The work culture in Germany

As a highly individualistic (and egalitarian) society, Germans are not known to be good at teamwork. Rather than co-operating in a group, tasks are usually broken up into chunks to be handled by individual contributors and the team convenes only to discuss interfaces or put the pieces together.

Meetings with Germans are focussed on factual discussions of and finding solutions for the meeting's topic. There is little chit-chat, few attempts to create a comfortable athmosphere or to build an emotional relationship between the parties involved. This may feel cold or heartless to people from cultures with an orientation on emotional well-being.

An impotant issue when dealing with Germans is the concept of "Holschuld" (somebody is expected to request or "get" the information or results of your work from you) and "Bringschuld" (you are expected to actively volunteer or "bring" the information or results). These do not exist in many other cultures - and where it exists, the expectaions can be radically different. Unfortunately, there are no written rules about this, so ask a trusted German colleague!

Germans are very direct in their communication. This includes personal criticism, which is often expressed without any filter and this may suprize or even hurt you.

Although there is no corruption and very little nepotism, there is of course favouritism, getting ahead (or at least heard) through connections and office politics. All of these are strictly verbal and in German language (even in the very few companies where English is the working language). If you are less than fluent in the language, you cannot participate in (and benefit from) this.

Although most Germans speak some English, many do not feel comfortable enough to accept a non-German-speaker as team member. For contacts with external partners, customers, suppliers, etc., fluent German is expected in all cases. This limits career prospects of non-German-speakers tremendously.

Most Germans strictly separate work and private life, and this is also expected by most employers. This means:

• Finding friends or discussing hobbies at work should be restricted to lunch break - IF your colleages take lunch with you (many will not, as the social and teambuilding function of eating and chatting together is not commonly recognised).
• Displaying more than a small picture of wife and kids at the workplace might not be appropriate. (Neither is making private phone calls during work hours - although the recent switch to home office in many companies as changed this somewhat.)

I recommend reading a few books about Dos and Don'ts in Germany, e.g. the "Culture Shock" series. Also, understanding Hofstede's six cultural dimensions for Germany and how they differ from your home country would help you understand the situations you may face.