You have been assigned to Mexico for a two-year international assignment. Your task is to support the development of a new subsidiary. During the first weeks of your stay in Mexico, you experience again and again that your Mexican employees as well as your suppliers and customers are never on time. Now you are sitting in a restaurant and you are waiting for the Sales Director of one of your Mexican suppliers. Your meeting was at 12.30 but it is already 13.00 and the person you were waiting for did not show up. As you have another appointment at 13.30 you ask for the bill, still hungry! Exactly at this moment, the Sales Director shows up – half an hour late.

a. What reaction do you expect from your Mexican partner?

b. Which reactions would be inter-culturally competent and which would not be?