Culturally Intelligent Leadership: Essential Concepts to Leading and Managing Intercultural Interactions

205 Pages·2010·0.657 MB·English

by  Mai Moua

Culturally Intelligent Leadership M Human Resource Management and
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u Organizational Behavior Collection
Leading Through Intercultural Interactions
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Mai Moua Jean Phillips • Stan Gully
Editors
Organizations in the 21st century must have culturally intelligent man-
agers and leaders. The pressure to build authentic global networks and
to cultivate an appreciation and respect for cultural differences and
Culturally
similarities has driven cultural intelligence to the forefront of diversity
and inclusion work.
If you’re that manager or leader, this book will help you learn the
Intelligent
steps that must be considered and then practiced to get your organiza-
tion to a culturally intelligent level. The most important aspect covered
within this book is that cultural intelligence is both a strategy and a tool
toward cultural competency and proficiency. Inside, you will learn the Leadership
importance of understanding culture and its impact on organizations, C
u
the strategic value of cultural intelligence, and the significance of in- L
t
tegrating and practicing cultural intelligence in everyday business life. u Leading Through
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Learn from this unique author the ability to identify, recognize, and a
L
L
acknowledge the differences and similarities that exist between and y Intercultural
among cultural groups and systems, and when properly applied, how In
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cultural intelligence can bridge the gap in cultural misunderstanding e
L Interactions
by creating awareness, knowledge, and patience of cultural norms and LI
g
behaviors. e
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Mai Moua received her doctorate degree from Gonzaga University and L
e
specializes in leadership and diversity. She is Hmong-American and a
d
came to the United States in 1979 as a refugee from Thailand. She cur- e
r
s
rently serves as a faculty member at Walden University teaching in the h
I Mai Moua
College of Business and Management. In the past she has taught at the p
University of Minnesota, Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, Concor-
dia University, the College of St. Scholastica, and Union Institute and
University. She has presented research and conducted workshops on
leadership and organizational effectiveness, cultural competency and
diversity, and strategic planning to internationally diverse audiences of
leadership scholars and academics, executives and directors, practitio-
ners, and students from the Middle East, Europe, and Canada.
Human Resource Management and
Organizational Behavior Collection
Jean Phillips • Stan Gully
Editors
ISBN: 978-1-60649-151-5
90000
www.businessexpertpress.com 9 781606 491515 www.businessexpertpress.com
Culturally Intelligent
Leadership

Culturally Intelligent
Leadership
Leading Through
Intercultural Interactions
Mai Moua
Culturally Intelligent Leadership: Leading Through Intercultural Interactions
Copyright © Business Expert Press, LLC, 2010.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other
except for brief quotations, not to exceed 400 words, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
First published in 2010 by
Business Expert Press, LLC
222 East 46th Street, New York, NY 10017
www.businessexpertpress.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-60649-151-5 (paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-1-60649-152-2 (e-book)
DOI 10.4128/ 9781606491522
A publication in the Business Expert Press Human Resource Manage-
ment and Organizational Behavior collection
Collection ISSN: 1946-5637 (print)
Collection ISSN: 1946-5645 (electronic)
Cover design by Jonathan Pennell
Interior design by Scribe Inc.
First edition: December 2010
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America.
Abstract
Culturally Intelligent Leadership outlines the important concepts of cul-
tural intelligence (CI) and the steps that must be practiced to become a
culturally intelligent leader. CI is both a strategy and a tool that leaders
can use to gain more confi dence and profi ciency when working across
cultures. This book outlines the importance of understanding culture and
its impact on organizations, the strategic value of cultural intelligence,
and the signifi cance of integrating and practicing cultural intelligence
in everyday business life. When all these aspects are properly integrated
and applied in the leadership and management process, organizations are
more innovative and adaptable to respond to cultural changes.
Keywords
cultural intelligence, diversity, leadership, culture, inclusion, cultural
competence, cultural diversity

Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Introduction: A Global Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
Chapter 1 Culturally Intelligent Leadership Matters . . . . . . . . . . .11
Chapter 2 Understanding Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21
Chapter 3 Cultural Intelligence Defi ned . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .57
Chapter 4 Thinking About Thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69
Chapter 5 I Think I Can and I Will . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .81
Chapter 6 Adapting and Performing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .105
Chapter 7 Cultural Intelligence in Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .137
Chapter 8 The Future of Cultural Intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165
Notes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .171
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .183

Preface
As a young Hmong American child growing up in two cultures, I played
a game where I guessed the cultural background of everyone around me,
regardless of their ethnicity or race, gender or class. It was my version
of the game “I Spy,” a popular game in the United States that encour-
ages children to be observant of, and learn to identify, objects, places,
people, and things. My elementary school teacher taught me the game,
and because I wanted to be “just like every American child,” I played it
every time I had the opportunity. At that time, I did not realize that I was
categorizing the things “I spied” into boxes:
I spy a White person who goes to church.
I spy a rich, White man going to work.
I spy a Black man running to catch the bus.
I did not know about “labels” and “stereotypes” and how an innocent
game of observation can become harmful in creating blind spots, yet be
powerful in bringing to the surface one’s assumptions and perceptions.
As an educator and consultant, I use this personal story in my class-
room as an example when discussing core elements of identity, culture,
diversity, and inclusion. Generally, the conversation starts with a discus-
sion of the physical differences of people and then moves into the invis-
ible differences of culture: rules of engagement, a culture’s relationship to
nature, socially acceptable ways of interacting, notions of justice, deci-
sion making, working styles, and more. More often than I would like to
admit, a large majority of time, conversations about cultural differences
(whether in a classroom or organizational setting) focus on physical dif-
ferences and race and ethnicity as the core of culture. I have to remind
managers and leaders that subcultures exist, as well as invisible things
they do not see, including individual beliefs and assumptions that con-
tribute to the creation of culture.