The global business guide to “reading the air”

An American attends a meeting in Paris with a room full of his French colleagues. At the end of the meeting, the host stands up, claps her hands together and declares, “Et voilà!” Everyone smiles, shakes hands and leaves. The American feels extremely confused. He can’t be certain what was agreed — or exactly when the agreement even happened. What are his next steps meant to be?

A Swiss executive walks into a room of his direct reports in the Beijing office of his global company. The Chinese employees listen intently to the 40-minute presentation that he gives, complete with agenda-setting slides, frequent recaps, and summaries. Later, one of these employees confides to a colleague that she wasn’t impressed. She felt the executive was dumbing things down, patronizing them, and didn’t say much of substance.

As New York Times bestselling author Erin Meyer explained in her fascinating keynote at DeepL Dialogues, incidents like these happen every day — in fact every hour — within international organizations all over the world. They happen when people from low-context cultures encounter colleagues, customers, or partners from high-context cultures (more on that below). Gaps in how these different cultures communicate undermine international business relationships, lead to confusion and misunderstandings, and get in the way of collaboration and productivity. And these gaps occur without anybody realizing what’s really going on, and why.

What are low- and high-context cultures?

Members of low-context cultures prioritize absolute certainty that people understand what they say, and leave no room for ambiguity. Erin describes how, when giving a presentation, they first tell people what they’re going to tell them, then tell them what they want to tell them, and then tell them what they’ve just told them. The United States, the lowest-context culture of all, epitomizes this approach. At the end of meetings, there are notes. There are next steps. Nothing is left to chance.

In high-context cultures, there’s no need for such repetition because members of a shared culture can assume others can read their intentions, even when they don’t express them explicitly. The joy of communication in these cultures comes from this unspoken understanding. It gives depth, adds layers of meaning, helps to form stronger relationships, and means that members of the culture can communicate extremely efficiently. In Japan, which Erin identifies as having the highest-context culture, there’s a distinct term for this kind of communication; it’s known as “reading the air”, or seeing the meaning between the lines.

In her keynote address, Erin summarizes where different countries fall on the spectrum of high- to low-context communication. As a quick rule of thumb, colleagues from Latin, African or Asian cultures (think France, Italy, Kenya, China or Korea, as well as Japan) are more likely to expect you to read between the lines of what they say. Those from Anglo Saxon or Germanic cultures (Australia, Canada, The Netherlands and Germany, as well as the US and UK) are more likely to appreciate simplicity and clarity.

Bridging cultural gaps through technology and understanding

Breaking down cultural barriers in how people communicate is distinctly different from breaking down language barriers — but as Erin made clear in her keynote, it’s a task that Language AI technology can still help with. The greater the clarity, accuracy, and contextual understanding of translations, the more potential colleagues have for reading the air, or filling in the gaps for those unable to. In virtual and face-to-face meetings, live translations that are close to the speed of speech enhance participants’ ability to decode the different conversational signals that people send. In order to leverage this potential, though, it helps to understand the different communication cultures you’re engaging with.

As Erin emphasizes, neither high- nor low-context communication is objectively right or wrong. Both have their distinct advantages, and both work brilliantly in their respective cultural context. They also make absolute sense given the cultural history and identity of different countries. For instance, Japan is the world’s highest-context culture because it’s an island nation formed of people living in close, shared proximity for thousands of years. The United States is the lowest-context culture on earth because it’s been formed over a few hundred years of intense mixing of cultures and languages, in which simplifying is the best way to be understood.

Avoiding cultural misunderstanding in international meetings

Assemble an international meeting of people from different high- and low-context cultures, though, and these cultural communication differences quickly start to get in the way of things. High-context communicators might feel patronized and irritated by low-context communicators repeating themselves or stating the obvious. Similarly, low-context communicators might think their high-context colleagues are being deliberately opaque and keeping things from them.

Avoiding these potential misunderstandings starts with an awareness that can they exist. 

Once you’re aware of the different ways that colleagues in a meeting might communicate, you can start to work around them.

For example, if you’re a high-context manager meeting with low-context colleagues:

• Include more signposting and recaps in presentations than you instinctively would
• Go through your notes to find where you might express things more explicitly and simply

And if you’re a low-context person meeting with high-context colleagues:

• Try to observe how people say things as well as what they say
• Pick up on as many different unspoken cues as you can
• Don’t be afraid to ask questions if it feels like something is being left unsaid 

Mastering multicultural meetings

These considerations are especially critical for international organizations that frequently host meetings with a mix of different cultures represented. When different high-context cultures get together, the potential for misunderstanding is greatest of all. When high- and low-context colleagues share a meeting, it’s often low-context cultures that seem to push their point of view more strongly. This can lead to valuable perspectives of those from high-context cultures being missed or lost in the discussion.

The solution that Erin recommends is to mix a low-context framework for meetings with a high-context listening style. Some examples include: 

• Structure your meetings with recaps to help your low-context colleagues
• Make time to ask questions of higher-context participants who might appear to have less to say — on the surface, at least
• Ask follow-up questions of high-context colleagues to explore what they mean, and help to make their ideas more explicit to others

Leveraging Language AI to bridge cultural gaps

How does Language AI technology help to overcome these cultural barriers? As Language AI platforms evolve to not only translate words but also convey cultural nuance, their contribution grows. The more contextually aware translations are, the easier it is for people to pick up on the nuances of what others are saying. As DeepL’s models advance, they give more and more assistance to colleagues trying to read between the lines of what others have said. 

This becomes even more valuable with a technology like DeepL Voice for Meetings, which delivers accurate, real-time translations of what someone is saying, in multiple languages. The ability to follow conversations in real time makes it far easier to read colleagues’ body language, and it increases collaboration and engagement by making it easier to ask follow-up questions that help clarify meaning, if needed.

One of the great things about working across language barriers is that it creates the opportunity to bridge cultural divides. As DeepL CEO Jarek Kutylowski recently explained in his interview on Bloomberg Daybreak, learning languages enables you to “think in different cultures”. This is an invaluable skill for international colleagues; understanding languages and cultural nuances accurately in real time builds more productive, collaborative and gratifying professional relationships that also lead to greater efficiency and profitability for the business at large.