When people talk about culture gaps, the focus is almost always on the big, visible categories: nationality, race, language. But culture is more than passports and mother tongues — and some of the trickiest misalignments happen in the quieter, less obvious kinds of cultures: generational and vocational.
I was reminded of this during an onboarding program I once attended, following a tech upgrade for a group I’ve worked with on and off.
I was the oldest person in the room. The facilitator, with the best of intentions, clearly directed certain parts of the presentation toward me — the kind of “helpful” emphasis that assumed I might be less tech savvy than the younger attendees.
The real gap, though, emerged later.
The tech trainer was showing us how to use a new feature. Someone asked, “So that’s how we do it for online participants. If it’s a hybrid session, do we follow the same steps so both the live and online participants can see?”
Tech Bro replied, “No, it doesn’t work that way.”
After some back and forth, a senior IT staff member said, “So it’s just a limitation of the system.”
The participants murmured agreement — “So we can’t do it.”
Tech Bro confirmed, “Yeah, it’s a limitation.”
At that point, I asked, “But you can do it if you just follow this one additional step, right?”
Tech Bro paused.
“Well, yes, then you can. But that wasn’t what they asked.”
Exactly.
Two culture gaps had been quietly at work:
Generational culture – The unspoken assumption that I, the older participant, might struggle with tech. (This time, they were wrong — although I admit I sometimes choose not to bother with the finer points.)
Vocational culture – The tech professional’s mental model was all about process: steps, rules, system constraints. The participants’ mental model was all about outcome: “Will it work for both audiences?” They were speaking different dialects within the same language.
They weren’t disagreeing. They just weren’t answering the same question.
And that’s the overlooked CQ insight here: The same skills that help us communicate across national or linguistic borders — clarifying intent, reframing questions, checking for shared definitions — are just as powerful when the “gap” is between generations, professions, or even departments.
When you bridge those less visible divides, you’re not just translating words. You’re translating thought patterns.
Sometimes the most valuable thing you can do in a meeting is to pause and ask, “Let’s not focus on the exact way it was phrased. What’s the outcome we’re trying to achieve?”
That’s when real alignment begins.
©2025 Shelly Bryant
Wow! It's amazing to me that Tech Bro didn't automatically respond by acknowledging the limitation of the system AND then offer the solution/extra step/workaround.