Cultural divide

From eg

A cultural divide is any persistent failure of groups trained in different cultures to understand each other or cooperate. This can affect contract and human capital and even technique/technology/doctrine decisions. One problem is that all members of other cultures are perceived as trolls by less forward cultures, while the less forward are seen as tolerant of silent failure by the more forward and confrontational.

As one UK ITweek article put it:

"There is one type of phone call I hate taking. The caller will say how his company set up a new international project team a few months ago. It had all started so well. They had a kick-off meeting to agree objectives and an awayday to bond. But it had all gone horribly wrong: the objectives were still out of sight and the bonds had come unstuck. Sergio is seething at Dirk’s brutally direct communication style and baffled by John’s ironic comments and rapid-fire English. Tina has upset Ashok by openly accusing him of not being able to do his job. His accent is so strong she cannot understand his English anyway. Toshiyuki seldom speaks and when he does, Pin humiliates him by rejecting his ideas as unworkable. Markus complains that Marie-Claire is never adequately prepared for meetings and does not listen, while she asserts that she can never get hold of him because he goes home so early. The walls of prejudice have been raised and the team members are seldom willing to break them down."