I recently displayed a map of the world at work to highlight all the different countries represented in my team. It brought out some interesting observations that I thought I would share.

Firstly, quite a few people thought the map was “wrong” – why? Because Australia was in the middle! They had grown up in countries where Australia was always on the far right of the map. Interesting to see how people are thrown by a different perspective – definitely opens your eyes to looking at things from a different “angle” 😉

THIS

 VERSUS THIS…

 AND JUST TO REALLY THROW YOUR PERSPECTIVE – THIS…

I decided to use dots to represent where people were from. Some suggested that I should use flags, but I avoided that for a number of reasons. For one, many countries are very patriotic about their flags and it can evoke passionate political responses (e.g. would you put a flag for Taiwan when there are also people from China in your office?). Australia is quite laid back about their flag, however just because you are living in a “neutral” country doesn’t mean you can dismiss the experience and perspectives of those who have migrated and are working with you.

In addition, my husband used to work for a company where they had flags on their nametag to identify which languages the employee spoke. However this is also problematic, as many countries have many different languages and you cannot assume which language a person will speak without knowing which region they are from.

I’m happy with the dots – it’s an easy way to avoid the political tensions and other potential divisive factors, whilst still achieving the purpose of giving everyone an appreciation of the diversity of our team.