A good client of mine has offered me a job. The company that needs my services comes from the country which is on my list "will never work for them again, no matter what". I have been hurt very badly a few times from clients from this country, so I told myself never again will work for them even if offering me $1M.
Now, how shall I decline this in polite English without being an ass, chauvinist, racist, and so on?
Now, how shall I decline this in polite English without being an ass, chauvinist, racist, and so on?
It's unfortunate that a few bad times has soured you so much against an entire country, but if the job requires working with/for them and you feel this strongly, then just decline the offer.
If you want to be honest, you tell the folks offering you the job something like "I'm sorry. I have been hurt very badly a few times from clients from [this country]. I told myself that I will never again will work for them, so I politely decline your job offer."
Depending on the individual you are speaking with, you still may well come across as prejudiced (a bigot? a xenophobe? an anti-XYer?). In some sense of the word, you are one. But just maybe this company will hire you and only require that you work with clients from countries that you don't dislike - assuming that's your desired outcome here.
You should decide ahead of time if what led you to feel this way about an entire country is something you would want to share with the hiring manager or not. Some interviewers would ask why you feel this way, some might not.
If you don't want to be honest, you could make up any sort of lie, I suppose. That might help you not to come across as prejudiced, but you will of course be a liar.
Don't explain. Don't justify yourself. People decline job opportunities all the time. It's not a big deal.
Do you think that a potential employer will tell you the truth if they decide not to hire you. Of course not. We're all human beings. We all have hidden biases. And we're all imperfect. Every employer would get sued if they'd let their employees tell the truth when they're rejecting someone. If you don't feel like telling your client the entire truth, then don't.
You have the right not to. Besides, even a truth you hold can have many layers. Justifying yourself completely to everyone is just giving your power away. It's oversharing. Trying to control exactly how that client will end up perceiving you is futile.
But if for some reason, you do try to justify yourself, try to stay away from using universal absolute quantifiers like everyone, all of them, always, or never. These kinds of quantifiers can easily antagonize people.
Along the same lines, try not to label people, you can talk about your own limited experience and your feelings, it's difficult for people to argue against feelings, and at the same time, sharing your feelings about a group of people is usually more truthful than trying to paint an entire group of people with the same absolute label.
Because when it comes down to it, we're all individuals and nobody likes to be labeled for the wrongs committed by other fellow individuals of the same gender, race, or nationality.
If you want to say this (which I guess you do, so your contact understands) without sounding like a bigot, focus on the country, not the client.
"I've found X country difficult to work in."
"I've found the business practices of X country difficult."
This is a valid issue in some industries. You just need to frame it right. The below is from my own experience. Does it sound bad?
We had difficulty breaking into the market in the petroleum industry in Latin America. Many oil companies there are state owned, which means they are inordinately slow and clumsy at making decisions regarding new technologies (not good if you've invested lots of time and money demonstrating your product.) In North America and Europe most large oil companies are privately owned and we were able to sell much more easily there.
All that you need to say is:
I am sorry I can not accept this client/contract/offer at this time.
If pressed for a reason:
I have some business obligations that would be in conflict if I accepted so I must decline. I wish I could explain further but I am not able to do so at this time. I am so sorry and wish I could help you.
That is all true. The client is free to assume that the conflict is some sort of contractual conflict and you do not have to explain that you have a bias against businesses from that country. This should cause minimal damage to your relationship with your existing client, and keep it open for future business.
The reason for your actual declining is no ones business and in most cases you are going to be better off keeping those reasons entirely to yourself.
You cannot (politely or not) simply state "I don't want to work for someone from XY country" without sounding close minded at best, and full on racist at worst (depending on the context etc...)
You have to identify the mechanism that allowed the other party to "hurt" you, and/or the missing mechanisms which should have protected you. Once this is defined, it makes it very easy to decline with business objective reasons:
The contract/job is in this country. Very well, after former disappointing business experiences with a similar contract setup, I am afraid I can only consider working in this environment again if:
- condition 1
- condition 2
- etc ...
are respected.
This way the onus is on them to either provide you the guaranties you want ... or to decline.
Sure you can even be cheeky and ask for crazy conditions which you know would be rejected, but this is not the most professional behaviour, and it can even be seen as offensive in some culture. So if you plan to decline anyway, better follow Stephan answer: just decline without explicit justification.
In any case, DO NOT simply decline stating only your dislike of doing business with/in a specific country. Either decline abruptly without justification, or detail the specific reasons which makes you not feeling safe to practice business there.
I have been hurt very badly a few times from clients from this country, so I told myself never again will work for them even if offering me $1M.
Then what if they offer $2M ? ... will you consider it ?
That would be looking at the wrong thing anyway. If you only look at the carrot, you do not see the man with a stick and a string holding the carrot and moving you like a puppet.
You were not hurt because they weren't offering you enough in the first place, I'm assuming (guessing) that you were hurt because you were not given what you were promised in the end, or because nothing happened according to plans and everything went belly up.
So a repeat of that scenario would definitively be hurtful, but a higher expected pay off would in no way guaranty less pain if in the end this number is just a figure with no tangible aspect (might even increase frustration actually).
I worked several years in a country, culturally very far from most western ideology, but so wealthy that countless western business men come to try their luck and have a bite at what appear to be a golden apple. With time, it became a routine to see a major proportion of these go back home empty handed (some with barely a shirt to wear even after having significantly invested). Ok for a few of them this was just the result of bad management, but a significant number simply got screwed (sorry for the lack of a better word) by their mandatory local partner.
This was ~15 years ago (my very first assignment). The pattern observed was so frequent that it did make an impression on the young me, and I must admit that for a while after I left the country, I did have similar thoughts like:
I'll never work in this country or for people from this country again
but a rational train of thought (and exposure to several other business cultures) quickly turned that into:
"I'll never work in this country in the same conditions, however, provided certain safeguards are in place to limit the (now identified) risks, then it become no more risky than some transactions/jobs with other countries or business cultures"
So Know your enemy.
Remember that at list you have exposure to this specific business culture, so you know the obvious traps and pitfalls. Doing business knowing that is sometimes less risky than doing business with a new partner ... which might look appealing (yeah yeah, this one is from the same country than me, the village next door actually, and he has got a nice carrot of $2M, promised!) ... but who might still stab you in the back at the first opportunity.
Incidentally, as an example, my current company receive numerous quote requests for equipment to be shipped in a very similar country. I was impressed and terrified at the same time when my boss stood his ground and systematically asked 50% of the contract sum before we would start any manufacturing (Our products are worth ~500k$ a pop and take about 6-8 months to be produced) and the remaining 50% before we would box the products and actually ship them.
This is quite 180 degree from the classic line of business we are. In western countries it is not rare to place products directly on customer location, in "consignment", and the product is only invoiced if/when it is used.
Well, sure enough, most quotes do not receive much attention, but we do get responses. And those who respond are the one who are actually interested and didn't have a tricky scheme planned behind. At this point the discussion can be opened and there is still time to review the terms of the mutual protection if the initial ones are too strict for them (escrow accounts and other international safeguards).
In the end, the one which didn't follow up where:
So putting these conditions was an effective way to filter a lot of the unwanted business cases, yet still remaining open to this market, and discover a few loyal and honest customers ...
Now, how shall I decline this in polite English without being an ass, chauvinist, racist, and so on?
You can't: i.e. some people (or a lot of people) might consider you chauvinist etc. if you said that.
I don't know whether your saying that is also verging towards illegal (race discrimination).
My basic model of racism in commerce is something like as follows:
In your example, you didn't specify in what way you've been "hurt very badly from clients". So let me imagine, just for the sake of having in example, that you were hurt by a change in the definition of the requirements, by their blaming you, and by their not paying you.
To answer your question then, the polite way to decline would be to say something like, "I'm worried that the requirements aren't well-defined, I'm worried about the communications difficulties, and I'm worried that the client won't be satisfied and won't pay for all the work."
Assuming hurt = not paid, this is perfectly fine:
I had some problems with customers from X not paying me. Since the laws in country X made it ipmpossible to sue them, I won't risk working anymore with customers from X.
If their mentality is different, e.g. all last minute, many changes and you got stressed more than in other projects, this should be understandable too.
By giving a good reason, you avoid looking racist (e.g. I don't like people from X). After all, you probably would spend your free time with them, you just don't want to do business with them, since the potential risk is higher than with other customers (from your little experience, general knowledge, ..).
Everything else might cost you future work offers if you claim different reasons.
In this world you can never please everyone. There are many ways to politely saying “No”.
You can assess your situation and say something accordingly like “Thanks for the opportunity but I’m afraid I’m fully booked” or “This type of project isn’t my strong suit” etc. I'm not talking about giving a false reason here. And if you find it appropriate recommend someone else for the job.
In these type of situations “No” is always better than a reluctant “Yes”.
You could then thank them again for thinking of you, that way you won’t be burning any bridges either.
There have been some strange answers here. I assume that you have some very good reasons for your refusal to work with anyone from a country. I can imagine some very good reasons; claiming that you are irrational, bigoted, racist and so on without having heard those reasons is very strange.
The best thing to do is tell the client "sorry, I have had some very bad experiences working for a company from X, or working in X, or working with people from X, and it was so bad that I won't take the slightest risk repeating that experience". If it's something that another person likely thinks to be a good reason, and not too personal, and not something that would reflect badly on you, you may tell what the reason is.
You are judging by country which is prima facie prejudicial.
However, there is more to it than that. For every objective injustice, there are available remedies. Apparently you have been either unable or unwilling to avail yourself of them. There are also insurances and/or business associations working from either your country or internationally that may cover things going wrong.
I once subcontracted for someone who worked for a company more or less run as a sidejob of some high-ranking manager who employed partly relatives. The subcontractor had been burnt a few times since their engineering was pretty bad and they basically were on the outlook for scapegoats all the time and sue-happy. They had secured contracts through personal relations that were quite well-funded and were clearly going to blow them. But they paid really well, very significantly above industry average.
The subcontractor's experience with this company was factored into his offers and he basically considered it equitable remedy. It incurred additional work and cost as every offer and delivery had to be watertight and checked and acknowledged in writing without fail. In addition there was the aggravation because of being a target for scapegoating.
Basically we were talking about recording systems to be employed in cars, and they worked with their own switching power supplies on Eurocard PCBs right next to the measuring boards. I've seen their systems crash when you switched on the neon lights in the room (cars are not exactly renowned as the cleanest source of electric power) and you could measure significant AC next to the power supply just by forming a single loop with the cables from a multimeter. The subcontractor's job was the recording subsystem.
So this was a system bound for failure and fingerpointing but inundated with money temporarily. And a certain scarcity of subcontractors still willing to work there. He crossed his t's and dotted his i's and cashed his cheques and paid his legal insurance and after all that came out ahead as planned, with his systems provably working as specified and, after initial tussles, certified as that.
The project, of course, eventually tanked after being several years overdue and the company probably went into liquidation at some point of time and its company head reverted to his main job.
The answer for you to take away here is that you can take on jobs you are sure to fail if you make sure that your payout is ensured at all steps, by advance payments at contractually ensured points of the project and taking out all proper insurances necessary to cover against a malintentioned partner.
If you factor everything in into your offer, it's not a cause for worry when it gets accepted, and it's not a cause for worry when it gets rejected.
Basically, you have conditions to adhere to when doing business in that country that have been shaped by your previous experience there. If stuff works better than expected repeatedly, you can factor those experiences into future offers conservatively, more likely than not based on who you are doing business with.
It's not everybody's idea of fun to work under circumstances felt to be hostile. If you don't find yourself able to put together a working plan where you are secure against the kind of catastrophes you did encounter so far, I do not consider it amiss to tell your prospective business partner that previous experience with that country has shown you that your business models and procedures are a bad match to doing business there and that you currently see no way but to decline.
Just say it, don't obscure it.
Why?
Your client isn't the foreign company in question.
It is good if they know your requirements clearly - helps them match offers to you, not to mention it may help them avoid the same pitfalls.
If you think it feasible, leave it to them to turn the offer down (or offer to someone else, or have the terms amended) with the needed diplomacy.
Cultures / subcultures would not be identifiable entities if they had no distinctive traits. Superstitions, ingrained habits, different moralities taught as a way of life...
I would not try selling whistle-activated devices to theatre employees. I would not count on a Japanese businessperson clearly stating refusal. I would be extra wary of anything where a newly met Rom and my cash are mentioned in the same sentence.
Past experiences are a quite valid reason for making personal decisions - in many cases, they're the only form of statistics you have available.
You have detected a trend. You are not obligated to have peer-reviewed social studies to put value on it. You do not claim that is representative of the country's population, only that you consider it sufficient to reject the offer in favor of ones you are less wary of.
If the company is on your "never, ever again" list then it doesn't really matter if they think you are a chauvinist or a racist. So you can bluntly speak your mind. Nevertheless, if you want to sugarcoat it you could say something like "The management and workplace practices of XY country do not match my style of working. So, I will decline this offer."
