Are entrepreneurs in the US biased against developers from East?
I am a developer from India who has had few interactions with some budding developer-entrepreneurs from US. It might not be proper to judge based on these interactions but I felt like something was not right. Their behavior was one of smug feeling of superiority which might be hinting at their insecurity.
This might be an one off case or just an issue with me. But I am interested to know how others feel about the perception that entrepreneurs in US have of Indian developers and how they treat/interact with them.
6 comments
[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 18.7 ms ] threadThe second and I believe more sever issue, is cultural differences in the way India and America do business. It is no great secret that as a culture you guys do not like to deliver bad news. I think it is because as a culture you are as well far more respectful than Americans on average. Coming from the American south, I see this all the time. As a culture we in the south had a concept called southern gentry (this culture has died out) part of there culture is that your are considered of a less social status if you are not hospitable and respectful, there are a group of people that see this as a weakness due to a mis-match of cultures. I was part of the first generation in the south that was more culturally compatible with the rest of America so I see the contrast between the two very well.
Anyway I am derailing with back story to get to my point, the point is this aversion to bad news when applied at the management and project management level can be disastrous to a project. Not getting a complete picture of the bad issues can leave people in the dark and hamper their decision making process. 9 times out of 10, when I hear an India outsourcing horror story it has everything to do with the management of the project and nothing to do with the quality of the developers.
You guys experienced a gold rush, when we decided to outsource development to you, some of your business infrastructure and practices where not ready to do so, it is a natural product of two cultures colliding. I would not take it personal, and would recommend trying to look at the human issues involved, something American developers would be well served to do as well.
When I worked in China, both my students and school administrators would avoid saying "no". If you are relying on some piece of work being done for product/project success, this approach can also be disastrous because people will say "Yes" to some request that they have absolutely no intention of performing/completing and you may not find out something wasn't done until something fails.
That being said, it's not a race issue, but a cultural issue. Someone of Chinese or Indian descent raised in the US are unlikely to present this cultural incompatibility.
On the otherhand, I think that if this cultural incompatibility exists, it is the manager's responsibility to neutralize it by demonstrating that delivering bad news (or saying "no" when the answer is in fact "no") is valued. This would be preferable to declining a good candidate for the task at hand.
For the record, I worded the above poorly, I should have phrased it, given that Indians where given their jobs. The former denotes active participation on Indians part. Which is not fair, a man needing to feed his family should not be held to account for accepting a position that someone else took from the original holder.
longer answer: everybody is subjective. don't think programmers of the east think too greatly of programmers from the west, or programmers from down south. everybody carries a set of cultural assumptions. when outsourcing work (no matter if it's abroad or around the corner) the best approach is to harness the best qualities of every team, not to force them into being something that they're not. the same thing is true when you're working with people in your dorm room.
I really think it has to do with their structured life and education system that focuses on accomplishments and not on problem solving/creativity (and the fear of being wrong). If I want a generic well-known structure built they are fantastic, but if you push the limits they tend to struggle. I learned to design everything myself and then give them exact instructions on how to accomplish each broken down task. The work improved drastically once I began following this rule.