Category Archives: New Product or Package-Press Release

Cultural Detective Online is LIVE!!!!!!!!

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Cultural Detective is proud to announce the new product launch of Cultural Detective Online! This tool is like having a virtual coach in your back pocket, successfully guiding you through the all-too-common missteps of cross-cultural negotiations and communications. Please check out the four videos on the home page. Today only (15-16 October, depending where you are on the planet) there is a 25% launch discount; enter promo code:   CDO-blog25  during checkout.

Huge thanks goes out to each of you who have worked with and incorporated the Cultural Detective Method into work with your clients or employee populations globally, as over the past eight years this tool has become a significant contribution to the intercultural field. Because of our clients and team, Cultural Detective has become globally recognized as one of the premier developmental tools of our time. Now we are on the cusp of very exciting and broader use of the tool through Cultural Detective Online! This new product launch furthers our mission of encouraging communities globally to prosper through intercultural understanding and collaboration.

Cultural Detective Online is useful in a broad range of contexts including global business negotiations and multicultural team effectiveness, international assignments and study abroad, and for successfully communicating within our families and communities, and within and across faith traditions.

A subscription to Cultural Detective Online offers the opportunity to explore the concepts of “culture” and “values” and how they impact communication in everyday life. It provides access to dozens of culture-specific Values Lenses and topic-specific Challenges Lenses, hundreds of real world cross-cultural incidents, and the easy-to-use Cultural Detective process for improving the ability to collaborate successfully across cultures, both on individual and organizational levels.

We are excited to announce that subscriptions are now available for individuals or groups, and we invite you to subscribe to Cultural Detective Online today by visiting http://www.culturaldetective.com/cdonline/ ! Subscriptions start at less than US$100/year, and are less for larger groups of subscribers. You will rarely find more value for your money.

Cultural Detective Online for International Teams

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You’ve already told us Cultural Detective is fabulous. That it’s helped your team achieve its deliverables. That it’s rocketed your performance to new levels. That’s why we are very excited to SOON be able to offer you the Cultural Detective product line as an integrated, online system rather than as stand-alone packages! And, better yet, it’s designed as a personal coach, encouraging you and your team members to track your goals, summarize and apply your learning, and upload, debrief and share with a facilitator, team lead or each other your daily life experiences (and make accurate meaning from them).

Be sure to stay tuned for our official launch. Or, enter to win a free subscription for you or your team!

If you are unable to view the video above (if you are on an iPad or other device that doesn’t play Flash), click here to view the video on YouTube.

Please feel free to share this video with others who might be seeking a virtual intercultural coach. Please let us know what you think! Thank you!

Global Competitiveness Events in Bogotá Colombia

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Cultural Detective is very proud to partner in bringing several leading-edge intercultural events to Bogotá, Colombia. We hope you can join us! Please pass this announcement on to your professional and social networks so that we might let everyone know about these unique opportunities.

On Thursday May 10

We will officially launch the Colombia Transfórmate program and the Cultural Detective Colombia package. Cultural Detective President Dianne Hofner Saphiere will facilitate a workshop which will be followed by a cocktail reception. This terrific evening is not to be missed! Cultural Detective is very honored to be part of this incredible project.

On Monday May 14

We will hold a high-energy event designed to ready Colombians to reap the benefits of their recent Free Trade Agreements with Canada and the USA, and upcoming agreements with the European Union and South Korea. Anyone wishing to improve their cross-cultural business acumen will find attendance extremely valuable. We believe this is one of the first-ever public workshops on intercultural communication in Colombia. The workshop will be facilitated by Fernando Parrado of Global Minds, Andrés Forero of the Forero Medina Abogados Asociados, and Dianne Hofner Saphiere of Cultural Detective.

Sponsor These Two Events

Put your organization’s name in the hands of thousands of first-tier Colombians by purchasing a sponsorship. Show your commitment to global effectiveness, and to Colombia! Sponsorship opportunities start at an incredible US$1350, and include two seats at both the Thursday and Monday events, an exhibit table, an introduction of your organization, and your logo on event banners.

Act quickly, as these very affordable sponsorship opportunities will be available for only two weeks.

On Wednesday May 9

Dianne will also present a seminar on intercultural and global business competence for students and staff at Sergio Arboleda University. The seminar will take place on day three of the university’s fifth think tank entitled, Marketing, Sociedad e Interculturalidad: Una Mirada desde la Globalización.

Much-Anticipated New Release! Cultural Detective: Bridging Cultures

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Cultural Detective Bridging Cultures coverIntercultural understanding is essential to working in a global world, though by itself it is simply not enough. There is a critical need beyond awareness of differences: an ability to generate and demonstrate effective, transformative, out-of-the-box solutions to challenging intercultural situations. Since 2004, the Cultural Detective series has successfully enabled people to do just that.

We are proud to announce the debut of our latest offering, Cultural Detective: Bridging Cultures. This new tool enables individuals, teams and organizations to purposefully strengthen mindsets and skills in order to leverage cultural differences as assets. It contains worksheets, exercises, tools, tips, and complete instructions. The learning package is authored by Kate Berardo.

Not every situation can be bridged, perhaps not every situation should be bridged, and the act of bridging, as many things in life, may involve an investment of time and energy. This new set of learning materials begins, therefore, by helping you distinguish whether “to bridge, or not to bridge.”

Cultural Detective: Bridging Cultures will enable you to understand how you tend to react when encountering cultural bridging opportunities, identify more effective strategies for bridging both in-the-moment and over time, and practice putting these skills into action. More specifically, you will:
  • Identify when a conversation is about to spiral up or down.
  • Identify “bridge builders” and “bridge blockers” to your successful intercultural communication.
  • Learn techniques for in the moment bridging of differences to ensure conversations spiral upward instead of downward.
  • Develop holistic strategies that consider influencing factors such as history, context, and structure of the interaction.
  • Learn how to expand, filter and test effective bridging solutions.
  • Develop high-impact, creative bridging solutions to both prepare for and repair intercultural relationships.
  • Practice, and receive feedback, on bridging strategies in situations that are real and relevant for you.
Cultural Detective: Bridging Cultures is organized around four main competencies that are essential to bridging cultural differences. They are:
  1. Self-Awareness: Being aware of the mindset you bring to challenging intercultural situations, and knowing both your strengths and blocks in turning such situations into bridging opportunities.
  2. Course Correction: Recognizing points in an interaction where misunderstanding or conflict starts to occur, and responding appropriately.
  3. Holistic Analysis: Being able to analyze complex intercultural situations in a detailed and holistic way that considers a variety of influencing factors, and, thereby, more effective solutions.
  4. Creative Solving: Learning skills and methods to generate “beyond the obvious” solutions to bridge intercultural differences.

While this is not to suggest these are all the skills needed to work effectively across cultures, these are often under-developed abilities that need to be strengthened to enable effective intercultural bridging, and, therefore, are the focus of this package.

SAMPLE EXERCISE

How about an exercise to get you started? The purpose of this activity is to learn what bridging and blocking look like for you, so you can hold a bridging mindset more often.

Let’s begin with some simple definitions.

Blocking Mindset:
  • Focused on own agenda
  • May become defensive or impatient
  • Unintentionally harming the relationship

Think about a challenging interaction in your own life (who, what, when, why) during which you held a blocking mindset. How did you feel? What did your blocking mindset look like? What behaviors did it entail? What outcomes did you achieve?

What do your reactions tell you about yourself and how you might improve your intercultural effectiveness?

Bridging Mindset:
  • Open and curious about others
  • Willingness to meet others more than half-way
  • Belief that others are NOT “out to get us” but that they have positive intentions

Think about a challenging interaction in your own life (who, what, when, why) during which you held a bridging mindset.  How did you feel? What did your bridging mindset look like? What behaviors did it entail? What outcomes did you achieve?

Learn more about Cultural Detective: Bridging Cultures; view a short video on the core Cultural Detective method, which a major software manufacturer credits with a 30% increase in customer support satisfaction; purchase small quantities of the package; or contact Kris Bibler about a site license.