Think globally and act locally. It’s not hypothetical, it’s reality.

We have been a global world for quite some time. Think colonialism and transcontinental trading partnerships. From tea and spice routes to opium trade; from laptops to refrigerators; from oil, to water, to steel we consider the world as a whole our backyard. Think mass migration during political turmoil; war and famine as well as new business opportunities have driven millions from their homelands to settle elsewhere.

Now, with Internet, transcontinental food and product exports, service personnel who follow jobs from market to market, transnational education, and the ongoing culture of war that extends the influence of one country into another, our interdependence and mutual reliance grow daily.

A trip down the grocery aisle is very telling. Fruit from Chile, Mexico, New Zealand; fish from a dozen countries, baked products from Canada, England, Germany and Italy. The list goes on. Food is grown in one country, processed in another, consumed in yet another.

Self-sufficiency is something most people can’t even imagine. Those who believe national boundaries are sacred are missing the way products and services transit those boundaries at will.

Being able to communicate with those who are growing, processing, shipping our foods and other goods, requires a quantum shift. They are also consuming our products and services. Increasingly they are our bankers. But the dialogue is too often left to those who are negotiating the transactions and consumers themselves are all too often out of touch.

Consumers everywhere want our foods to be safe and nutritious and we want affordable food to be available year ‘round. We want our products to be child-friendly. We want pharmaceutical and nutritional supplements to be healthy, their production quality controlled. We want components for our computers, consumer electronics, medical equipment and machinery to be well built of globally sourced materials using quality standards that we are clear can’t be sustained. All you have to do is turn to the media on any given day to see the growing chasm between our expectations and the ability to implement needed safeguards.

How do we go about developing communications that will enable the dialogue needed to maintain the quality of life we want? Is there something that we as individuals can do that will create a realistic grid for equitable communications?

Cultural nuance easily changes meaning. Limited access to information is a challenge though with Internet and other technologies is increasingly less so. But the standards for communication often assume that one can use similar concepts, terminology and delivery systems. The flaws in this type of thinking means there are too many opportunities for miscommunications and missed opportunities to establish and sustain a dialogue, let alone a relationship of mutual trust and understanding.

An open dialogue with other cultures means starting with an understanding of the others’ literacy, delivery systems, interests and needs. Solely focusing on the assumptions of the person or organization initiating the communications is downright myopic.

Without understanding how information is received, organized and understood, it is probable that the connection will be missed.

To communicate effectively with individuals in other cultures, start by learning about the person receiving your message and how to speak to them in their own language.