Third Experience: Pellegrino Riccardi, TEDx

Pellegrino Riccardi is a cross-cultural expert in communications. He is an Italian born in the United Kingdom, who has also lived in Norway for over 21 years. In our last class, we watched a TEDx talk of him addressing a crowd in the year 2014, whereby he described culture as a system of behavior that helps us act in an accepted or familiar way. His main topic was that of acceptance and familiarity. He stressed on perception which means understanding what people see rather than what you want them to see.

This is very important in the world of business. He described one of his experiences at the airport when expressing his disappointment at the airlines staff during different trips. When he talked using the English British accent, he was taken much seriously than when he used the Italian accent which invoked laughter instead. It got me thinking of how much relatable that was. People take you more seriously when you speak English. In my day to day life, I find that whenever I communicate in English, I am much likely to get attention and approval from others than when I any other local language. English is the most spoken language in the world and is a symbol of royalty and class. However, this emanates from the fact that Britain had most colonies in the world and therefore English spread faster and vast. The world’s superpower or the United States of America is a former British colony. Most rich countries of the world are former British colonies thus English is dominant. It is associated with imperialism and that is what is accepted and familiar.

He also gave great advice on small talk. He gave two simple rules which were; asking a simple question and listening to the answer, and picking out a word and following it up. In addition, people are more likely to answer your question when you express it with curiosity. The power of persuasion or speech is the most powerful tool in life. if you are good enough at appealing; people might listen to you.

Finally, he gave the formula for creating a global mindset. It is taking different cultures and trying to merge them into one new culture. It is about extending our borders and creating new ones around us. This is what makes the world go round.

Reference:

(2021). Retrieved 14 February 2021, from https://youtu.be/YMyofREc5Jk