Anh works for a manager from a different culture than her own. He gives her instruction. She follows it exactly.
He looks at the result. He is not happy.
"This is not what I wanted," he says. Nothing more.
So Anh tries again. She changes the format. She adds more detail. She sends it back.
Two days later: "Better. But not there yet."
She tries again. And again. Each time, she gets a little closer to something she cannot name.
By the fourth try, she is not thinking about the work anymore. She is thinking about her manager. Is he angry with me? Does he think I am not good enough for this job?
She is tired. Not from the work. The work was never hard for her. She is tired from guessing.
Why This Looks Like a Skills Problem — And Isn't
This looks like a skills problem. It gets treated like one — more training, more polish, more confidence coaching. But that is not what is happening.
What is happening is a gap between what her manager needs and what Anh thinks he needs.
Over the years, I realised this wasn't unique to Anh. Different people. Different countries. Different industries. The same invisible pattern kept appearing.
Eventually I gave that pattern a name. The Interpretation Gap™.
Years after I had begun noticing this pattern, I discovered research that described something remarkably similar. In 2022, Dai, Li, Xie and Deng found that communication problems associated with high power distance beliefs were concentrated in communication with superiors rather than peers or subordinates. They identified fear of authority as one mechanism helping explain the pattern. For me, this wasn't the origin of the idea — it was independent evidence supporting an observation I had already seen repeatedly in global workplaces.
Independent Evidence
Dai, Li, Xie & Deng (2022) — communication difficulty linked to power-distance belief is concentrated specifically in upward communication with superiors, with fear of authority identified as a contributing mechanism. Full citation below.
Over fifteen years working across aviation, hospitality and leadership development, I kept encountering versions of the same moment. A cabin crew member freezing in front of a passenger who outranks them socially. A manager going quiet in a meeting with someone senior. Different job titles, different industries — the person was fine with colleagues, fine with people reporting to them. It only showed up in front of authority.
My conclusion was that the dominant driver wasn't a lack of skill. It was fear of authority, which changed how capability was expressed under pressure.
Fear changed how it was expressed.
This happens every day, in ordinary workplaces. What is rare is someone fixing the actual cause. Most responses fix the surface — more confidence training, more English lessons, more coaching on how to "come across" well. The real gap, between what the room expects and how the moment gets read, stays untouched.
The Two Questions She Was Actually Answering
Here is what was actually happening with Anh.
Every time the feedback came back unclear, she was trying to answer two questions at the same time, without knowing she was doing it:
What does he actually need from this work?
Does he still think I am good at my job?
The first question has an answer. She can ask for it directly. The second question is about approval. No amount of redone work can answer it. Anh kept working on the second question. That is why nothing she did was ever enough. She was solving the wrong problem — carefully, correctly, again and again.
What Changed When She Asked Directly
Something changed when Anh separated the two questions.
Instead of guessing again, she asked her manager directly: "What does 'done' look like for this task?" Not are you happy with me — only: what is the standard.
Once she had an answer to that question, the other question mostly disappeared on its own. She was no longer managing his mood. She was working toward something she could actually see.
She reached the result faster. Fewer redos. Less exhaustion. Because she was no longer trying to solve two problems with one action.
Founder Observation
The redo cycle was never really about the work. It was Anh trying to get a read on her standing, through a channel that could never answer that question. Once the two questions were separated, the work became simple again.
The Two Questions to Separate Before You Redo
If this sounds familiar — in your own work, or in someone you manage — here are the two questions to separate before your next redo.
Question 1: What does success actually look like here?
This is a professional question. It has a real answer, and someone can give it to you. Ask it directly, out loud, to the person who can answer it — your manager, your client, whoever set the standard.
Question 2: Does this person still think I'm good at my job?
This is a personal question, about approval. Most of the time, it was never actually in doubt — you only think it's open because Question 1 wasn't answered yet.
Answer Question 1 first. Question 2 usually resolves on its own once you do.
Before Your Next Redo
Which of the two questions are you actually trying to answer right now — the standard, or the approval?
It sounds simple. It is not easy. Most people never separate the two. That is why the guessing keeps repeating.
Once I began seeing this pattern, I realised it wasn't only happening between managers and employees. It appeared in interviews, leadership transitions, multicultural teams and customer interactions. Different environments. The same human pattern. That became the starting point for everything I would later build through Global Citizens Skills™.
The more I studied these moments, the more I realised something uncomfortable. Organisations weren't actually judging technical skill first. They were observing something far less obvious — and almost nobody was talking about it.
That's where we'll go next.
If this pattern sounds familiar — in your own work, or in someone you manage — I'd be glad to talk it through.
Source
Dai, Y., Li, H., Xie, W., & Deng, T. (2022). Power Distance Belief and Workplace Communication: The Mediating Role of Fear of Authority. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(5), 2932.
