CONNECT GLOBALLY: WHAT APPROACH SHOULD YOU ADOPT?
[slide 1]
Jeff:Hello, everybody! Please get ready: we’ll begin the webinar in one minute.
Jeff:As promised we’ll begin today's webinar in 30 seconds. Please get ready.
[slide 2]
Jeff:Welcome, everyone, to today’s webinar, “Connect Globally: What Approach Should Yo Adopt?” And as you can see, this is a one-hour program. I’m very excited about what we’re going to cover. But first, let me go over one or two administrative items.
[slide 3]
Jeff:First, a very simple disclaimer: the views and opinions expressed on today’s program are those of Phil Vassallo, the author and expert commentator. They are not necessarily the views and opinions of ADP or SmartPros.
[slide 4]
Jeff:In addition, I want to thank ADP for sponsoring this series of webinars as well as a program of lunch-and-learn sessions. And in that context, I’d like to introduce Jamie Seegmiller, who is ADP’s marketing manager for the Accountant Channel. Thanks for joining us today, Jamie.
Jamie: Thanks so much, Jeff, and hi to everyone on the line. Thanks so much for joining us. As Jeff just mentioned, I’m part of marketing here at ADP and I actually work very closely with our sales team to look after our accounting partner from the marketing perspective. One of the areas I manage are the continuing education resources. I'm are very proud to partner with SmartPros today to bring you this webinar on the topic of effective communication, particularly across borders and culture. And of course, as you know, you have the ability to earn free CPD or CPE credits upon successful completing which Jeff will provide some details on shortly.
Before we begin, I’d just quickly mention two things, the first being the great Accounting Program we have at ADP that was newly launched under a year ago, part of which included a dedicated account-only hotline and preferred discount on our services for your client. To learn more, you can always contact your ADP representative or email us at: the second item is the brand new blog that we just launched a couple of months ago. You can find this under the “Insights and Resources” section at ADP.ca. And one of our most recent entries is titled “Minding the Growth Cap,” which speaks to the long-term advantage that professional development provides and how it’s more important now than ever before - which I thought was very fitting, since you're all participating in this webinar to learn how to apply this new knowledge to help your business and your clients. So, please be sure to check it out. Again, it’s under the “Insights and Resources” section of ADP.ca.
I'll pass things back to Jeff once more to introduce our expert commentator Phil Vassallo. Thank you so much in advance. Like everyone else, I’m really looking forward to today’s presentation.
Jeff:Thanks, Jamie. We truly appreciate your hard work as well as ADP’s sponsorship.
[slide 5]
Jeff:As Jamie mentioned, our expert commentator today once again is Dr. Philip Vassallo. And you may recall from his last appearance on this program that Phil is a well-known author of books and articles, as well as the blogmaster for “Words On The Line.” While Phil is well-known for his training and presentations in North America, he also served as a faculty member for the Beijing International MBA program. So, Phil not only has experience in teaching people about connecting globally, but he has experience in connecting globally himself. It’s great to work with you once again, Phil Vassallo.
Phil: Thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. And a special thanks to ADP, for sponsoring this program and offering it to your accountant partners.
[slide 6]
Jeff:One final administrative item: how do you receive continuing professional development credit for participating in today’s webinar? This program qualifies for one CPD credit, and there are two ways that you can validate your attendance today. I will interrupt Phil Vassallo’s presentation four times today and – each time - I will provide you with an attendance validation keyword. If you are logged into your own computer, all you have to do is select the “prompt” on the screen when it appears. The second way is for those participants who are watching in a group or are not logged in to your own computer. You will need to write down the four attendance validation keywords, so that you can enter them after the event. I’ll remind you at the end of the program, but you’ll enter those four validation keywords within twenty-four hours at:
adpcanada.smartpros.com. That same link - adpcanada.smartpros.com – is where you can also go to download a complete copy of today’s presentation or to ask questions of today’s expert commentator. Without further ado, Phil, let me turn to you.
[slide 7]
Jeff:And as is customary, please tell us what our learning objectives are for the next hour.
Phil: Thank you very much, Jeff. The program will actually be divided into two parts.
The first part will be some reflections. We'll call it:“Think Global, Act Local.” And during that time we will cover these first two objectives:
- position thought evolution in a context that avoids stereotyping; and
- identifying opportunities to foster international collaboration.” So, we will be able to develop a mindset of what it means to thinking and connect globally.
And then, the final two bullet points will cover the second part of the webinar, which is more practical and hands-on. It will be about some best practices and I call it: “Get Grounded, Keep Flying.” Because after being grounded with those reflections, the question arises: what can we do to get things moving? So, the best practices will focus on how you can:
- employ strategies to overcome cultural barriers and gain acceptance; and
- tailor your communication style to be sensitive to global etiquette.
[slide 8]
Phil:So, let's get started.When I think about those terms “global” and “local”, I think about the world, correct? And on this slide, we are looking at four completely different continents. But look at what they have in common too. So, on the top row, we're looking at: Bratislava, Slovakia which is in Europe; and Buenos Aires, Argentina in South America. On the bottom row, we’re looking at Mumbai, India, which is in Asia, and then we're looking Sydney – the only English-speaking city that is shown – in the country and continent of Australia.
So, what do these cities have in common? Yes, they all have skyscrapers. And you’ll notice that they also all have rivers running through them. So, we're going to be looking at some commonalities, as well as some differences, in today’s program.
[slide 9]
Phil:Which brings me to an important consideration: why do we want to connect globally? Let's think about it. Every business says, “Oh, we’ve got to go global.” But why do we want to do that and what does it really mean?
So, number one is the main reason for connecting globally: to win new opportunities. If we think about it from the perspective of our brand, our product, or our service, it could become a global opportunity - with the right positioning - no matter how local that current product or service is. As you will hear today, I certainly found that that was true in the case of my one-person business. Yes, I am a sole proprietor. Yet, I have worked around the world - with some degree of success - because of that global perspective.
[slide 10]
Phil:Let's think about the fact that the world population: it was 7.3 billion people the last time I checked and it is constantly growing. Let’s consider that total in connection with social media. According to the current statistics, about one in every five people around the globe are Facebook users: about one and one-half billion. That’s very impressive. But look how small the North American users are compared to the more than one billion Facebook users there are throughout the world. Because of my own location, I’ve just enumerated the U.S. users of Facebook: more than 150 million, or about one-tenth of the total Facebook users. Yes, the Canadian Facebook users would add to that total. But when you think about it, North America is just a small percentage – about ten percent - of the total global user population.
[slide 11]
Phil:The next slide presents the same information, but for LinkedIn. No, I have not updated the world’s population since you looked at the last slide, even though it does increase every minute. And I listed 400 million as the worldwide population of LinkedIn users. In fact, according to the company’s own data, there are now 600 million users.In this case, you’ll see that North America makes up a greater percentage of worldwide LinkedIn users than they do for Facebook: about twenty-five percent instead of ten percent.
[slide 12]
Phil:Let’s turn to Twitter. On the one hand, there are a high percentage of Twitter users in North America: almost twenty percent. But on the other hand, there are local variations of social media in general – and Twitter in particular - that have emerged in other countries. For instance, in countries as diverse as Russia and as Israel, they prefer to use a platform known as Vkontakte. So, the worldwide Twitter usage does not include all of its competitors.
The bottom line: there are just many, many social networking organizations that can bring us together globally.
[slide 13]
Phil:We discussed that there are at least three great reasons as to why we might want to connect globally. And the second one is to create greater value. Now, here,I am not only talking about winning new opportunities for ourselves to grow our business, as we did with point one. Instead, I’d like you to consider creating greater value in terms of our presence.
[slide 14]
Phil:Now, if you just think about a great symbol of globalization, it would be the United Nations. And what does the U.N. stand for? To most people’s mind, in one word, it’s “diplomacy.” Now, the U.N. is one of my clients, so I know this for a fact. Yes, they are concerned with the diplomacy – the hand shaking and getting countries together. But they are also very concerned about providing all types of services to individual countries.
On the bottom left of the slide, you’re looking at a group that met on behalf of a program that’s very important to the U.N.: the International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats. And if you look at the right side of the slide, you'll note a book that notes the fact that businesses worldwide are forming partnerships and collaborations between their own enterprise and organizations in other countries. Not only are businesses developing new local alliances and discovering new local customers, but they are even working with their competitors on industry-wide initiatives. So, these publications – which I highly recommend to you – provide an interesting perspective on how companies, in pursuit of their own markets, are actually caring more about their global footprint and about are adding value to the regions where they do business.
[slide 15]
Phil:And of course, if we win new opportunities that create greater value, we will shape a better world. And that's another reason that we might want to connect globally. It’s the world that we do business in, but it’s also the world that our children – and, in my case, grandchildren – are going to live in.
[slide 16]
Phil:So, as an example, I'd like to have you think about this online search that you can do yourself: the most popular people in the world. In other words, these are the people who are most frequently the subject of global searches on Google. Now, if you just look at the top ten figures on this slide, you will see three values or common factors about them that immediately come to mind. What do they all have in common? In many cases, it’s spirituality. With other individuals, it’s aesthetics - meaning the arts, painting, music, literature or that kind of thing. And probably the third one would be intellect or education.
After all, these ten folks are more than philosophers; most of them are what we would call spiritual leaders. Now, I'm not trying to get you to subscribe to some kind of religion. All I'm trying to say is that these are the people who are being searched. People do take their searches seriously: they are looking for meaning in their own life. And that's why it's very important for us to add value and to contribute to the world.
And I should be candid with you: there is another individual who makes the list of most frequently searched individuals on Google. But because he does not fit neatly into any of those three categories, I decided to exclude “Adolf Hitler” as an outlier to the rest of the group.
[slide 17]
Phil:In recent years, you’ve probably heard a lot about the four BRIC countries. In fact, some experts now spell BRIC with a K at the end – as BRICK – to include the presence of Korea. I am going to be a traditionalist and confine my remarks to the four original BRIC nations: the B is for Brazil; the R for Russia; the I for India; and the C is for China. Having been to three of these four countries myself - and having been to the other one by means of a virtual connection very often and also having been there vicariously through my children - I wanted to just share with you some reflections on these nations and their cultures.
[slide 18]
Phil:So, let's start with Brazil. Most of us felt a connection with that nation last summer, when we watched the Olympics games. And what many of us have in in common, I suppose, is that we have a favorite athlete or two. In my case, it’s American decathlon champion Ashton Eaton, who’s married to Canadianmulti-event athlete Brianne Theisen. Both of them did very well in Rio.
But what I think about, and what we saw on the screen over that two-week period, were incredible pictures of Copacabana Beach, the Christ the Redeemer statue, and all of the festivals. Yes, that is the stereotype that we see. But what we also need to think about is the fact that Brazil, as a country, has 63 million Facebook users, 10 million LinkedIn users and 8 million Twitter users. And despite the stereotype, both of those worlds exist simultaneously.
[slide 19]
Jeff:I said that I would interrupt you four times today, Phil, and this is the first of those: our first attendance validation keyword. And if you would like to earn CPD credit for today’s program, please note that our first keyword is “Brazil.” If you are logged in to your own computer, a “prompt” should have opened up on your screen. And all you have to do is select the word, “Brazil.” Just click on it. But, if you're watching this program in a group, or if you're not logged into your own computer, then please, I'm going to ask you to write down these four validation keywords down, so that you can go online later and enter them. So, since you’ll have some choices, do yourself a favor: start making a list right now, and begin it with: “number one, Brazil.” And after the webinar is over, I’ll remind you of the link you can go to in order to enter these four words and get your CPD credit.
Before my interruption, Phil Vassallo was discussing the BRIC nations, and Brazil – our attendance validation keyword – was the first of the four countries.
[slide 20]
Phil:As many of you recall, Russia is the Rnation in BRIC. And I clearly remember when my adult daughter went there. I said to her: “Be sure to check out Red Square.” What else did I suggest? “Be sure to go to St. Basil’s Cathedral. And make sure you check out the Bolshoi Ballet when you're in Moscow. After all, those are the cultural icons of that country. But we should also think of the fact that they have a social network service there called Vkontakte. And as I mentioned, that social networking organization happens to be the second most used platformin Israel, just to give you an idea of the interconnections between these countries. So, Russia has 55 million VKontakteusers, but they also have 24 million Facebook users and 8 million Twitter users. And when we look at these cities, we're looking at a photo of Moscow right now on the right, I wouldn't be able to tell right off the top of my head, whether we’re looking at Chicago or Toronto or Moscow, unless you gave me a hint. So, again, we have to think about those similarities – all of things that connect us as people and places.
[slide 21]
Phil:Let's take a look at the next country: India. Here you're looking at, on the left, the Akshardham Temple. We also think about the India Gate and the Taj Mahal. We think about, if you're like me, the great food that India offers. And of course, that's all true. But you also need to think about the fact that they're a nation of 12 billion people, and at one-quarter of a billion of those people are internet users. And one-half of those internet users are also social media users.