If Arnold Schwarzenegger can do it then so can one Martin Pfleger. Mr. Pfleger hails from Austria and now lives in San Francisco. While I'm here on a 3 year secondment with Deloitte, Martin was kind enough to provide me with advice and counsel on how to better work the locals here and does a nice job answering the question: What motivates an Austrian to trade Vienna for San Francisco? Can this "bet the farm" approach be taught to other Austrians?
Enter Martin Pfleger:
Hello Jason,
Before I tell you what motivates me, why I am as I am and what I recommend you to do/try I want to introduce you a bit into the Austrian mentality because I think it will help you understand many things when you see them.
First, I think in general Austrians are very conservative people. We don’t like big changes and we don’t like unexpected incidents. In other words, we don’t like to go outside of our comfort zone. A good example would be that Austria has the lowest mobility rate in the EU. The attitude of many people is still that they finish school, maybe college, and then try to find a job at a nice established company and ideally work there, in the same city, their entire life.
I think a big reason for that is the Austrian system overall. There are no incentives to work harder or more. About 2 years ago I read an amazing article in “Die Presse” (one of the quality newspapers in Austria). They came up with a statistic that compared the income of two families – each consisted of the parents and two children. One family earned I think about 2500 Euros the other one a bit more than 4000 Euros a month. After all the social benefits were included both families had about the same income!
Also, if you do work harder and earn more than the average person then people usually get jealous and ask how can he/she earn more than me? Most Austrians also don’t understand why managers at companies earn a multiple of the regular workforce.
Furthermore, Austrians know that they live in one of the most beautiful and richest countries in the world. Because of the vast social system people basically have no worries. Everyone is insured and if you lose your job the government will take care of you. There are actually people that don’t work because they get higher unemployment payment than they would earn if they worked.
We are also very skeptical, pessimistic and risk averse people. This explains the low mobility rate and the “we don’t like unexpected incidents” mentality. That’s also why almost no Austrian would pack his or her belongings and move somewhere else in the world.
I hope this little inside helps you understand some behavior.
Why am I not like this typical Austrian I just described?
I think I am more curious about things and other people/cultures than most other people in Austria. I’m also a very optimistic and believe that I can accomplish whatever I want. When I was 16 my Dad sent me to relatives in Colorado where I spent my summer vacation. My English at that time wasn’t very good and I had never done anything like this before. I was a little scared, to be honest, and definitely went outside of my comfort zone. But those 6 to 7 weeks were so amazing and I learnt a lot. Since that time I think I constantly want to explore new things and I try to constantly get outside of my comfort zone. I constantly want to learn new things, make new experiences and face new challenges.
What motivates me?
I want to prove myself. I set myself goals and want to accomplish them. So far it has worked out quite well. I always wanted to study in the United States which I first did when I did my exchange semester in St. Louis, Missouri. I also wanted to learn more about South America and improve my Spanish which I did in Mexico (although Mexico is still part of North America, I know). I also knew that I didn’t want to do my master’s degree in Austria and get taught in English by Austrians. So I went to San Francisco to study there. This might sound kind of easy but it wasn’t due to the explained Austrian mentality of my family as well as for financial reasons. My current challenge/goal is to find employment here in California and stay here at least for some time. For me it’s like if I don’t go outside of my comfort zone regularly I feel like I’m standing still and I’m not improving as an individual.
Recommendations:
OK, this is by far the toughest part because I have tried to change my family’s and friends mentality but haven’t come up with a magic formula. I think you have to try to get them somehow outside of their comfort zone. A great way is a change of environment – international exposure. It really had an impact on me and I just love it. I know it’s very tough to do that. Maybe a good starting point would be to somehow get them to know or work with some international people. This might be a way to develop curiosity for other people and cultures and lead them to do things they usually wouldn’t do.
Otherwise I can only think of some kind of incentives.
I think it is important to show them the objective of your changes. If they don’t see a reason or benefit they won’t do it. Most people are kind of stubborn. Whatever you do you should be careful though. As I said, we don’t like change. Austrians are resistant to change. The mentality is: why should you change something if everything works fine the way it is? Especially if a foreigner tries to initiate change they will think: “this guy tries to do things like they do in America, but we are here in Austria and this is not what we do or how we do it.” So they will expect that you adapt to them and if you try to change things you might face some intended obstacles from other employees.
I hope my thoughts help you a bit. If you have any further questions feel free to send me an e-mail or give me a call! In the meantime I will think of other recommendations that might help.
All the best and good luck with everything!
Martin
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