Most managers make a mistake when it comes to cross-cultural training: they
focus only on explaining what the cultural differences are. Understanding these
differences is important, but you can t stop there. Once people learn how
behaviors and norms differ across cultures, the real challenge becomes learning
to adapt and adjust their own behavior to work with others. So help your
employees take the next step in their cross-cultural training. Assess what
skills they need to develop to better work across cultures, and then integrate
training into their actual work. Cross-cultural training doesn t happen with a
manual, website, or off-site. You have to give employees opportunities to
practice and hone their skills in the actual contexts where they ll need to use
them. Bring people from different backgrounds together for long-term projects,
encourage mentorships, and initiate group discussions for people to voice what
they re learning and what they re struggling with.