The Importance of Cultural Competency Across Borders, Disciplines, and Organizations: Designing Distance Learning for Successful Communication

Workshop Presentation
Mona Pearl,  Fabio Verruck  

The ability to communicate using different cultural mindsets is a core challenge for organizations worldwide. In this workshop, we share our process for our collaborative design of the program and digital platforms, as well as the methodology behind the learning, assessing progress and outcomes. We consider the activities designed for the learners, including specific deliverables produced. Also, we discuss how the planned activities took into consideration known differences in approaches to power structure, view of collaboration, gender roles, uncertainty, and other aspects of working collaboratively between the two settings, using Hofstede’s dimensions as the theoretical model for design, analysis, and facilitation.Details of the planning process will be presented, as well as the challenges faced throughout the execution of the activities, lessons learned, and the research methods applied to measure the predicted results. We share the assessment tools, data and evidence of the development of CQ in students and executives in the US and Brazil, and lessons learned. We also share our experimental research and methodology of developing CQ, intercultural problem solving, collaboration, and global teamwork to accelerate a greater understanding and an intercultural learning environment that can be adopted in other organizations. This report offers a summary of an ongoing research project focused on understanding the effects of a online international exchange activity over students’ performance, based on an experience conducted with students in Brazil and in the USA.