Culture

"A Contrast Between U.S. and German Teams’ Ways of Functioning "


In an experiment in which German and American teams attempted to reach consensus on a complex task, the German groups generated 30% FEWER  statements focused on possible solutions than the American teams and more than TWICE as many statements focusing on various problems, such as inadequate information.

Sample Size & possible reason

 The findings, drawn from research on 30 teams of university students, support past research suggesting that culturally, Germans tend to desire a substantial amount of background information before making decisions and prefer clarity over uncertainty, whereas Americans tend to quickly come up with solutions, often without having a complete and thorough analysis of the problem.

 Insights like these can be valuable to managers running intercultural teams, the researchers say.

Courtesy : Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock of VU University Amsterdam and colleagues.