Cultural Intricacies

Navigating the Cultural Maze

Between them, Jack and Andrew have spent years working across Central and Western Europe, including France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, and the Netherlands. And while the technology may be the same, the way people work with it isn’t always.

Communication styles are an obvious example. Dutch colleagues can be remarkably direct, while the French may take a more reserved approach. Neither is necessarily better, but put both styles into the same meeting without understanding the difference and things can get interesting quickly.

And that’s before we get to bureaucracy, engineering culture, lunch breaks, or, inevitably, French strikes.

Cultural differences are a can of worms. So naturally, we’re opening it.

“If you start mixing cultures and you don’t know what you’re doing, that’s so much fun.”

Sales Challenges

Cultural differences become particularly visible in sales.

Andrew gives the example of sending Dutch salespeople into French companies. A direct, straight-to-the-point approach that works perfectly well in the Netherlands can come across very differently in a French business environment, where the conversation may be more reserved and relationships matter differently.

Belgium sits somewhere between the two. Flemish people speak Dutch and are familiar with the Dutch way of working, but also tend to have more experience navigating French-speaking business culture.

That can make a Belgian surprisingly useful when the Dutch need to sell something to the French.

Engineering Insights

Getting Straight to the Problem

The same differences show up when engineers talk to each other.

Andrew describes Dutch engineers as particularly direct. If there’s a technical problem, you may hear exactly what’s wrong before you’ve even finished saying hello. Within the same working culture, that’s simply efficient. Across cultures, the same approach can sound rather more confrontational than intended.

That directness can also affect business relationships. As Andrew puts it:

“Unless you’re ASML, I would never see a French person buying something from a Dutch person without having a valid reason.”

The technology may cross borders easily. The people selling, buying, and supporting it sometimes need a little more translation.

Leisure and Professionalism

The differences don’t stop when people leave the meeting room.

Andrew points out that German working culture can be quite structured during working hours, while becoming noticeably more relaxed once it’s time for a break. In the Netherlands, the line between work and leisure can be less clear, and a business discussion may simply continue over drinks or dinner.

Head further south in Europe and that distinction can become stronger again. A lunch or coffee break may actually mean taking a break, rather than finding somewhere else to continue the meeting.

Knowing when not to talk about work can be just as useful as knowing how to talk about it.

Crisis Management

When crisis strikes, every culture has its own way of handling the chaos. In France, Cultural differences become particularly interesting when something actually breaks.

In Andrew’s experience, French organizations can be heavily bureaucratic during normal operations. But once everyone agrees there is a genuine crisis, that bureaucracy can suddenly become remarkably flexible. Rules get bent, people improvise, and the priority becomes getting things working again.

His experience with Dutch and German organizations has often been different. Before everyone switches into crisis mode, they first want to establish that there really is a problem and understand what is happening.

Neither approach necessarily produces a better result. But when several countries are involved in the same incident, simply agreeing that yes, we have a crisis can become part of the crisis.

Data Center Differences

You can even see some of these differences in data centers.

France vs. The Netherlands

In Andrew’s experience, Dutch data centers tend to be extremely tidy and organized. Cabling is structured, things are labeled, and equipment is generally where you expect it to be.

France can be a little more… pragmatic.

We’ve encountered everything from unusual cabling to network cabinets that apparently also had a secondary purpose as storage space for cleaning equipment.

Both can run perfectly well. But walking into the room can give you a very different first impression of what you’re about to work with.

“You would assume water and data centers don’t go together, but I have been challenged on that notion.”

Of course, a perfectly organized data center isn’t necessarily better at dealing with a crisis. As we discussed earlier, Andrew’s experience in France is that when something genuinely goes wrong, people can become remarkably pragmatic and very good at improvising a solution.

Sometimes a little flexibility has its advantages.

Luxembourg’s Unique Edge

Luxembourg is an interesting case because several of these cultures meet in one small country.

French and German influences are both obvious, while its proximity to Belgium adds another familiar layer. Multiple languages and different ways of working are simply part of everyday business.

In our experience, that creates an interesting mixture. You can encounter some of the structure associated with German organizations alongside the flexibility and communication styles we’ve discussed in France and Belgium.

If you’re used to working across those countries, Luxembourg can feel strangely familiar from several directions at once.

“It’s half French and it’s half German. Both in languages and in the way of working.”

European Culture Wrap-up

None of these observations are hard rules. They’re experiences collected over years of working with teams in different European countries, and there are plenty of exceptions on every side of every border.

But understanding that people may communicate, work, and react to problems differently can save a surprising amount of trouble when international teams have to work together.

And if we were forced to design the ideal European IT organization?

Let the Dutch run the data centers, put the French in charge of the people, and give the Germans the budgets.

Just make sure the French or Italians are responsible for the food.

Problem solved. Probably.

“Luxembourg might just be the winner of Europe—a blend of the best cultural elements with a dash of resilience.”