CULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY
Isidoros S. Tiano

Change is a powerful word that brings forth many varied human emotions. Productivity is achieved through the implementation of improved methods and processes in the daily work of people. Since people are involved, experience shows that the human factor is the most important part of any change and the key to any productivity improvement.

People are part of families, communities, cities, and countries. They belong to cultures that have set ways on identifying and understanding the concept of productivity. As we become more global in our methods of living, consuming and conducting business, these culturally based productivity concepts clash and their effects are shown in behaviors that leave many surprised.

I use the term Cultural Productivity to underscore the fact that different cultures around the word map their understanding of productivity in different ways. Dominant trends such as market globalization, emerging common currencies, (e.g. the dollar, the euro, the yen), a primary language (such as English); world-wide news media (e.g. CNN, BBC, AP), global advertising; rapid communications, the Internet, and other such life-changing factors, have given rise to consumers/people who have certain expectations of the relationship between price and enjoyment of goods and services. In the past these relationships have always been realized on the basis of a culture's productivity. Now we are totally disconnecting these relationships and we are creating standards and expectations in many societies that are not related to their Cultural Productivity Norms.

We must work diligently to connect again the concept of Productivity to a people's expectations and their ability to consume goods and services. Since their expectations for a different life, and supposedly a better one, have been established by the means described above, our only hope is to create new and dominant Productivity Standards and do our best to install them in each of our societies. Through the convergence of each group's Cultural Productivity to the Standard Productivity, we will bring about meaningful change that will affect people's lives and their well-being, and in the process, contribute to World Peace.

Influential Readings

• Carter, Stephen L., Civility, Basic Books 1998
• Covey, Stephen R. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Simon & Schuster 1998
• Popcorn, Faith, Clicking, Harper Collins, 1999
• McRae Hamish, The World in 2020, Harper Collins 1995
• Feather, Frank, future consumer.com, Warwick Publishing 2000
• De Bono, Edward, I am Right You are Wrong, Penguin Books 1991
• Davenport, Thomas H., Process Innovation, Harvard Business School Press 1993
• Graham, Donna, Online Recruiting, Davies-Black 2000