By Executive Director John Yoder

[email protected]

Individuals discover profound insights into their personalities using tools like the Myers-Briggs, DISC, Enneagram, and more. They also discover how personality differences create tension within relationships—and how to manage that tension.

Did you know that nations also have personalities? It’s common for anyone who has never lived outside the country of their birth to believe that their country really doesn’t have a personality. To them it’s background noise, like neutrally toned wallpaper. Their country’s personality is “just the way things are”. But foreigners living among them can clearly discern the personality of their country. So how do our immigrant neighbors complete the sentence “Americans are so……”? Here are a few responses I frequently hear.

Friendly Compared to the typical citizens of many countries, Americans are more likely to share a smile and a friendly greeting with strangers on the street.

Outspoken (that’s a polite way of saying loudmouthed!) The flip side of American friendliness is that we tend to dominate conversations with friends of other cultures. If you’re not sure about that, just try to observe how much of the talking you do when you’re chatting with someone from another culture.

Honest Compared to the governments, corporations, legal systems, and police of many countries, America has amazingly low levels of corruption. While every culture has hackers and other bad actors, Americans have a global reputation for honesty.

Direct The flip side of America’s honesty is our bluntness. It’s not uncommon for Americans to  “say what they think.” That has some advantages, but huge disadvantages as well. Our directness can be horribly offensive. America’s reputation for bluntness is the evil twin of its reputation for honesty.

Efficient Americans manage their time to accomplish the maximum number of tasks. As one African put it, “Americans don’t just solve their problems—they solve their inconveniences.”

Individualistic The flip side of our tendency to manage time to accomplish the maximum number of tasks is that we don’t manage time to maximize the depth of our relationships. People of global cultures struggle to understand why Americans spend so little time with their adult children and aging parents. While Americans see global family structures as enmeshed and codependent, they see ours as disassociated and isolationist. It’s an apparent contradiction—Americans tend to be smiley and friendly to strangers on the street, but lacking in deep connections with their own friends and family.

This is only a partial list. And just like individual personality traits, what I’ve shared here certainly isn’t true of all Americans. But these generalizations occur frequently enough to be valid.

Can you see how these national personality differences can lead to misunderstandings?  These and other cultural personality differences frequently cause misunderstandings between pastors.

I founded Immigrant Ministry Connections to equip pastoral leaders to understand and work through cultural issues like these. Our next blog series is titled Cultural Differences that Drive Pastors Crazy. It will deal with some of the issues I’ve mentioned above, and several others.

I’m also coaching pastors on these issues through a series of live webinars beginning this month. These webinars are provided as part of The Merging Streams Coalition. Each webinar includes a presentation, case studies, and live interaction. There is still time for you to take part in the beginning of this webinar series. I invite you to join us at this link.