In this short, the speaker recounts a personal experience where a challenging trip forced them to confront cultural differences, prompting a crash course in the four capabilities of Cultural Intelligence (CQ) as defined by the Cultural Intelligence Center: CQ Drive, CQ Knowledge, CQ Strategy, and CQ Action. They explain CQ Drive in depth, distinguishing intrinsic motivation (personal desire to learn) from extrinsic motivation (external pressures such as a boss’s expectations) and introduce self‑efficacy as a confidence factor. While the speaker had strong CQ Drive, they acknowledge that motivation alone is insufficient without understanding the cultural system (CQ Knowledge) and applying appropriate strategies and actions. A reference to nursing cultural competence illustrates professional relevance. The narrative culminates in a failure at a border crossing, highlighting the practical consequences of incomplete CQ development.
Chapters
That trip threw me into the absolute deep end of what I later learned I could call cultural intelligence. I had no choice but to learn how to swim or pack up and abandon the whole reason I was there. Over the next four weeks, I got a master class in what the Cultural Intelligence Center calls the four capabilities of CQ. There's C. CQ Drive, CQ Knowledge, CQ Strategy, and CQ Action. And I'm going to explain all those by telling you the rest of this story. CQ Drive just means your motivation to learn about another country. I was there, I wanted to help, I was excited, I had good intentions, but here's the hard truth: drive alone isn't going to be helpful if you don't know how the system works. Cultural intelligence, defined by the folks over at the Cultural Intelligence Center, is the capability to function effectively across various cultural contexts— national, ethnic, organizational, generational. There's too many to list, but you get the idea. Okay, I taught on this for years because in nursing we're told that we have to be culturally competent. That makes a lot of sense. So my first encounter in this situation. Like I said, I had tons of CQ drive. What is CQ drive? That's your motivation to learn about another culture. Now, I had been in other cultures prior to that. I had a lot of experience with a family who spoke multiple languages, so there was intrinsic drive. I just wanted to get better myself so I could function better even in my own family. There's extrinsic drive. Some people have extrinsic drive because your boss is telling you you have to learn the language, Or your boss is telling you you have to cut a business deal. That is extrinsic motivation. And then there's self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is simply your desire to function effectively in another country or another culture because you want to feel good about yourself. You want to feel like you're competent. There's nothing wrong with that. Okay, so those are the things that impact our CQ drive. In this situation, I had a lot of it and I really wanted to help. In my story, this is where I completely failed at the border.
