’s wife Eleanor once commented about him that “He recognized the difficulties and often said that, while he did not know the answer, he was completely confident that there was an answer and that one had to try until one either found it for himself or got it from someone else.”
Americans take a similar viewpoint towards products. They don’t want something that will last forever, but just long enough for them to try it, and see how it compares to other products that they’ve used. Then they want to move on to try another product.