Preliminary findings

2nd order: In the following I am going to present some of the preliminary results after the first ten interviews.
The first part contains an analytical framework which I extracted out of the interviews by summarising some guiding distinctions.
The second part specifies general propositions located within this framework providing a set of rules, which may help to manage projects in a cross-cultural complex context.
The third part further elaborates these propositions in form of hypothesis for the special context of Dubai.

1. A framwork for mapping culture
By purpose I left the definition of culture, respectively cross-culture in the context of project management open to my interview partners. Abstracting what they came up with I constructed the framework shown in Figure 1:

• The project team is embedded in a certain cultural environment, which comprises the culture and people outside of the project team. One could refer to it as the Leitkultur (core culture). For example, in the case of Dubai this culture is Arabic and Muslim.

• The project team itself consists of team members, each having a specific background and being socialized in their own Leitkultur (core culture), which influences their everyday behavioural patterns.

• When it comes to the personality of the team members, I found another distinction between cosmopolitan and ethnocentric types. The first prefers to mix with different cultures and backgrounds and perceives cultural differences as a challenge, while the latter rather sticks with people of his background and perceives cultural differences as an obstacle.

• Furthermore, the project team is influenced by and imbedded in an organizational culture. I could identify two predominant cultures there: Mono Culture Organizations and Multi National Culture Organizations. The two differ in terms of management style, decision-making capacity, staff empowerment, responsibilities take-over, etc. The first one is characterized by decision-making of a few people, mostly the founder group or family. The decision-making capacity of the individual manager is therefore rather limited. In contrast, in Multi National Culture Organization modes of interaction are rather participatory. Also, larger organizations can be mono cultural. An indicator might be that the executive board comprises just one nationality. Career opportunities in Multi National Culture Organizations seem to be better developed, too.

2. Propositions for managing Triple-C projects
The following propositions are rules that according to my interview partners seem to work in practice for managing projects in a cross-cultural complex context. The propositions are marked with alphabetical letters and located within the framework (see Figure 2).To be clear in one point, following all propositions does not mean that a project is going to be successful. Social behaviour is always context related and one context never resembles the other to 100 percent.

Set-up Phase

• a. Guarantee connectivity:
  The set-up of the project team has to guarantee the connectivity with the cultural environment. That is, the project team should at least partly reflect the surrounding culture in terms of cultural background or experience of the team members.
  

• b. Limit the size:
  The size of the project team should not exceed 20 members or in this case be split-up in decentralized subunits. Up to a size of 20 people, mouth-to-mouth conversation and coordination is still possible.
  

• c. Avoid clusters:
  Avoid cultural clusters within the team. Instead, go for a good mix of nationalities and cultural backgrounds. A team of mixed cultures will increase complexity; however a team with clusters will blockade a smooth functioning altogether.
  

• d. Create an atmosphere of awareness:
  Awareness is probably the most important competence to be developed in cross-cultural project teams. Awareness has to be internalised by each team member. Don’t insist on doing the things in a certain way with reference to your own cultural background or the notion "it has always been like this".
  

Operations phase

• e. Primacy of organizational culture:
  When it comes to operations the primary working culture should be determined by the organizational culture not the local or Leitkultur.
  

• f. Milestones and budget:
  Bottom line the most important pillars to guarantee a proper project management are milestone and budget plans. Successful project management needs to follow up both.
  

• g. Success factor number one: communication
  Almost all of the interviews indicated that successful project management starts and ends with communication. According to them communication seem to be the most important instrument and success factor. Communication training may therefore be one crucial success factor that is often in its consequences underestimated.
  

• h. Be prepared for excuses:
  Culture is going to be used as an excuse not to do things. In most of the cases this is just a subterfuge. This point is again closely related to awareness, but I want to expatiate it because it seems to be of much importance.
  

Interfolding of phases
Although I distinguished between set-up and operation phase both phases cannot be separated from each other. In fact they are rather interfolded and have to be taken into account continuously and repeatedly. This is indicated by the circular arrows surrounding the propositions’ letters (see Figure 3). Each proposition is an ongoing process in the entire project – and fostering every “step” during the whole operation might guarantee its success.

3. Application Dubai

• Interpersonal relationships are the basis for successfully managing projects in Dubai. Building trust is the most important task.

• Verbal communication is more important than written communication. Needs and information should be brought up via the face-to-face conversations.

• English is the working language, however most people working in Dubai are not native English speakers. This creates room for misunderstandings and misinterpretations.

• Foster awareness building. The greatest mistake is to justify procedures with reference to your own Leitkultur (“We do the things always like this!”).

• Dubai is an emerging market. Therefore, the environment is more variable which leads to greater uncertainty. Calculate with eventualities and prepare yourself for them. It can be of value to have a plan B, C, D, etc.

• The administration is strongly influenced by its British-Indian history, which led to a according to the book approach. Be prepared that the administration will follow rigid procedures.

• Local staff still seems to show a lack of professionalism in term of qualifications and competences of the people.

11th Interview: German construction business in Dubai

1st order: I had my 11th interview with the CEO of a German construction company, who is responsible for the company’s business in the Middle East and South Asia.
Project management in construction business: German vs. British/American approach
He told me that there are two fundamentally different approaches to construction business in general and for projects in particular. The British/American approach is very standardized. Checklists are the main tool to plan and organize all phases starting with offer and assignment. The German approach in comparison is based on individualization. Each project is perceived as a unique endeavour. The idea of being a service provider is dominant. While the British/American approach is much faster, because it decreases complexity from the beginning, it also tends to create blind spots. Therefore the German approach although taking longer is more sustainable especially when it comes to difficult and more complex projects.
For some form of standardization his company invented an approach dealing with 65 topics in terms of directing the attention on these fields. It is not about ticking boxes, but clarifying objectives and content within each of these topics. However it turns out that cross-culturality seems to be a bigger issue when using an individual instead of a standardized approach, he said.
Complexity in construction
According to my interview partner there are different types of complexity in construction business. One is what he called content complexity. That is for example in terms of technology, Greenbuildings, which materials are used and how to construct the building or in terms of multiple utilisations the renovation of existing buildings. A second complexity comes in by the internationality in Dubai. Every national background has its own standards and practices. A lot of communication is needed to intermediate between them. He made one side remark here, for example the documentation of meetings is of great importance otherwise it might happen that the other party forgets about already made agreements or takes things for granted that are not. Another complexity especially in Dubai stems from the principal-owner-builder structure which tends to be very branching, especially if governmental organizations are involved. Also each free-zone has its own laws, which one should know when dealing with the administration.
The project manager
I have been told that the competences of a project manager depend 70-80 percent on fact based expertise and 30-20 percent on social competences. 20 percent accounts for Germany, while in Dubai the importance of social competences goes up to 30 percent. However the success of a project depends mostly on the 30-20 percent of social competences. This is where the project managers make a difference. Therefore his company set-up an academy in which the project managers are trained six days on fact-based skills and three days on social skills.
Organizational structure
In terms of his company’s organizational structure he told me that they go for a lean structure with low hierarchies. An executive manager within his organizations has not more than 15-20 people to lead. This is interesting as it reflect the 20 people rule [see preliminary results].

My interview partner fostered the importance of milestones and budget, like others did before (see 7th Interview, section: where to go from here? Merging the best of two worlds >>>)

7th Interview: Finger on the spot the major difference between the West and the Middle East

1st order: My 7th interview was with the executive director of a local owned program management office in Dubai. He is from origin Iraqi lived 20 years in London and has probably the same amount of years experience in project management.
Cultural differences in management
I have been told that bottom line the most striking difference is in delivery. While the Middle Eastern attitude is to get the things done, the West has a process orientation. That means in the Middle East you have a launch date, which has to be fulfilled no matter what comes around. Radically speaking it doesn’t matter how just that. The Western approach is to a 180 degree different. The focus is on multiple phases: initiate, plan, execute, evaluate. Each phase is processed one after another. Assuring efficiency and quality is the major goal. Additionally, scope and change management is of importance to set the framework.
Cultural differences in relationship
The second point to be recognized is that business in the Middle East is based on interpersonal relationships, not on professional relationships like in the West. Personal relationship builds trust and trust is considered to be the most important property (see also 6th Interview, section: challenges for triple-C PM in Dubai >>>)
Where to go from here? Merging the best of two worlds
According to my interview partner the importance of a proper project management has recently been appreciated in Dubai. This is the result of a deep learning effect in terms of money squandering and a deficit in operations. Therefore he had the mission to set-up a program management office (PMO), alleviating these weaknesses but still being adaptable to the cultural circumstances. Knowing the differences in culture he had the vision and focus to merge the best of two worlds: “the can-do-attitude” of the East and the process-orientation of the West. He took the in detail elaborated Western project management approach and distilled it to the maximum, extracting the essence in reference to the Middle Eastern culture, which is milestones and budget. The PMO was set-up with the objective to “deliver in time and budget”. This development follows two phases: plan and operate. Heart of the PMO is a communication framework upwards to the Executive Committee and downwards the project managers. Additionally a project management toolkit including coaching, mentoring, trainings, etc. was brought to life. The setup is not affiliated to a specific sector. In fact the projects come from very diverging sectors such as real-estate, IT, finance and banking, insurance, telecommunication, etc. Currently the second phase of operation has been started with the launch of Project Management Lite: a set of processes and a supportive infrastructure.
The difficulty of the whole endeavor lies in a successful cultural change from the “old” schemes of Middle Eastern dealing with projects to the new ‘best-of-two-worlds model”, I have been told.
Complexity
In terms of complexity the projects are enormous by scope, number of suppliers, quantity, etc. According to my interview partener, clear communication is the nuts and bolts to manage this complexity. However interestingly when referring to last interviewee’s remark on decreasing in complexity, I have been told that the project initiation phase is less complex than compared to the West (argumentation see 6th Interview, section: decreasing complexity >>>), while the project execution phase is by far more complex.

6th Interview: about constructive paranoia and decreasing complexity

1st order: the 6th interview was held with the managing director of an executive leadership consultancy.
Challenges for Triple-C PM in Dubai
According to him the challenge of project management in Dubai lies primarily in communication. Challenge in two ways, first in terms of scope for confusion and second in terms of wrong assumptions. Confusion stems from a different understanding of commitment, e.g. you will someone with a Middle Eastern background never hear saying 'no' to his superior. This would be considered as a weakness and a loss of face. A second barrier is the language. Although English is the business working language you have to consider that many people are not native speakers. This can lead to absurd misunderstandings in alignment. For example for some reason Asians mean with behind the building beside the building. It is important to assure making yourself clear, simple language as lowest common denominator. Second, confusion out of wrong assumptions increases uncertainty. For someone coming from a Western background it might be confusing that what is correct today might not necessarily be correct tomorrow. And perhaps the most important thing to understand is that business in the Middle East is relationship-orientated and based. It goes that far that what Westerners consider as nepotism Arabs consider as duty.
Management by “constructive paranoia”
One thing that is very important when doing business no matter in which emerging market you act is to consider eventualities, I have been told. That is, the environment is more variable, which leads to a greater uncertainty. Don’t rely on just one plan. Play with eventualities and make a plan B, C, D. Things change often in theses countries and than you should be prepared, that needs sort of creativity.
Cultural change in local business
From his work as a recruiter and head-hunter the interviewee observed a change in local business culture. More and more local corporations recognize that they have to professionalize their business in terms of getting the best people for an executive job, not someone who is part of the family. Along with that goes also the cultural shift implemented by the next generation of leaders, who were send for their studies abroad. This generation is now often a sponsor for change.
Obstacles
When asked about obstacles I have been told that the obvious are the infrastructure. Traffic is difficult (see article: Getting a taxi or survival of the fittest >>>). However more serious are the lack of transparency and critical thinking. This leads in the long term to a lack of confidence, which might backslash especially in the times of a financial crisis. However there are improvements on the way as the current investigations of local personalities might indicate.
Decreasing complexity
In terms of complexity I was introduced to an interesting perspective. Due to the fact that developer, land owner, regulative authority, ruling family are one and the same entity the complexity rather decreases than increases. That’s why it is possible to accomplish such amazing endeavors as the palm, Burj Dubai, the metro in such a short time span.

5th Interview: some guiding distinctions

1st order: I hold the fifth interview with a professional recruiter. He was living for more than 20 years in Asia, having a British background now being in Dubai since one and a half years. I would like to start this documentation a bit different than the other interviews. My interview partner brought up a lot of sense-making by himself. Following the why-question he provided me a couple of guiding distinctions, which I am going to introduce in the following.
Professional Expatriates ׀ Cosmopolitans
The professional expat is an individual experienced and senior in working abroad, most probably even in different countries or regions. Although living and working for some years abroad (s)he lives in a “bubble” together with others of his/her kind., searching for places and activities which they affiliate with home. My interviewee referred to this as “ghettoization”, that is mini-Britain in Dubai for example. (For this argument see also interview two including comments)
Organizational culture: mono culture ׀ multi national culture
In terms of organizational culture I have been provided with an interesting distinction between mono culture [wording by JSL] and “multi national culture organizations”. They differ in terms of management style, decision-making capacity, staff empowerment, responsibilities take-over, etc. The local culture refers to a mostly, but not necessarily owner or family driven corporation. They will make the important decisions and decision-making capacity for the individual manager is rather limited. Another indicator is the executive board which in a local culture organization is homogeneous consisting of rather one dominant nationality (depending where it was founded). Management style is characterized by command and control, as well as top-down leadership approaches rather than participatory modes of interaction. Carrier opportunities do exist but are not as good developed as in comparable multi national culture organizations. The difference might correspond to the size of the respective organization, but not necessarily.When asked about how to detect the culture from outside, my interview partner proposed three categories that should be explored when talking to people from the respective organizations:
(1) What is great in the organization?
(2) What are the current and general challenges?
(3) How does the senior staff deal with its staff?
Local culture ׀ organizational culture
When starting business abroad organizations will always face the challenge to balance the local culture and the organizational culture. “For the operations you have to rely on the organizational culture” I’ve been told. Local culture will always influence the behavior of the people working in the organization, but are rather idiosyncrasies. To put it in another rather radical way: “culture has nothing to do with the business”. According to my interviewee 99.9 percent of human beings are the same in terms of wants, which account for desires, children, house, living, etc. “Culture is used as an excuse not to do things!” This is his key learning being abroad for more than a decade, he said. To make one point clear the one culture is not better than the other. It is rather the question, who is going to work well in your organizational culture.
Educational system: learn-by-rote ׀ learn-by-apply
When it comes to the why-question my interviewee identified as the main discriminator the educational system. He distinguished two types of educational systems following two different approaches: the “learn-by-rote” and the learn-by-apply [wording by JSL] (or learn-to-learn approach). The approach you have been raised up with affects your behavioral patterns in all interactions. To give an example according to his experinece when problems occur, people trained by a learn-by-rote approach will wait until someone tells them what to do, most reasonably this is their superior. This accounts for people from Indian, the Philippines, Thailand, but also the Arabic peninsula. On the other hand the learn-to-apply approach mostly taught in the West encourages you to take initiative when problems occur. Analytical models and frameworks are applied to different situations in order to explain them and find solutions. This difference in how the people are trained and raised results in different behaviors of every day business. In fact the educational system in combination with the hierarchical society leads at the end of the causality to a lot of micromanagement when it comes to business operations. At least this is what I have been told.
Working on projects in Dubai
When working on projects in Dubai there are a couple of idiosyncrasies one has to consider. First the informal hierarchy in terms of national background (1) Emirati, (2) GCC, (3) Whites, (4) Indians, Pilipinos, etc. Second Islam is influencing daily life, which especially come into account at times of Ramadan, but also in terms of daily prayer, women clothing and dealing with, etc. But with a certain amount of awareness there shouldn’t be much barriers.

4th Interview: setting up a cross-cultural complex project consortium

1st order: The forth interview was held with the region’s general manager of a large research organization for applied sciences. It might be that he is soon involved in the establishment of a research consortium between organizations based in Europe and the Middle East. I asked him how such a project would be planned and organized. He explained that in this case the consortium would be an umbrella based on two pillars, one Arabic and one European. Each pillar would contain several organizations and is steered by one regional head organization respectively. In terms of managing this consortium a management team would be set-up again containing two heads, one representative for the Arabic part and one for the European part. Main tasks would be to organize conferences and meetings in order to bring people from the organizations together and establish contacts which hopefully lead to concerted projects. So to say the consortium project provides the infrastructure for a dialogue and sets the ground for future collaboration. Different cultures don’t seem to be a predominant issue, as long as you have each side organizing each sides’ events and the involved partners come just for a visit to meet the others.
Negotiation proceedings
I was told that collaborations, be them for doing business, projects, etc. start with a personal contact and are build on a personal contact. “You get to know the other person”. It’s rather collaboration between persons than organizations. Deciding to collaborate seldom happens after the first meeting. Usually, you have to introduce yourself and your organization in the first meeting. In the second meeting your opponent shares his visions and then in the consecutive meetings you agree on a cooperation model. (It doesn’t have to be exactly like this, but schematically this is how it works)

3rd Interview: love what you do, do what you love

1st order: I had my third Interview with the head of a well established communication agency in Dubai. The agency comprises 25 people all from very diverse national and cultural backgrounds, including many women. Consequently, all projects are by organizational nature very cross-cultural.
Managing Cross-Culturality and Complexity
When asking how they manage their projects I was introduced to some simple, but straight forward strategies:
1) Keep the number of people working in the organization at around or below twenty. Communication at this size is still possible via mouth-to-mouth conversations. I was told that when the organization grows larger than twenty the complexity increases dramatically. Personal interactions are no longer easy to be managed and the people get out of touch. An organization with twenty people is still the appropriate size in which each member can know what the others are doing.
2) Love what you do, do what you love. Enjoying work is an essential part in successful organization. Clients projects are chosen when someone on the team likes to work on them or not. If this is not the case, projects are refused. Just work with clients who you personally associate with.
3) National background is not of importance, what counts are the personal qualifications and capabilities. People working in the agency are of the same kind: cosmopolitan, open-minded, not restricted by cultural boarders. Multi-culture is a desired asset and advantage.
4) Women in the organization are considred as a competitive advantage for multi-tasking and integrating others.
5) No politics no prides! People in the organization are rather seen as part of a family than just working colleagues. The whole human being is of importance, going out on events, organizing get-togethers, having dinners, fostering and supporting individual development from organizational side.
On Arabic Culture and Identity
I have been told that the Arabic identity follows a cascade of family, tribe, region and then nationality. This has to be considered and is the baseline of all social actions. When it comes to Emirati in Dubai, the systems of political and business circles are much closed. Established ties are strong and relationships are regularly fostered. They tend to be long time established.

2nd Interview: construction business

1st order: I had the pleasure to hold my second interview with a project manager working in the construction business. He himself is half German, half Iraqi raised and worked in both countries.
German Standard vs. British Standard
According to him two standards in the construction business can be distinguished: the German and the British standard. While the German standard combines design and building in the hands of one organization, the British standard splits the contracts for design and building to two organizations. According to him both standards occur in Dubai.
Complexity
Construction projects in Dubai are by far larger in all dimensions than he used to have it in Germany and Ireland, he said. A project of around 200’ million United Arab Dirhams (approx. 40 million Euro) needs a management team of around 20-25 people and 1000-2000 workers on the construction site (building phase). The team is hierarchically organized in terms of operations with the project manager on top; below him two project engineers, which again have site engineers (around 4), who are supervising the foremen. Three levels of management are caused by the size fo the construction site. Then there are specialized roles such as quantity and quality surveyors (two each in respect to the mentioned project size), two accountants, one safety manager, and one safety engineer, plus the technical apartment (two according to the size). The management team is also responsible for the sub-contractors.
Cross-Culturality
The company he is working for has approximately 120 people, responsible for the management. Twenty Germans, because it’s a Germany based company and the rest from very diverse backgrounds an equal mix of Westerners, Indians, Arabs, Pakistani, and Pilipino. He said that of course there are cultural differences, but in terms of work it depends on the personal qualifications and capabilities. There is no difference between background and culture on the one side and duties and job profiles on the other side.
Management
The common ground and basis for communication is English. The company’s correspondence is in English, except for the official correspondence with authorities, which are most of the time bi-lingual. Arabic is seen as the officeal languages still. I’ve been introduced to three strategies, which seem to work quite well in terms of managing cross-culturality:
1) The project/management team needs a good mix of different cultures. Too many people from one nationality or background (e.g. Germans) would lead to difficulties when dealing with the outer world, suppliers, workers, sub-contractors, authorities, etc. The other extreme to have just locals would diminish the competitive advantage vis-à-vis other local competitors.
2) Too many people from one nationality tend to behave as a pride, which leads to a decreasing of awareness and sensitivity concerning other habits and behavioral patterns. Avoid the creation of prides if possible.
3) Clashing cultures: It is always a balancing act to keep your identity in terms of doing the things in the way you are used to (which is your competitive advantage) and the relativism how much you let go of your own culture in the sake of “harmonic and peaceful” collaborative teamwork. I’ve been told that this “battle” is to be fought on every day basis. He told me as of most importance: ‘never say that the things have to be done this way, because the company (with the respective cultural background) has always done it that way.’ Awareness and sensitivity is of most importance, don’t steamroll people.
Germans and Germans
About Germans, he said there are two types: the first one is open minded, interested in other cultures, curious about other people. This type sees working with people from different backgrounds as a challenging endeavor. The second type is there just for work, prefers to eat his local food, and be surrounded by people of his nationality. For this second type working with people from different backgrounds is rather an obstacle.