Re:Are entrepreneurs in the US biased against developers fro...
by malandrew on Saturday December 11, 2010 @10:49AM
(#1994995)
China and Japan both have a similar issue with bad news and saying "no".
When I worked in China, both my students and school administrators would avoid saying "no". If you are relying on some piece of work being done for product/project success, this approach can also be disastrous because people will say "Yes" to some request that they have absolutely no intention of performing/completing and you may not find out something wasn't done until something fails.
That being said, it's not a race issue, but a cultural issue. Someone of Chinese or Indian descent raised in the US are unlikely to present this cultural incompatibility.
On the otherhand, I think that if this cultural incompatibility exists, it is the manager's responsibility to neutralize it by demonstrating that delivering bad news (or saying "no" when the answer is in fact "no") is valued. This would be preferable to declining a good candidate for the task at hand.
When I worked in China, both my students and school administrators would avoid saying "no". If you are relying on some piece of work being done for product/project success, this approach can also be disastrous because people will say "Yes" to some request that they have absolutely no intention of performing/completing and you may not find out something wasn't done until something fails.
That being said, it's not a race issue, but a cultural issue. Someone of Chinese or Indian descent raised in the US are unlikely to present this cultural incompatibility.
On the otherhand, I think that if this cultural incompatibility exists, it is the manager's responsibility to neutralize it by demonstrating that delivering bad news (or saying "no" when the answer is in fact "no") is valued. This would be preferable to declining a good candidate for the task at hand.