In an increasingly globalized workplace, where team members might be spread across continents and clients are spread even more widely, communicating within proper cultural norms can determine whether teams work well together, secure a deal, or watch everything fall apart.

Here is what you should know to effectively communicate across certain cultures. Keep in mind that cultural traits should never be taken as absolutes. While a particular communication style may be fairly common in a certain culture, individual people, businesses, and industries also have their own styles.

Respect and honor are prevailing themes that influence Asian communication styles. This quickly becomes apparent in speaking patterns. There is a strong emphasis on listening, and many Asian business people, following what they are taught growing up, will wait for a sentence to end before responding, then also wait for a couple of beats of silence before talking. “You can imagine the outcome on a global team for those individuals who are waiting for silence that never comes,” said Erin Meyer, who specializes in cross-cultural management and is the author of The Culture Map. “Business people from Asian countries tend to be stronger negotiators compared with managers from Western cultures,” said Gayle Cotton, who offers training and coaching programs to global clients.

That’s because they wait to speak —which often throws off the people on the other side of the table — and they reveal very little with facial expressions and body language. “They will pause and be quiet and honor us to show what we have said is important to them and that they are reflecting on it,” said Cotton. “They don’t want to respond hastily, and Americans often don't get that.” Asian cultures are also the least direct cultures in the world, Meyer explained. Open criticism, negative feedback, and the word “no” are almost always avoided, because they all are considered highly disrespectful. “Maybe is a no,” Cotton said. Asian cultures tend to be very hierarchical. Authority is highly respected and meetings that include different levels of hierarchy are not encouraged.

In Latin countries, including Italy and Spain, family is the priority — and business is also very focused on relationships. People in Latin countries love engaging in small talk, asking sincerely about families and weekend activities. They communicate with more emotion, using lots of hand gestures and personal expressions, compared to people in many other places. According to Cotton, presenting decisions or ideas subjectively with phrases such as “I feel” mixed in with research is acceptable and often well received. People from Latin countries also have a great respect for authority figures and honor them. One Swedish person working in Mexico told Meyer he realized he needed to change his communication approach after he voiced disagreement in meetings — intending to contribute to the conversation — and the group went silent. But “when he voiced an opinion, people automatically lined up behind it,” she said. “And he realized he needed to get the dialogue going in another way.”

Independence and personal initiative characterize the U.S. communication style, Cotton observed, because U.S. work culture is very focused on results. People of varying status are given the authority to make decisions, and they are expected to speak up. “In the U.S., we wouldn’t hesitate to say, ‘Sure, I can do it’,” Cotton said. “There’s more pride involved in that ‘I’ than in other countries.” When she works with non-Americans who will be working in the U.S., she always urges them to be assertive. U.S. communication style also prioritizes clarity, Meyer said. “We tell them what we’re going to tell them, we tell them, and then we tell them what we told them,” she said. “And that style often comes off as condescending to other cultures.” But feedback is given in a very distinct way in the U.S., too, Meyer said. A negative is often heavily sandwiched between multiple positives. Meyer tells a story of a French employee, recently transplanted to the U.S. His boss informed him that his performance needed to change. But because she delivered the negative feedback by first explaining what she appreciated about his work — and he was generally unaccustomed to receiving positive feedback — he floated out of the meeting thinking it had gone well.

Germanic, Scandinavian, and Dutch communication styles can be traced to the languages themselves, which are very precise and direct, Cotton explained. “They are frank, serious, direct, and detailed.” These cultures also tend to be very objective. When topics are presented, they want facts and research as support. Meyer said, in particular, that the Dutch give and receive very honest and direct feedback — and it’s appreciated as a sign of respect. The Law of Jante, which is little known outside of Scandinavia, offers 10 rules to live by, such as “you’re not to think you’re anything special”. The law, which emphasizes the collective over the individual, is pervasive in Scandinavia, according to Meyer. As a result, the region is likely the most equal place in the world. “In fact,” Meyer says, “it’s often difficult for an outsider to pick out the boss when watching people in a meeting in Scandinavian countries.”