Culture Alive!

April 20, 2026

Andrew Hedinger

At CultureBound we define culture as, “The patterns of thought, behavior, feeling, and interaction that are normal and appropriate within a specific group of people.” This definition, if left on its own, is not particularly helpful for cross-cultural workers. “Go and look for some patterns… you’ll figure it out,” is a recipe for disaster. That’s why we provide our trainees with tools: attitudes, skills, and knowledge, that will help them decipher the patterns of the culture to which they are going. Our training is practical. Students put their training to use during Culture Course by engaging with a “lab” culture; a local culture that is different than their own in which they practice new skills and apply new attitudes and knowledge.  

One of my favorite tools for understanding a new culture is the Culture Tree™. 

The Culture Tree™ is a model for breaking down cultural patterns into smaller, more easily understood pieces. It also highlights two important elements of culture.  

First, all cultures are made up of different types of patterns: there are root patterns of values, beliefs and ideas, there are historical patterns, social networks, and organizational structures. These underlying structures are expressed in behavior, art, and cultural products. By considering different types of patterns that make up a culture, we can help people recognize patterns more easily.  

The second benefit of the culture tree is that it reminds us that cultures don’t exist in a vacuum. They are the outgrowth of their environment, and they change over time as they interact with other cultures. In Riding the Waves of Culture anthropologist Fons Tompenaars argues that one way to think about the development of culture is, “culture is the way in which a group of people solves problems and reconciles dilemmas.”¹ These dilemmas may revolve around interpersonal and social relationships, people’s relationship with time, or their interaction with their environment.²  

The Culture Tree™ gives us a model to break cultures into smaller pieces that can then be considered alone and in relationship to each other. In our Culture Course, we spend time with our students thinking about the culture tree and talking about how it provides insight into a new culture. We discuss tools that can help students explore some of these subsets of cultural patterns. 

If you are a cross-cultural worker and this tool would be helpful for you, I encourage you to consider taking our CultureCourse. If you are a church leader or member and you are looking for help reaching people in your community who are from another country or culture, I encourage you to visit our website. We have resources available that can help you begin see patterns that you may not otherwise notice.

¹ Alfons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner, Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Cultural Diversity in Global Business, 2nd ed (McGraw Hill, 1998).

² Quoting Schein, E. Organizational Culture and Leadership, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 1985. 

Andrew Hedinger grew up as a missionary kid in central Mexico. He now lives with his wife and children in Portland, Oregon where he serves as the Director of Admissions for Western Seminary.