We argue here that the concerns interculturalists express about their commercial relationships are indicative of a collective image they have of themselves (a form of professional identity) and of their clients. In the previous section, we saw that the community feels responsible for a particular content: personal growth, transformational experience, intercultural awareness, and sensitivity (Berardo
2008). However, some see their clients as hampering the realisation of ‘good’ training content with their corporate concerns of return on investment or effectiveness and impact. In addition, conversations denote that some interculturalists feel limited responsibility to the client firm. As long as they can keep their own business going, some have expressed a preference of responsibility towards the beneficiaries of their training: the trainees, the persons, and not the organisation. Finally, interculturalists discuss the possibility that the knowledge they diffuse can be used for manipulative or exploitative purposes, while the claimed purpose of the intercultural community is the contribution to better understanding between people (see below). This reveals a suspicious or critical stance towards clients and clients’ objectives.
We argue the reasons for such a relationship and view of their client is linked with the self-portrayal interculturalists sketch of themselves when they actively construct their image (conference programs, websites, internal communications) and in differentiation talks, where they tend to present themselves in opposition to another. We show that in collective conversations this ‘other’ (thus the one who the interculturalists are not) is precisely their client, or briefly said: the corporate environment.
The Claimed Humanist Identity of the Group
Intercultural dialogue and building bridges between people from different backgrounds is at the core of the advanced community’s ideal (or ideology) in its self-portrayal (Pusch
2004) and in official statements. Main themes with which interculturalists work include cultural awareness, mutual understanding, social justice, and even world peace. The intercultural work as well as the organisation SIETAR has their roots in foreign student services and Peace Corps work (Dahlén
1997; Pusch
2004). SIETAR asserts in its mission and vision statements its adherence to humanist and pacifist principles. For example, SIETAR USA (
2008) ‘believe(s) that we must all work towards effective and peaceful relations among the peoples of the world (…) It is a collective work that requires the efforts of many caring and concerned individuals’. The Intercultural Communication Institute, with its tight connections with SIETAR communities, insisted in its 2012 New Year’s greetings to ‘contribute to deeper understanding and reduced conflict among peoples of different cultures’. SIETAR Europa (
2011) ‘subscribes to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and works towards the elimination of every kind of discrimination’. The focal point of the conferences (e.g. ‘Human Rights’ for SIETAR France 2010 annual meeting), the keynote speakers, and round tables can be linked to persons or organisations involved in resistance to oppression, human rights activism, or anti-racial movements. In SIETAR, these references to meta-discourses on tolerance, integration, and resistance to injustice express the idea that ‘interculturalists have a mission to fulfil spreading the word of intercultural communication to make the world a better place to live in’ (Dahlén
1997, p. 41). The humanist ethos of the interculturalists constantly transpires in workshops and collective conversations and is presented as an ‘ideal’, as expressed in the following quote:
When we have diversity and respect, this makes for synergy and creative solutions. Perhaps we all, as citizens of the world, should be concerned about becoming actively involved in challenging oppression, wherever we see it, be it in the form of economic exploitation or even down to standing up for a colleague who is being bullied at work. Rose, entrepreneur (DIP)
In sum, we argue that, with such claims and discursive constructions, the group is developing not only an identity but also more specifically cultivating an ethical identity that places strong emphasis upon humanist ethos with the themes of responsibility towards the other, understanding, and respect. This characteristic of the professional group is both ‘distinguished’ (Whetten
2006, p. 223) and also, as we show next, distinguishing.
Who the Interculturalists Say They ‘Are Not’
When narrating her numerous years of experience in SIETAR France and Europa, entrepreneur Marie-Claire commented in 2010: ‘In the beginning it was tripartite: one-third of researchers, one-third HRM [Human Resource Management practitioners] and one-third consultants or coaches. Now, all HRM people are gone’. There were few direct representatives of the corporate context currently present in the SIETAR events we attended. As a result, the corporate context is neither directly nor strongly represented among the interculturalists. Rather, it is represented by few HRM representatives, and by interculturalists who work much with corporations such as successful entrepreneurs or gurus. If we focus upon collective conversations such as workshops or conference sessions, the portrait they sketch of the corporate context or corporate HRM appears interestingly coherent, thus, indicating a form of collective identity discourse. This corporate context is outlined as instrumental and is in opposition to the interculturalists’ humanist ethos.
During the SIETAR Europa
2011 congress, the head of the famous corporate training centre of a large multi-national company described the philosophy behind their intercultural training: ‘Everything we do has to be linked to (have an) impact on the products, impact on sales […] and we measure this’. He later on summarised the changes in the field of intercultural training over the past 10 years, and dramatised by stating: ‘Now [interculturalists] need to be hyper professional, [it has changed] from
Kultur Romantik to professionals oriented toward business and results’. The session facilitator at the SIETAR USA 2011 conference session on diversity and global leadership who works in the North American HRM department of a well-known multi-national corporation explained in detail how to adopt a corporate narrative. She devoted time to show the contrast between the audience’s spontaneous association of ‘diversity and global leadership’ with words such as ‘acceptance’, ‘understanding’, ‘inclusion’, ‘synergy’, and ‘multiple viewpoints’. She recommended using the ideas and terminology of ‘compliance’, ‘representation’, ‘employees’ attraction and retention’, ‘employees’ productivity’, ‘innovation’ and ‘corporate image’ instead. She argued that these principles reflect the reality of corporate HRM and should serve as a guide for selling intercultural products within the corporate context.
Famous interculturalists too, especially
gurus, partake in the diffusion of this instrumental image of HRM. Some have been very successful at developing their own training material, training models, or measurement tools that they sell to companies and other interculturalists through accreditation trainings. During a training session at the SIETAR USA 2007 conference on interculturalists’ work with companies, a
guru explicitly addressed the theme of cultural awareness: one of the core distinctive missions that interculturalists perceive they have (Berardo
2008), and authoritatively opposed it to a corporate logic: ‘You should not make people [culturally] aware. You have to make them effective’. Another interculturalist among the
gurus explained at a conference workshop (SIETAR USA 2011): ‘We have to have the [cultural] insights, but also the means to show corporations that, given our insights, they can get to their goals faster or cheaper’. Training provided by an upcoming European trainer (
entrepreneur) during a SIETAR France event (2010) devoted a half-day session to the difficulty of combining both the ‘idealist’ views on the intercultural work (‘anti-discrimination’, ‘human rights’, ‘equality’) and what can be called strategic HRM (‘competences’, ‘benefits’, ‘business case’). The trainer’s rationalisation recommended the participants keep these two notions separate or, even better, not mention the idealist view since the terms are ‘so loaded (…); they create a big smoke screen’ and can jeopardise the conversation with corporate clients and, therefore, the training.
We call ‘privileged voices’ those who are seen as knowing the corporate conditions and are viewed as being an authority, and given prominence in discussions. These voices can sketch a picture of commercial business environment with traits of return on investment or employee performance. Some interculturalists perceive these traits as standing in opposition to their convictions. During a pre-conference workshop (SIETAR USA 2011 Master workshop), an activist specialising in diversity management, who attended the session to professionalise her business, said: ‘It would feel like selling my soul to use words like bottom line, profit, and return on investment’. If she were to address private clients, she faces the assumed necessity to fit into the instrumentalist logic depicted by HRM representatives and the gurus. Her comment triggered mixed reactions in the room. Some appeared to find her convictions exemplary, while an entrepreneur replied: ‘This is just packaging’.
In brief, during collective conversations, the corporate environment is depicted in terms that are explicitly placed in opposition to that in which the community says it stands. This representation of the corporate environment is most perceptible in collective conversations. However, encounters with the corporate environment can be presented very differently during private exchanges. For example, Karoliina is a successful entrepreneur using narrative analysis as a training technique. Her strategic positioning contrasts that, which the corporate environment is said to welcome: namely, intercultural measurement tools and assessment techniques. ‘I am doing fine, in fact… I have had my business for seven years now. (…) I have different kinds of clients, being the [culture] specialist for a training agency. Some of [my clients] are big Finnish corporations’.
In sum, there are collective statements and conversations about the interculturalists, who they are, what they stand for (humanism), and from whom they differ. These conversations tend to sketch a one-sided and homogeneous portrait of the corporate context, with dominant instrumental traits put in opposition to the principles of human development that the intercultural community officially supports. In other words, there is a form of professional ethical identity, and this identity is perceptible in the struggles that are discussed among interculturalists regarding the theme of responsibility. Consequently, an ethical identity of the professional community precedes and partakes in the ethicalisation process of the group, as we will now discuss in more detail.