First, effective international managers "know that they don't know." They
assume difference until similarity is proven rather than assuming similarity until difference is proven.
Second, in attempting to understand their foreign colleagues, effective international managers emphasize
description, by observing what is actually said and done, rather than interpreting or evaluating it.
Third, when attempting to understand or interpret a foreign situation, effective international managers try to
see it through the eyes of their foreign colleagues. This role reversal limits the myopia of viewing situations
strictly from one's own perspective.
Fourth, once effective international managers develop an explanation for a situation, they treat the
explanation as a guess (as a hypothesis to be tested) and not as a certainty.
foreign and home country colleagues to make sure that their guesses—their interpretations—are plausible. This
checking process allows them to converge meanings—to delay accepting their interpretations of the situation
until they have confirmed them with others.