Taking the Highroad Blog

On the Highroad to Space: A Day with NASA at Marshall Space Flight Center

March 30, 2011

In this blog we will share insights from our day at Marshall Space Flight Center as well as our plan to contribute to international cooperation in aerospace!

Dreams do come true, I can say with certainty. Those who know me well can tell you, I am a grand fan of NASA and a student of the early space programs in particular. My book shelves are filled with astronaut biographies, histories of the Mercury and Apollo programs, and photography books depicting the space shuttle era. My husband often marvels (and teases me) about my arcane knowledge of mission statistics.

Space, however, has always been more than a hobby. Like many children in my culture I dreamed of reaching the stars, but the dream never went away. I took three years of flying lessons from age fourteen to age seventeen, and my original major in college was aerospace engineering. I was serious.

The problem was that having a full time engineering career in the aerospace field never fit me like a glove. You can likely tell by now, dear readers, that I greatly enjoy speaking, writing, coaching, and culture. While I will always cherish my time in the skies, I had to admit in my early twenties that it was time to let go of the NASA dream.

Or was it?

In the years that followed this decision to switch career tracks, I saw the wonders of the world, from the deserts of India to the rolling hills of the German countryside. I discovered how much I loved to foster cross-cultural awareness and skills, and Highroad Global Services, the new dream, was formed. Now we work with clients all over the world to build international collaboration and I love my work – but NASA still occupied a space in the heart (no pun intended).

About six months ago I was reading my daily news when a large light bulb appeared above my head. Every time I opened a news website I saw an article about the increasing necessity of international cooperation in space. On one level this was nothing new. Crew members on the International Space Station and Soyuz craft have been engaging in cross-cultural work for years. What about the rest of NASA’s missions? With rising costs and innovation around the world bursting at the seams, partnering for resources and ideas makes perfect sense. The time had come to further enable commercial space and that meant cross-border efforts.

That’s when it occurred to me – I wanted to help NASA meet that need. The Highroad team has the skill and the passion to help and I spoke my intention to friends, colleagues, and clients.

Last month, as a result of speaking the dream aloud a good friend forwarded me an e-mail about NASA’s small business outreach event at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL. I signed up immediately and attended the conference last week. My theory was correct – a need exists for international collaboration at NASA. I had a wonderful time talking to contractors such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin, as well as NASA small business specialists and program directors. Everyone was friendly and helpful. 

NASA, though retiring the shuttle program soon, is engaging in cutting edge missions. Last year alone saw three successful shuttle launches, and satellites were launched with six payloads. The President of the United States has given clear direction to get beyond low Earth orbit, and the SLS (Space Launch System) program to facilitate that is in his budget. As one of the presenters at the Huntsville event stated, “Space exploration can unite human kind.” As I wandered among the rockets at the meeting site, ideas flowed over about how much potential existed at NASA for true partnerships. I was in the right place.

To thrive in space, keep exploration alive, and seek solutions to our growing environmental issues, space agencies around the world are going to have to work together. I am already setting the new dream in motion as Highroad begins its mission of contributing to international cooperation in space, and I will share more in the coming weeks.

If you dream a dream, don’t forget to make it known. Say it aloud. You never know how it will make its way into reality. We are excited to share our dream with you! Comments are welcome.

 

The Global Virtual World: What is Lost and How Do We Compensate?

March 22, 2011

I want to clear up something right away. I love technology. I’m not one of those crotchety people that tells stories about how great life was before all these newfangled devices. I have this blog, a website, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, an iPhone, and documents in the “cloud.”

I would also be hard pressed to deny the positive influence that technology and the virtual world have had on recent events and on business. Think of Egypt and the role the Internet played in their eighteen day revolution. Think of CEO’s making critical decisions sitting in Cisco Telepresence meeting rooms with life-sized images of each participant. I even think of my own ability share culture by taking videos on my iPhone in India and sharing them with my clients.

Regardless of how we feel about technology, in the words of a Zen master, it is what is. The generations below me will only know the pervasiveness of technology and when they enter the workforce they will likely be part of multiple global virtual teams.

We know what we have gained from all of this virtuality: The ability to meet without traveling, to work across time zones, and to benefit from the diversity of thought.

My question is what have we lost?

This past January in India I had the honor of talking to a Professor from a University in Vadodara. Wisdom seemed to ooze from every pore of his being, and quotes from every word out of his mouth. I asked him about India’s growth and development, wondering about the impact on the country’s culture and values. While we had a long discussion on the subject, his initial answer stuck with me.

He said “Nothing is lost.”

When I think of the virtual world I can’t help wondering if this is true. I conduct virtual training on a regular basis, everything from complex half-day courses with web-based breakout rooms to a simple broadcast presentation over the phone. While I enjoy these engagements, I have never been able to agree with those who say that virtual work is fast approaching the feel and effectiveness of face-to-face. For me something is missing and I set about trying to find out what. The answer, as usual for me, came from Asia.

At a recent conference in India I sat next to a student from a nearby university. As we talked we got on the subject of virtual training and I told her my feeling that something is missing, but that I couldn’t figure out what it was. She looked reflective.

“I might have an idea,” she said. “As a Hindu I believe that every person has energy that emanates from them, energy that is physical, that can be felt and moved. It’s like an aura, you could say. When you work virtually no matter how good the technology is, the aura is missing.”

That was the best explanation I had ever heard. It reminded me of how my good friend and colleague Peter, a program manager at Cisco and a Vietnamese native, told me he was going to send his positive qi (pronounced chee) my way for a successful presentation. Simply put, qi is energy, a vital part of trust and effectiveness.

We cannot deny the losses we experience when we do virtual work. To do so in my opinion would be counterproductive. But the virtual world can be liberating. As my colleague from Britain put it, “I’ve been able to work with my friend Bob for fifteen years because we don’t have to work in the same office!”

How do we manage the loss and maximize the benefits of technology? Here are my contributions:

  • Don’t lose the ability to give someone your undivided attention. Yes, we have the opportunity to be in the virtual world almost every second of every day, but that doesn’t mean we must always choose that path. Try participating in one conference call where you actively listen and do not multitask at all.
  • For at least a part of the day, try doing one thing at a time. Shut down your e-mail and focus on engaging your creativity. To block distracting websites, try this application: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/leechblock/
  • Make intentional, scheduled efforts to connect with people virtually on a personal level. For example, about once a month or more I go through my Skype contacts and see who I haven’t talked to in awhile. If they are online I ping them and say hello, just to catch up.
  • Use Skype video for every first-time virtual meeting. If you have a new client or colleague and you will not have the chance to meet in person right away, plug in your video camera and see each other’s faces.
  • Budget in time and resources for face-to-face meetings, especially for new teams. You can establish a highly effective virtual team, but remember that the qi will be missing. Meeting face-to-face early on can solidify trust and fill up the bank account for future interactions.

What do you do to manage virtual loss? How do you use technology to connect? I look forward to your comments.

Cultural “Baggage”: The Key to Business Success Around the World

March 3, 2011

In today’s blog we will examine why knowing the “why’s” of different cultures determines your level of success in business with them. Using the United States, Germany, and India as examples, we will dive into our cultural “baggage!”

In the United States, people sometimes use the word “baggage” to describe their past personal experiences and influences, especially the negative ones. I propose a new use of the word. When I think of baggage, I think of what you check in at the airport when going on a trip. You carry your suitcase everywhere you travel so that you may have a little home away from home. Just like that baggage, we carry cultural suitcases filled with not only our personal past and present, but also that of our culture’s history, geography, religious beliefs, and more. Our workplace behavior comes from somewhere, it has an origin, and so does that of our global partners. The question is, how much do we know about what’s inside the baggage of both sides? Without the answer to this question we risk operating in global business only from our own set of rules.

Let us take India as an example. When I survey my American clients about their challenges working with India, the answers rarely vary. Here is a sample from a client:

“They seem to lack a sense of urgency,” the American says, “and we’ve had a lot of projects bumping right up against the deadline, or over it. The way they go about their processes seems inefficient, spending multiple hours on something that should take less time. And I don’t always get responses to my e-mails asking about the schedule.”

When I surveyed the Indian counterpart, here was their response:

“When the U.S. client changes the scope of the project dramatically they expect us to keep the same deadline. We have a hard time to tell them “no” but then we have to work eighty hours a week to catch up. They are not forgiving on the deadlines and sometimes they are not emotional. They just keep pushing but don’t always give us the information we need.”

If we don’t look to the cultural baggage from both sides, this U.S./India team could fall apart. In this one example several issues creep up.

Mythologist Devdutt Pattanaik provides great insight into this case. As I mentioned in a previous post, a strong belief exists in India among a large part of the population that death is not a period, it is a comma. Rather than a beginning, a middle, and an end, one goes through the circle of life through reincarnation and lives again and again. Dr. Pattanaik gives the example of India’s Ganesha festival, where the god Ganesh is made of clay, kept for ten days, and then dissolved. This shows that everything ends and is renewed again.

In the United States, by contrast, the Judeo-Christian value system is prominent. Here the belief is you live once, you pass away, and you go to heaven or are joined with God. This way of life and death is a line rather than a circle. Many other belief systems exist in both countries and are equally valid, but the influence of these majority beliefs is hard to deny.

Let us now apply these perspectives to our U.S./India team and we can begin to answer “why.”

From the American perspective, if you believe you only live once, you will want to hurry up and live. You will tolerate little “inefficiency” and want everything in your one life to be perfect. As a result you may achieve a lot but have little patience for wasting time. In addition, the history of the U.S. contributes to the American client’s struggles. As the early American colonies were established in part to shake off the class-based societies of Europe, Americans had to define their standing by what they had measurably accomplished. Without results, how do you define your work?

From the Indian perspective, if you believe you live again and again, you will be more flexible with time, knowing that eventually things cycle back around. This is manifest in many aspects of Indian society such as the thali meal vs. the sequential four course dinner, cremation vs. cemetery burial, and driving habits. Schedules are subject to change and emotions take a high priority.

Of course, other issues are at stake in the example provided – the American’s assumptions about inefficiency in India (if you want to see true efficiency click here to read about the Dabbawallas of India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dabbawala) and the difficulty the Indians have saying “no” to the client, even if they cannot meet the schedule. But understanding the underlying beliefs would have given some immediate solutions to this team, at least to begin examining the problem.

Another example from author Patrick Schmidt is that of German and American teams. Americans sometimes experience frustration with their German counterparts’ need for perfection in quality, order, and certainty. Germans similarly become frustrated with their American colleagues’ tendency for quick decisions, brainstorming in meetings, and “time is money” attitude.

If you think of their comparative histories this is no surprise. Germany has suffered a great deal of wartime trauma beginning with the Thirty Years war and lost 35% of its population in the 1600s. Other horrible conflicts followed. Such trauma has in part shaped a culture that strives for stability and order. By contrast, the United States built a nation in a relatively short amount of time which meant decisions had to be made quickly, time was money, and uncertainty was part of being a separatist explorer. These are only two factors in the cultural suitcases of Germany and the U.S. – think of how many others lie inside!

While globalization and the younger generations of these cultures are impacting the values described here, to assume that cultural baggage has dissipated or disappeared is a risk not worth taking.

Before you head out on your next global business venture, even a brief look inside the cultural suitcases of all parties, including your own, will lead to optimized teams, better negotiation, improved relationships, and greater collaboration. In a globalized environment can we afford not to collaborate?

Let’s discuss: What is your cultural baggage? How has it played out in your professional and personal life?

Tip: Doing business abroad? Try the Travelers History Of… series http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_20?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=travelers+history+of&sprefix=travelers+history+of

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