Go East!

The harmony trap in relationship management in Asia (and maybe us too)

In Asia, social harmony often prevails over individual opinions, creating challenges in corporate decision-making. Here is how to try to unlock the potential of human capital

15 November 2024

3' min read

Among the biggest professional challenges I faced in my five years in Asia, perhaps the main one was not to fall into the harmony trap.

In Asian cultures, the priority is to maintain harmonious interaction between colleagues, with the result that you will rarely hear real debates of opinion during a meeting.

This is because in Asia, social harmony and the collective good prevail over the individual good, inevitably also reflected in the decision-making process. The most extreme example is Japanese culture, where the suffix 'WA' (Peace/Harmony) is one of the pivots of language, present in dozens of words such as reconciliation, unison, peaceful negotiation. Even two of the last three Japanese emperors used words with the suffix WA in their choice of motto for their reign.

In this context of seeking harmony at all costs, it is difficult to move according to Western paradigms, such as brainstorming, let alone debating different solutions to a business problem with opinions.

And it does not help that there is absolute respect for elders inculcated by Confucianism and Buddhism in Asia: in a meeting it is almost impossible for the junior to speak in front of his superior, let alone even remotely express dissent.

Here is the harmony trap, and the dilemma for anyone who has to work in Asia.

Because while this simplifies the decision-making process, in a diametrically opposed way to what happens in meetings in Italy, this peaceful facade has serious drawbacks.

Firstly, it does not allow for robust scrutiny of actions, which are decided upon not because they are really the best, but simply because they are the ones sponsored by the most senior person in the room, which might as well be you. And this creates 'echo chambers', where a series of yes men nod to the boss out of politeness, giving him the false comfort of having had a good meeting. And above all, it does not allow for innovation, for the most innovative ideas to flow out, effectively undermining the company's potential for innovation and growth.

How to overcome the harmony trap and unlock the potential of human capital in the company? Here are some suggestions based on my experience.

The bulldozer technique does not work. Do not force debate in meetings under the guise of 'wanting to create a healthy confrontation'. It simply does not work, and indeed imposing our model of interaction shows little cultural sensitivity and will make people lose trust and respect in you.

Beware of making the boss 'lose face'. Questioning juniors in front of their boss shows that you do not trust his opinion. It is one of the most common ways to play down the senior's esteem for you.

Harmony does not always mean agreement in Asia. In reality, people have opinions, and plenty of them. In Japan, in the realm of harmony, when we used to carry out anonymous surveys on staff satisfaction, our colleagues from the Rising Sun were the most caustic in the whole of Asia. You just have to find a way to bring out these individual opinions.

Read people and the room. Whether in a meeting or individually, read the non-verbal signals, the subtle hesitations that people convey to you to find clues of disagreement, concern or different ideas to explore. As we see in the next point.

Move to individual mode. This is the real key. Once the non-verbal signals have been read, prepare the meeting with individual conversations where people will open up more easily. In fact, in many Asian countries, the real decision-making process rarely takes place in meetings, where in reality one simply sanctions the agreement that has already been discussed and found behind the scenes. It is therefore necessary to work well before the decision-making moment, interfacing individually with key stakeholders and getting their agreement in the first instance.

To do all this, the key factor as always in Asia is to build trust and the individual relationship with each of the parties involved. If you have invested in building a personal bond, it will be easier to read the non-verbal signals, people will open up in private and then in a meeting you can agree on a decision that can only be... harmonious.

The secret to breaking out of the Harmony trap and unlocking the potential of ideas in Asia is all here: in building trust and relationships, reading people and deepening them individually in advance.

But in the end, wouldn't it also work for us in the West? Wouldn't it make the process more shared by people, even if slightly longer?

Perhaps Asia shows us an additional path for relations here too.

* Partner at FA Hong Kong Consulting