American "courtesy" drove me nuts after two weeks so much I understood I'll never going to be able to live there and keep my sanity

You think Americans are bad for that? Try living in Britain. I've lived here my whole life and don't notice the passive-aggressive, repressed, seething fake politeness crap one bit (as you can probably tell), but The Girl particularly hates it. She's always being accused of rudeness. Mostly by me. I think she's just going to stop talking entirely soon.

BTW, Shir, well done on reporting the incident. Sorry, that sounds patronising. But you know what I mean. Reporting can be difficult.

I'm totally with you on the thing where you wish you could just make dinner to apologize, erika.

Good luck to your nephew, DC Jensen!

She's always being accused of rudeness.

Since I started working for the Beeb, every single performance review I've had has included a "personal development goal" of, essentially, "be less American when you talk to the UK office." Phrased in a professional diplomatic manner, of course, but that's always the essence!

How are Americans more rude? The overfamiliarity?

American "courtesy" drove me nuts after two weeks so much I understood I'll never going to be able to live there and keep my sanity

Yeah, I didn't get what that meant either.

Hope your tooth is feeling better, Typo Boy.

ION, I hate rain. Yesterday, I washed my hair and put in product and styled it and blow-dried it, so that it would look good for the interview tomorrow. Today, in the time it took me to walk the two blocks home from my office, the sky opened up and I got soaked, which means that my hair is turning into a gigantic ball of frizz. So I've got to do the whole hair styling thing AGAIN tonight, and find an umbrella to bring with me when I go to the interview tomorrow.

What in an American office comes across as being direct and businesslike comes across to the British as rude & pushy. You can't skip pleasantries and small talk, you can't skip the greetings or sign-offs when you write emails. Things like that.

[eta: I should say, it's probably unfair of me to generalize out from BBC employees to the British public at large. Auntie Beeb is an old and venerable institution with all the stuffiness and formality that implies. I'm sure there are plenty of younger companies in the UK where an American style of business communication would not result in one of the new sales assistants almost literally hiding under his desk for a week because he was too scared of me to respond to what I thought was a perfectly standard email. Seriously, this happened.]

Sounds like American South. I thought I was going to die from small talk when I moved back here.

You can't skip pleasantries and small talk, you can't skip the greetings or sign-offs when you write emails. Things like that.

Oh, dear. I would go mad having to do small talk all the time. But many people here would just adore working in a very chatty office full of un-pleasantries and tiny talk.

So it's not Americans, it's non-Southern/Western Americans.

edit: and it explains why I often have the reputation of not liking my co-workers. I never did understand why people wanted to hang out with all their co-workers for drinks after work.

Auntie Beeb is an old and venerable institution with all the stuffiness and formality that implies. I'm sure there are plenty of younger companies in the UK where an American style of business communication would not result in one of the new sales assistants almost literally hiding under his desk for a week because he was too scared of me to respond to what I thought was a perfectly standard email.

This cracks me up because Joe wants to work for Auntie Beeb after he finishes his degree.