What I learned about conducting business here is that culture has a major impact on all areas of life, especially business. For example, the people here want to get to know you in order to trust you. They care more about your personality and how well you get along over a ranking or title. They want to work with people who share the same values as them, even if those individuals are not as widely known or as large. Human connection drives the majority of business meetings which is very different from the US. In America, business meetings are exactly that, business meetings. You go in and automatically begin discussing what the purpose of the meeting was for. There are many people I know who do not know much about the personal lives of their coworkers, employees, or employers. Here, meetings often have long phases of just talking. You could go to a dinner meeting and only talk about actual business for the last few minutes. When I was working with my consulting company, they were giving us background information about every worker in their business. They told us that when they hire people, they need them to fit into the business model and values that have been set already. This was one of my initial impressions that was not accurate. However, a few of my initial impressions about Italy were correct. I knew that there would not be as much of a language barrier because English is widely known in Italy. I knew that in Florence, walking was the main way of getting around. This however surprised me by how much I was actually walking every day. My step count is crazy! I also knew it was going to be hot but wow I did not expect it to be this bad. Our last week here has been in the upper 90s. I also expected for people here to be well-dressed but it was very confirmed. One day, I wore athletic clothes to run some errands and felt like everyone was staring at me. One thing I did not know or expect was the lenience with pace of life. People here like to take their time with life and business. I am someone who likes schedules and this was something I did not even think about before getting here. I am so grateful that I got to spend a month abroad in Florence!
