An A to Z Guide to International Management, by Bocconi Alumnus Matteo Pellegrini

Needless of the umpteenth management handbook, the former President of Asia for Philip Morris International describes how he has experienced a multinational leadership career, which took him all over Europe and ultimately to Hong Kong, where he has recently announced his retirement. Personal life experiences along with an open-minded, curious attitude have made up the equipment that has allowed him to develop an effective emotional intelligence. It is really a small world from his perspective.

Is there a sort of to-do list to check in order to prepare for an international management experience correctly and be effective as a leader in a different cultural situation?

Being flexible and adaptable is obviously the first requirement. That involves being extremely open-minded with respect to the array of unexpected notions that one will inevitably come across, and consequently avoiding to make assumptions and to take things for granted, even though they might seem obvious at first glance. Indeed, another crucial prerequisite is being willing to know what you do not know, and accept that there is always going to be something new to learn. After my graduation, a one-year career in IBM and my MBA, I was hired by Philip Morris in Switzerland and I was moved to lead the markets of Portugal, Spain, France and Italy, and every time I moved to a new country I became aware of all the differences among those countries. When 12 years ago I was offered the opportunity to become President of Asia and moved to Hong Kong, I realized that those discrepancies were not as big as they used to seem, compared with Asia, which is of course very different from Europe as well as very diverse within itself, in terms of culture, traditions, religions, but also of markets and consumer trends. In a way I was born ready to face this kind of situation because I have been exposed to international mobility since a very early age, given that my father was an expatriate to France and to the US and by 16 I was already fluent in 3 languages. On account of my personal experience it is not surprising that it did not take more than 10 minutes before I accepted the Hong Kong opportunity. And yet, once I started to work in Asia, whenever I introduced myself in a new country I would apologize for the cultural mistakes that I was going to make and ask everybody to advise me in every possible way in order to avoid being offensive to the local culture. As a matter of fact, local people are an invaluable source of cultural knowledge and it is fundamental for a leader to be open to their advice and feedback – which often need to be encouraged in the fairly hierarchical Asian tradition. Ultimately, getting to know what you do not now is the biggest challenge for every newcomer, and being respectful and willing to learn provides you with an invaluable personal enrichment.

Global companies often have to approach a gap between corporate culture and local cultures. How can you approach these kind of delicate circumstances and keep being respectful?

As a leader, it is not easy to find the right balance between implementing the organization's directives while respecting the local mentality. In my experience, a method that consistently serves the purpose is showing that corporate culture has nothing to do with personal beliefs, religions and traditions, but rather with a set of global values like honesty, integrity and transparency, which are recognized across cultures. It is about an ethics that is already part of the personality of the people we hire and therefore will overlay and not replace their personal culture.

As an international leader, do you reckon that it would be beneficial for global companies to develop a transnational common language that could be equally intelligible to managers and employees around the world?

Every multinational organization has a common language that can be heard in every single office, and that is the technical, specific jargon. However, personally I believe that learning the local language gives you a competitive advantage, first of all because it shows that you, as an individual, respect and appreciate the culture you are operating in. Even more importantly, learning a language enables you to really understand the culture and the whole range of its nuances. Being aware of those nuances earns you respect and credibility and it is also the most powerful tool to motivate people to perform according to the corporate guidelines. This is something that I experienced first-hand while working in Europe and that I am witnessing here in Asia.

It seems that language can act as a tool of negotiation and motivation. Does any sort of a universal method to motivate people exist?

Along with mastering the language and the cultural nuances, there are some aspects of motivation which are related to our nature of human beings rather than to different countries and traditions. Everybody becomes extremely motivated if they are rewarded when they are successful and if they are given the wider context of the frame in which they are operating, in other words if they know what their role is and why it is important to the company. These are elements that work regardless of the environment, be it cultural or corporate, and this is why I feel that what lies behind intercultural skills is actually emotional intelligence.