Cultural Differences in Outsourcing

This is not about which country has better programmers. What cultural issues did you experience with the offshore country you've dealt with?

I'm not trying to generalize, or present any natioinality in a negative way, but this what I've heard so far:

India:  programmers do not say no, which does not mean that they've correctly understood the assignment and will deliver what you expect.

Russia: money does not motivate them that much. Threats like "I won't pay you unless you'll code this in 5 days" may not help. But if you tell them that so-and-so can do this in 4 days, they'll do it in 3.

China: they won't admit that there is an issue unless it becomes an obvious disaster.

Can you add more of a culture-specific outsourcing issues?

posted Monday, 8 May 2006