So last week I met a friend who reminded me how important and powerful ‘frames of reference’ are in understanding how people/cultures deal with certain circumstances.
This friend is a very smart and successful business woman who, despite being Malay, spent most of her formative years growing up in Singapore during the late 70’s, 80’s and early 90’.
As she went through school and university, her exposure to Westerners was primarily through the ‘controlled’ media … however she did come across the odd Westerner in her daily life and almost universally they held positions of power – often managing or consulting important companies located within the City State.
So far so boring …
Anyway, a few years ago she went to the UK for the first time on holiday … and despite the huge growth in technology and information access … she was dumbfounded when she saw some Western labourers fixing a hole in the road.
This image just did not compute with her … Westerners didn’t do this sort of thing, they had others do that thing [read: Asian locals] … and so after staring at them in shock for a good 10 minutes, she started laughing hysterically because at that exact moment she realised she could knock the Westerners off the pedestal she had been influenced to place them all on, because she wasn’t ‘lower’ than them – she was just as good as them.
Now whilst you may think this is an isolated case … it’s not … and it’s not even unique to the people of Singapore/Asia.
One thing that absolutely drives me nuts is the arrogant, condescending and down-right ignorant view so many Westerners have of other cultures.
We like to pretend we’re all ‘culturally accepting’ and that racism/prejudice isn’t as prevalent anymore but I still hear far too many Brits telling me the country is being ‘overrun’ by immigrant Poles.
Apart from the fact it just isn’t … this insinuation that Polish people are thieving scum is a fucking disgrace but what can you expect when people believe they are entitled to glory just because of things done years in the past.
Hey, it’s not just people … brands are at it too.
There’s so many who think that because they did some good things back in 1973, they are entitled to continued customer loyalty, despite doing little to generate it in the last 20 years.
As I’ve said many times, brands cannot sit on their laurels and think the people will continue to come, regardless what they do – those days are over, if they were ever really there in the first place.
If you’re not prepared to fight for loyalty each and every day of your life – you might just find that one day the people and brands you thought were strictly 4th division have used their hunger, ambition and talent to leave you in the dust.
It’s time to stop looking at competition – be it cultures or brands – simply as the enemy, but to regard them as the people who can help you keep your standards high and your hunger to keep learning, fed – because without those 2 traits, you don’t deserve to be in a position of power in the first place.