My first job was as a recruiter in Doha, Qatar. A newly minted graduate, I arrived with a cocktail of enthusiasm, confidence and worry, and wielded exactly one tool: be direct. I'd been raised to say what you mean and expect others to do the same. So when I put several strong candidates forward and the country manager brushed them aside without much explanation, the rationale didn’t register with me. There was nothing wrong with the candidates I recommended, yet I was repeatedly given a firm no. And with my single tool, I directly questioned the country manager’s decisions, insisting on some explanation. He was bemused the first time but this got old pretty quick. We were both frustrated and still had no new hires.
What I didn't understand yet was that the decision hadn't been made in that meeting at all. The real conversation happened later, in Arabic, over cigarettes, with a colleague whose advice the country manager trusted far more than mine.
I had brought one blunt instrument. And this room called for a whole toolkit.
The shadow effect
I've gone back to that experience many times, through regional roles in the Middle East and later in global ones. When leaders take on international roles, the scale and complexity of the work grow. Something quieter grows too. I call it the shadow effect: the frustration, the fear of failure, the dip in confidence and the resistance to change that creep in when the approach that worked at home stops working across borders.
If no one deals with it, the shadow shows up in the results. Clarity slips down the priority list. Communication thins out right when it needs to get richer. Good people leave. At the global level every mistake is highly visible, so each misstep makes the shadow a little longer.
I know because I made those mistakes. Here are three of them.
Mistake one: I trusted my default
Doha taught me that a style that served me well at home could hit a wall somewhere else. In The Culture Map (2014), Erin Meyer shows that cultures build trust in different ways. Some build it mainly by doing good work together. Others build it mainly through personal relationships that take time. My task-first, say-it-plainly approach was made for the first kind of room. I was standing in the second.
Let’s take Meyer's point one step further. Culture was only part of my story. Power was in the room as well. So was person: the life experiences and childhood stories that teach us what "good" behavior looks like. I think of these as three lenses: Culture, Power and Person. Before you can start to understand anyone else through them, you have to focus them first on yourself.
The practice that helped me most was simple: zoom out. When I caught myself taking something personally, I learned to ask what actually mattered. What mattered more - that the candidates I put forward were selected, or that the role was filled with someone good?
Leaders need to trust their motivations while developing different approaches, lenses and perspectives in order to be more effective.
Mistake two: I read clarity as distrust
Years later I worked at a German bank in the UK, surrounded by colleagues who asked questions. Lots of them. Who exactly owns this? When precisely is it due? Where will the work live? At first I heard every detailed question as a quiet vote of no confidence, believing that if I were trusted by others, they wouldn’t be so inquisitive.
It took me a while to see what was really going on. My colleagues were removing ambiguity so we could work together well. Their need for precision was no reflection on my ability or our relationship. Once I saw that, the questions started to feel like their way of gaining clarity. In some cultures, asking questions can be construed as a sign of distrust. In others, it is a respectful way of gathering information to improve the working relationship; a sign of respect.
Same behavior. Opposite meanings.
Clarity can read as distrust in one culture and as respect in another. So now I make expectations explicit on purpose, especially across distance:
Who does exactly what, and who decides versus who contributes
Handoffs, the points where one person's work becomes another's
Timing, including whose time zone counts and what "end of day" actually means
Cadence, with more check-ins when the work gets complex
How you introduce this matters as much as what you do. Explain why you're doing it. Review how you work together, as well as what you deliver. And frame it as an experiment: we'll try it, see how it goes and adjust. Introduced that way, it comes across as care, which is what it is.
Mistake three: I trusted the org chart
The decision made over cigarettes in Doha wasn't a one-off. On a global HR team, I watched our chief HR officer give enormous weight to the advice of one or two people. I wasn't one of them, and it was frustrating. I had to learn to influence indirectly.
As I gained experience and seniority, I stopped assuming the org chart was also the decision chart. Now I start with the hypothesis that there are other influencers, on the chart or off it. Then:
Identify the trusted voices early. In person, notice who the decision-maker mentions and who they have coffee with. At a distance, watch who gets copied on emails and whose expertise people talk about with admiration.
Build real relationships with them, so you understand their motivations and ways of thinking.
Go to them first, before the official ask, and let them help shape the work.
Power on a team comes from tenure and knowledge as well as hierarchy. Sometimes it sits a row below you on the chart.
So what can we do about this?
Looking back, the thread running through all three mistakes was leadership capacity. Geography was only the setting. And capacity can be developed.
That gives me hope. My training as an anthropologist taught me to watch how people make meaning. My MBA taught me to watch the business results. International leadership asks for both at once, because it all connects and it all matters.
The image I keep coming back to is a willow tree. In a storm a willow bends, sometimes dramatically, and then returns to its recognizable shape. Its roots are what you won't flex: your values, your integrity, the outcome you're committed to. Its branches are what you can flex: your style, your pace, how direct or explicit you are. Honesty and kindness travel everywhere. The rest can bend.
I'll leave you with a few reflective questions:
Which of your defaults served you well at home and might be a blunt instrument somewhere else?
Where on your team might clarity be reading as distrust?
Who really shapes decisions in your organization, and have you had coffee with them yet?
What are your roots, and which branches are you ready to let bend?
⭐️ I am deeply invested in you being the best leader you can be, and I partner with clients on three things:
✅ Bringing calm to the chaos
✅ Having clarity in decision making
✅ Maintaining confidence in their leadership
That's what you get when you work with me — ✨ calm, clarity, and confidence. Interested? Curious? Know someone who might benefit? Let's explore, together.
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