Doing Business in Mexico: Culture Differences to Watch for

By IBTimes Staff Reporter: Subscribe to IBTimes's RSS feed

February 20, 2012 5:57 PM EST

U.S. businesspeople have more and more reasons for doing business in Mexico. To be successful, however, they need to keep in mind cultural differences between the two countries.

Mexico may get a lot of attention in U.S. media for its escalating drug violence, but its economy is also booming, said Shannon K. O'Neil, a Mexico expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Previous image Enlarge Close Next image

Share This Story

High oil prices have helped. So we have a "huge boom in manufacturing along the border tied to U.S. companies and to U.S. consumers," said O'Neil.

"U.S. companies think about becoming increasingly globally competitive; you have to create global supply chains and we've done that increasingly with Mexico," she said.

Mexico, moreover, is also a growing consumer market for U.S. exporters.

Follow us

Must Read

Sponsorship Link

Relationship

"Mexicans place considerable reliance on personally relationships, rather than the business contacts we are used to dealing with in the United States," stated Missouri Southern State University.

Communicaid, a culture and communication skills consultancy, went so far to say that "business relationships often take precedence over [professional] capability."

Therefore, it is important to secure friendships with Mexican businesspeople one directly does business with or those who can introduce and vouch for oneself, according to Communicaid.

Mexican businesspeople prefer to avoid overt disagreements; their way of saying "no" is often by saying "maybe" or "I'll get back to you."

For American businesspeople, it is helpful to understand these indirect rejections from the Mexican side and not convey overt disagreement from their own side.

Time

Mexican businesspeople have a less strict sense of time than American businesspeople. Many of them are used to doing business with Americans, so they try to arrive on time for appointments. If they arrive late, however, it should not be considered a sign of disrespect, according to the Australian Trade Commission (Austrade).

Moreover, it is common for Mexican businesspeople to cancel meetings.

1 | 2 Next page | View all

This article is copyrighted by International Business Times, the business news leader