Affiliate since: 01/07/2014, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Sujit's 20 other Ask SC answers

I must very frankly declare that I have never considered this factor. The reason being that I consider the SFI business as a real business and this is no different than any other business.

What would you do if you have a physical shop or business? You would naturally tell your customers and all concerned that on such and such date, your business will be closed for so and so cultural reason, but in case of emergency you are available at a particular phone number. The same goes here. You inform all concerned, including your downline in advance.

Regarding time zone, we should all maintain SFI time zone mentioned at the top of your SFI homepage. For direct contact through SFI chat or Skype and like, you can always ask the person concerned regarding his preferred time of contact.

I personally specifically inform all concerned that I am available on phone 24/7/365.

Hope this helps. Best of luck to you all and Happy New Year 2015.

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I must very frankly declare that I have never considered this factor. The reason being that I consider the SFI business as a real business and this is no different than any other business.

What would you do if you have a physical shop or business? You would naturally tell your customers and all concerned that on such and such date, your business will be closed for so and so cultural reason, but in case of emergency you are available at a particular phone number. The same goes here. You
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Affiliate since: 03/13/2014, Power Rank: 964 | Read Reuben's 70 other Ask SC answers

Hi Carlos,
1. I would rather admit that managing affiliates in your team coming from different countries with different cultures, languages & time zones, is not an issue at all in the first place. As a matter of fact, it’s very interesting & a wonderful opportunity to deal with people from different races, religions etc on a global platform. I do take it as a pleasant challenge to guide, help & encourage my global affiliates to perform well and progress in SFI.
2. Isn’t it better to run a business on which people are working around the clock around the world? This is definitely a positive feature of the SFI business.
Analogically speaking, our online shop is open for business 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, 12 months in a year.
3. I do understand the following:-
a). SFI is a global internet business.
b) The affiliates who are sponsored & sign up will hail from different countries with different languages, time zones etc.
c) This also calls for making good use of the 24 hours available in a day to contact with my team mates by mail, mobile, online chat or any other media source.
d) Though languages are not the same, English can be used for global communication.
e) At the outset, it is important to understand that there is only one "Business Culture", especially in the world of Internet-the culture of efficiency, cost effectiveness and multiplying your income!
4. Moreover, SFI has given us the additional luxury of a language translator which I make very good use of in my team communications. When I sponsor someone speaking a different language and not understanding English, I use the translate system provided by SFI and send the group/individual mails. This has helped me in number of cases where the response is prompt & better when mail is translated into respective languages of my team members.
5. Once you focus on being efficient, providing cost effective ways to do business and helping people make money, the affiliates around the world will understand your message. This will ultimately break the language barriers and attract people to your business, regardless of their culture,race,religion, language of communication or their location on the global map.
6. I use my tools of communication quite effectively; they are my
a) Personal tools like my own websites, my blogs etc.
b) Collective tools like the social media (Twitter, FB, Instagram etc) and the built-in SFI Marketing and Advertising features /banners ,Gateways etc..
7. Finally to summarize, managing the team with many cultures, languages, race, religions and time zones is always welcome.
Presently, sponsoring active & performing members under your team is the biggest challenge for all of us .Patience & perseverance are the keys. Let’s be optimistic that who ever is serious will definitely become active - if not today at least in future!!
Before I conclude, let us realize that we are in business that is global and all our sponsored affiliates are not similar like the fingers of our hand!!


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Hi Carlos,
1. I would rather admit that managing affiliates in your team coming from different countries with different cultures, languages & time zones, is not an issue at all in the first place. As a matter of fact, it’s very interesting & a wonderful opportunity to deal with people from different races, religions etc on a global platform. I do take it as a pleasant challenge to guide, help & encourage my global affiliates to perform well and progress in SFI.
2. Isn’t
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Affiliate since: 10/07/2014, Power Rank: 252 | Read Alvin's 86 other Ask SC answers

"How do you manage your team with many cultures and timezones to navigate?"

This is not so serious. There are many ways to overcome these barriers. Google Translator is one of the most effective means to achieve desired communication with those team members assigned from abroad. We do have to understand some cultures will celebrate at times when other don't. Timezones are really not a problem either as we have access to help online.

I think the most important consideration is to recognized trade and currency rates when products must be shipped from countries abroad. In these instances we can connect with our ECA's and request this information from them. Example: "We are not responsible for customs delays and if you are ordering for WGF Enterprises, Inc. check the customs regulation for yourself. Inform us of any restrictions to your country."

Here I see would be the hugest barrier for managing teams with Affiliates from diverse regions. There would be many requests for help from their Sponsors in this case. Myself, I have had a member request my assistance for creating a standing order through PayPal. This person was not understanding how SFI or PayPal played a role in this purchase. I was asked to help the process, but first wanted more information from the team member.

In the end we must know more regarding trends, policy, and regulations when dealing with diverse nations. Culture too is also very important as certain holidays are not traditional worldwide. Terms may not be as well perceived or be acceptable in certain regions, and phrases may also be unacceptable and recognized as taboo.

These categories would be considered a larger influence toward barriers.

Thanks for the question. You have opened my mind to something never really considered to be as serious until now.
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"How do you manage your team with many cultures and timezones to navigate?"

This is not so serious. There are many ways to overcome these barriers. Google Translator is one of the most effective means to achieve desired communication with those team members assigned from abroad. We do have to understand some cultures will celebrate at times when other don't. Timezones are really not a problem either as we have access to help online.

I think the most important consideration
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Affiliate since: 10/20/2014, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Teresa's 9 other Ask SC answers

A.At my first interaction with the SFI page when browsing I learned and understood that:-

1. SFI is a global internet business.
2. By it being global it for it meant that if I sign up I will be interacting with everyone in the globe;
3. This meant that I will be operating the business 24 hours, for the world country's time zones are different.
4. Cultures and languages are not the same, but ENGLISH is more understood.

B.Sponsoring

1. When I happen to sponsor someone with a different language and not understanding English, I use the translate system provided by SFI and or I type the message in the wordprocess and Microsoft provide an option of translating, I then translate and copy to the message I need to send.

2.I have to tell you this worked for me, for one of my affiliate is not versatile with English and we can communicate and he/she is doing wonders.
3. This is making my sponsoring exciting, because in the process I get to learn other languages.
4. I also get to be vested with other countries time zone and earaning income at the same time.
5. I make it a point that I log into SFI messages and emails daily to check on what is sent during my countries times.
6. That does not discourage me, I respond and if need be also apologize for responding late.

There is a lot I could say with regard to this question, but I think this will be of assistance.

All of the best.

Regards.
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A.At my first interaction with the SFI page when browsing I learned and understood that:-

1. SFI is a global internet business.
2. By it being global it for it meant that if I sign up I will be interacting with everyone in the globe;
3. This meant that I will be operating the business 24 hours, for the world country's time zones are different.
4. Cultures and languages are not the same, but ENGLISH is more understood.

B.Sponsoring

1. When I happen to
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Affiliate since: 11/29/2011, Power Rank: 22 | Read Gliceria's 402 other Ask SC answers

It is hard and it is easy, but SFI has given us many tools to solve this problem.

For many of us who live in the other side of the world, there are certain advantages of having a different time zones from our team.

For when they are asleep in their own country, we are awake where we are and can easily catch up with their emails and act on their questions and find solutions. Our emails with the solutions/answers to questions/issues will then be waiting for them when they wake up and log in.

The time difference also offers the advantage of being ahead of time, if you’re from New Zealand and Australia. While those in New Zealand and Australia have already finished theirr own tasks and done for the day, others are still getting ready to log in. It’s this time you can make full use of – by being able to monitor your team’s progress and offer help where necessary. This is very handy at the end of the month when your team are working hard to requalify.

With language issue, SFI has also installed a Translate option on every pages of SFI Affiliate Center, even in the Forum. In addition to this, there’s the Google Translate . A2A friends from the same country are also very willing to help with translation.

There are certain cultures that are completely different from ours, so to be safe just be polite, friendly and choose the right words when communicating with them.

For example, not all cultures celebrate Christmas so the safest thing to do is to adopt the American way of greeting Happy Holidays.

It’s also prudent not to discuss religion, politics, or anything with racial connotations in your weekly newsletters and regular communication.

Different cultures and different timezones are no barrier to success in SFI.

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It is hard and it is easy, but SFI has given us many tools to solve this problem.

For many of us who live in the other side of the world, there are certain advantages of having a different time zones from our team.

For when they are asleep in their own country, we are awake where we are and can easily catch up with their emails and act on their questions and find solutions. Our emails with the solutions/answers to questions/issues will then be waiting for them when they wake
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Affiliate since: 03/31/2013, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Tom and Diana's 69 other Ask SC answers

Easy! I don't even try to navigate anything. Through the magic of the Internet I can send a newsletter or email, or post a stream and everyone on my team has access to it within a few minutes.

No juggling phone calls with time zones. No setting up conference calls so everyone can be there. If you wish to set up a Skype call with one or two parties it is a simple thing but overall I just allow the internet to do its' thing.

Now as far as culture is concerned, I simply embrace it. There is plenty of room under this big tent called SFI. Everyone has basically the same view of owning a business no matter where you live. And of course we have a translation tool on each page and we all have access to Google Translate for use in our emails.

I love technology.
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Easy! I don't even try to navigate anything. Through the magic of the Internet I can send a newsletter or email, or post a stream and everyone on my team has access to it within a few minutes.

No juggling phone calls with time zones. No setting up conference calls so everyone can be there. If you wish to set up a Skype call with one or two parties it is a simple thing but overall I just allow the internet to do its' thing.

Now as far as culture is concerned, I simply embrace
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Affiliate since: 12/31/1969, Power Rank: 99999999

Thank goodness for modern technology - it shrinks the world a whole lot so it does not really matter where your team is. You do your part like placing adverts, sending mails to your team when you are awake and they will react to your adverts or read your mails when they are awake - so the different time zones is not that important - although it would be nice if you catch them online despite the different time zones so you could have a one on one chat to them - but if it does not happen it is not a train smash.

As far as culture goes I feel the keyword is respect. Show your interest in them as human beings by finding out for instance about Hindi holidays and wish them well. So what I am saying is improve your own general knowledge by doing a little research about the culture of you affiliates and use it to show your good intentions towards them.

The only thing that I find the biggest obstacle is language - even with Google Translate the message does not always gets translated to its full effect. My solution for this with inactive affiliates that might be inactive because of a language barrier?
If I have a worker that speaks the same language as some of the inactive affiliates I explain my thinking to them and ask if they would be willing to take over the affiliate in their team and try to get them to work - I then transfer if possible to that PSA - if they have success we all win.

Hope this will give you a few ideas. Good luck.
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Thank goodness for modern technology - it shrinks the world a whole lot so it does not really matter where your team is. You do your part like placing adverts, sending mails to your team when you are awake and they will react to your adverts or read your mails when they are awake - so the different time zones is not that important - although it would be nice if you catch them online despite the different time zones so you could have a one on one chat to them - but if it does not happen it is not
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Affiliate since: 05/10/2012, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Wayne's 236 other Ask SC answers

In this world of Internet Marketing where we have access over the entire globe we have affiliates from many different cultures and languages along with 24/7 on going activities within our teams.

As far as managing my team with these differences in mind I created extra avenues of communication for my teammates.

I have informed all teammates that we have a Facebook business fan page where they can leave messages any time they want.

I have an Email service that is dedicated strictly for my SFI teammates. It is a hosted email address and my teammates can contact me at any time there – I check the emails about 5 times a day.

Almost every day I post a message in the Stream for my teammates. Something up-lifting or encouraging along with notices of milestones reached.

Four or five times a month I send out a newsletter to all my teammates, informing them of SFI news and news about how our team is doing and sometimes about a great product in TripleClicks that they may not be aware of.

To top that I also send E-cards to new affiliates (along with information of the different ways to contact me) when they join or when they advance to a new level.

If an affiliate contacts me in any of the above methods I try to respond to them that day (if possible). I do not try to set up personal time to get on Skype or instant messaging services at this time I just cannot afford such things.

As a team leader with many activities I have very little time to invest in contacting individuals unless they request it.

As my personal team grows larger I will acquire more effectual ways of communication with individuals when needed.

This business is about building relationships through our partners in our team. I am always working on ways of improving avenues. Like in the future I already have access to a conference room that can hold 50 plus members at one time. I would schedule live training at any time of day or night (to accommodate those in different time zones).

When enough people want to gather in a single country I would have a person from that country to interpret the training so all can understand.

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In this world of Internet Marketing where we have access over the entire globe we have affiliates from many different cultures and languages along with 24/7 on going activities within our teams.

As far as managing my team with these differences in mind I created extra avenues of communication for my teammates.

I have informed all teammates that we have a Facebook business fan page where they can leave messages any time they want.

I have
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Affiliate since: 09/28/2014, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Marco Polo's 18 other Ask SC answers

Very good your question. In fact this is one of the challenges you have ahead when he decides to join the SFI. Balance and harmonize so many different cultures and times of several works, no joke, but you can you get trying to popularize the information through weekly newsletters that you send to your team. Remembering you should choose to universal language for this task the English to the group information and try to find out the nationality of the PSAs and when making a direct communication via e-mail try to send messages in their native language through google translator . I recently did this, communicating with Indian PSAs, I discovered I had videos in Urdu and Hindi on Youtube about SFI and sent it to them ... they awoke and now in my team have new EAs ... Another good way is to always be visitanto their MOVERS and trying to get in touch with them when they are online ...
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Very good your question. In fact this is one of the challenges you have ahead when he decides to join the SFI. Balance and harmonize so many different cultures and times of several works, no joke, but you can you get trying to popularize the information through weekly newsletters that you send to your team. Remembering you should choose to universal language for this task the English to the group information and try to find out the nationality of the PSAs and when making a direct communication via
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Affiliate since: 04/13/2012, Power Rank: 784 | Read Andrew's 330 other Ask SC answers

I had a Aussie business partner for 7 years. His 6AM tomorrow was like 4PM in my today.

We had a site administrator and content writer who was Indian but lived on an island near the arctic circle, a dutch lady with broken English who headed up part of our marketing and advertising wing, and thousands of members from around the world who spoke numerous languages.

Fact is our budget didn't afford us to have people translate all these languages and most of the team at least spoke some English so we learned to face the day with Google Translate and the power of Skype Chats.

When you decide to start an international business you shouldn't be narrow minded and say I will only do business with people who speak Spanish, English, French, or Russian. You simply do your best to serve each community equally. Sure you will have cases where the Person from Serbia who grew up in the USSR doesn't trust the Americans, or the person in China and the other business partner in Japan can't agree who is right on maritime issues, but being a steady voice of reason will eventually win over the sharpest critics.

In short, do what it takes to serve the global community. Don't look for reasons it wont work or for an opportunity to avoid difficult and just ship off your PSA to someone who speaks their language. Learn and grow, and as US President Eisenhower said, "The Buck Stops Here".


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I had a Aussie business partner for 7 years. His 6AM tomorrow was like 4PM in my today.

We had a site administrator and content writer who was Indian but lived on an island near the arctic circle, a dutch lady with broken English who headed up part of our marketing and advertising wing, and thousands of members from around the world who spoke numerous languages.

Fact is our budget didn't afford us to have people translate all these languages and most of the team at least spoke
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