6. Gather experience to negotiate successfully abroad

Negotiation is a difficult art to master, especially if you regularly find yourself dealing with people from different cultures. Indeed, there are as many different negotiating styles as there are potential markets to conquer.

A Frenchman will tend to develop a distributive negotiating style, which can be fatal when dealing with a Chinese counterpart.

Culture has a definite impact on the negotiation dynamics implemented by different interlocutors. In particular, it has been shown that two individuals from the same culture do not negotiate in the same way when confronted with interlocutors from a different culture. But it has also been observed that many negotiations between different cultures frequently fail because of a failure to avoid certain obvious cultural faux pas.

For example, it is essential to know whether...