Frank Garten PhD
Intercultural communication expert sharing valuable insights into cooperation between people from different cultures
Why you should book Frank Garten for your next event
- Understand how cultural values and behaviors influence communication and collaboration within teams and across global operations.
- Apply simple, proven strategies that improve cross-cultural communication, build trust, and boost team effectiveness immediately.
- Improve performance by fostering cultural intelligence, reducing friction, and strengthening global cooperation across your organization.
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Cross-Cultural & Effective Communication for Success
How often does your organization face challenges due to cultural differences, even though effective communication is key to your success? Speaker Frank Garten offers deep insight and real solutions. As an expert in intercultural collaboration, he helps companies break down barriers and foster truly effective teamwork.
Frank Garten is a highly sought-after speaker and trainer specializing in intercultural cooperation. With a PhD in physics and chemistry, and an impressive career in marketing, general management, and HRM at companies like Philips and NXP, he brings a unique combination of scientific precision and practical experience to his keynotes. As an international advisor, he has helped numerous organizations understand and bridge cultural gaps.
Frank’s approach is practical and to-the-point. He believes effective collaboration starts with self-reflection. His book Managing Through a Mirror emphasizes that you must first understand yourself before you can understand others. His keynotes are known for their interactive and humorous style, as he exposes and dismantles stereotypes to give participants deep insight into the complexity of cultural interaction.
Thanks to his extensive knowledge of cultural dimensions and leadership, Frank offers valuable tools for international managers. He teaches how to motivate and lead effectively across diverse cultural settings. His workshops challenge leaders to step outside their comfort zones and embrace true diversity, resulting in stronger, more connected teams equipped to achieve shared business goals.
Book an inspiring keynote by Frank Garten today and unlock the power of intercultural collaboration for your organization.
Keynotes
Keynote by speaker Frank Garten:
Cultural Differences in Business
In this engaging keynote, Frank Garten offers a lively and insightful overview of cultural differences in the workplace. With a mix of humorous anecdotes, short video clips, and relatable real-world examples, he illustrates how cultural norms and expectations shape behavior, communication, and collaboration in business.
Far from theoretical, this talk brings culture to life, highlighting how even well-intentioned professionals can misread signals or miscommunicate across cultures. Participants will recognize their own experiences, laugh at familiar situations, and walk away with a deeper understanding of how to work more effectively in international and diverse environments.
This keynote is both entertaining and enlightening, making it ideal for teams and leaders navigating cross-cultural challenges or preparing for global collaboration
Keynote by speaker Frank Garten:
Diversity: If Only Others Would Be Tolerant
A keynote about the stories we tell ourselves when it comes to the urgent need for diversity in the workplace. Where managers believe that the lack of diversity is someone else’s fault. Where we count minorities and convince ourselves that if the numbers show diversity, the company must be inclusive. Where we appoint a Chief Diversity Officer to the board and hope things will finally move in the right direction.
Real change happens when we stop externalizing the diversity issue and start examining our own behavior and systems. This keynote is filled with real-life examples and scientific insights, but above all, it delivers a clear message: stop talking about diversity and start embracing the differences between people.
Keynote by speaker Frank Garten:
Our Defensive Brain
Workplace conversations often go off track when our brain switches to defensive mode, reacting to perceived external threats. This happens when we feel disrespected, treated unfairly, or emotionally unsafe. In those moments, our primal brain takes control, and our rational brain goes offline, often harming our relationships, self-esteem, and even our careers.
But science offers hope. In this keynote, insights from neuroscience, behavioral economics, and psychology come together to explain how our brain works under pressure and how we can take back control. You’ll learn how to recognize and manage defensive reactions, improve emotional resilience, and maintain effective collaboration, even in challenging interactions.
This talk is both enlightening and practical, equipping professionals with the tools to strengthen relationships, make smarter decisions, and thrive in their careers by working with, not against, their brain’s natural instincts.
Keynote by speaker Frank Garten:
The International Manager
The business world is filled with false assumptions about the global applicability of management models. Concepts like management by objectives, the 5 dysfunctions of a team, and performance management are often deployed in a one-size-fits-all manner across organizations, ignoring critical cultural differences.
But leading across borders requires more than just rolling out standard frameworks. The International Manager must understand how cultural context shapes behavior, motivation, and collaboration. What works to engage teams in the U.S. may fail in Brazil. Leadership expectations in Belgium differ significantly from those in Taiwan.
This keynote dives into the nuances of international management, offering practical insights into how culture influences leadership, communication, and team dynamics. It equips leaders with the awareness and skills needed to truly connect, motivate, and perform in diverse global environments, because successful international leadership starts with cultural intelligence.
Workshop by speaker Frank Garten:
Intercultural Leadership
Leadership is often linked to vision, decisiveness, connection, and results, among many other qualities. But in this workshop, we challenge the confidence that tends to grow stronger higher up in organizations. We often hear statements like, “I have plenty of experience with other cultures, but my team could use some training.”
This workshop invites leadership teams to take a closer, more honest look at themselves and explore what it truly means to embrace diversity. It’s not just about managing difference, it’s about being genuinely open to those who are different from you.
In shaping your own style of intercultural leadership, the mirror becomes an essential tool. Through reflection, dialogue, and confronting biases, this workshop helps leaders develop the awareness and mindset needed to lead inclusively across cultures with authenticity, humility, and impact.
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Interview with Frank Garten
Watch speaker Frank Garten in action
Frank Garten in action
Watch speaker Frank Garten in action
