Category: Culture & Society

Brazilian culture is a culture of a very diverse nature. An ethnic and cultural mixing occurred in the colonial period between Native Americans, Portuguese and Africans formed the bulk of Brazilian culture. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries Italian, German, Spanish, Arab and Japanese immigrants settled in Brazil and played an important role in its culture, creating a multicultural and multiethnic society.

The core culture of Brazil derived from Portuguese culture, because of strong colonial ties with the Portuguese empire. Among other inheritances, the Portuguese introduced the Portuguese language, the Catholic religion and the colonial architectural styles. This culture, however, was strongly influenced by African, Indigenous cultures and traditions, and other non-Portuguese European people. Some aspects of Brazilian culture are contributions of Italian, German and other European immigrants; came in large numbers and their influences are felt closer to the South and Southeast of Brazil. Amerindian peoples influenced Brazil's language and cuisine; and the Africans influenced language, cuisine, music, dance and religion.

At Work in Brazil: No Point Complaining About the Government’s Red Tape – Expat – WSJ

il: No Point Complaining About the Government’s Red Tape

One of author Paulo Trevisani’s old Brazilian carteira de trabalhos. Paulo Trevisani

One of author Paulo Trevisani’s old Brazilian carteira de trabalhos. Paulo Trevisani

BRASILIA — The woman sitting next to me in the airplane heading to Brasilia from Salvador was a Brazilian executive planning to set up shop in the U.S. She said she was fed up with Brazil’s difficult business environment.

I mentioned that my experience working in the U.S. had involved relatively little bureaucratic red tape and that there was no American version of Brazil’s ubiquitous “Carteira de Trabalho” (work book) containing proof and basic terms of employment.

 

Source: At Work in Brazil: No Point Complaining About the Government’s Red Tape – Expat – WSJ

Management the Brazilian way!

The Brazilian samba school: Delivering high performance with happiness!

Management the Brazilian Way

Management the Brazilian Way

Many foreign corporations dealing with Brazilians complain about low productivity, poor communication, high turnover and lack of engagement. Yet, at samba schools, Brazilian members show the opposite, and for no pay too!

Online course

This is an online course in English addressed to business people who work with Brazilians.

To show what is missing at corporate management Alfredo Behrens has researched and interviewed at samba schools. He has elicited the people management practices and leadership styles that can be implemented at corporations to achieve higher profitability with greater happiness. Much of the course is drawn from subtitled interviews with genuine samba school members and can be easily transferred to corporations, like recruiting, selection and promotion techniques, even compensation ones, though samba schools do not pay members.

High performance with happiness can be achieved in Brazil following the samba school method of management!

The self-paced course is designed for executives. It consists of 14 lectures but they are short: 7 minutes each. They can be fitted between phone calls if necessary. Altogether we are talking of just over one and a half hours of lectures. Each lecture comes with additional reading material and quizzes to measure the participants’ understanding. The course will remain free, for sure, until November 14, when all 14 lectures will have been completed. At present only the wrap-up lecture is missing. But you can fully benefit for free from the rest, 13 out of 14 lectures! That is all there is between you and success!Management the Brazilian Way can be found here. Once there you may click on This course and you will be taken to the course´s landing page, enrol free, no credit card asked, and start learning.

In below video, sponsored by the Dutch Brazilian Chamber of Commerce you will get an idea of the course content.

 

About Alfredo Behrens

Alfredo Behrens holds a PhD by the University of Cambridge, has taught at Princeton University and is an expert on Cross-Cultural Management and Leadership, which he lectures on at FIA, the São Paulo business school. His book ‘Culture and Management in the Americas’ is published by Stanford University Press. Another book: ‘Shooting Heroes and Rewarding Cowards’ is praised by Suzy Welch, the former Editor-In-Chief of Harvard Business Review as ‘Fascinating and Innovative’.

For more information, contact: Alfredo Behrens, e-mail: ab@alfredobehrens.com Brazil land line phone: +55 11 38280554 or mobile +5511991339779

 

Public-sector pay in Brazil: Shaming the unshameable | The Economist

 

How the bureaucrats rob the taxpayers

How the bureaucrats rob the taxpayers

Public-sector pay in Brazil: Shaming the unshameable | The Economist

When his time as São Paulo’s mayor finishes at the end of the year, jokes Gilberto Kassab, he will look for work in the garages of the city’s municipal assembly. This month the city’s legislature published, for the first time, the salaries of some of its 2,000 employees. Half the 700 people named, paulistanos were surprised to learn, take home more each month than the assembly’s chairman, who earns 7,223 reais ($3,508) after tax.

Facebook Blasts into Top Position

Facebook Blasts into Top Position in Brazilian Social Networking Market Following Year of Tremendous Growth – comScore, Inc.

Facebook Brazil

Facebook Brazil

São Paulo, Brazil, January 17, 2012 – comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released data showing that Facebook assumed the top place in the Brazilian social networking market following a year of exceptional growth. In December 2011, Facebook.com attracted 36.1 million visitors – representing an increase of 192 percent in the past twelve months – to surpass Orkut as the leading social networking destination in the market.

“Facebook’s rapid ascent in the Brazilian market has certainly been one of the most interesting stories to develop during the course of 2011,” said Alex Banks, comScore managing director for Brazil. “Brazil has always been a particularly social market and now owns the fifth largest social networking population in the world. But despite the cultural affinity for social media, Facebook adoption had traditionally lagged in the market. That has all changed in the past year, during which the site has tripled in audience size as engagement has grown sevenfold to assume the leadership position in the market.”

Facebook.com, Orkut and Windows Live Profile Lead Social Networking Rankings

Results from the recent comScore study It’s a Social World revealed that Brazil was one of just seven markets (including China, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Poland and Russia) where Facebook did not lead the local social networking class according to October 2011 data.

In December 2011, however, Facebook.com finally secured the top place in Brazil’s social networking ranking with 36.1 million visitors age 6 and older accessing the site from a home or work computer, nearly tripling in audience size in the past year. Orkut, which fell to the #2 place with 34.4 million visitors, still managed to grow its audience 5 percent in the past year despite Facebook’s growing prominence. Windows Live Profile ranked third with 13.3 million visitors (up 13 percent), while Twitter.com ranked fourth with 12.5 million visitors (up 40 percent).

 

“Brazilians are ruining FACEBOOK …”

"CNN says that Mark is saddened by the behavior of Brazilian Facebook"

“CNN says that Mark is saddened by the behavior of the Brazilian at Facebook”

The news channel CNN said that the behavior of the Brazilians on the social network site Facebook is saddening Mark Zuckerberg. “On the one hand, Brazilians are growing Facebook, however they ruin everything,” he said.

Facebook engineers were considering allowing the inclusion of images in the format animated GIF-pictures (moving images), but Mark refused the idea because he has seen the behaviour of Brazilians at the social network site Orkut, which is loaded wioth animated gif’s.

According to Mark, if Facebook make room for the gifs, sharing among users will be equal to the Brazilian Orkut, full of colorful moving letters, loaded with messages of affection and love.

 

Closing Facebook in Brazil

On the possibility of closing the Facebook in Brazil, Mark drops . “I will not blame the Brazilians use the network, but will create a manual of behavior.”

When asked about Facebook is turning into a Orkut in Brazil, Mark said that there is no difference between social networks, the difference is Who uses. “Any service that has the Internet users in Brazil, in large proportions, it becomes a problem,” he said.

 

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Source: G17.com.br

Note of the editor: This article has been published in Portuguese on the site G17.com.br. So, please don’t take this serious. It has been republished by many serious news websites in Brazil. However, for those of you intending to do business and want to learn about the culture you might be interested to read the various comments been made by the readers.

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