intercultures has the distinct pleasure of working around our globe with many of you to provide high quality intercultural training, coaching and consulting. We acknowledge your value as clients, consultants, business partners and friends—both new and mature—and your investment in intercultures as a work partner. This communication includes a handful of highlights from our activity in 2015, and gives a hint at some of our anticipated activities in 2016.
• From Berlin to Bonn and beyond, intercultures expertly manages the global complexity of „Culture—Conflict—Cooperation,“ the theme of SIETAR Deutschland’s 2016 Forum in Bonn of which we are a Sponsor. We invite attendees to join us as we present, „Conflict resolution through the negotiation of a joint ‚feedback culture‘: A real example from work with an international team.“ Our own team will be present for the 18-20 Feb. Forum, and looks forward to reconnecting with colleagues from around the globe. intercultures invests annually in the work we do together with you, in part, by sponsoring, presenting at, and attending SIETAR Deutschland forums and SIETAR Europa congresses.
• intercultures is pleased to announce our new partnership with RShore, a consultancy that supports companies offshoring to India. Founded and headed by Deepa Natarajan (pictured left), who brings in-depth experience in India business operations and IT, RShore’s areas of consult include Offshore Strategy; Transition Guidance and Management; Project Management Guidance; Performance Acceleration; and Facilitation of Global Team Cooperation. intercultures‘ partership will provide Global Skills Development in compliment to RShore’s portfolio of business offerings. Deepa says that she, „looks forward to this synergy with intercultures.“
• Our 2015 „greatest hits“ included the following most popular e-newsletter articles (from third to most viewed):
– Tres! intercultures swiss: Knowledge & Know-How
– Dos! Influencing Perspective at Amway: Marketing Diversity
– Uno! Gieseke & Devrient’s (G&D) Going Regional with Global Talent
Honorable mention goes to the post-SIETAR Europa feature, „To Our Valued Global Network.“
• For their participation in our client features for select 2015 e-newsletter editions, we would like to make specific mention of our gratitute to the following individuals (in order of appearance):
– Daniela Oprea, Human Resources professional at YAZAKI’s Arad, Romania branch – Simone Könen of Corporate Human Resources Development at Gieseke & Devrient (G&D)
– Mr. Imran Zaman, Chief Marketing Officer, and Ms. Teresa Ainger, PA to CMO, of Amway EIA
– Dr. Axel Sprenger, Sr. Director of European Operations for Automotive Solutions at J.D. Power
• (Re)visit intercultures‘ 2015 webinar series on YouTube. Webinars included, „Diversity: It’s Bigger than One Day“; „Working with Religion,“ with guest speaker and intercultures Consultant, Alex G. Elsohn; „Germany-India Virtual Business Savvy,“ with intercultures Consultants Mala Ullal and Sujata Banerjee; and „Leading Intercultural Change from Top-Down,“ with guest speaker Paulo Santos of Daimler Group. We thank all guest speakers and attendees for their engaged participation.
• intercultures is interested in increasing our work with African cultures, and we plan to share more content related to the region in the coming year.
• We grew our global presence in 2015 by stategically increasing our global consultant pool, which now includes hand-selected, high-quality intercultures Consultants in, and/or who focus upon the cultures of, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Czech Republic, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, the UK and the US.
• intercultures also thanks the following, additional contributors to our 2015 e-newsletter communications who have lent their time, insights and keen editing eye to our e-newsletter this year.
– intercultures Consultants include Joseph Shaules (author of The Intercultural Mind: Connecting Culture, Cognition and Global Living); Uta Schulz (author of Swedish Business Culture); Dr. Gabi Kratochwil (recipient of the 2015 World Women Leadership Achievement Award); Sunniva Heggertveit-Aoudia (author of Culture and Diversity: Stories for Work and Life); Sunita Nichani (who recommends the read, Flex: The New Playbook for Managing Across Differences); and Adrienne Rubatos (contributing author to Organizational Development: Knowledge, Ways and Tools for Tomorrow).
– Business partners and associates include Piotr Pluta (PsychologyOfHumor.com); Katrin Hoffmann; Dr. Marcus Hildebrandt (Learning.de); Merlinda Dalipi; Charta der Vielfalt (founder of 9 June Diversity Day); HR Fitness Club collaborators; Berlin Change Days organizers; SIETAR Europa (creator of „SIETAR Europa: Discover, Learn, Share“ promo video); and Lothar Katz (for his Closeness at a Distance book review).
– For sharing their moments captured in Albania, Australia, China, Macedonia, Malaysia, Portugal, Thailand and the US, we thank our Photo of the Month contributors, Natalia S. in Italy, Mariana S. in the US, and Julia W. and Stefan M. in Germany.
– Last and certainly not least, we thank our 2015 Interns, Marta Pluciennik, Vivien Pfannstiel, Annarina Kemnitz and Saskia Schmitz.