Encouraging participation — Cross-Cultural Meetings part 9

This article is part of a series on effective meetings between Japanese and non-Japanese.

For many Japanese, participating in a meeting means showing up for it. However, from a western perspective, truly participating in a meeting involves “making a contribution” – in other words, saying something. Western meetings are centered on discussion, and it’s felt that everyone in the meeting needs to participate for it to be successful. Everyone’s ideas are considered necessary to reach the best conclusion. Taken from the opposite point of view, westerners believe that the reason someone would attend a meeting is to participate in the discussion. If you’re not going to say anything, why be there? Why not just read the minutes?

However, not everyone feels comfortable speaking up in a meeting. Glib and talkative people tend to dominate meetings, making it difficult for quieter people to get a word in edgewise. And when cultural and language differences are added in, the situation becomes even more complicated. For example, when Japanese are meeting with non-Japanese and the meeting is held in English (or other foreign language), the Japanese tend to be focused on understanding what was being said. Unlike native speakers, it’s difficult for them to simultaneously listen to what is being said and to think of what they’d like to say next. Typically, Japanese will need a few moments to digest what was just said and prepare their response or contribution. Unfortunately, the native speakers have usually moved forward with the conversation long before the Japanese participants have a chance to do that.

Cultural differences are also behind the difficulties that many Japanese face in participating in meetings the way that westerners would like. In many cases, when westerners are really excited about a topic, they start speaking rapidly, with no pause between speakers, or with people talking over one another. For Japanese who are conditioned not to interrupt, and to wait until others are finished talking before they begin speaking, it feels very unnatural to jump into an ongoing conversation. Also, many Japanese tend to be self-critical, thinking that others won’t find their views worthwhile. They fear that they will be criticized if they say something that is deemed to be of little value, so they usually stay quiet to be on the safe side. (This is in contrast to the tendency of many westerners, particularly my fellow Americans, whose default assumption tends to be that whatever they are thinking must be of great interest and value to everyone and thus certainly should be vocalized!)

If you are the meeting leader, one technique you can use to encourage participation from members who are quieter is to call on individuals directly. If someone has not been talking, you can ask something like this:

• “Susan, do you have anything to say?”
• “Yamada-san, would you like to make a comment?”
• “Keiko, do you have any thoughts about this to share?”
• “John, is there anything you would like to add?”

Typically, when someone is called on in this way, they will need a few moments to pull their thoughts together, so be sure to restrain others from trying to jump in at this time.

For more on how to make your cross-cultural meetings effective, get a copy of our free bilingual ebook here.