This past Wednesday marked the midpoint check-in for our consulting engagement with our client, Caras Con Causa, a non-profit in Cataño, Puerto Rico. It is truly exciting and inspiring to see how dedicated many of the amazing individuals associated with Caras are, including Caras’s CEO and Founder Michael Fernandez. I had originally anticipated difficulty in the virtual environment in terms of communication and effective project management, however this has not been the case with all of our meetings thus far. Both the client meetings and cultural awareness activities have catalyzed my interest and excitement for the duration of this project, and we’ve been able to effectively communicate with Michael and his team. During one of our cultural awareness activities, the difference in work culture between the continental US and Puerto Rico was emphasized. The US is widely regarded as an individualist culture, while Puerto Rico is more collectivist. These fundamental social principles dictate the cadence and content of meetings, and this juxtaposition was evident from our first client meeting. Our team was ready to begin working, armed with questions to maximize total information obtained from the meeting. This caused initial awkward tension, as a collectivist culture is usually associated with more “casual” meetings fueled by dialogue. We took this into account for our second meeting, and while we used slides to maintain an agenda, we provided the opportunity at the end of each slide for the client to ask questions or engage in dialogue about the idea. This was effective because it synthesized both meeting styles to achieve a productive discussion.
Our group has been able to overcome the minimal communication challenges that have arised, and successfully modified our meeting facilitation strategy to account for the difference in norms. Our project focuses on assisting Caras with the development and marketing of their environmental sciences laboratory to international students as a place for education and cultural immersion. In our meeting with members of Caras, it is evident that Puerto Rico is the perfect location for beginner international experiences in a country with a different primary language. With Puerto Rico being a US territory, travel is relatively easy, and Puerto Rico uses the US dollar for currency. Recently, legislation has been proposed to make Puerto Rico an official state. While the path to statehood is a long one (for Alaska it took over 50 years to reach statehood after the first legislation was passed), a survey found that over half of Puerto Rican’s support statehood. I digress, I discovered that Puerto Rico can provide an enriching and immersive cultural experience with minimal barriers to overcome if aided by organizations like Caras.
My perspective of global business has certainly evolved, as I’ve never experienced a difference in cultural norms surrounding work before, and it was extremely insightful to experience the differences firsthand and develop methods to ensure everyone was comfortable and productive. For consulting, client comfort is of utmost importance, and this international experience has provided me thus far with the ability to recognize uncomfortable situations and make the necessary amendments to dispel discomfort. After the midterm client meeting, our team was inspired to continue to push further on the project, and we loved to hear that the client was interested in pursuing some of the additional opportunities we had developed. Michael asked many insightful questions that prompted our further consideration in some new areas related to the project, and we’re in the process of following up to gather even more information about Caras current operating environment.