Developing Successful Relationships with Indian Colleagues

Communicaid

Communicaid is a global culture and communication skills consultancy that assists the world’s leading organisations to mitigate the risks and maximise the

opportunities of working in a complex and ever-changing international environment. We work with international organisations such as Corus to

provide a complete suite of consultancy services as wellas targeted intercultural, language and communication skills training.

Corus

Prior to its acquisition by Tata Steel, one of the world’s most geographically diversified steel producers, with operations in 26 countries and commercial offices in over 35 countries, Corus was Europe’s second largest steel producer. Born out of the 1999 merger of British Steel and Koninklijke Hoogovens, Corus subsequently adopted Tata Steel in Europe as its new identity in September 2010.

Training Objectives

The core aims of the programme were:

•Toincrease understanding of India, particularly Tata Steel’s locations•Toraiseawarenessof Indian cultural values and working styles

•Toprovideadvice,tips and practical strategies on how best to develop working relationships with Indian counterparts

Challenges

Key challenges were seen as:

•Designingaflexible workshop that would be relevant for all levels of Corus staff•Ensuringadelivery format that was engaging and highly interactive•Incorporating information about Tata Steel’s corporate culture and brand values

To coincide with Corus’ acquisition by Tata Steel, the company approached Communicaid to provide an Indian cultural awareness raising intervention for all staff, fromshopfloortoseniormanagement.As most staff had little or no exposure to India or Indian business culture, it was important that this first workshop wasdesigned as an awareness raising introduction to Indian culture, business practices and customs.

Helping Corus to Build Successful Relationships with Indian Colleagues

Training Approach

Communicaid recommended group sizes of no more than 15 delegates to allow formaximum participation and interaction. Detailedconversations with Corus’ human resources personnel enabledCommunicaid to design adynamic awareness raising workshop which includedspecific information on Tata Steel’s geographies and brand values. Initially the programme was offered to all Londonstaff interested in learning more about their Indiancounterparts. Based on the success of these firstprogrammes, Communicaid was then approached by teams at other Corus locations across the UK, including Port Talbot and Scunthorpe, to adapt anddeliver the workshop to meet their requirements. Since then, training has also been provided to Indian colleagues working on secondment in the UK.

Our Solution

Communicaid designed interactive workshops based on the following key components:

•Contextandbackground to India, including religion, geography and

politics•Anin-depth understanding of underlying attitudes, values and behaviours•Insightsintoworking practices, structure, hierarchy and etiquette in Indian organisations•Aninitialunderstanding of Tata Steel and its brand values

Results

The workshops gavedelegates the essential knowledge and skills to understand Indian business culture and build initial relationships with their colleagues at Tata Steel. Several months later, most delegates had had their first experiences of communicating with new Indian colleagues. Corus then commissionedCommunicaid to facilitate a more advanced workshop for those employees working more closely with Indian colleagues based on practical case studies and evaluation of experiences so far. This allowed delegates to assess their learning to-date, apply it to their own context and develop further strategies for building more successful relationships with Indian colleagues.

Communicaid has provided informative

Indian cultural awareness programmes,

which are perfectly aligned with our

objective of providing practical advice, tips

and strategies on how best to develop

successful working relationships with our

Tata counterparts

Annanya SarinHead of Communications

Corus

Experience Innovation Impact

LONDON

Communicaid Mitre House

12-14 Mitre StreetLondon EC3A 5BU

United Kingdom

PARIS

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France

BRUSSELS

Communicaid6th Floor

Rue Guimard/Guimardstraat, 91040 Brussels

Belgium

FRANKFURT

CommunicaidMainzer Landstraße, 27-31

60329 FrankfurtGermany

NEW YORK

CommunicaidRockefeller Center, 7th Floor

1230 Avenue of the AmericasNew York, NY 10020

U.S.A

T: +44 (0)20 3370 8500F: +44 (0)20 3370 8501E: info@communicaid.comW: www.communicaid.com

T: +33 (0)1 77 71 25 85F: +33 (0)1 77 71 25 86E: info@communicaid.frW: www.communicaid.fr

T: +32 (0)2 808 31 90F: +32 (0)2 808 31 91E: info@communicaid.beW: www.communicaid.be

T: +49 (0)69 274 015 259F: +49 (0)69 274 015 183E: info@communicaid.deW: www.communicaid.de

T: +1 212 618 6369F: +1 212 618 6309E: info@communicaid.comW: www.communicaid.com

©istockphoto.com/OlegFedorenko©Communicaid Group Ltd. 2013