If you’ll be doing business with Turkish people, you should know the following. I know that stereotyping is not a reasonable thing to do, but i will try to base my ideas on facts.
- White collar workers are usually better educated than their American peers. This is partly because the demand for college is higher than the supply, leading to the inevitable solution of a nationwide exam to eliminate candidates who are not good enough. This also leads to a tough competition among high schools, increasing the total quality of higher education.
- The downside is that, once you base the whole system on a test that takes a couple of hours, although students get a lot (and i mean A LOT) of information during their education, what they learn is limited to that information, and that information only. Even the homeworks usually require students to bring together a bunch of information that already exists in some form out there. They are not expected to figure out a new method, or come up with new ideas. I believe that this leads to lack of initiative, which is important especially if you’re trying to fill up an executive position.
- I believe that our way of thinking is usually more practical than that of American people. This is i guess due to the fact that we have less resources for our disposal, compared to a typical American citizen, thus, have to come up with solutions that will allow us to live a better life. So, despite lack of initiative, if you give the sense of trust to an employee, you might be surprised by how he/she comes up with solutions you have never thought of.
- English might be a challenge to deal with, should the position require interaction with foreigners. Somehow, excluding a few, even our best high schools fail to teach English well. Maybe it is the structure of our language… Our brains are so used to the way we form our sentences (lining up all the elements of the sentence differently) they cannot adapt to a different structure. So, you’ll easily notice that, even if the candidate could understand you perfectly, he/she might not speak as well. The best way for us to speak really fluent English is to spend a couple of years abroad.
- Although there are laws against discrimination, it is not a hot issue as it is in USA. I was even asked if i practiced any religious rituals once! Yes, this is apparently an extreme case, but i don’t think the interviewer or the company he represented would suffer from any charges even if i reported them. I’m not suggesting that you should do it, but discrimination is almost a custom in Turkey.
I might turn this subject into a series, i guess i like stereotyping 
Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: | recruiting in Turkey
