Culture
The first quiz that I took was "Cross-cultural quiz 1." My score was 4/7. The quiz covered a lot of different cultures, so it was interesting to see which ones I had a better feel for. The Saudi question was viewed as wrong, that Tailor should have dealt with the team members individually or in small groups. Talking to 50 people individually would take about a week of Tailor's time, and he clearly has trouble motivating the Saudi workers. I disagree with the assessment -- it is a poor use of Tailor's time. The Saudi manager can do the talking, that way there is no cultural or linguistic misunderstanding and Tailor can better use his time on other aspects of the project. The Korean question was also listed as wrong, but the two answers reflecting that Koreans are unlikely to transfer to this new company are almost identical. We know they are reluctant to transfer, the details of why aren't that important. I didn't really know the Thai one. The whole "face" thing is ludicrous to me and I may never understand it.
The second quiz was Cross-cultural quiz #2. My score was 17 out of 26. However, the quiz...
"British people drink more than 200 million cups of tea per day" is not worded correctly. No person can physically drink 200 million cups of tea per day. Ambiguous wording isn't good enough for a quiz like this. Whether all Arabs are Muslims or not depends on the definition of Arab, something that is quite variable depending on the source. There are Christians in Egypt and the Levant, but they are not always considered to be Arabs. There are no Christians among Arabs on the Arabian peninsula, which is most closely associated with Arab identity. Whether Omanis or Yemenis are considered to be Arabs is also subject to debate -- both countries have non-Muslims among their populations. I can accept the quiz intended to illustrate that there is some religious diversity among Arabic-speaking people, but it misrepresents the complex nature of Arab identity.
The quiz also attested that Arabs can eat kosher meat. This is false. While the butchering techniques of kosher meat are more strict than those of halal, the second criterion for halal meat is that the slaughter must be performed…
