Back to work

[logan37]

Welcome back Shelby. Happy to hear you had a nice experience.

[Shelby07]

Our company has a fair piece of operations in Mumbai, Gurgaon and Delhi (as well as other cities in India) I have been threatened on several occasions that I'm going - I've managed to dodge the bullet each time. A number of my coworkers have gone and returned with stories similar to yours, Mark.

While I'm avoiding the trip at all costs (primarily because 17 hours of traveling will totally screw up my work), I am very curious. I routinely interact with our partners in India - and am fascinated by their mindset. Is is clearly different than ours.

Good on you!!!

George,

I'd encourage you to take the trip, but be prepared for a totally different reality. Delhi, Mumbai and Gurgaon will be easy to work in, but outside the business centers things are very strange for us. Aside from the obvious stuff mentioned above, the people and the culture are very different. Everything in India is based on making deals, and the ability to position ones self and negotiate is a part of their mindset. Hence, you will never get the full story unless you dig for it, and you'd better be good at it. Never assume anything as you will be wrong 100% of the time. They don't lie, they just don't tell the whole truth, or they bend the truth when convenient. The people verbally fight among themselves, but will rarely do harm to each other (unless you are talking about some of the more extremist groups like the Naxalites or the Docoids (sp?) who are usually not found in the more generally visited areas.) There are several religions, and each person is rooted deeply in their own. The most common language is Hindi, but there are 15 different languages spoken in the country, depending on the area you are in. Just about everyone in the business world speaks English, but be prepared for some very strange sentence structures. The states in India are much more like separate countries. Goods shipped from state to state are required to go through a sort of customs, paperwork is necessary and taxes must be paid. Police walk around with AK-47's and private security guards armed with shotguns sit outside banks and jewelry stores. The dowry system is alive and well, but not talked about to foreigners very much. Honor killings are common and many people defend them. Villagers tend to defend their men no matter what the crime. The government is extremely corrupt and anything can be bought for a price. The cities are very dirty as compared with ours, safety standards are very low and building standards are non existent. They think of George Bush as the devil but they like Americans in general. As a white American male, respect is given, whether it is deserved or not. Yet in spite of all of these things the culture works and people live their lives in a fairly normal way. The first couple of weeks there is an American tendency to think that if they could only be shown the American way (i.e., the "right" way) everything would be better, but of course that isn't the case. Their religion and culture is ingrained in them, and they have had life experiences that we can not imagine.

Sorry for the rambling... I'm doing more of a brain dump here. My mind is still in a transition phase.

EDIT: By the way, I am not knocking or belittling the Indian people. The question was about their mindset. The things I mentioned above are some of the things you need to understand before you can start to understand the culture. The Indian people are really quite friendly and interesting.

[basil]

Awesome Mark! I'd go at the drop of a hat! Good to hear from you.

[mrtr33]

They think of George Bush as the devil but they like Americans in general. As a white American male, respect is given, whether it is deserved or not.

I was in Doha, Qatar, about a year ago. I noticed the same thing, not so much amongst the Qatarians (?), but amongst the African and Indian peoples. They would generally ignore you, unless you made the effort to acknowledge them in any way. I was told by other Americans that there is a tremendous amount of racism practiced there, where lighter-skinned people were assumed to be of higher social class (which I found amusing, as at the time, I didn't have a dime to my name).

In short, I would live overseas (for probably a set length of time, say 3-5 years) at the drop of the hat, if conditions were reasonably acceptable. Good for you.

[drew_goring]

Sounds like you had quite the experience Mark. Glad to hear you had a good time.

I had a chance to go to Abu Dhabi about 8 months ago for a couple of months but decided I would enjoy Oklahoma much more during the summer.

[ggiese]

George,

I'd encourage you to take the trip, but be prepared for a totally different reality. Delhi, Mumbai and Gurgaon will be easy to work in, but outside the business centers things are very strange for us. Aside from the obvious stuff mentioned above, the people and the culture are very different. Everything in India is based on making deals, and the ability to position ones self and negotiate is a part of their mindset. Hence, you will never get the full story unless you dig for it, and you'd better be good at it. Never assume anything as you will be wrong 100% of the time. They don't lie, they just don't tell the whole truth, or they bend the truth when convenient. The people verbally fight among themselves, but will rarely do harm to each other (unless you are talking about some of the more extremist groups like the Naxalites or the Docoids (sp?) who are usually not found in the more generally visited areas.) There are several religions, and each person is rooted deeply in their own. The most common language is Hindi, but there are 15 different languages spoken in the country, depending on the area you are in. Just about everyone in the business world speaks English, but be prepared for some very strange sentence structures. The states in India are much more like separate countries. Goods shipped from state to state are required to go through a sort of customs, paperwork is necessary and taxes must be paid. Police walk around with AK-47's and private security guards armed with shotguns sit outside banks and jewelry stores. The dowry system is alive and well, but not talked about to foreigners very much. Honor killings are common and many people defend them. Villagers tend to defend their men no matter what the crime. The government is extremely corrupt and anything can be bought for a price. The cities are very dirty as compared with ours, safety standards are very low and building standards are non existent. They think of George Bush as the devil but they like Americans in general. As a white American male, respect is given, whether it is deserved or not. Yet in spite of all of these things the culture works and people live their lives in a fairly normal way. The first couple of weeks there is an American tendency to think that if they could only be shown the American way (i.e., the "right" way) everything would be better, but of course that isn't the case. Their religion and culture is ingrained in them, and they have had life experiences that we can not imagine.

Sorry for the rambling... I'm doing more of a brain dump here. My mind is still in a transition phase.

EDIT: By the way, I am not knocking or belittling the Indian people. The question was about their mindset. The things I mentioned above are some of the things you need to understand before you can start to understand the culture. The Indian people are really quite friendly and interesting.

I see quite a bit of what you say in the dealings I have with our employees in APAC. I have found the Indians to be VERY friendly and fiercely proud. I do not believe they generally lie - however, they will carefully choose their answers. When challenged, there seems to be a feeling that you are disappointed in their performance - and they do not take disappointment in any form very well at all. They definitely are very linear thinkers - and have difficulty sorting out multiple paths from the same issue. I've had them totally shut down when offered more than a couple of choices for resolution.

Our priorities are not their priorities. And they handle priority entirely different than we do (there does not seem to be the pressure to get things done like we view getting things done). Not that the Indians are lazy - they are very task focused and work very hard.

Most of the Indians I deal with are extremely bright, but you really have to dig to extract their opinions (if they're not used to American culture). It's as if they are giving up a piece of themselves in expressing their ideas. Once they know you appreciate their view - it can be difficult to harness their enthusiasm.

I've found it very difficult to understand their accent when you first hear it - but I've found that with time it becomes much easier to understand - though I'm still struggling with conference calls when one (or more) Indians are using a speaker phone when an echo is present.

I look forward to going - and I know it is inevitable (so I'm told). The only reservation I have is I hating devote the better part of a day getting there - and the better part of a day in getting back...

[WOXOF]

Glad to hear you're back. It sounds like you had an unforgettable experience.

[CoventryCat86]

Wow Mark! It's great to hear a first hand experience about India.

I know I bust yer nuts about long winded posts but I found this fascinating! Please tell us more if you get a chance.

[Shelby07]

Wow Mark! It's great to hear a first hand experience about India.

I know I bust yer nuts about long winded posts but I found this fascinating! Please tell us more if you get a chance.

I can tell you about the things I have seen, but if here's one thing I've realized in India, it's that my own perception of the world is at the best skewed, and at worst totally inaccurate. I find myself questioning everything about what I knew to be true and I'm seeing everything in a different (albeit confusing) light.

The people and the culture are very different. What at first seems primitive turns out to be quite clever and even ingenious. Their view of reality is molded by experiences I can never know or understand. The best I can do is try to work within it, but it is confusing to say the least. I have learned just how narrowly focused my own view of the world is (it seems that someone here might have mentioned that to me in the past .) I wouldn't say the blinders are off, but it seems that I'm trying to turn my head a bit more often.

So, it appears that I am learning more about myself than India or the people there. It's difficult for me to get up in the morning and try to function in a space where I seem to be throwing out every assumption I've ever had about people. The one thing I do know is that I'm not as smart as I thought I was a few months ago. But if that has opened me up to seeing things differently, then I can't complain. I think it's going to be a fascinating experience. It's why I can't wait to get back.