Are You Competent…With Culture?

In today’s diverse work environments, Cultural Competence is an absolute essential for success. While we know we should practice it, we don’t often don’t understand what Cultural Competence means.

Before we can fully understand it, we need to get the basics down: “‘Culture’ refers to integrated patterns of human behavior that include the language, thoughts, communications, actions, customs, beliefs, values, and institutions of racial, ethnic, religious, or social groups. ‘Competence’ implies having the capacity to function effectively as an individual and an organization within the context of the cultural beliefs, behaviors, and needs presented by consumers and their communities” (hhs.gov, adapted from Cross, 1989). (more…)