Future Manager Program "Day 4" -- Business etiquette and Cross Culture training
Today I felt it was a satisfying day and the sessions were really interesting. Business etiquette and cross culture were today's sessions. I felt these sessions would help us to lead better professional and corporate culture. Sonali (the slim lady) handled the Business etiquette session and Rennie(i am not very sure of the name) handled the cross culture.
As usual Sonali started with her diplomatic voice by questioning us and getting from us what we are expecting from this session. Few of them put across their expectations and questions about the business etiquette. This session was different in the sense we had the entire session driven by a video and it was more general than specific to any country. I was happy with that as I deal with a different client and if I am told about American client then I would have got lost. May be I would have used it provided I would dealt with them and not presently as I am dealing with a Japanese client. The video was a 45minutes long and she was stopping to clarify our doubts. Just like any other sessions video this was also an american video and all of them were american's in it with their typical and friendly accent.
As far as I could recall the video mainly dealt with main aspects like introducing a collegue or any other person, dressing etiquette, dining etiquette, using the office resources, handshakes, how to interrupt somebody while they are discussing, how to enter a closed room etc. I think, for each of these etiquette there could be different ground rules in different countries and most of them in the video were inclined more towards US and a bit towards to British.
The video as expected started with a three different uncomfortable act which we would face many a times in a corporate world. Later it goes to Introducing act by two business persons (a woman and a man). When they were discussing, a lady joins them. Unfortunately while trying to introduce the man fumbles as he doesnt get her name and apologies for not rememebering her name. The lady graciously accepts and says it always happens with her too. She introduces herself to the other lady and makes this situation much lighter. In this scenario we can could learn that we need to know the names of the person before hand and if dont we need to apologize for the same. Sonali also told if such a scenario occurs we graciously handle by asking the two to introduce themselves by going a step back. There were other acts of how not to interrupt people if they are talking and if a new person joins you graciously introduce the other person also before going ahead with your discussion. If you are joining a group of persons who are discussing dont jump into your discussion without allowing them to stop.
The other main etiquette discussed was dress code. How our attire should be when we are suppose to wear, what type of material should the shirts and trousers be, when to wear ties, suite, what is the color of shirt, trousers, suite, belts, glasses, shoes, etc. It discussed about both male and female attires. Let me first discuss about the shirt and trousers. The shirts should be of uniform color say white, blue or what ever. It would look professional if we wear light colored shirts. The trouser should be charcoal black, grey, navy and must never be brown. Now a days khaki is also accepted for semi formal wear. Checkered shirts are also not considered formal wear but at social gathering it is ok to wear. The shirts should have full arm sleeves and should come out one inch out of the coat. It is usually considered very formal. The coat colors should be darker in blend as that of your trousers and both trouser and coat color should match each other. The ties should contrast your shirt color for eg. a red tie with a light colored shirt which would look really nice and professional. The next comes the shoes; the shoe color should be either black or brown. If you are wearing a black trouser, a black shoes would always go well with it. Next comes the socks which even I didn't know of. We are not suppose to wear white socks for formal shoes. I used to wear it since it was comfortable and doesnt stink as it was cotton. If we see the manufacturer it is usually the sports company who manufactures it. It also looks odd too. So you need to wear black or dark colored socks. When it comes to ladies the darker colored stockings are recommended and should be wearing closed toe sandals. For them recommended attire for professional wear is similar to men and they can also wear skirts not short ones but hip fitting ones.
I think entering this sessions granularity would take me pages together. So presently I will stop here and may be later I would put them when I find time. Please mail me if it is not updated in next one week at the given address.
posted by Chaitanya Prabhu @ 8:36 PM
