Intercultural Training

Bespoke Cultural Awareness Training For Organisations And Individuals Working Across Borders

Get started today

Developing Intercultural Competence

Developing your intercultural competences will equip you for working as an international manager or project leader.

Whether you are preparing for an international assignment or managing a cross-cultural team at home, intercultural skills are a must when working across cultures.

You will learn how to:

  • communicate effectively in the international arena

  • build relationships and trust across cultures

  • give feedback in a culturally sensitive way

  • develop your cultural awareness and sensitivity

Developing Intercultural Competence can be booked as a 1-1 or group training for a full or half day, online or face-to-face.

All my training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

Working in the UK

Do you need to prepare for working with the British?

Maybe you are about to move to the UK, or you have already experienced some dilemmas while working with the British and would like to get to the bottom of them!

This country-specific training considers work practices in multicultural working environments but focuses mainly on living and working in the UK.

In this training you will learn about:

  • The British mindset

  • Life in the UK – practical tips and tricks

  • Common business practices

  • Communicating with the Brits

Working in the UK coaching can be booked as 1-1 coaching for a half day or 2 x 2-hour sessions online or face-to-face.

All my training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

The International Profiler

If you are working cross-culturally on a regular basis, you may want to develop your intercultural competences with an international psychometric tool called The International Profiler.

Created by Worldwork, this tool is based on 22 dimensions that will help you develop the competencies you already possess and encourage you to try different skills and strategies when working across cultures.

The International Profiler helps you develop the followinging:

  • Giving feedback across cultures

  • Communicating effectively

  • Creating synergy from diversity

  • Building resilience

The International Profiler consists of a questionnaire and feedback via a 1-1 coaching session or as part of any intercultural training program.

My training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

Repatriation Support

To manage expats successfully, companies should follow the three practices that make the assignments work from beginning to end:

  • they set clear strategic objectives for the assignment abroad

  • they make sure that candidates have cross-cultural skills to match their technical abilities

  • and they prepare people to make the transition back to their home offices

Did you know that 50% of repats quit their job within the first year of return as they don’t feel challenged or valued enough? And many accompanying partners have to reinvent their careers on return.

Using THE REPAT FORMAT, I can assist you to nurture your expat talent by guiding them home. The three-way strategy is simple – it assists the company, the repat and the repat’s family.

Repatriation support can be booked as 1-1 coaching for a half day or 2 x 2-hour sessions online or face-to-face.

My training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

“When I got back, I found I was no longer a round peg in a round hole, but a square peg trying to find a hole that didn’t seem to be there at all.”

The Art of Coming Home by Craig Storti

Cross-Cultural Teams

Are you working in an international team and looking for ways to improve team spirit and communication between team members? Maybe attitudes to time, communication and deadlines are different concepts. Have you ever asked yourself WHY?

My cross-cultural team training helps you to:

  • Create a framework for recognising differences and synergies

  • Achieve a greater awareness of individual and team strengths

  • Become more aware of cross-cultural communication styles

  • Draw up a new team charter with agreed ways of working together

Cross-Cultural Teams training can be booked as a 1-1 or group training for a full or half day, online or face-to-face.

All my training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

Managing the International Classroom

Calling all college and university lecturers! Are you dealing with international students? Are your instructions sometimes misunderstood? Would you like to improve collaboration in the classroom?

This training provides you with a toolkit to:

  • Communicate effectively across cultures in an educational setting

  • Achieve higher participation & optimal learning outcomes

  • Encourage students to bring more of their authentic selves to the classroom

Bridge the gap between cultures & create synergy from the diversity

Managing the International Classroom can be booked as a 1-1 or group training for a full or half day, online or face-to-face.

All my training courses can be adapted to suit your company and individual needs.

Meet Me

My name is Vanessa and I am a trainer and coach, helping professionals to work more effectively across cultures.

My training is in person or virtual, one-to-one or in groups.

Find out more about me

Read the latest news and information

It’s not WHAT you say, it’s HOW you say it

It’s not WHAT you say, it’s HOW you say it

It’s not WHAT you say, it’s HOW you say it Effective Communication for Global Teams  Do you work in a global team? Do you notice that colleagues do things differently from other cultures? Maybe their communication is very different? Or you feel as if you don’t know...

Does speaking another language affect your personality?

Does speaking another language affect your personality?

Some language learners say they don’t feel the same when they speak another language. They say they feel underconfident, or that they speak too slowly. Others say their sense of humour, which is a large part of their personality, gets lost in...

Culture Chat

Culture Chat

3 Years of Culture Chat Three years ago, as for many people, my working life changed dramatically. With the onset of a worldwide pandemic, I found myself working alone online and nobody knew how long this would go on for. When I saw The Interchange Institute inviting...

What Others Are Saying

Read my testimonials

“I thoroughly enjoyed Vanessa’s interactive and eye-opening intercultural webinar “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it. Through her webinar, she helped me remind me what I know about intercultural communication and taught me many new points about being more effective on intercultural communication. I can definitely recommend Vanessa for intercultural communication training. Thank you, Vanessa!” Ronald Minkyu Kim Interculturalist I Cross-cultural Teams

She proved to be able to transfer her own intercultural experience and sensitivity to others in a motivating way. Participating in her lectures was highly rewarding. Without the insights gained during her lectures I might not have chosen to go for a Master’s degree in cross-cultural communication afterwards.

Dorothee Simpfendörfer

She has such in-depth knowledge about cultures and communication based on different global industries

Nikhil Rustagi

Vanessa is a professional intercultural trainer who adapts quickly to different situations so that she meets the expectations of clients both intelligently and personally.

Saskia Torn Broers, MEd

What I liked the most – she is able to involve all the students to participate in the discussion. Her workshops prepared me well for my first years living abroad, made me more conscious, and helped to avoid many adaptation problems

Alexandra Demidova

My ambition to become a “Competent Trainer” took me to you. You have oceans of “International Cultural Knowledge” & “International Communication Skills”. During our sessions, I learnt a lot from you. But still I am done yet. I love all my trainers and you are one among my elite group of trainers. Love you Mam..!! Anand Dwipesh Train the Trainer I International Customer Service I Communicator

The webinar “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it” covers lots of useful points and insights, allowing you to estimate yourself and also to understand others in a better, profound way. Communication is an art which needs to be trained. And Vanessa is a highly professional trainer, who is always ready share her experience or view. As a speaker she never makes you bored and lost. Information she shares is indeed interesting and helpful.

Anastasia

Vanessa is a pleasure to work with and she is genuinely passionate about what she does. She works very hard to ensure she delivers the best outcomes for our clients and as a result feedback is always very positive.

Cathy Wellings

Vanessa’s cultural knowledge helped me to relocate from Europe to the States

Vanessa Zwinselman

I enjoyed working with Vanessa on a few occasions as she contributed to our corporate Insights blog. Vanessa wrote articles specialising in language learning and culture, often proposing subjects and researching for submissions. Given that Marketing didn’t have an in-house copywriter, Vanessa’s editorial work over the years has been instrumental to some of our core Marketing campaigns. She is reliable, easy to work with and receives feedback well. I look forward to reading more of her in-depth articles.” Charleen Parkes Founder and Head of Digital Content  Travel & Lust

She has such in-depth knowledge about cultures and communication based on different global industries

Nikhil Rustagi

I enjoyed working with Vanessa on a few occasions as she contributed to our corporate Insights blog. Vanessa wrote articles specialising in language learning and culture, often proposing subjects and researching for submissions. Given that Marketing didn’t have an in-house copywriter, Vanessa’s editorial work over the years has been instrumental to some of our core Marketing campaigns. She is reliable, easy to work with and receives feedback well. I look forward to reading more of her in-depth articles.” Charleen Parkes Founder and Head of Digital Content  Travel & Lust

Vanessa is a great trainer! Throughout my classes with her, I enjoyed not only business English but intercultural components of working abroad. She is very disciplined, knows where to focus and always finds the ways to motivate you!

Elif Arikan

Thanks to her support, I am now constantly developing my communication skills, reaching positive outcome from any interaction with people from all around the world.

Federico Stoppello

Vanessa is a true professional with a talent for connecting with her audience in an authentic way. She’s delivered several presentations and a webinar for The Interchange Institute; all glowing reviews from participants. She is organised, responsive, and always delivers high quality content. We’ve already booked Vanessa for future events. Tasha Arnold (Ed.D.) Executive Director of The Interchange Institute

The webinar “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it” covers lots of useful points and insights, allowing you to estimate yourself and also to understand others in a better, profound way. Communication is an art which needs to be trained. And Vanessa is a highly professional trainer, who is always ready share her experience or view. As a speaker she never makes you bored and lost. Information she shares is indeed interesting and helpful.

Anastasia

Vanessa’s cultural knowledge helped me to relocate from Europe to the States

Vanessa Zwinselman

Vanessa is a great trainer who has helped me polish my interview skills in English. The lessons were varied, interesting and we had a lot of fun too. I loved the discussions about social behaviour in Austria and England.

Raphaela Stefandl-Herburger

Vanessa is a professional intercultural trainer who adapts quickly to different situations so that she meets the expectations of clients both intelligently and personally.

Saskia Torn Broers, MEd

Vanessa is extremely knowledgeable in all intercultural concepts and models and has examples to share from an abundance of international work assignments she has completed

Sarah Grötzinger

I also have other key courses also available:

Joint Intercultural and English Language Training

Language and global mindset training for International executives

w

English Language Training

Communication skills for international professionals

Subscribe to my Mailing List

* indicates required

Schedule a Call to discuss your training needs

If you want to know how your company can improve its global profile and skilfully manage its global talent get in touch.