egruberman
Member
I question your assessment and how it relates to my assertion, which is that there is a greater focus on STEM education in India. It was not my assertion that Indians had greater critical thinking abilities or creativity. Typically, the material is quite a bit more advanced, schools are more competitive, and there is a great deal of pressure to do well.
I think what you're doing is illustrating the cultural differences that exist. Both are collectivist and in each there is pressure to preserve social harmony and be deferential to authority. Rote learning is widespread. There is certainly some capcity for critical thinking, but it's not especially prevalen.
I could elaborate further, but it would end up being a book on the topic before I finished. Needless to say, I've worked with tons of people on H1Bs from either country. There are a couple of engineers in my org from China presently. They're both extraordinary engineers, extremely productive, and produce high quality work. I struggle getting either of them to speak up and voice a potentially contrary opinion in the presence of more senior engineers. Teasing apart what they are interested in working on vs what they think I might be interested in them working on is a pain in the ass. What is not a pain in the ass is the simplicity of asking them to do something vs. other engineers.
I have an Indian engineer working for me as well. That engineer is mediocre in terms of his engineering abilities, but he is great at delivering complex projects that require coordination across many different teams and in that sense is valuable.
