Employees of public authorities and research institutions come into contact with people from different cultural backgrounds every single day. This is where misunderstandings may arise, not only because of language barriers, but also because of different cultural backgrounds. Communicative customs and strategies may vary from country to country. Since 2014 our project has been organizing a range of intercultural training sessions to help overcome such communication barriers in conversations between employees from Germany and guest researchers from abroad. What is special about these intercultural training events is that they also provide an opportunity for administrative employees from the different research institutions of the Leipzig Science Network, and from the different municipal authorities to get to know each other and discuss their views on intercultural communication. This is why these events focus very much on the exchange of experiences on the part of the participants. One participant remarked: “The more we know about other cultural areas, the easier it is to understand why our conversation partner sometimes reacts differently to how we expect. This is what makes this training event very useful.” The training sessions take place on September 10 and 17, 2025, and we are delighted that, in addition to colleagues from a variety of research institutions of the Leipzig Science Network, representatives from the Foreigners' Authority, the Registry Office (Standesamt), and the Leipzig Citizen Hotline (Bürgertelefon) were among those who attended. The intercultural training events for German employees aim to raise their awareness of German communication and behavioural patterns compared to those of other countries. In this way, it is possible to develop communication strategies for difficult situations and give each participant new ideas for how to communicate. Annemone Fabricius