Cross-Cultural Management Consultant in Barcelona
International teams in Barcelona lose time, trust and money to cultural friction. I help them fix it — through workshops, leadership training, and ongoing advisory.
Barcelona is one of Europe’s most international cities — and that internationalism creates a specific kind of problem that most organisations never quite name.
Teams here are often genuinely diverse: Spanish and Catalan professionals working alongside colleagues from Northern Europe, Latin America, the UK, and beyond. English is frequently the working language. Growth is fast. And beneath the surface, cultural friction quietly accumulates — in meetings that feel aligned but aren’t, in feedback that never quite lands, in decisions that get made but don’t stick.
I work with Barcelona-based organisations — and those sending teams to or from Barcelona — to surface that friction, name it, and fix it. Not through generic training, but through structured interventions built around what is actually happening in your specific team.
What Brings Leaders to Me in Barcelona
Most of the organisations I work with aren’t searching for “cross-cultural training.” They’re experiencing something concrete that nobody can quite explain. Here are the patterns I see most often:
None of these are personality problems. They are cultural friction — and cultural friction has structural solutions.
Barcelona’s Specific Cross-Cultural Context
Working in Barcelona means understanding a genuinely complex cultural layer that most generic consultants miss. Catalan business culture is distinct from both Spanish and Northern European norms — neither as direct as Dutch or German, nor as indirect as Japanese. It has its own specific logic around feedback, relationship, and authority that takes time to read correctly.
Feedback in Catalunya is delivered differently depending on setting and relationship. What a Catalan colleague will say privately, they will often not say in a group. What feels like evasion to a Northern European colleague is often the culturally appropriate channel for honest input. The article on working with Catalans on feedback and evaluation explains how this plays out in practice.
On top of that, Barcelona-based international teams typically bridge multiple cultures simultaneously — Southern European, Northern European, UK, Latin American, and increasingly Asian and Middle Eastern. That’s not one cultural gap to manage. It’s several, operating at once, in the same room.
How I Work with Barcelona-Based Organisations
The work begins with a conversation about what’s actually happening — not a generic cultural awareness presentation, but a real look at the specific friction your team is experiencing. From there, I typically work in one of three ways:
Half-day or full-day structured sessions for global or multicultural teams — surfacing hidden assumptions, building shared communication norms, and creating a common language for navigating difference. Delivered in Barcelona or at your location.
Focused work with leaders and managers of multicultural teams — building the skills to lead effectively across cultures in decision-making, feedback, trust and communication. Particularly relevant for Barcelona-based regional leaders with European or global responsibility.
Ongoing support for leaders navigating sustained cross-cultural complexity — working through specific challenges as they arise, developing cross-cultural leadership capability over time, and embedding lasting change across the organisation.
One-to-one advisory and coaching for leaders navigating sustained cross-cultural complexity — working through specific challenges, developing capability over time, and embedding lasting change.
I am based in Barcelona, which means in-person delivery is straightforward — no travel delays, no jet lag, no three-hour prep calls about logistics. For teams that prefer remote or hybrid delivery, I work across formats with equal effectiveness.
Background & Credentials
I have been working in cross-cultural communication for over 25 years — across the UK, Spain, West Africa, and internationally. I lecture on cross-cultural communication at SBS Swiss Business School in Barcelona. I am a member of SIETAR Europe (Society for Intercultural Education, Training and Research).
My work draws on the research of Erin Meyer, Geert Hofstede, Amy Edmondson, and Edward T. Hall — grounded in the evidence base, but applied practically to the real situations your teams are actually experiencing. You can read more about my approach and background on the About page.
Is cultural friction active in your Barcelona team?
30 minutes is usually enough to understand what’s happening and whether I can help. No pitch — just a conversation about your team.
Book a discovery call See the workshopsCross-Cultural Workshops
Structured sessions for global and multicultural teams — building shared norms and reducing everyday friction in communication, feedback and decision-making.
See all workshops →Leadership Training
For managers of multicultural teams — developing the cross-cultural leadership skills that make a real difference in how teams communicate and collaborate.
View the workshop →Advisory & Coaching
Ongoing support for leaders navigating cross-cultural complexity — coaching, mentoring, and advisory work tailored to your specific situation.
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