On the flipchart of our team’s cultural rulebook, it appeared suddenly and almost casually among the other action points: Travel. I had to look twice. Travel? Listed alongside themes like trust, responsibility, or unwritten rules? Why was this point so important to my team?
The answer became clear: they didn’t mean travel as an activity. They meant travel as an attitude.
Travel broadens our horizons. It pushes us out of our comfort zone and into encounters that change us. New cultures, unfamiliar ways of thinking, different lived realities. All of this disrupts our familiar patterns. We stop seeing the world only through our own lens and begin to see it through many. And that is where empathy begins.
The world is complex, dynamic, contradictory. Those who travel experience this diversity directly: in conversations with strangers, in moments of wonder, in the small irritations that force us to rethink.
My team wasn’t calling for a new learning initiative. No one expected us to schedule training sessions in far‑off places. The message was different: Use every journey, private or professional, as an opportunity to learn.
Travel with open eyes and ears. Be curious. Allow yourself to be unsettled. Notice what is different. And ask yourself what it does to you.
That is why “Travel” ended up so prominently on our flipchart: because it reminds us that learning doesn’t only happen in a seminar room. We learn wherever we are willing to open ourselves to something new.
And it makes me wonder: How do you travel through your world with open eyes or on autopilot.
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Strong intercultural leadership enables global teams to achieve outstanding results with clarity, trust, and impact. In my book, you will find four guiding principles to strengthen collaboration across cultures. I am Bernd Scharbert, and I am here to support you.
And in Guiding Principle Number 3, we explore how teams can learn about culture together. Travel included.
The e-book, „Prepare for Landing: Leitlinien für interkulturelle Führung“ is available at the online shop of Verlag Barbara Budrich as well as the print version. In German language, though, as I am now working on the English translation.
