Finding belonging halfway across the world

A few years ago I researched cosmopolitanism, which basically is a philosophy or worldview that emphasises the importance of recognising and respecting the diversity of cultures and identities that make up our global community. It is based on the belief that all human beings have inherent value and dignity, regardless of their nationality, ethnicity, religion,…

Power & Control

Welcome to the third blog on the subject of diversity, equity, inclusion & belonging. For those who missed part I & II: in part I the subject of diversity & inclusion was unravelled. The main outtake here is that we need equivalency to make sure discrimination and power abuse are not disguised as something good…

What do you know about equity & belonging?

In my last blog I wrote about Inclusion & Diversity I explained that diversity refers to the variety of differences among individuals in a group and inclusion refers to creating an environment where all individuals feel valued, respected, and supported, regardless of their differences. These terms are often used in combination with equity and belonging.…

Diversity & Inclusion

Diversity and inclusion are hot topics that together create lots of search quests & questions online. In fact if you would put this into a figure, Answer the Public says it would look something like this: Answer the public To me this variety of questions shows that the subject needs some clarification and explanation, so…

How to align your corporate culture towards business success?

A strong organisational culture is the key to a successful business to many leaders in business. Therefore, corporate culture plays a key role in supporting business strategy. Organisational culture is, simply put, "the way we do things around here". It's about the ways in which a company conducts itself as a whole, including all it's…

Cultural literacy

This blog has been discussing intercultural (mis)communication for a few years now. What hasn't had a lot of attention yet though, are the expectations when it comes to the ability of people to engage with traditions and activities of people who come from different cultural backgrounds. Since this subject plays a big rol in intercultural…

World café

In my last blog I discussed intercultural dialogue, and I gave you three practical methods to facilitate opportunities for dialogue: 1.    Experiential learning. Get to know your host country. Build traditions together with your team. Highlight cultural aspects of the host country and invite everyone to talk about their cultural backgrounds. 2.    Art & music. Encourage people to provoke…

Is your team ready for intercultural dialogue?

How to facilitate opportunities for dialogue in a culturally diverse team? Making everyone's voice in your team heard and understood by facilitating team building, communication, and open dialogue! This blog provides three different practical methods to facilitate opportunities for dialogue in a culturally diverse team. It also will give insights in cultural peculiarities based on…

We welcome all

A while ago I addressed social inclusion, this blog will continue on that subject by expanding the subject to social and cultural diversity and it's implications in the Netherlands. First off, what is social diversity? Social diversity refers to a variety of individuals when it comes to race, religion, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, gender, language, sexual…

You might sabotage yourself without knowing

Making intercultural communication effective is key when it comes to improving productivity & overall performance in diverse teams. Often enough though, without the intention or even knowing, we sabotage our own effective listening. How do we do this? When you rethink conversations that took place in intercultural settings the level of sabotage can be reduced…