my father times details or past 15 years I've been thinking about this topic of culture and conflict resolution how do we resolve conflict across cultures how do we apply culture to mediation and arbitration negotiation I live in two cultures I grew up in Punjab India a land known for spiritual and cultural identity I now live in Salem Oregon a land known a land known for its beautiful Willamette Valley and almost perfect family values I started teaching law at the age of 24 teaching is in my family my father is a retired law professor but president of a university in India he and I constantly discuss negotiation across cultures we discuss which negotiation has to occur how and cultural compatibility at the end of the day I let him win or he wins and you can see why few months ago my father and I were chatting over the phone we were discussing something we were discussing his lecture he said I just gave a four hour long lecture and friend says you know hearing you as we law teachers typically give three or four hours long lectures so I was wondering why is that an important thing after a pause he goes the lecture was meant to be for two hours I felt connected to students so I went going for four hours I wondered if I will be able to do that in the US to my american thinking that almost seemed impossible how can you flex time from two to four hours do my indian thinking it seems perfectly fine a person with the power a president of a college why to give a lecture that went on from two to four hours culture shapes the way we see time for example some of you came here early today nine o'clock that was time for you some of you came at 8:45 and a few of you would have been here at 8:30 or 7 o'clock or 7:30 we all see time differently in 2010 my first child APAR was born you see my mother visited from India to stay with us for four months as many of you know it's a blessing when your mother comes and helps you with your first child after she left a neighbor of mine who like me came from India came over to me and said your mother was here that was very helpful great has she already left that's a short wizard I didn't think of that comment too much after about few days later when my American neighbor comes over to me and says your mother has left man that was a long visit culture also shapes the way we communicate let me take you bad little more in time in 2007 I was teaching in Minneapolis and as you know in January's gets a little bit colder in Minneapolis so we were stuck inside a building I remember vividly and I'm walking past in corridors for my students and my students look at me and they say professor Singh how's your day going and I stopped and I want to talk to them my day is going great I'm actually not liking the weather outside but and this is what my wife stopped them in the morning and they will not stop and they'll continue going and after a few of these interactions I learned they actually wanted to say hi to me in some cultures we have this over emphases on words in others we do not allow me to take you from a different dimension on the same topic not only individually we see communication differently but collectively as a society if you take a look at this picture which some of you may of course be aware of you see a lot of signs on rowers here in Oregon in the US different color signs now they fascinate me because where I grew up we did not have such colorful a--such elaborated signs we had sign like these however which are far and few in between and if you look at them closely they have misspelling in it so I asked my friends how come this sign in New Delhi has a misspelling and here comes my friend who's a practicing lawyer in New Delhi says it's not that design has a problem is that that you're reading it culture also adds different emphases on nonverbal communication you see in some cultures we can share volumes without saying a word in India and another cultures around the world we have this gesture of folded hands and bent body position what means to us is respect and humility a wonderful greeting that we don't do to everybody when we will be connected respectful we do it to our audience in this picture you'll see me standing next to my father almost a similar gesture in front of a Supreme Court judge in a state in India I'm not saying anything but I'm speaking a lot that's just one gesture French the other gesture that you should all know about is a gesture of touching the feet if my father is standing next to me right now assume he is and I saw him after five or six months I won't shake hand like this or like this I'll bend down and touch his feet or almost his feet and do this and he'll touch my shoulder and he'll say bless your son or have a nice day all right we don't even exchange a word yet we speak volumes now you should know culture changes over generations so I've been observing teenagers in my culture how do they do it so seeing they actually do the same thing but little differently when they see their parents hey Dad how you doing there is a dent it's just a little different than what my thinking eludes me too is that we have this subconscious platform that all of us have which is driven by our worldviews our upbringing our family that's what I call cultural thinking we don't think about this cultural thinking all the time it's like a software that programs us that runs us above it is cultural interests like what is that comfort zone what time and space we are comfortable with but what we see in people is the communication what is fascinating me the most for last 15 years is this question how does our culture influence our decision-making as you know in negotiation mediation after push clients to come to a decision hopefully an amicable decision what better example that example across cultures of an event almost all of us think or do at some point in life marriage if you take a look at this picture you will see a couple sitting on something they actually sitting on a swing in next few moments they're going to get pushed by an elder family member so Gregor go up swing and then we'll go down swing right this is by the way from South India and then the elder family member is going to ask them a question what did you do when you were up swing they're going to give some wrong answers and then they're gonna say oh I think we held our hands stronger and the family member says that's what marriage is you're going to have difficult times and easy times remember when your difficult times hold your hands stronger I thought that was a wonderful way of showing how marriage is approached in some cultures in some cultures we fall in love and we get married in others we married with the thinking that we may fall in love this is a picture of one of my friend's daughter getting married here this summer in Portland close to Portland and I wanted to show you the symmetry the detailed attention to detail they've given to all the things in this picture one benefit they had was they had 45 guests including me and my wife my wedding in India had 1100 in 2007 my sister who lives in California called me when I was in Minneapolis and says I have a match for you and I'm thinking from my indian mind saying okay sister let's talk about this she goes no you're coming to Sacramento tomorrow I won't have a meeting so as we do not collective culture I've listened to my sister she's the oldest family member I had in u. s. so she acted like my mother in the absence of my mother I flew down I came to Sacramento I met my sister and my QB wife and in this room which is about 50 people big living room I'm supposed to talk to my wife finally we had an alone time for about 45 maybe 40 minutes in those 40 minutes we had so many questions for each other I asked her what's your philosophy of life out of those 40 minutes I walked out and I saw my sister and her family member standing in front of me looking at me I felt very persuaded and then came the question it is a yes right now friends in those 40 minutes I've seen my wife smile once and I knew is say yes so I said yes but behind my mind I would be lying if I don't say it if I don't share that I had a fear the fear what if it doesn't work out what if this is not the right decision my indian thinking right now is dancing with joy you are sharing your responsibility with all these family members how can you be wrong and if you are wrong they're all sharing the responsibility but my American thinking is feeling stripped of this independence autonomy in decision making what I learned is that we have these two different kind of reins all of us have them in some of us pay more attention to the collective of us the family owner and the other offers favorite attention to the independent of us and of course across the world the differences are even larger in conclusion I want to share a few things with your friends first I think we must listen to cultural interests to learn about them cultural interest mean how do cultures see time space comfort how do they decide it's not just listening we must listen with the right intent I can listen to you with an intent to disagree with you I should listen to you with the intent of learning and curiosity and maybe agree with you in negotiation literature in the u.
s. we typically see this model that one person speaks one person listens and we come to resolution I agree with that model but allow me to add my last thought to it I think that's a great model but I think we should listen as I already said with the right intent we should talk with the right attitude you can shut down a person or open a person up with the right question allow me to take you further back in time and my last story in 2005 on the Stanford go Airport on my arrival in the u. s.
