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Bees and Spiders: Applied Cultural Awareness and the Art of Cross-Cultural Influence
Declining budgets and withdrawing military forces seem to spell a period of diminishing influence for U.S. business and government officials overseas.Not so! Bees and Spiders provides answers on how to develop real influence that does not come through massive military presence or big budgets. These answers promote the idea of influence through developing relationships. Such relationships can provide influence that lasts even when there are few military forces and little money.This influence is lasting because it is empathy-based. Bees and Spiders explains the critical nature of developing empathy, and provides usable and useful recommendations for turning simple understanding into the possibility of seeing the world from another perspective.
Brian L. Steed is a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army and currently serves as an instructor of military history at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. He served in the Middle East for more than eight and a half years. During that time he was an officer in the Jordanian Army, a liaison to the Israel Defense Forces, and an advisor and analyst in Iraq, and was responsible for coordinating all training between the U.S. and the United Arab Emirates. He has traveled extensively to nearly every Arabic-speaking country. This book comes from a seminar series he designed and taught to help advisers, and was later used for business executives in the United Arab Emirates. His three previous books are about applied history, and military and organizational theory.
Brian L. Steed is a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army and currently serves as an instructor of military history at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. He served in the Middle East for more than eight and a half years. During that time he was an officer in the Jordanian Army, a liaison to the Israel Defense Forces, and an advisor and analyst in Iraq, and was responsible for coordinating all training between the U.S. and the United Arab Emirates. He has traveled extensively to nearly every Arabic-speaking country. This book comes from a seminar series he designed and taught to help advisers, and was later used for business executives in the United Arab Emirates. His three previous books are about applied history, and military and organizational theory.
204 pages, Paperback
First published April 7, 2014
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August 11, 2020
While this is very obviously a white paper that has been extended into a book, the take-aways from the content are really quite good. As the author says himself, this is not the basic "don't show the soles of your feet" kind of cultural awareness. That's grade school stuff. This is college level thought and application of cultural awareness.
What surprised me is that this book actually affected the way that I manage my team at work (I'm military, but I was once in corporate America and I can see this applying there as well). I am one million percent a "bee". Understanding the values of "spiders" helped me see teammates with "spider like" qualities in a new light and, more importantly, helped me see how my "bee like" behaviours were not supporting them. And these weren't Arab teammates. They're born and bred American Soldiers. But just as there are both introverts and extroverts in the military, there are those who tend to be like bees and those who tend to be like spiders, and this book helped me appreciate both.
What surprised me is that this book actually affected the way that I manage my team at work (I'm military, but I was once in corporate America and I can see this applying there as well). I am one million percent a "bee". Understanding the values of "spiders" helped me see teammates with "spider like" qualities in a new light and, more importantly, helped me see how my "bee like" behaviours were not supporting them. And these weren't Arab teammates. They're born and bred American Soldiers. But just as there are both introverts and extroverts in the military, there are those who tend to be like bees and those who tend to be like spiders, and this book helped me appreciate both.
Displaying 1 of 1 review