Work-Life Authenticity

Israeli-American Workplace Connections: A Tale of Two Cultures

At the time when I switched roles within the company, Craig (not his real name) and I had already been working closely together for eight months. After 8 months of daily conversations, and 4 or 5 happy hours, this is what I could tell you about Craig: he is a data engineer, he seems smart, and his name is Craig. 

While risking drawing major generalizations here, I’d say that my relationship with Craig isn’t an outlier compared to my other workplace relationships. When speaking about this to some of my American friends, none of them seemed surprised. They all explained to me (Amerisplained?) that it made sense to them, separating their personal identities from their professional ones. I think one of them may have said “boundaries are good”.

Growing up in Israel, I was accustomed to keeping my personal and professional identities as one. Most Israelis I know are the same, not only we’re used to being ourselves at work, but also work is one of those places in which we get to meet new people who many times become our good friends off work. Learning the American common practice opened my eyes to the pros and cons of each of these “ways”. 

Of course, it’s not just Israelis who feel out of sync when working in the US. Batja Mesquita, a cultural psychologist who studies emotions for a living, shared her experience, writing:

“Coming to America made me aware, for the first time, that my own emotions were not like those of people from this other culture.”

“The Dutch virtue of “honest authenticity” is so ingrained in me that I have found myself on many occasions (politely) expressing my views or making revelations about my emotions to American colleagues, schoolteachers, and friends, only to realize how “Dutch” I had been.”

In many ways, it grows on you. Once I got used to it, and realized it could be a conscious choice of how to look at things, it became clear that the ‘U.S. way’ has a few very distinct advantages. For example, practicing (what I often view as extreme) politeness helps bring colleagues together to discuss things unemotionally. 

This scales very well. As organizations get bigger, having each coworker bring their authentic self to work might not be the best way to get everyone focused on the task at hand. As everyone stays focused and polite, there’s much less ‘office drama’ to deal with. This becomes even more important when considering diversity and inclusion aspects. By maintaining at least some distance from one another, large diverse groups can effectively collaborate without letting cultural differences get in the way.

Reflecting on my military service, I realize the army ingrained a set of core values in us, which played a crucial role in navigating the melting pot of diverse backgrounds we encountered. These values allowed us to focus on the task at hand and work together effectively.

I can't help but notice the similarity with large commercial organizations, which also rely on their own cultural values to unite employees and guide them towards achieving a common goal. Perhaps any form of unification necessitates sacrificing some aspects of individual culture.

In Israel, it’s quite common for everyone to express their full authentic self. And no doubt, all that honesty often leads to significant drama. Breaking down barriers between personal and professional means that many of my friends receive messages from their coworkers and boss over WhatsApp. Now, while Israelis would find this a common practice, most Americans would be shocked (and not just because of our use of WhatsApp as opposed to iMessage). 

Once the barriers are removed, deep relationships start forming. And yes, for many, all that drama might push them away to look for other employment. It is a make or break situation. Yet if and once it clicks, the employee isn’t just driven to come to work, they start to feel part of something they cherish. 

As one friend from Tel-Aviv recently shared with me, this gets to the point where he and 5 other teammates regularly go out for drinks, parties, and dinners together, during all of which they rarely talk about work. 

Another friend, who works at a company with offices in both Tel-Aviv and NY, recently came to NY for work and told me that even within the same company, the differences in work cultures were odd. Apparently, there was a team dinner in NY, and after which everyone went home. You might wonder, what’s odd about that? It turns out, he couldn’t remember a single dinner or work event in Tel-Aviv after which everyone went straight home. He said, “there are always at least 5-10 coworkers who go on to continue the night together elsewhere and have another drink”. 

These examples are not necessarily desirable. And whether you find them as such will depend on what you would expect to ‘get’ from your place of work. 

As I said, the U.S. way tends to grow on you. On my last trip to Israel, I noticed how I got used to the calmness that comes with distance and politeness. I even got annoyed once or twice by some very honest and authentic people. 

Nevertheless, I plan to continue, at least occasionally, embracing the "Israeli" in me. After almost 4 years of living in the U.S., I acknowledge that every place is different, every team is different, and even what we look for in our jobs changes over time. 

This obviously isn’t a critical analysis of cultural differences, but a mere anecdotal observation of my personal experience. I think the U.S. way has plenty more advantages and disadvantages, all of which I continue to learn (sometimes reluctantly). But still, I wish I knew a bit more about Craig.