{"id":13965,"date":"2017-01-10T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-01-10T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.smarteventi.it\/business-etiquette-in-italy.html"},"modified":"2017-01-10T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-01-10T00:00:00","slug":"business-etiquette-in-italy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.smarteventi.it\/en\/business-etiquette-in-italy.html","title":{"rendered":"Business etiquette in Italy: useful tips to make it work"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Expanding your business internationally is an appealing prospect, but it will require you to employ a different skill set than you might be used to at home. There’s more to it than learning about local laws and regulations: having international clients or partners will require you to adapt your business etiquette and use your cross-cultural skills in order to maintain relationships, close deals and get leads<\/strong>. It is surprising how the smallest gestures, like greeting someone or presenting them with your business card, can differ remarkably from Country to Country. Not being aware of such differences can make your interactions with foreign counterparts uncomfortable, to the point of making you appear unintentionally discourteous to the people you are trying to impress. Even between Countries that, broadly speaking, share customs and a way of life, the tiniest detail can cause embarrassment or result in misunderstandings. If you are thinking of expanding your business to Italy<\/strong>, make sure you acquaint yourself with the finer points of Italian business etiquette. We have already provided you with a basic guide to planning a business in Italy<\/strong><\/a>. Here are a few more tips you might find handy when negotiating with Italian partners <\/p>\n

Scheduling meetings and engagements<\/h3>\n

Even though religion plays a smaller role in Italian culture than you might imagine, the official school and business calendar is organised around catholic festivities. You might be familiar with some of them, like Sundays, Christmas and Easter, but others might be entirely new to you. There are also other public holidays, that are connected with Italian history and politics, such as Liberation day (April 25th) and Republic Day (June 2nd). In Italy, it is customary, whenever a holiday falls within two days of a weekend, to take a day off in between, so as to have a long festive weekend. When scheduling a meeting<\/a><\/strong>, you should always make sure that there are no national festivities in sight.
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