Nowadays, China, the emerging market in Asia, contains huge business opportunities. At the same time, because of the different culture and history, the characteristics of Chinese society including its source of power, social order, and solidarity, is actually very different from the West. The big difference is that China is a relationship-oriented society. For this reason, how can Westerner adapt the ways of doing business in China? Here are three recommendations for the entrepreneurs that want to enter the Chinese market.
Learn The Crucial Concept of "Face"
The meaning of “face” in China covers much more aspects than the Western countries. Face is related to dignity, respect, and also to a person's social status, therefore face is
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Dealing your business with key person is important for growing the relationship in China. Building up good relations with government officials is not always wrong. This is indeed the key to the success during a short period of time.
Indirect Communication Style
The communication style in China is indirect. For Chinese people, the conversation is one way to build relationships, while in the West, it is to exchange information effectively in order to get things done as soon as possible. It is uncommon that the company gets the business done in the first time (Wang).
Very few Chinese who do business directly cut to the chase; they often talk a few pleasantries with number of disparate topics at first. An example is asking a government officer Zhang, “How is your son? Do his college things all go well?” Even so someone may think that pleasantries are unnecessary, it is a perfect time to work on your relationship with others. Do not underestimate this part, you need to fully prepare before you start conversation with the trivial things seemingly insignificant to the other party. Take the prior conversation for example, in the first place
Business leaders in the US may rely more on formal policies and processes, while Chinese business leaders may stress people orientated practices of loyalty and trustworthiness. These ethical concepts are not necessarily incompatible (many may actually overlap), but do highlight the importance of understanding perceptions from each culture.
It would be the best if she tried to learn Chinese and reached to a certain level to communicate basic things with her customer directly. But she didn’t try even to know Chinese cultural relationship, which is guan-xi (觀視).
For example, employee loyalty can be described and improved by reciprocating favors. Developing business relationships are expected to take more time in the Chinese culture as opposed to how they are developed in the united States. In the U.S., businesses and clients typically meet in a formal setting and focus on the business requirements and solutions whereas, in China, first, second and even third meetings might be in informal settings where business is not expected to even be discussed.
In a business perspective, the oriental and western cultures remain a huge difference. Low-context societies such as American egalitarian culture, they emphasize on logic and facts, verbal messages are more direct and concise, individualism and extremely tolerant to changes. However, high-context societies such as Chinese hierarchy culture, they prefer non-verbal methods to express meaningful communications, group-oriented, and pay more attention to interpersonal relationships during business interactions. For example, a successful business interaction will count on interpersonal relationships among businesses and government. On the other hand, business dealings can be completely transactional with Americans, without building relationships to do so.
The following examines the nation of China and its trade relations with the world, particularly the United States. The focus is primarily on China’s culture and how it impacts business dealings with other countries. Areas examined include: Religion, Management Philosophy, and Business Etiquette. Also discussed is China’s growing status as a world super power and how that has impacted the global business landscape. Likewise, various trading partners are examined and the effects of doing business with China, specifically for the United States. Points of concern for the United States are things such as the
This process has more significance in most countries except the Unites States. The approach in the U.S. is to get down to business straight away without wasting too much time on people. This is in stark contrast to the process in China where the focus is on building “Guanxi”, that is, the intricate and omnipresent network of personal relations. The U.S. approach can be a huge problem when doing business with China. The American efficiency interferes with the patient development of a mutually trusting relationship – the very basis of an Asian business agreement. This is what happened in the case study. Mr. Smith had done his research and was aware about the Chinese business methodology, but he did not think it was important to implement it. He was well advised by Mr. Tang. Mr. Tang, even though pointed out the significant features of the “American” and the “Chinese” way of doing business, did not stress enough to make Mr. Smith understand its significance. Mr. Tang also jeopardized his relationship with Mrs. Ming whom he had known for many years by not disclosing that the supplier was not a direct supplier.
Time; in America people arrive to any business meeting on time or before the meeting, but in China they time walks and people take it easy instead of living a busy life and in China if
On the other hand, Chinese worker are centered on relationship. Chinese focus on relationship with others and live in the world of trust. Chinese trust people around them in their work place. Often, Chinese did not require signing contract in every agreement unlike American where all agreement must be in contract. By trusting others credibility, it helps create a friendly working environment and promotes intimate relationship among the workers. However, their main weakness is their business culture, where they are quiet and reserved which will reduce their credibility when dealing with American. They weakness also made them a weak immediate decision maker. As for interpersonal problem, Chinese are very concern about the good relationship, and hold it as their top priorities. Chinese would not do any agreement or trade that could harm their relationship with others. Lastly, Chinese are very polite and indirect. They try as hard to prevent the relationship from
Chinese workers believe that close personal relationships are imperative to effective communication. American companies don’t share the same views and some organizations have even related this to workplace fraternization, which can result in disciplinary action. Since we don’t believe that these relationships are necessary, or even appropriate, we don’t form them and this could affect a bi-national workplace and possibly even carry over to business dealings outside of the company. The Chinese believe that, when conducting business with other people, a relationship must first be formed to gain the trust of business partners.
The people in China are rich in culture just like other Asian countries. Therefore, to be involve with Chinese people in China for business, undertsanding their values and culture are very important. The first important thing to understand about Chinese is their devotion to collectivism. Chinese is trained from very early to consider himself as a dependent segment of a group, which is also called totalitarianism. It is helpful to think of the notion of family in China as a template applied to many networks of relationships that hold the society together. In the Chinese business context, the notion of family is about more than the emotional support and ties of a nuclear family. Family members, for
With China emerging as a global power in business within the last decade, knowing about doing business in China has become more important than ever. There are both many advantanges and challenges with doing business in China in this modern era, and understanding both sides of this coin is the key to being successful in China. Some aspects to keep in mind include the cultural barrier, the price of the work force in China compared to the United States, and have the “made in China” brand be accepted back in the United States.
China is becoming more westernised, particularly the ‘cosmopolitan’ city of Shanghai, where demand for Western products is increasing rapidly as disposable income rises in line with China’s strong economic growth. Michel’s wanted to establish a foothold in the market at an early stage to demonstrate a long-term commitment, which has been identified as essential to compete successfully in the Shanghai market (per Tim Harcourt, Austrade Chief Economist).
Firsty,we can analyze the Chinese language and what has been written about the the notion of face. When we analyze what has been written in Chinese,we can see many thing about the notion of the face.David Yau-fai Ho(1976)in his journal ‘On the Concept of Face ‘explains and demonstrate the many aspects of the notion of face. Face is ‘the(Chinese)’social ideology which determine the status of people in the society.Ho(1976)continues to explain the notion of face in Chinise.Face isn’t a stable/standard behavior but it is a mixture of judgements concerning the extent.Face isn’t seen as an analytic exercise but it can be used in literature, everyday speech and figurative meaning. Face is both the mixture of nuances of social interactions and values that is given in the society. Face isn’t stable thing. Ho(1976)explains that the notion of face is in Chinese origin and this notion is the literal translation of Chinese lien and mien-tzu.Hu(1944)makes an important distinction between these two concepts of face. Mien-tzu reflects the prestige of person in the society but the lien reflects the confidence of people in the society. In spite of these distinction, they can be used together in Chinese context. Loss of face comes out when a person fails to meet some requirements in society. For Chinese maintenance of face is similar to being moral member of society. Gaining
The situation for new entrants was very complex in china; acquisition of cities took much longer than in developed countries. Starting a new business in china was not a rapid process. Making relationships between channels was a slow process, because manufacturers, distributors, and other actors preferred to negotiate with people who they knew before, in china personal relationships are quite important in businesses. Some factors that influenced this process were
Resist the urge to jump into conversation if your associate is silent for a minute. Many Asian cultures have silence as a form of communication. (Hong Kong - Language 2014)