Published Articles by Maureen Rabotin

Organizations have gone from domestic to international to multinational to global. These shifts have brought major changes in the organizational structure, but what has changed in leadership? This six-part series will discuss what leadership means in today’s global organizations.

A comfort zone is what our brain creates over time when our lives are comprised of a routine—our repetitive behaviors, which occur on regular intervals and are well memorized. That is how we develop a comfort zone...

The minute you take for granted that someone has understood what you have just said is a minute too late to save the situation. Any leader, but even more so a global leader, can never underestimate the importance of getting communication right, the first time. 

Aligning and motivating people whose experience had been more hierarchal, formal, and status-oriented compared to egalitarian, informal, and achievement-oriented proved to be quite the challenge.

Intercultural research has defined a wide range of communication styles, which vary from indirect, high context, or implicit styles down to more direct, low context, or explicit styles. The first step to becoming an effective global leader is to be aware of your preferred communication style and how it is perceived by others. 

Learning how to leverage cultural competencies starts by understanding how one’s own culture affects and influences who we are today: our strengths, weaknesses, assumptions, beliefs, and values. This is the foundation to self-awareness.