The Multicultural Mind: Unleashing the Hidden Force for Innovation in Your Organization

by David C. Thomas

In today's rapidly evolving business world continual innovation is now a must. Scholar and consultant David C. Thomas says the same forces of globalization that have created today's superheated competitive environment have also provided a potential hidden the multiculturals in your midst. Thomas cites ample research and examples showing that people who have experienced more than one culture are more creative that those with more limited experience. Multiculturals have a broader worldview. Having to integrate different cultural values forces them to develop more complex ways of thinking and makes them better able to see new patterns and connections. Their heightened empathy, the result of learning to adapt to sometimes wildly different cultures, helps them build support for their ideas and work effectively on the teams that implement them. This book makes a powerful business case for recognizing and cultivating a new dimension of diversity. Thomas looks at how different people express their multicultural identities and how to establish the organizational conditions under which multiculturals can flourish, And he shows how even the most monocultural among us can develop the characteristics of a multicultural mind.

Genres: Audiobook, Nonfiction

220 pages, Paperback

First published February 15, 2016

About the author

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Please see: David C. Thomas


David C Thomas (PhD University of South Carolina) is currently the Beedie Professor of International Management at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada.

He is the author of ten books including the bestselling Cultural Intelligence: Living and Working Globally, (2009, Berrett-Koehler Publishers). His book Cross-Cultural Management Essential Concepts (2008, Sage Publications) was the winner of the R. Wayne Pace Human Resource Development book of the year award for 2008. In addition, he has recently edited (with Peter B. Smith and Mark Peterson) The Handbook of Cross-Cultural Management Research from Sage Publications. His research on cross-cultural interactions in organizational settings has appeared in numerous journals. He is currently the Area Editor of the Journal of International Business Studies and serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of World Business, Journal of Organizational Behavior, and European Journal of Cross-Cultural Competence and Management.

His previous academic postings have included positions at the Australian Graduate School of Management, University of New South Wales, Australia, the Pennsylvania State University and The University of Auckland, New Zealand, where he was also Director of the Master of International Business Program.