So how about the teams where you've worked abroad?

In your opinion, have they been kind of tuned into issues of diversity and

inclusion and making high functioning teams?

And do you think that that's a necessary part to

having high performance in these abroad teams?

>> I will answer the second question first.

I do think that it is extremely important.

And necessary to having high performing teams, peak performance teams.

I will say, having worked in Europe, working in Africa,

particularly when I was working throughout Africa, it's more of an implicit

type of a situation where the diversity is there, there's different cultures,

different languages, different dialects of different languages.

And so all of that people are aware of.

But then sometimes in those professional situations people do gravitate, just like

we do here in the United States, toward the things and the people that we know.

And so one of the things that we tried to do when we were there was,

similar to some of the things that we were able to do in China, but

it was to get to know each other's families.

For me, as an African American working in Africa, it was extremely interesting.

Because, from a tribal standpoint, from the traditions, a lot of those things I

gravitated towards simply because I had an intellectual curiosity about them.

But the fact that I had that intellectual curiosity actually made the people,

professionally and personally, open up the doors even more, right?

And then we were able to bond, create a relationship.

And then, as a senior executive level leader making decisions, and

as a foreigner, it actually helped us to be able to move forward with the projects

that we were working with.

Europe is very diverse, right?

I mean, you have different countries, you have different languages.

So when working in the UK, which is where I was working with Pearson,

you may have someone that is German, but understands the language and

the culture of other countries.

And a lot of that comes through the educational system.

It comes very early.

Many times, people actually study in those countries for the summer, so

they'll pick up French and go to France.

They want to learn Spanish, they'll go to Spain.

That actually helps from a team standpoint.

Because you start to plant those roots

extremely early into the process of working with other people.

On the continent of Africa that was a little bit different in that it is

a little bit more from a tribal standpoint, if you will.

And not in a derogatory way, but the cultures are so inherited, just so rich,

that people go back to that.

And in fact, a lot of times, people don't necessarily live in the major city.

They live still in their village and commute during the week.

So that proved to be a little bit more challenging.

Particularly as you start to work in different countries.

Tanzania, Kenya, very different as opposed to Ghana and Nigeria.

Diversity and Inclusion Issues on International Teams

Optimizing Diversity on Teams

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