Our organization has recently grown to include multi-national teams. What are some best practices for scheduling leadership development or training sessions to accommodate a global audience?  The goal is to have options that meet the needs of each time zone, language, and cultural expectations (major holidays, cultural customs, day-to-day work expectations, etc.).  In your experience, what times work best globally? What resources exist to help reveal cultural norms?

In the past we have conducted cross cultural awareness training that is specific to the regions in which we work. Differences in business etiquette, perspectives on leadership (hierarchical or not etc.) and experiences so that people can better understand leadership style. We found there were a number of "ah ha" moments There are companies that do that as well as individual consultants, but its very important that they have first hand experience operating in these spaces.

There really is no time  that fits everyone  if you have the full spread of continents. We would normally cluster in time zones and face the fact we will have to repeat sessions otherwise you will have people dialling in the middle of the night  and what does that say about about the businesses attitude to people in that region ?

To do the clustering  I find that Time Zone Converter – Time Difference Calculator (timeanddate.com)  is really handy you put the cities in and it then colour codes whats in working hours , general non working hours and normal sleeping hours