Manajemen | Fakultas Ekonomi Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji joeb.80.6.322-326
Journal of Education for Business
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural Journey
Bonnie Garson
To cite this article: Bonnie Garson (2005) Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural Journey, Journal of
Education for Business, 80:6, 322-326, DOI: 10.3200/JOEB.80.6.322-326
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.3200/JOEB.80.6.322-326
Published online: 07 Aug 2010.
Submit your article to this journal
Article views: 113
View related articles
Citing articles: 7 View citing articles
Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at
http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=vjeb20
Download by: [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji]
Date: 12 January 2016, At: 22:45
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural
Journey
BONNIE GARSON
Reinhardt College
Waleska, Georgia
B
efore 9/11, I was invited to teach in
the undergraduate school of business of a prestigious English-speaking
university in Cairo, Egypt. In this article, I reflect on the crosscultural journey
that I took as a single Jewish female
management professor in an Arab country whose population is approximately
96% Muslim and in a university whose
faculty is about 15% American and 85%
Egyptian. My purpose in this report was
to explore my own process of adapting
to academic employment and life in a
foreign country and, more important, to
derive meaning from my experience as a
professor of management and adult
learner.
As professors in the 21st century, we
are teaching management principles to
future global leaders who will experience cross-cultural challenges as well as
other issues involving diversity (e.g.,
gender, religion, race). In the 1999
Global Relocation Trends Survey
Report sponsored by Windham International, the Institute of International
Human Resources, and the National
Foreign Trade Council, 66% of the
respondents indicated that they expected an increase in expatriate activity
(Doblins, 1999). As professors, we are
availing ourselves of global teaching
assignments through a variety of opportunities such as the Fulbright Scholar
Program and the International Rotary
322
Journal of Education for Business
ABSTRACT. In this study, the author
explored (a) the impact of culture on
the process of adapting to academic
employment and life in Cairo, Egypt
and (b) the meaning derived from her
experience abroad as a professor of
management and adult learner. Experience with global travel may help
instructors empathize more with foreign students and expatriate managers
who are attending classes or executive
MBA programs in the United States.
In addition, the author sought to stimulate the sharing of similar experiences so that faculty members are better prepared to teach in foreign
countries and conduct research during
expatriation. She hopes to continue
the discussion regarding the transferability of American management theories to foreign countries.
Foundation. As a management consultant and professor whose teaching philosophy entails bridging the real business world and the academic theory of
organizational behavior, I knew that the
offered position at a university in Cairo
would enable me to experience globalization as an expatriate worker. This
opportunity would further afford me the
ability to create relevance in the classroom by sharing my experience of
working and living in another culture.
Through this qualitative report, I
hope to stimulate the sharing of similar
experiences so that we are better prepared to teach in foreign countries and
to conduct research in the area of expa-
triation. My experience also suggests
that we should continue to evaluate the
efficacy of transporting American management theories and practices embedded with Western values into foreign
countries.
Expatriation
According to crosscultural research,
30% of the corporate expatriates transferred overseas from the United States
do not perform adequately, and 25%
repatriate earlier than expected (Lublin,
1992). The cost of these failed foreign
assignments is estimated at $2.5 billion
annually. A 1997 study of Fortune 500
United States multinationals indicated
that 85% of the companies surveyed
lacked an adequate number of globally
competent executives (Gregersen, Morrison, & Black, 1998). The single most
frequent reason for failure was the
inability of global managers to adapt to
the culture of the host country.
My experience as an expatriate professor parallels the management literature focusing on the cycle of adjustment
in a foreign country and re-entry into
one’s home country (Adler, 2002;
Francesco & Gold, 1998; Lane, DiStefano, & Maznevski, 2000). There is a
dearth of research or training available
for expatriating professors and their
families. Although my experience is not
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
unlike the experiences of expatriate
managers, little in the literature addresses the issues of gender and other areas
of diversity. According to Bodycott and
Walker (2000), most expatriates share
their experiences among themselves,
and few resources exist to help the expatriates make sense of the radical
changes that working overseas can
cause in their lives.
Arrival in Cairo (Ahlan Wa
Sahlan: Welcome)
to downtown Garden City, where I was
to reside. Some workers who were completing the final clean-up of my apartment welcomed me, and a vase filled
with two dozen roses perfumed my
large dining room. Because roses are
inexpensive in Cairo, I kept this vase
filled during my 9 months abroad.
According to Adler, “Expatriates enjoy
a great deal of excitement as they discover the new culture” (2002, p. 263).
Certainly, I felt this excitement on my
first day.
Preparing for the Trip
Experiencing Culture Shock
Before leaving for Cairo, I read the
wonderful poems written by the great
Sufi Rumi and the Lebanese author
Gibran, listened to Arabic music, and
read some of the history of Egypt. I
wanted to be prepared culturally. The
next challenge was to prepare for the
academic part of the trip. The university
was using many of the same American
textbooks used in most business schools
in U.S. colleges and universities.
Because I had taught these same courses at my university in Georgia, I expected that teaching in Cairo would be a
cakewalk, but I was also on a mission. I
knew that the business trend in Egypt at
that time was privatization and the creation of joint ventures with a variety of
U.S. corporations. I was planning to
enlighten the Egyptian students regarding the American way of doing business. I have always considered myself a
role model in the classroom. I try to use
a facilitative teaching style that models
a participative and empowering leader.
How ethnocentric and naïve I was!
Cairo is a city of 17 million people.
Right away, I realized that my preparation for Egypt was hardly adequate.
Although reading the poetry of Rumi
was uplifting, it did not prepare me for
everyday life in Cairo. I knew that Muslims prayed five times a day and I hoped
that the city would become quiet during
these five prayer times—but Cairo was
noisy, frenetic, vibrant, and chaotic
24/7. The streets and markets were
jammed with people shopping and buying food from carts. The cafés were
filled with men drinking tea, smoking
the shisha pipe, playing dominoes,
idling, and chatting. Men typically
walked three abreast on narrow streets,
and I had to step aside to allow them to
pass me. The energy of Cairo is intense.
Sometimes I walked to the university
with a scarf over my blonde hair to partially blend in with the Egyptian women
and hide. At first, it was unnerving to
not feel like an equal member of society.
About 30 American faculty members
arrived in September for a 2-year contract. The university provided 1 week of
orientation. We met some of the Egyptian faculty members, became familiar
with some Arabic phrases, learned how
to grocery-shop in our local neighborhoods, and tried to internalize some of
the policies of the university. Though
96% of the Egyptian population is
Islamic, during the course of our orientation, not one word was mentioned
about the Islamic culture, politics, or
environment of Egypt.
When the first day of class arrived, I
was simultaneously nervous and excited. I had already learned how to traverse
my way through the streets of Cairo
Initial Phase of Entry
The thought of teaching in an exotic
city such as Cairo triggered my imagination as well as my adrenaline. An
“official greeter” at the airport swept me
through customs. It is a common practice for companies to employ greeters so
that arrivals do not have to go through
the annoyances of long lines and baggage inspection. The taxi ride through
Cairo exceeded my mental images of
1001 Arabian Nights. The sun sparkled
on the many gold-domed mosques, and
exotic palm trees lined the roads leading
without getting run over (drivers often
do not stop for red lights or stop signs).
I could bargain with the street vendors
for food, and I was coping with the heat.
The dirty streets, pollution, and the
noise level produced by the continuous
honking of car horns were overwhelming at first, but I had gradually become
accustomed to them—and amused by
the small herds of sheep on the street
during various holidays. Probably the
only thing I knew how to do in this new
environment was to tie my shoelaces.
On the morning that I walked into class,
I assertively started out with introductions and described my facilitative
teaching style and my expectations. I
forgot my organizational development
(OD) training and did not ask what my
students expected of me. I soon found
out that the traditional style of learning
in Egypt is rote memorization. I came
to realize that the learning culture
appeared to reflect the religious, family,
and political environment of Egypt.
Critical thinking was not a priority in a
class that considered me the professor
and expert. My students expected me to
feed them the information that they
would memorize. My perception was
that my being female, American, and
relatively short in stature exacerbated
the negative reaction to my participative style. The students considered my
emphasis on empowerment as a sign of
my weakness. I encountered a classroom cultural divide that I had not
anticipated.
Adjusting and Living in Cairo
Undaunted, I had to learn how to
relate to my Egyptian students. I asked
one of my colleagues in the business
school to be my mentor. I visited one of
her classes to observe her style. She
energetically moved through the 50 minutes of class at a fast pace. Her style
included interaction with the students by
having them fill in the blanks of her partially completed sentences (e.g., “Many
employees are motivated by ____,” and
“It is important for the supervisor to
______.”). The students seemed motivated and happy to participate.
After that, I had to learn how to make
the American management principles
described in my textbooks fit my stuJuly/August 2005
323
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dents’ life experience and their culture.
Unlike many of my U.S. students, the
Egyptian students did not hold part-time
jobs. Consequently, it was difficult for
them to relate to most of the subject
matter. In the United States, when I
cover job analysis and job descriptions
in my Human Resource Management
course, I usually ask students to write a
job description for a salesperson at the
local department store, a restaurant
server, or bagger at a grocery store. I
asked my Egyptian students to write a
job description for their mothers. I was
really surprised at their enthusiasm and
at the excitement that buzzed through
the room. Moreover, the students
enjoyed presenting their information in
teams to the class. Teamwork seemed to
be another strategy that they were not
accustomed to but really enjoyed. I
encouraged the students to be creative
in their presentations, and they seemed
to really take pleasure from working
together and creating fun and informative presentations.
My approach to making business
concepts realistic for undergraduates in
the United States is to bring in courserelated articles from newspapers and
magazines such as the New York Times,
Fortune, or Business 2.0. In Cairo, I
found several Arabic newspapers written in English and a business magazine
called Egypt Today. This local information helped me to connect the concepts
that I was teaching to the business environment in Egypt. In addition, I wrote
short business cases that reflected Arabic culture and used Arabic names for
all the characters. I once again was
enjoying the creativity and stimulation
of being a college professor.
Every other Saturday, the university
provided a professional tour guide and
minivan to take us to see various places
in Cairo. I went with the Arab Language
Department faculty members and students to Siwa (near the border of Libya).
I went with other faculty members to
Alexandria and cruised down the Nile. I
walked through the streets of Cairo,
shopped and visited ancient mosques,
thoroughly enjoyed the Sufi dancers at a
historical mosque in the Khan Al Kalili,
and ate some delicious Arabic food.
Again, my experience matched the following observation made by Adler:
324
Journal of Education for Business
“After three to six months, most expatriates escape their culture shock and
begin living a more normal life abroad.
Little by little, they learn what the new
culture considers important and what it
considers meaningful” (2002, p. 266).
Goodbye, Cairo (Maa Essalaami:
Goodbye)
Halas! Enough! Prior to going to
Egypt, if anyone were to ask me
whether I was flexible and responsive to
change, I would have quickly responded, “Yes.” After a period of adjustment,
I believe that professionally I was able
to do a satisfactory job. Indeed, the 9
months that I spent in Cairo were a
wonderful adventure. Why did I leave?
Although I was starting to make sense
of the culture as a resident and professor, the continuous change and intensity
of Cairo were exhausting. During the
first 6 months, the American faculty
members bonded. We were all that we
had that was familiar. Then the couples
paired off, and the parties became old.
Faculty members who had been there
for a couple of years were trying to get
positions in the United States and were
finding it particularly challenging to be
in another country. At that time, it did
not seem to help their careers to be on
the other side of the world and “out of
the loop.” Similarly, many managers on
global assignments returned home and
found that they had suffered the “out-ofsight syndrome” (Hazzard, 1981).
Moreover, I did not feel comfortable
in Egypt when doing the many things
that I would do by myself at home. I felt
uncomfortable eating a meal in a restaurant, having tea at a café, or going to a
movie by myself. It was not a customary
practice for women to be seen alone in a
public place in Egypt. My Egyptian colleagues did not seem available for
friendship outside the university. It was
difficult to manage the stress of change
without a support system. Honestly,
after 9 months, I was anxious to go
home.
Repatriation
When I was preparing to leave Cairo
and return home to Atlanta, a colleague
mentioned that I might experience re-
entry shock. I said that that notion was
ridiculous. I could not wait to get home.
Once back in the States, however, I discovered that she was right. I had to find
a place to live, everything was more
expensive, and the great customer service that seemed nonexistent in Cairo
and on which I thought Americans prided themselves seemed to have disappeared. I had to clean my own house
after enjoying inexpensive housecleaning service, and I had to find another
job. I felt worldlier than many of my
friends, and after a while, they were not
interested in hearing every detail of my
trip abroad.
At the time, I was hard-pressed to
understand my frustration with and
intolerance of the Egyptian way of life.
For the first time in my professional
career, I felt that I had not stood up to
the challenge. After settling back into
my comfort zone, I decided to research
the process of expatriation and repatriation. As I read the business literature on
these processes as described for global
managers, I realized that I had had an
experience similar to those of managers
who returned early from their overseas
assignments.
In this article, I also discuss my
reflections on and understanding of my
experience in Cairo, their relation to
crosscultural literature, and my suggestions for embarking on a successful
overseas assignment. After studying the
impact of culture on the expatriation
process and my own change process, I
have enjoyed a positive Fulbright-Hays
experience in South Africa, a teaching
adventure in France, and an extraordinarily exciting and successful term at
the Indian Institute of Management
Bangalore. Overseas assignments are
always an adventure and fraught with
change. Now I feel that I am able to face
these challenges with more equanimity.
Understanding Culture
Culture, when used in a broader
sense, refers to the “collective programming of the mind which distinguishes
the members of one group or category
of people from another” (Hofstede,
1991, p. 5). Culture is learned behavior
that usually operates below the level of
consciousness because it involves
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
taken-for-granted assumptions about
how an individual perceives, thinks,
feels, and behaves. The forces that tend
to shape culture are religion, distribution of political power, history, and
physical surroundings. Essentially, culture determines the “shoulds” and
“oughts” of behavior. Had I compared
my own “shoulds” and “oughts” to
those of the Egyptians, I believe I would
have been better prepared to cope with
the challenges. When I was in Egypt, I
did not have the understanding or the
constructs to describe and organize
what was happening to me. Professionally, I perceived my role in the classroom to be that of a facilitator, a role not
well understood in a culture where individuals with power are perceived as distant. My experience was one that Bodycott and Walker (2000) have noted: “for
many teachers of higher education the
challenge of internationalization severely tests beliefs about their role as teachers and the approaches they adopt to
meet the needs of a changing student
clientele” (p. 81). They say that during
their experience of teaching overseas,
they began with an arrogant and
assertive style, expecting the students to
conform to it. Bodycott and Walker
have come to rethink their approach and
have developed an intercultural understanding to apply to their teaching practices. When I taught in France and
India, I retooled my teaching approach
and had a more relaxed attitude. I was
able to integrate—“go with the flow”—
and “do as the Romans do.”
Organizational culture is typically the
integration of societal and organizational values, attitudes, assumptions, and
expectations. The expatriate may be
faced with a difference in culture, which
manifests itself in attitudes about
authority, conception of self, ways of
dealing with conflict, relationships
between the individual and the group,
concepts of masculinity and femininity,
strategies for dealing with uncertainty,
and the expression of feelings. As a
businesswoman, consultant, and professor in the United States, I had taken for
granted my relatively equal status. I had
not thought through how I would
respond in a culture lacking the same
equality. Moreover, I did not have a support system in Cairo. To make matters
worse, the American and the Egyptian
faculty members seemed to be engaged
in a covert conflict regarding what I perceived to be culture-based politics. This
conflict was more ardently voiced during a team-building meeting on the differentials regarding salary and benefits.
Several weeks before I left, one of my
favorite students visited me in my office
for a chat. I never discussed politics or
religion with the students, and these
topics seemed to be taboo among my
colleagues. In the course of the student’s conversation with me, he said,
“You know we hate Jews.” I thought this
might be a splendid opportunity to share
with a student who probably never met
a Jew the fact that I was Jewish. I was
not in Egypt on a political mission, and
I was due to leave soon. My instinct for
self-preservation was to keep this information to myself. I did not respond to
his comment. I am not sure whether I
passed up an educational opportunity
for both of us.
Confronted by so much change and
differences in culture, I started doubting
my ability to be flexible and to cope.
Living in a developing country seemed
to challenge my judgments, and now I
am embarrassed to admit my ethnocentric beliefs. I have come to understand
that my frustration during my first
assignment to a developing country
hinged on my not understanding the
impacts of my culture, internalized and
taken for granted, and that of the host
culture. Through study and interaction
with a group of Arab friends in Atlanta,
I have found that Hofstede’s (1991)
words about “programming of the
mind” have taken on a new reality.
Proactive Return to Teaching
As a result of my experience in
Egypt, I have learned to be more
patient, compassionate, and more tolerant. I try to be more aware of my
own expectations and those of others. I
have become actively involved with
visiting Rotary and international students taking courses at my college.
They know from my experiences that I
understand many of their problems
with expatriation. I have begun several
research projects regarding crosscultural management and have developed
a very successful course, Managing
the Global Workforce. Early on, my
friends tired of my international stories, but now I have a regular and eager
audience of students. I emphasize that
we need to understand the components
of our culture and those of other cultures and collaboratively explore
strategies for effective partnerships.
Recommendations for Teaching
Overseas
Many professors teaching international management covet the real-world
experience as well as the exploits of
overseas travel. I recommend that any
professor teaching overseas apply the
success and failure stories of global
managers to themselves and read the
small body of literature on teaching
abroad. I suggest that they become
familiar with all the techniques of stress
management. I encourage them to be
prepared for the phases of culture
shock: (a) the honeymoon, in which
euphoria and adventure initially overshadow the mundane tasks of house
hunting, finding schools for children,
and finding acceptable food; and (b)
irritation and hostility, which involve
numerous adjustment problems. For
example, one’s student assistant might
state that she or he does not have time to
help; one may lack an assistant when
the copy machine may be located in
some mysterious place; one’s computer
might not have the needed software; one
may have difficulty adapting to a new
daily routine or to the climate change;
or one may be constantly challenged by
everything new.
When I was in Egypt, I was provided with a lovely furnished apartment
without a television. How will the faculty member feel about the lack of
such comforts as a TV, telephone,
Internet connection, washer/dryer, and
dishwasher? If you are going with a
spouse or family members, they must
anticipate the same kinds of preparation and adjustments. Learning the language of the host country is invaluable
not only for communication but also
for understanding some of the nuances
of the culture. Nationals typically
appreciate a visitor’s effort to speak
their language. Many studies indicate
July/August 2005
325
that those who do not adjust well
become homesick or bored; read
obsessively; sleep, drink, or eat excessively; or become generally irritable.
Marital stress and psychosomatic illness sometimes result. Certainly, I
have observed all of these symptoms in
both colleagues and myself.
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
CONCLUSION (Shookran: Thank
You)
I am grateful for my experience in
Cairo. It helped me divest myself of a
great deal of personal baggage and
opened the door to many discoveries. I
believe that now I really am more flexible. I also know the areas where I do
retain some rigidity and accept that char-
326
Journal of Education for Business
acteristic in myself as I do in others. We
live in a borderless world. How beautiful
that world is depends on our ability to
dismantle our own cultural fences. Success at global teaching is certainly about
our academic knowledge, but it is also
about our willingness to let go of much
that we think we know so that we can lay
hold of new understanding.
NOTE
I would especially recommend the following
readings: Adler (2002); Lane, DiStefano, and
Maznevski (2000); and Scarborough (2001).
REFERENCES
Adler, N. J. (2002). International dimensions of
organizational behavior. Mason, OH: SouthWestern.
Bodycott, P., & Walker, A. (2000). Teaching
abroad: lessons learned about inter-cultural
understanding for teachers in higher education.
Teaching in Higher Education, 5(1), 79–94.
Doblins, I. L. (1999). Financial rank high in 1999
global trends survey. ACA News, 42(8), 32–35.
Francesco, A., & Gold, B. A. (1998). International organizational behavior. Upper Saddle River,
NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Gregersen, H., Morrison, A. J., & Black, J. S.
(1998, Fall). Developing leaders for the global
frontier. Sloan Management Review, 40, 21–32.
Hazzard, M. S. (1981). A study of the repatriation
of the American international executive. New
York: Korn/Ferry International.
Hofstede, G. (1991). Culture and organizations
(software of the mind). London: McGraw-Hill.
Lane, H. W., DiStefano, J. J., & Maznevski, M. L.
(2000). International management behavior
(4th ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Lublin, J. S. (1992, August 4). Companies use
cross-cultural training to help their employees
adjust abroad. Wall Street Journal, pp. B1, B6.
Scarborough, J. (2001). The origins of cultural
differences and their impact on management.
Westport, CT: Quorum Books.
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural Journey
Bonnie Garson
To cite this article: Bonnie Garson (2005) Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural Journey, Journal of
Education for Business, 80:6, 322-326, DOI: 10.3200/JOEB.80.6.322-326
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.3200/JOEB.80.6.322-326
Published online: 07 Aug 2010.
Submit your article to this journal
Article views: 113
View related articles
Citing articles: 7 View citing articles
Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at
http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=vjeb20
Download by: [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji]
Date: 12 January 2016, At: 22:45
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
Teaching Abroad: A Cross-Cultural
Journey
BONNIE GARSON
Reinhardt College
Waleska, Georgia
B
efore 9/11, I was invited to teach in
the undergraduate school of business of a prestigious English-speaking
university in Cairo, Egypt. In this article, I reflect on the crosscultural journey
that I took as a single Jewish female
management professor in an Arab country whose population is approximately
96% Muslim and in a university whose
faculty is about 15% American and 85%
Egyptian. My purpose in this report was
to explore my own process of adapting
to academic employment and life in a
foreign country and, more important, to
derive meaning from my experience as a
professor of management and adult
learner.
As professors in the 21st century, we
are teaching management principles to
future global leaders who will experience cross-cultural challenges as well as
other issues involving diversity (e.g.,
gender, religion, race). In the 1999
Global Relocation Trends Survey
Report sponsored by Windham International, the Institute of International
Human Resources, and the National
Foreign Trade Council, 66% of the
respondents indicated that they expected an increase in expatriate activity
(Doblins, 1999). As professors, we are
availing ourselves of global teaching
assignments through a variety of opportunities such as the Fulbright Scholar
Program and the International Rotary
322
Journal of Education for Business
ABSTRACT. In this study, the author
explored (a) the impact of culture on
the process of adapting to academic
employment and life in Cairo, Egypt
and (b) the meaning derived from her
experience abroad as a professor of
management and adult learner. Experience with global travel may help
instructors empathize more with foreign students and expatriate managers
who are attending classes or executive
MBA programs in the United States.
In addition, the author sought to stimulate the sharing of similar experiences so that faculty members are better prepared to teach in foreign
countries and conduct research during
expatriation. She hopes to continue
the discussion regarding the transferability of American management theories to foreign countries.
Foundation. As a management consultant and professor whose teaching philosophy entails bridging the real business world and the academic theory of
organizational behavior, I knew that the
offered position at a university in Cairo
would enable me to experience globalization as an expatriate worker. This
opportunity would further afford me the
ability to create relevance in the classroom by sharing my experience of
working and living in another culture.
Through this qualitative report, I
hope to stimulate the sharing of similar
experiences so that we are better prepared to teach in foreign countries and
to conduct research in the area of expa-
triation. My experience also suggests
that we should continue to evaluate the
efficacy of transporting American management theories and practices embedded with Western values into foreign
countries.
Expatriation
According to crosscultural research,
30% of the corporate expatriates transferred overseas from the United States
do not perform adequately, and 25%
repatriate earlier than expected (Lublin,
1992). The cost of these failed foreign
assignments is estimated at $2.5 billion
annually. A 1997 study of Fortune 500
United States multinationals indicated
that 85% of the companies surveyed
lacked an adequate number of globally
competent executives (Gregersen, Morrison, & Black, 1998). The single most
frequent reason for failure was the
inability of global managers to adapt to
the culture of the host country.
My experience as an expatriate professor parallels the management literature focusing on the cycle of adjustment
in a foreign country and re-entry into
one’s home country (Adler, 2002;
Francesco & Gold, 1998; Lane, DiStefano, & Maznevski, 2000). There is a
dearth of research or training available
for expatriating professors and their
families. Although my experience is not
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:45 12 January 2016
unlike the experiences of expatriate
managers, little in the literature addresses the issues of gender and other areas
of diversity. According to Bodycott and
Walker (2000), most expatriates share
their experiences among themselves,
and few resources exist to help the expatriates make sense of the radical
changes that working overseas can
cause in their lives.
Arrival in Cairo (Ahlan Wa
Sahlan: Welcome)
to downtown Garden City, where I was
to reside. Some workers who were completing the final clean-up of my apartment welcomed me, and a vase filled
with two dozen roses perfumed my
large dining room. Because roses are
inexpensive in Cairo, I kept this vase
filled during my 9 months abroad.
According to Adler, “Expatriates enjoy
a great deal of excitement as they discover the new culture” (2002, p. 263).
Certainly, I felt this excitement on my
first day.
Preparing for the Trip
Experiencing Culture Shock
Before leaving for Cairo, I read the
wonderful poems written by the great
Sufi Rumi and the Lebanese author
Gibran, listened to Arabic music, and
read some of the history of Egypt. I
wanted to be prepared culturally. The
next challenge was to prepare for the
academic part of the trip. The university
was using many of the same American
textbooks used in most business schools
in U.S. colleges and universities.
Because I had taught these same courses at my university in Georgia, I expected that teaching in Cairo would be a
cakewalk, but I was also on a mission. I
knew that the business trend in Egypt at
that time was privatization and the creation of joint ventures with a variety of
U.S. corporations. I was planning to
enlighten the Egyptian students regarding the American way of doing business. I have always considered myself a
role model in the classroom. I try to use
a facilitative teaching style that models
a participative and empowering leader.
How ethnocentric and naïve I was!
Cairo is a city of 17 million people.
Right away, I realized that my preparation for Egypt was hardly adequate.
Although reading the poetry of Rumi
was uplifting, it did not prepare me for
everyday life in Cairo. I knew that Muslims prayed five times a day and I hoped
that the city would become quiet during
these five prayer times—but Cairo was
noisy, frenetic, vibrant, and chaotic
24/7. The streets and markets were
jammed with people shopping and buying food from carts. The cafés were
filled with men drinking tea, smoking
the shisha pipe, playing dominoes,
idling, and chatting. Men typically
walked three abreast on narrow streets,
and I had to step aside to allow them to
pass me. The energy of Cairo is intense.
Sometimes I walked to the university
with a scarf over my blonde hair to partially blend in with the Egyptian women
and hide. At first, it was unnerving to
not feel like an equal member of society.
About 30 American faculty members
arrived in September for a 2-year contract. The university provided 1 week of
orientation. We met some of the Egyptian faculty members, became familiar
with some Arabic phrases, learned how
to grocery-shop in our local neighborhoods, and tried to internalize some of
the policies of the university. Though
96% of the Egyptian population is
Islamic, during the course of our orientation, not one word was mentioned
about the Islamic culture, politics, or
environment of Egypt.
When the first day of class arrived, I
was simultaneously nervous and excited. I had already learned how to traverse
my way through the streets of Cairo
Initial Phase of Entry
The thought of teaching in an exotic
city such as Cairo triggered my imagination as well as my adrenaline. An
“official greeter” at the airport swept me
through customs. It is a common practice for companies to employ greeters so
that arrivals do not have to go through
the annoyances of long lines and baggage inspection. The taxi ride through
Cairo exceeded my mental images of
1001 Arabian Nights. The sun sparkled
on the many gold-domed mosques, and
exotic palm trees lined the roads leading
without getting run over (drivers often
do not stop for red lights or stop signs).
I could bargain with the street vendors
for food, and I was coping with the heat.
The dirty streets, pollution, and the
noise level produced by the continuous
honking of car horns were overwhelming at first, but I had gradually become
accustomed to them—and amused by
the small herds of sheep on the street
during various holidays. Probably the
only thing I knew how to do in this new
environment was to tie my shoelaces.
On the morning that I walked into class,
I assertively started out with introductions and described my facilitative
teaching style and my expectations. I
forgot my organizational development
(OD) training and did not ask what my
students expected of me. I soon found
out that the traditional style of learning
in Egypt is rote memorization. I came
to realize that the learning culture
appeared to reflect the religious, family,
and political environment of Egypt.
Critical thinking was not a priority in a
class that considered me the professor
and expert. My students expected me to
feed them the information that they
would memorize. My perception was
that my being female, American, and
relatively short in stature exacerbated
the negative reaction to my participative style. The students considered my
emphasis on empowerment as a sign of
my weakness. I encountered a classroom cultural divide that I had not
anticipated.
Adjusting and Living in Cairo
Undaunted, I had to learn how to
relate to my Egyptian students. I asked
one of my colleagues in the business
school to be my mentor. I visited one of
her classes to observe her style. She
energetically moved through the 50 minutes of class at a fast pace. Her style
included interaction with the students by
having them fill in the blanks of her partially completed sentences (e.g., “Many
employees are motivated by ____,” and
“It is important for the supervisor to
______.”). The students seemed motivated and happy to participate.
After that, I had to learn how to make
the American management principles
described in my textbooks fit my stuJuly/August 2005
323
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dents’ life experience and their culture.
Unlike many of my U.S. students, the
Egyptian students did not hold part-time
jobs. Consequently, it was difficult for
them to relate to most of the subject
matter. In the United States, when I
cover job analysis and job descriptions
in my Human Resource Management
course, I usually ask students to write a
job description for a salesperson at the
local department store, a restaurant
server, or bagger at a grocery store. I
asked my Egyptian students to write a
job description for their mothers. I was
really surprised at their enthusiasm and
at the excitement that buzzed through
the room. Moreover, the students
enjoyed presenting their information in
teams to the class. Teamwork seemed to
be another strategy that they were not
accustomed to but really enjoyed. I
encouraged the students to be creative
in their presentations, and they seemed
to really take pleasure from working
together and creating fun and informative presentations.
My approach to making business
concepts realistic for undergraduates in
the United States is to bring in courserelated articles from newspapers and
magazines such as the New York Times,
Fortune, or Business 2.0. In Cairo, I
found several Arabic newspapers written in English and a business magazine
called Egypt Today. This local information helped me to connect the concepts
that I was teaching to the business environment in Egypt. In addition, I wrote
short business cases that reflected Arabic culture and used Arabic names for
all the characters. I once again was
enjoying the creativity and stimulation
of being a college professor.
Every other Saturday, the university
provided a professional tour guide and
minivan to take us to see various places
in Cairo. I went with the Arab Language
Department faculty members and students to Siwa (near the border of Libya).
I went with other faculty members to
Alexandria and cruised down the Nile. I
walked through the streets of Cairo,
shopped and visited ancient mosques,
thoroughly enjoyed the Sufi dancers at a
historical mosque in the Khan Al Kalili,
and ate some delicious Arabic food.
Again, my experience matched the following observation made by Adler:
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Journal of Education for Business
“After three to six months, most expatriates escape their culture shock and
begin living a more normal life abroad.
Little by little, they learn what the new
culture considers important and what it
considers meaningful” (2002, p. 266).
Goodbye, Cairo (Maa Essalaami:
Goodbye)
Halas! Enough! Prior to going to
Egypt, if anyone were to ask me
whether I was flexible and responsive to
change, I would have quickly responded, “Yes.” After a period of adjustment,
I believe that professionally I was able
to do a satisfactory job. Indeed, the 9
months that I spent in Cairo were a
wonderful adventure. Why did I leave?
Although I was starting to make sense
of the culture as a resident and professor, the continuous change and intensity
of Cairo were exhausting. During the
first 6 months, the American faculty
members bonded. We were all that we
had that was familiar. Then the couples
paired off, and the parties became old.
Faculty members who had been there
for a couple of years were trying to get
positions in the United States and were
finding it particularly challenging to be
in another country. At that time, it did
not seem to help their careers to be on
the other side of the world and “out of
the loop.” Similarly, many managers on
global assignments returned home and
found that they had suffered the “out-ofsight syndrome” (Hazzard, 1981).
Moreover, I did not feel comfortable
in Egypt when doing the many things
that I would do by myself at home. I felt
uncomfortable eating a meal in a restaurant, having tea at a café, or going to a
movie by myself. It was not a customary
practice for women to be seen alone in a
public place in Egypt. My Egyptian colleagues did not seem available for
friendship outside the university. It was
difficult to manage the stress of change
without a support system. Honestly,
after 9 months, I was anxious to go
home.
Repatriation
When I was preparing to leave Cairo
and return home to Atlanta, a colleague
mentioned that I might experience re-
entry shock. I said that that notion was
ridiculous. I could not wait to get home.
Once back in the States, however, I discovered that she was right. I had to find
a place to live, everything was more
expensive, and the great customer service that seemed nonexistent in Cairo
and on which I thought Americans prided themselves seemed to have disappeared. I had to clean my own house
after enjoying inexpensive housecleaning service, and I had to find another
job. I felt worldlier than many of my
friends, and after a while, they were not
interested in hearing every detail of my
trip abroad.
At the time, I was hard-pressed to
understand my frustration with and
intolerance of the Egyptian way of life.
For the first time in my professional
career, I felt that I had not stood up to
the challenge. After settling back into
my comfort zone, I decided to research
the process of expatriation and repatriation. As I read the business literature on
these processes as described for global
managers, I realized that I had had an
experience similar to those of managers
who returned early from their overseas
assignments.
In this article, I also discuss my
reflections on and understanding of my
experience in Cairo, their relation to
crosscultural literature, and my suggestions for embarking on a successful
overseas assignment. After studying the
impact of culture on the expatriation
process and my own change process, I
have enjoyed a positive Fulbright-Hays
experience in South Africa, a teaching
adventure in France, and an extraordinarily exciting and successful term at
the Indian Institute of Management
Bangalore. Overseas assignments are
always an adventure and fraught with
change. Now I feel that I am able to face
these challenges with more equanimity.
Understanding Culture
Culture, when used in a broader
sense, refers to the “collective programming of the mind which distinguishes
the members of one group or category
of people from another” (Hofstede,
1991, p. 5). Culture is learned behavior
that usually operates below the level of
consciousness because it involves
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taken-for-granted assumptions about
how an individual perceives, thinks,
feels, and behaves. The forces that tend
to shape culture are religion, distribution of political power, history, and
physical surroundings. Essentially, culture determines the “shoulds” and
“oughts” of behavior. Had I compared
my own “shoulds” and “oughts” to
those of the Egyptians, I believe I would
have been better prepared to cope with
the challenges. When I was in Egypt, I
did not have the understanding or the
constructs to describe and organize
what was happening to me. Professionally, I perceived my role in the classroom to be that of a facilitator, a role not
well understood in a culture where individuals with power are perceived as distant. My experience was one that Bodycott and Walker (2000) have noted: “for
many teachers of higher education the
challenge of internationalization severely tests beliefs about their role as teachers and the approaches they adopt to
meet the needs of a changing student
clientele” (p. 81). They say that during
their experience of teaching overseas,
they began with an arrogant and
assertive style, expecting the students to
conform to it. Bodycott and Walker
have come to rethink their approach and
have developed an intercultural understanding to apply to their teaching practices. When I taught in France and
India, I retooled my teaching approach
and had a more relaxed attitude. I was
able to integrate—“go with the flow”—
and “do as the Romans do.”
Organizational culture is typically the
integration of societal and organizational values, attitudes, assumptions, and
expectations. The expatriate may be
faced with a difference in culture, which
manifests itself in attitudes about
authority, conception of self, ways of
dealing with conflict, relationships
between the individual and the group,
concepts of masculinity and femininity,
strategies for dealing with uncertainty,
and the expression of feelings. As a
businesswoman, consultant, and professor in the United States, I had taken for
granted my relatively equal status. I had
not thought through how I would
respond in a culture lacking the same
equality. Moreover, I did not have a support system in Cairo. To make matters
worse, the American and the Egyptian
faculty members seemed to be engaged
in a covert conflict regarding what I perceived to be culture-based politics. This
conflict was more ardently voiced during a team-building meeting on the differentials regarding salary and benefits.
Several weeks before I left, one of my
favorite students visited me in my office
for a chat. I never discussed politics or
religion with the students, and these
topics seemed to be taboo among my
colleagues. In the course of the student’s conversation with me, he said,
“You know we hate Jews.” I thought this
might be a splendid opportunity to share
with a student who probably never met
a Jew the fact that I was Jewish. I was
not in Egypt on a political mission, and
I was due to leave soon. My instinct for
self-preservation was to keep this information to myself. I did not respond to
his comment. I am not sure whether I
passed up an educational opportunity
for both of us.
Confronted by so much change and
differences in culture, I started doubting
my ability to be flexible and to cope.
Living in a developing country seemed
to challenge my judgments, and now I
am embarrassed to admit my ethnocentric beliefs. I have come to understand
that my frustration during my first
assignment to a developing country
hinged on my not understanding the
impacts of my culture, internalized and
taken for granted, and that of the host
culture. Through study and interaction
with a group of Arab friends in Atlanta,
I have found that Hofstede’s (1991)
words about “programming of the
mind” have taken on a new reality.
Proactive Return to Teaching
As a result of my experience in
Egypt, I have learned to be more
patient, compassionate, and more tolerant. I try to be more aware of my
own expectations and those of others. I
have become actively involved with
visiting Rotary and international students taking courses at my college.
They know from my experiences that I
understand many of their problems
with expatriation. I have begun several
research projects regarding crosscultural management and have developed
a very successful course, Managing
the Global Workforce. Early on, my
friends tired of my international stories, but now I have a regular and eager
audience of students. I emphasize that
we need to understand the components
of our culture and those of other cultures and collaboratively explore
strategies for effective partnerships.
Recommendations for Teaching
Overseas
Many professors teaching international management covet the real-world
experience as well as the exploits of
overseas travel. I recommend that any
professor teaching overseas apply the
success and failure stories of global
managers to themselves and read the
small body of literature on teaching
abroad. I suggest that they become
familiar with all the techniques of stress
management. I encourage them to be
prepared for the phases of culture
shock: (a) the honeymoon, in which
euphoria and adventure initially overshadow the mundane tasks of house
hunting, finding schools for children,
and finding acceptable food; and (b)
irritation and hostility, which involve
numerous adjustment problems. For
example, one’s student assistant might
state that she or he does not have time to
help; one may lack an assistant when
the copy machine may be located in
some mysterious place; one’s computer
might not have the needed software; one
may have difficulty adapting to a new
daily routine or to the climate change;
or one may be constantly challenged by
everything new.
When I was in Egypt, I was provided with a lovely furnished apartment
without a television. How will the faculty member feel about the lack of
such comforts as a TV, telephone,
Internet connection, washer/dryer, and
dishwasher? If you are going with a
spouse or family members, they must
anticipate the same kinds of preparation and adjustments. Learning the language of the host country is invaluable
not only for communication but also
for understanding some of the nuances
of the culture. Nationals typically
appreciate a visitor’s effort to speak
their language. Many studies indicate
July/August 2005
325
that those who do not adjust well
become homesick or bored; read
obsessively; sleep, drink, or eat excessively; or become generally irritable.
Marital stress and psychosomatic illness sometimes result. Certainly, I
have observed all of these symptoms in
both colleagues and myself.
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CONCLUSION (Shookran: Thank
You)
I am grateful for my experience in
Cairo. It helped me divest myself of a
great deal of personal baggage and
opened the door to many discoveries. I
believe that now I really am more flexible. I also know the areas where I do
retain some rigidity and accept that char-
326
Journal of Education for Business
acteristic in myself as I do in others. We
live in a borderless world. How beautiful
that world is depends on our ability to
dismantle our own cultural fences. Success at global teaching is certainly about
our academic knowledge, but it is also
about our willingness to let go of much
that we think we know so that we can lay
hold of new understanding.
NOTE
I would especially recommend the following
readings: Adler (2002); Lane, DiStefano, and
Maznevski (2000); and Scarborough (2001).
REFERENCES
Adler, N. J. (2002). International dimensions of
organizational behavior. Mason, OH: SouthWestern.
Bodycott, P., & Walker, A. (2000). Teaching
abroad: lessons learned about inter-cultural
understanding for teachers in higher education.
Teaching in Higher Education, 5(1), 79–94.
Doblins, I. L. (1999). Financial rank high in 1999
global trends survey. ACA News, 42(8), 32–35.
Francesco, A., & Gold, B. A. (1998). International organizational behavior. Upper Saddle River,
NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Gregersen, H., Morrison, A. J., & Black, J. S.
(1998, Fall). Developing leaders for the global
frontier. Sloan Management Review, 40, 21–32.
Hazzard, M. S. (1981). A study of the repatriation
of the American international executive. New
York: Korn/Ferry International.
Hofstede, G. (1991). Culture and organizations
(software of the mind). London: McGraw-Hill.
Lane, H. W., DiStefano, J. J., & Maznevski, M. L.
(2000). International management behavior
(4th ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Lublin, J. S. (1992, August 4). Companies use
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adjust abroad. Wall Street Journal, pp. B1, B6.
Scarborough, J. (2001). The origins of cultural
differences and their impact on management.
Westport, CT: Quorum Books.