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Module 5: Cultural Awareness |
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assist GmbH, Simona Fabellini |
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Enhancing your consciousness about your own cultural values, norms, attitudes and forms of behaviour helps developing an awareness also for the differences between cultures. Starting from the question about what Culture is, you will discover the link between Culture and Open Innovation and then explore how certain elements of culture, called culture dimensions, can typically show when people are working together adapting Open Innovation processes. As people behave according to their own set of values, it is important to understand why the “ethnocentric” perspective may lead to intercultural misunderstandings leading to a negative influence on Open Innovation. Last but not least, you will receive some tips about strategies how to open up to cultural awareness so that in the end you will be better prepared for intercultural encounters by having grown in your intercultural competences. |
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Upon completing this module, you should be able to: |
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Case study 1
To meet the annual seasonal challenge of having enough workers at harvest time, a small organic farm in a rural region in southern Germany has been working with public agencies and temporary employment agencies for several years. Not just out of a social attitude, the management of the farm decides to open up more to migrants and refugees for the coming season in order to give this group of people the chance to work and to integrate better and, of course, also to cover their own labour needs. Cooperation with the public authorities was initiated, through which the first harvest workers, mainly young men from non-EU countries, especially from Syria, arrived very soon.
The cooperation on the farm is going well all in all. The young men are happy to have social contacts and employment. The only recurring difficulty is that the young men do not carry out work orders given by the female instructor or only after being asked to do so several times. Male colleagues who give the young men work orders cannot confirm this behaviour.
In the role of the female instructor, what would you do to make the young men carry out your work orders? Choose the answer that is closest to you.
Story choices
Background information
Young men of Muslim background usually grow up with the understanding of respect for parents and, especially in more traditional families, the image of women as mothers and wives. As the male offspring of the family, sons are entrusted with small tasks by their mothers at an early age, but they do not experience the consequences of not following their mother’s instructions in a consistent manner. Toprak writes: “This allowance makes the boy insecure about the authority of his female caregivers”[1]. This leads to female authority being questioned in other contexts as well, which is expressed by contradicting and not carrying out work orders.