Cultural differences in EU projects

Part 7-Switzerland

I have to admit that what I know about Swiss people mostly comes from short holiday/school experiences, not working/project relations.
Switzerland’s participation rate in EU research is quite good, so sooner or later our paths will cross hopefully. Based on the descriptions I have read or heard from people living there, the picture is not that positive. I would like to note in advance, that my limited experience with Swiss people in projects is much better.

Four language communities live in Switzerland – German, French, Italian and the Romansch. Culturally they are integrated but also separated a little bit, which makes it hard to describe their cultural identity. They believe in commodity and security. Their thinking is logical, things are in order in Switzerland (the Pascal programming language has been developed by a Swiss). This also results in loyalty or better to say solidarity to the system, administration. They are creative in industries, which do not change their system, challenge their society – watches, knives, programming, zipper zips, chocolate, etc.

The need for security comes with the lack of trust in the others unfortunately, not only in foreigners, but also neighbours, fellow citizens. People moving to Switzerland for work or better living might see this behavior as socially excluding. Some use the word ‘police state’.

They do not see life as an open place of opportunities, they are more narrow-minded, keeping the rules, focus on security, precise logic. This is slowly changing with the new generations growing up.

The neutrality of Swiss can easily turn into or seen as disinterest, coldness. EU projects require hard commitment and a little passion as well. What you might keep in mind that disinterest does not mean the lack of commitment.

Swiss people have a strict sense of time, understanding of deadlines, which is generally good, but EU projects have to be managed with certain flexibility. At least one partner will keep all deadlines for sure. The Swiss in business are detailed, thorough, cautious, accurate, tiring negotiation partners, fair bargainers. They value consensus-building and group decision-making. They will come well prepared to the meetings, they will see no need for improvisation of any kind. You might prepare yourself for longer discussions, questions on details before the meeting. Do not ignore these questions, don’t try ice-breaking with a joke, and don’t stop the discussion aggressively.

None of the authors describing Switzerland seem to admit fully understanding this nation or specifically liking their behaviour on an average day.

Citizens on the other hand are satisfied; they are quite a happy population in Europe. That includes also the around 1 million foreigners living in Switzerland.

In summary:

• Treat them with respect, always be well prepared when meeting them
• Do not pressure small talks, go straight to the point
• Be happy to have them in the project, they will do the job by the due deadline

Sources: http://www.communicaid.com (Sarah Goldberg); Richard Hill, We Europeans (1997)

Ms. Gabriella Lovasz

Do you know Swiss people better? Please share with us!

European Geothermal Congress 2013-the networking event

The European Geothermal Congress 2013 this year was held in Pisa, Italy and being the coordinator of a project relevant in its topic it was a must to attend and get familiar with the latest trends and innovations in this realm for future project ideas and also to liaise with the most prominent representatives of this industry in Europe.

The four-day-long event couldn’t have served the above mentioned purposes better. Each day of the congress started with a few keynote speeches for all the participants covering the geothermal industry in general, its current state-of-play and also bringing into to the forefront some really cutting edge technologies which may boost the industry and help to open up new avenues broadening the use of geothermal applications in the future.

The keynote speeches were followed by various parallel sections about every possible aspect of the geothermal industry such as geothermal markets, regulations, incentives and R&D needs, resource assessment and EGS in general, ground source heat pumps and their design, geothermal applications, drilling and operation, geophysics etc. This enormously wide array of topics combined with the high quality of the presentations provided within each of the sessions allowed even the pickiest participant to find a few topics of his/her personal interest; scientist or economist, geologist or geophysicist did not matter.

Such a conference cannot be complete without providing the opportunity for the participants to interact with each other, to exchange views and to further improve their professional network. It was very cool to see (this being my very first of such events) how similar events in the past helped to build this community, where some people greet each other as old friends while they are totally open to accept the newcomers in their lines. The social event – hosted in the gorgeous setting of one of the largest monastery complexes in Italy – served exactly this purpose. You really had to work hard on not to get in touch with people you never met before even if you were part of a larger group. The tables were arranged in a fashion to prevent the close sitting of already tight groups and to promote the initiation of new connections.

That is how I ended up with a guy coming all the way from Australia only to attend this event. Their future plans in the field of geothermal exploration and utilisation along with the fact that the World Geothermal Congress in 2015 will be held in Melbourne gave us plenty of topics to cover over a few glasses of Chianti!:)

The amazing part about this whole networking is that it will not end in the exchange of business cards, because if you keep attending such events in the future those business cards will evolve into personal relationships, hence friendships, and probably that is a very important aspect of these conferences.

Apart from receiving updates on the current status of your fields of interest/profession you can boost your interpersonal relations which may result in a closer cooperation or even in a joint project eventually.

Not to mention that you can slip into the conversation the description of your own project, raising awareness on it and you can target your dissemination in a much more focused way rather than just leaving leaflets on the desk for anyone to take and maybe garbage it in a few hours.

It was a great thing to happen and I am already looking forward for the next event where I can get even more out of it now that I started to understand the rules of the game!

Mr. Istvan Pari