Disclaimer: This post is just about observations, not to judge any person, place or country. Its just my curious nature that is making me write the post, no other intention. These are personal observations, your experience may vary.
When I moved to US for my MBA, I could feel a lot of difference in every way I could think of. I saw a lot of improvement over what I have seen back in India and few times other way around too, but this post is not about those. Its about small observations that I found interesting, human behaviors mostly from cultural perspective.
Biggest difference was regarding ‘assignments’. The emphasis given on assignments was overwhelming, in India this kind of emphasis is given on exams only. Practical nature of assignments combined with team work helps you to learn a lot and reduce pressure from exams. May be practical nature of MBA has a part to play in it. This should be part of ‘education system analysis’ post that I would be publishing soon. Here my point was to drive towards issue of plagiarism. In most of Indian colleges plagiarism is not as strictly monitored as it is in US because of that some Indian students take time to understand the implications. Many learn in first month and few people take few semesters to get used to this idea. This leads to a lot of differences while working in teams and lead to rework.
Second difference I found was in newspapers. As I love reading I would go to library and check newspapers, the famous ones that I had only heard about and seen only electronic versions. It was a surprise for me that I did not find much international news. Many a times I noticed 8 page newspaper with 5 pages of sports and 1/4 page of international news. But thankfully in today’s Internet world I get all the news I wanted.
Socializing was another big difference. Classmates usually know about each other, form friends circles before or after class. Here I noticed that very less communication takes place after class, most of socialization happen in bar over drinks. For a teetotaler like me it was hard to adjust to but other form of socializing takes place at sports events. Here my knowledge and appreciation of sports came in handy.
Then there are smaller differences. For example a small help such as sharing book for few hours is considered ‘nothing’ in India, but I learned here its a ‘favor’. Now this changes a lot of things for me, even when it was considered ‘nothing’, I would ask for help rarely but when a big word like ‘favor’ is put in front of it, this shuts down the path for me to ask for any help.
Another example would be the way people say NO. In India we are not used to here ‘no’ if we ask for help, the other person will say ‘no’ in different way, the British way. I remember once I asked a friend for something small and when I got a blunt ‘no’ it came as shock to me. On the other hand Indian ‘Yes’ is different too. I learned this while working with US clients. Indian ‘yes’ refers to ‘honest effort in completing task’ not a commitment to complete.
Similarly, I do not understand the difference between definition of ‘inconvenience’ in these two countries – In India coming 10 minutes late is not inconvenience while here it is, walking 200 feet extra has different meaning too, privacy level in two countries vary tremendously. In India we rarely address people (other than friends and in Infy) by their first name where here it is considered must.
There are a lot of small observation that I have experienced and learned a lot from it. Always trying to gather best of both worlds and that’s why I am here (one of the many reasons). No book or any amount of reading would give me such a rich experience. In this globalized economy this kind of understanding is must for success.
Hofstede quotes – “Culture is more often a source of conflict than of synergy. Cultural differences are a nuisance at best and often a disaster”. I agree with him completely, few times I had disagreement with a friend over small things because of these differences. But this is the way to learn and I am glad I am here.
