by Howard Feldman, Head of Marketing & People<\/p>\n
Every family has a culture. That culture is reflected in the way that communication takes place, how they dress, what they eat and the type of humour that resonates for them. Any stranger entering that home for more than a few hours, will need to make it their business to read the environment so that they don\u2019t offend anyone at worse case, or look strange at best.<\/p>\n
Businesses are no different. As someone who has consulted with businesses across South Africa (and around the world), I can confidently assert that no two companies are the same in terms of culture. I would further suggest that even if there is a dominant culture within an organisation, that different offices and different departments might have nuanced aspects that make that environment unique.<\/p>\n
The understanding of a specific work culture is critical for companies like Synthesis, who as a matter of course have teams of software engineers based at clients. The engagement might be a few weeks or months, which means that staff need to be fully prepared before deployment.<\/p>\n
Where lack of sensitivity can harm the project and the outcome, the counter is also true. If the team is equipped with an understanding of the workplace culture of the client, they are significantly better positioned to succeed and to produce work for that client.<\/p>\n
For any company working in the office of another, it is worth taking the time to think about the client\u2019s work culture. The simple act of the discussion ahead of a project will create an awareness and a sensitivity to it.<\/p>\n
Here are some items that a team might want to consider:<\/strong><\/p>\n The famous saying that \u201cCulture eats strategy for breakfast\u201d is absolutely true. But I would expand on this. For a company not to be eaten for breakfast, it is imperative to take the time to understand a client\u2019s culture. It is not safe or smart to assume that the accepted norms within one environment will be the norm in another.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Howard Feldman, Head of Marketing & People Every family has a culture. That culture is reflected in the way that communication takes place, how they dress, what they eat and the type of humour that resonates for them. Any stranger entering that home for more than a few hours, will need to make it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":5720,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"ptype":[11],"sectors":[],"class_list":["post-5717","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conversation","ptype-articles"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n