Let’s learn from the Norwegians!

Posted on June 26, 2011 by Margaret

A news item this week reminded me of a letter to the editor I wrote to a business magazine, it must be ten years ago now. I had just heard about the Petroleum Fund of Norway (renamed in 2006 to the Government Pension Fund Global) and I wanted a similar fund for Australia.

After all, the circumstances between Norway and Australia are remarkably similar. The only difference is the quality of the foresight of the respective parliamentary representatives.

When oil was discovered in Norwegian waters of the North Sea, the Norwegian government could see that this windfall resource would not last forever. So in 1990 they decided to divert revenue from taxes and licenses earned from the resource into a special fund for investment, so that future generations of Norwegians could benefit from the wealth. There was the additional goal of avoiding a dangerous imbalance to the Norwegian economy that might be caused by oil price fluctuations.

Today, 20 years later, that fund is estimated to be worth $570 billion. It now owns 2% of all European stocks and is currently busy diversifying into real estate and the rest of the world.

The news item I heard this week that sparked my memory was an announcement that the CSIRO, Australia’s legendary (and shockingly underfunded) scientific research organisation, is about to undertake research on…wait for it… how to extract iron from the poorer grade iron ore which is all that will soon be left now that our highest grade iron ore has been dug up and sold off.

Why are the Norwegians so smart and we aren’t? There are fewer than 5 million of them, too!

I keep telling people in my training programs and conference workshops how much there is to learn from other cultures. We should be moving our gaze from the USA to the Nordic countries of Europe. That’s where the great ideas are playing out. And they are countries much more in our social democratic tradition than the Americans who have never even held the concept of a civil society.

It’s not too late! I can see a great use for that mining profits tax which is having so much trouble getting traction. Lets build up The Australian Sovereign Wealth Fund so that the CSIRO never has to go begging, and all unversity education is free, as it was for me in the 1960′s.

Posted in cultural competency training, cultural history, great ideas, learning from history, learning from other cultures, world cultures, world history | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

TLC: The Leadership Conference, Brisbane, 26,27 July 2011

Posted on June 15, 2011 by Margaret

The purpose of TLC is to meet the diverse training needs of busy leaders and senior managers working in organisations of significant size.

This conference, a serious training event, is the brainchild of the dynamic educator Michelle Day of MDD Tactics. The two-day program includes two inspirational plenaries and 6 workshops which you choose from a list of 17 topics.

Cultural Capability workshop

If you’re looking for help in tackling the opportunities and challenges presented by the growing cultural and linguistic diversity of Australia, I’ll be covering this in a two-hour training workshop on 26 July on the first day of the conference, held at the Bardon Conference Centre in Brisbane.

Margaret Bornhorst’s workshop: The Exciting Culture/Language Challenge

This two-hour workshop gives practical information on why and how your organisation can not just cope with, but benefit from, the explosion in cultural and linguistic diversity that Queensland and Australia are experiencing. Our population is now made up of people from more than 200 birthplaces representing every corner of the planet … and it’s continuing to grow! This diversity has serious implications for the management of staff as well as for customer service.

The workshop:

  • identifies the range of ethnic and cultural backgrounds now calling Queensland home
  • presents the business case for embracing this diversity in multiple ways
  • identifies the precise customer service skills all your frontline staff need now, and how those skills can be acquired
  • looks at how you can get the most from the knowledge and skills of your multicultural workforce, and at how to optimise harmony and communication between staff from different backgrounds.

For more information about TLC, or to register, go to the MDD Tactics website.

For more information about my workshop, contact me on 0409 062 610.

Posted in cultural competency training | Leave a comment

Lose faith in Western culture? Boeing 737 scandal, and the rest.

Posted on June 15, 2011 by Margaret

I spend a lot of time thinking about the advanced Western democracies. How we’ve spent 1200 years progressing from medieval individual powerlessness and poverty to the situation where an extraordinary number of people enjoy a high standard of living, a fair level of human rights, and a great deal of personal freedom.

We’re not perfect, of course. Too many people don’t have enough resources to live in health and dignity, too many children are abused, and there is a frightening and growing degree of inequality between rich and poor in some Western cultures, Australia included. But significant progress since the Middle Ages has been achieved and it is nice to think that we are on a continuing upward trajectory.

And then something happens that completely blows my faith in Western progress.

Last Sunday night’s expose of Boeing on SBS’s Dateline program really hit me hard. So much apparent corruption at so many levels: within Boeing sub-contractors, within Boeing, within the Federal Aviation Authority, and maybe even in the US Supreme Court. And such inexcusable treatment of extraordinarily courageous whistleblowers.

If a business can get away with this degree of structural safety breaches, what can’t it get away with?

So businesses and regulators in the United States of America, supposedly the leader of the Western world, put unethical profits before the safety, not only of millions of its own citizens, but also of millions of citizens around the world? The Boeing 737 NG is everywhere. Every time you fly from Brisbane to Melbourne or Sydney you are probably on one of these planes.

Is there no limit to the reach of unethical business? How widespread is it? How much are other Western democratic parliaments, including Australia, reliant on their support and influence? What can we as individuals or as communities do about it?

I can see a three possible courses of action.

The first is to find a way to publicly celebrate and support and encourage whistleblowers, and prevent them from becoming pariahs in their own communities, as so often happens. Perhaps there should be an Annual Whistleblower of the Year Award which spells out the many ways that whistleblowers benefit the community?

A second course of action is to publicly shame, and even boycott, unethical businesses. A bit hard to do when the company in question supplies the majority of planes in the world. But a clear message would be sent and might force change within the company.

The third action is to celebrate ethical businesses. After all, business delivers so many of the advantages that we enjoy in the Western world. Do we do enough praising of the good ones, who hopefully are in the majority anyway? Choice Magazine makes an effort to identify and praise businesses who have treated customers well or badly but perhaps this could go further? Perhaps there needs to be awards here, too? More publicity at the very least.

There is really no room for complacency.Where once government regulators were able to curb business practices which put the safety of their workers or the public at risk, increasingly governments see their role as supporting business no matter what their record. Governments regularly pass legislation which appears to be tough, and then ensure that there are no, or minimal, resources for enforcement. This is unlikely to be accidental.

The Western cultures need to pay much more attention to maintaining the basic principles that have created the enviable quality of life for so many people.

It’s true. The price of freedom (and prosperity) is eternal vigilance.

Posted in western culture deficiencies, world cultures, world history | Leave a comment

Communicating through professional interpreters, easy…

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Margaret

 …but also daunting if you’ve never done it before!

I designed the first Working with Professional Interpreters program delivered to state government agencies, including hospitals, at the time that the Language Services Policy was introduced by the Queensland Government in the 1990′s. And I have been delivering this program, with regular modifications, ever since. So I have a lot of experience, much of it acquired from professional interpreters and regular users of interpreter services, of what people need to know to assist them to communicate successfully through professional interpreters.

On the theory side, people need to be clear why BYO (‘bring your own’: ie family, friends, neighbours, etc) are only adequate when very simple, unconfidential information needs to be communicated. In medical, legal and education environments, where complex information needs to be received from, or given to, the patient/applicant/parent, you need to be sure that the interpreter is of a high quality. The only way to be really sure of this in Australia is to use interpreters with a NAATI (National Authority for the Accreditation of Translators and Interpreters) qualification. There are four levels of accreditation and it helps to know which level is appropriate for your needs. This is covered in my programs.

Also on the theory side, there are three basic principles you must follow when communicating through a professional interpreter.

1. You must look at the client (if they are in the room with you) or address directly the client (if they are at the end of a telephone line) while you are talking and while the interpreter is talking. (This is counterintuitive. When people first start working with professional interpreters, there is a strong tendency, unless they have had training, to treat the interpreter as the primary relationship in the interview. So it takes a bit of effort in the beginning to get yourself to look at and speak directly to the client, even while the interpreter is doing the interpreting.)

2. You must use the first and second person (I and you) rather than the third person (he, she, they). This confirms that the most important person in the relationship is the client not the interpreter.

3. Once you’ve got 1. and 2., all you have to do is speak to the person exactly the way you speak to someone who speaks English fluently, only remembering to keep your ideas and sentences clear and concise. (Long rambling sentences are hard for interpreters to keep track of.)

That’s the theory. (Well there’s more theory than that, but that’s the most important part of the theory.) And communicating the theory alone makes a very effective training program. But a few years ago I added to my program a component which I am convinced created a transformative training experience for participants.

I got the group to create a scenario typical of their likely need to use a professional interpreter. I got someone from the group (or an invitee) who spoke another language fluently to play the role of the client who didn’t speak English. And then we connected to TIS (The Translating and Interpreting Service) and conducted the scenario using a TIS interpreter (after asking the interpreter’s permission to participate in a training exercise).

Everyone could see and hear the process of connecting to TIS, could hear and see me asking for the language and level of the interpreter, and then could hear and see the interview being conducted by the volunteers. After we disconnect from TIS, we conduct a debrief of the scenarios.

It is this practical participation in, and observation of, a real-time interpreter-assisted interview that I believe makes this training failproof. Everyone goes away knowing that if they had to connect to an interpreter tomorrow, they could do it.

These scenarios are now a regular feature of my Working with Professional Interpreters program.

Posted in courts and professional interpreters, GPs and interpreters, immigrants and professional interpreters, interpreter training, judges and interpreters, judicial need for professional interpreters, linguistic proficiency, working with interpreters, working with interpreters training, working with professional interpreters | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

GP’s, judges, magistrates, school principals need professional interpreters.

Posted on June 5, 2011 by Margaret

 

I have a few theories on why it is so difficult to convince GPs, judges, magistrates and school principals to use the services of professional interpreters when they have patients, applicants, and parents with inadequate English.

My first theory is that there is widespread ignorance in the general Anglo-Australian (short for Anglo-Celtic Australian) population about how significant the differences between cultures can be. This is not peculiar to Anglo-Australians. According to research identified by Richard Brislin, a pioneer of cross-cultural communication training based in Hawaii, it is a natural tendency of all people to assume that the characteristics of their own culture are pretty much universal. People just don’t expect there to be significant differences unless they have an experience that convinces them that differences are real. It is easy to stay in a state of unawareness as long as you don’t come into intimate contact with a culture that is significantly different from your own.

Many Anglo-Australians have friends and acquaintances from other Anglo cultures like the UK or New Zealand or Ireland, or even the United States and Canada, but the cultural differences here are simply not enough to get people to really take notice (despite the fact that people from all these cultures can experience quite strong culture shock when they come to Australia!). Cross-cultural marriage can have the desired effect: when an Anglo-Australian marries a Tongan Australian or a Botswanan Australian or a Vietnamese Australian or a Greek Australian or an Italian Australian who has strong connections to his/her culture-of-origin the reality of cultural differences are revealed in all their glory. Going to live for an extended period of time in another culture can also provide the requisite insights. And even travel will do it, but only if you actually pay serious attention to the culture you are visiting.

So it is easy for doctors and judges and magistrates and principals to remain unaware of very significant differences in medical models and legal systems and education practices experienced especially by immigrants/refugees from non-Western cultures.

But then another element comes into play: lack of knowledge of the process of second language acquisition and how to recognise linguistic proficiency in the presence of a ‘foreign’ accent. On the whole, Anglo-Australians are not very linguistically sophisticated. If a doctor or judge or principal can conduct a bit of social chitchat with the patient or applicant, there can be the perception that this person is perfectly proficient enough to proceed into the more complicated medical or legal or education matters. Sometimes, and there is considerable anecdotal evidence for this, they ignore the specific advice of support workers (who have had a chance to assess the person’s linguistic skills over a longer time) that this person really needs to have an interpreter.

The only way to facilitate proper understanding in medical and legal matters and education contexts where a client is not proficient in English is to communicate through professional interpreters.

Which brings me to my second theory: most people are subconsciously so daunted by the process of getting and communicating through an interpreter that they find all sorts of excuses to avoid trying it, even when they know they really should. There are, indeed, challenges with communicating through professional interpreters. None is insuperable and most are easily overcome by an hour’s training or a bit of research. But that’s a topic for another blog!

Posted in courts and professional interpreters, GPs and interpreters, judges and interpreters, judicial need for professional interpreters, magistrates and interpreters, medical need for professional interpreters | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

We are so lucky in Australia…

Posted on June 2, 2011 by Margaret

To have ABC Radio National and ABC News Radio not to mention ABC Television and SBS Television! For anyone who is obsessed like I am with world events, the cultural characteristics of countries, and history generally, or who just wants to keep up-to-date on issues around world cultures and languages, we are spoilt for opportunities. I personally am addicted to Phillip Adams’ Late Night Live and Geraldine Doogue’s Saturday Extra. If they’re not already on the register of National Australian Treasures, both of these journalists should be. And if that weren’t enough, there is Background Briefing and Hindsight. And if that weren’t enough, you can turn to ABC News Radio and get the BBC, Deutsche Welle and the Radio Netherlands on a regular basis. A sign of how addicted I am is the withdrawal symptoms that I experience when I am in another country. They may have equivalent programs but I can never find them. We are such a lucky country, certainly in this respect!

Posted in cultural history, world cultures, world history | Leave a comment

The Five Stages of Cultural Capability for Managers

Posted on May 30, 2011 by Margaret

I’ve been working for a number of years to develop a schema for understanding how individuals and organisations develop cultural capability, of which cultural competence is only Stage 3. On 19 May I delivered a workshop on this topic for the Workforce Innovation Conference held in Brisbane. The conference itself was an inspiring event targeting the not-for-profit, community and health sectors in Queensland. Nic Frances, the social entrepreneur from the UK, featured prominently and was memorable for his personal energy and for the creative way he approached the provision of social services. My workshop was targeted to middle and senior managers and was designed to provide a guide for creating a culturally competent workforce and organisation. The workshop looked at why and how managers could tackle the challenge of creating a culturally competent organisation, and the myths and benefits along the way. Anyone who would like a pdf copy of the PowerPoint presentation and the handout should contact me. My schema is a work in progress and I would welcome suggestions on how to improve it!

Posted in cross-cultural models, cross-cultural theory, intercultural models, intercultural theory | Leave a comment

A Serious Training Event for Leaders and Managers

Posted on May 22, 2011 by Margaret

If you’re looking for help in tackling the opportunities and challenges presented by the growing cultural and linguistic diversity of Australia, I’ll be covering this in a two-hour training workshop at the inaugural The Leadership Conference (TLC) on 26 and 27 July at the Bardon Conference Centre in Brisbane. This serious training event is the brainchild of the dynamic educator Michelle Day of MDD Tactics. The two-day program includes two inspirational plenaries and 6 workshops which you choose from a list of 17 topics. Early bird rates are still available. The focus of TLC is meeting the training needs of busy leaders working in organisations of significant size. Details and registration on MDD Tactics website (www.mddtactics.com.au).

Margaret Bornhorst’s workshop: The Exciting Culture/Language Challenge

This two-hour workshop gives practical information on why and how your organisation can not just cope with, but benefit from, the explosion in cultural and linguistic diversity that Queensland and Australia is experiencing. Our population is now made up of people from more than 200 birthplaces representing every corner of the planet … and it’s continuing to grow!

The workshop:

  • identifies the range of ethnic and cultural backgrounds now calling Queensland home
  • presents the business case for embracing this diversity in multiple ways
  • identifies the precise customer service skills all your frontline staff need now, and how those skills can be acquired
  • looks at how you can get the most from the knowledge and skills of your multicultural workforce, and at how to optimise harmony and communication between staff from different backgrounds.

For more information or to register, go to the MDD Tactics website.

Posted in benefits of a multicultural workforce, conference workshop documentation, cross-cultural training event, cultural competency training, managing diverse organisations, managing multicultural organisations, multicultural leadership, working with interpreters | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment