This document discusses cultural barriers in distributed teams and provides suggestions for overcoming them. It notes that culture affects teamwork and identifies some common cultural challenges in distributed teams like miscommunication, different time zones, languages, and views of quality and deadlines. It recommends showing empathy, using tools like a culture canvas and distributed team canvas, and implementing practices like icebreakers, discussing perceptions of time, appointing intercultural ambassadors, holding regular retrospectives, and facilitating knowledge transfer through videos and wikis to help manage cultural differences and build an effective "one team."

1. Breaking down cultural
barriers on your distributed
team

2. 1. About Hugo
2. Why culture matters
3. Cultural challenges
4. What to do?

3. About
Hugo

4. 2004: TRIP TO INDIA

5. bridge-global.com

6. 2008
INDIA

7. Ekipa.co/ebooks

8. Ekipa.co/academy

9. The European
Market
Why culture
matters

10. What is “culture”?
Ideas, customs and
social behaviours.
How we understand and
interact with our social
environment.
Expression of our values.

11. Country
Group

12. Global vs Local
Collaborative vs Competitive
Consultative vs Decisive
Task-oriented vs Relationship-oriented
Keeping opinions to yourself vs Voicing your opinion
Agreeable vs Willing to disagree
Question authority vs Do as you’re told
Culture affects teamwork

15. The European
Market
Cultural
challenges in
distributed
teams

16. 43% of teams with 16+
locations report they never
have issues because of culture!
Survey

17. The more distributed the team,
the more engaged the leaders
Survey

18. Trust is not the problem
Survey

19. How often do you physically
(want to) meet
Poll

20. Miscommunication about
requirements
Issue # 1

21. Time zones
Issue # 2

22. Language
Issue # 3

23. Different views on quality
Issue # 4

24. Different perception of
deadlines
Issue # 5

25. The European
Market
What to do
about it?

26. Empathy

28. The culture canvas

29. The distributed team canvas

30. get in touch
www.hugomesser.com
hugo@ekipa.co
@hugomesser

31. culture
How to manage cultural differences?
Culture
canvas
Ice
breakers
training
Discuss
‘time’
Intercultural
ambassador

32. Team spirit
How do we become ‘one team’?
Retro
spectives
Training
as team
Equal
input
Team
canvas
Moving
motivators
Gather
often

33. How do we take a project from A to Z?
process
Agile &
scrum
Active
role of
PO
Proxy
PO
Full team
demo
Coding
standards

34. When and how will we meet?
Communication rhythm
Meeting
facilitator
Use
agenda’s
Do the
daily
standup
Retro:
Board +
actions

35. Knowledge transfer
How do we make everyone familiar with our product?
Product
videos
Online
wiki
User
talks
Trips
onshore