I have had nothing but the hardest of work form them and excellent product. Yes issues have arisen on quality and cost an all the usuals, but I have not once been able to work them out.

To go to China and take a bubble of your own world with you to live in is disastrous. I have not seen the show, but I did read all the above postings, and that is what it sounds like they were doing. Trying to fit thier own bubble of business understanding and lifestyle as a layover of protection from the chinese while getting them to do what he needs. Either go all the way in or stay out. Work on thier terms, in their country. Find a factory that fits your needs, do not try to fix a factory into what you want it to be. It cannot work.

Right away, credit goes to you for admitting that you haven’t done business here. An important clarification, and one that explains why you feel the way you do about certain matters.

There are 193 countries in the world, plus China. China IS different. And there is no way anyone can ever even begin to understand the how’s and why’s of it until after they have lived here, done business here, been fucked over repeatedly here, for quite some time. I have tried in vain to explain it to newly-arrived people, they always leave thinking I am a looney, only to come back to me after a year or two and say how much they wished they’d listened better.

Anyway, good luck with your PhD, and if you are ever in this benighted corner of the universe, look me up. First drink is on me.

I think it’s tough to do business in any culture that isn’t your own. If you guys would come and try to do business in Israel, you might find a lot of the same difficulties that you’re mentioning here, and I don’t think it’s because anybody would be out to screw you guys intentionally and in specific, it’s just that business is done is a completely different way. Israeli business is very blunt, direct, now-now oriented, relationship-guanxi-based (isn’t that true for everywhere?), shortcut based, somewhat messy, etc. etc. I’ve personally seen British and Canadians go insane in those interactions. I’ve also seen some interesting interactions between Americans and East European countries, which were full of cultural misunderstandings and included a lot of what is mentioned here.
But, I will try to not stereotype you and include you in the same group as those… I can see that you’ve been through alot.

Reason I was mentioning Taiwan is because, as odd as that may seem with Taiwan being a very modern and well-developed country, foreigners here say the same thing about Taiwan you are saying about China, especially when it comes to southern-Taiwan where I’m at. Which brings me to believe that this isn’t only about living-standards and economy, but rather something inherent in the way things are done and culture is experienced. I will also admit that it troubles me to hear about this and that I have a hard time understanding it…

This is a terrific discussion. It actually has a lot to do with what I plan to deal with in my PhD.

@Jeremy: All you said is the #1 reason I shiver to think about doing “real” business in China.

@Chriswaugh_BJ: Was wondering if you were ever coming back I agree absolutely that if you start a business in a country, you should by all reasonable standards, attempt to learn the language and culture. That said, business is business and only requires as much cultural understanding as the culture dictates. Fortunately for China (and unfortunately for everyone else) it has a super complicated culture to understand and generally only those that play by the Chinese rules (for better or worse) succeed – which I think the movie showed quite succinctly.

NOTE: You’re all welcome to continue posting comments about this here – but again, I have moved the topic to the forums where it can grow and branch a bit more.

Oh, oops, I did say English is not the lingua franca of this world. Then I backed it up by saying it’s the biggest international language. I think that’s the key. Most of the world’s people do not speak English, that is a simple fact. English is the biggest and most useful of the international languages, that is also a simple fact. Looking back, I think my point was that those of us from the big Anglo-Celtic countries need to accept that although our native tongue is the most widely spoken, it is still only spoken by a (large) minority of people in this world and we need to drag ourselves out of our rigidly monolingual dreamland. But I don’t need to tell you that, you’re studying Chinese, and for many good reasons.

To sum up, sorry for forgetting I left a comment here, and sorry for misunderstanding your point of view. But this bit I stand by:

“Is it unreasonable to expect foreigners wanting to do business in China to learn at least something of the local language and culture? No. What is unreasonable is expecting people in China’s less developed regions to suddenly stump up international-level English-speaking business people.”

It seems that comment would be more appropriate in a different discussion, though.

Let me add some observations. A friend and I started a business selling promotional products a couple of years back, and dealt with a bunch of shops, small Chinese factories, etc.

Before coming to China, I had a very open mind, and expected things to go well, if different.

But after coming to China, my view of things changed completely. In fact, if the old me looked at the new me and listened to what he had to say about China, he might say he were stereotyping, maybe even a little racist.

But after listening to the problems one runs into by doing business in China, you are floored by the amount of shit that can go wrong, how stupid many, many of the people you will deal with are, and things that just blow your mind until you accept the “this is China, anything and everything can go wrong, and don’t expect anything” kind of mentality.

I used to think this was contained to smaller manufacturers or shops – thinking the bigger companies that dealt with multinationals would be much better. Now, I know better – the quality of Chinese workers in multinationals is quite high, but the quality of Chinese workers at their suppliers is not necessarily so. I’ve encountered too much stuff that makes you wonder if these people want the business hanging in front of them to chalk it up to “cultural differences”.

And I’ve talked to people who work with even bigger suppliers (and we represent suppliers to the second biggest automotive parts manufacturer in the world) who say they run into similar problems.

Expecting someone to speak English when a very obvious job requirement is that the person you are hiring speak English is not a bad thing – maybe there is no one living in that area who has the skills this guy was looking for at the salary he was offering – if so you can only blame this guy. But someone who doesn’t know much English shouldn’t be applying for a job that calls for high-level conversational English or the like. They just shouldn’t go to the interview. If this means this business needs to open in a more modernized part of China, so be it.

fIli – have you done much on the ground business in China? Worked with smaller suppliers? Dealt with all of the crazy things that can go wrong? Tried to start a business in China? Not attacking you here, just asking you to realize that once you do these things your perspective on doing business in China changes forever.

The reality of the situation is that things are incredibly difficult, and often unfathomable (how could THAT happen? Kind of thing)… and you have no idea how bad it can be until you’ve truly worked in China. Most people sugar coat the reality. That doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of good suppliers in China – it means there is plenty of sub-standard suppliers to sort through before getting to the best that China has to offer.

PS – Taiwan has reached a far higher standard of doing business, it’s not fair to directly compare today’s Taiwan and today’s China.

Thoughts?

I would be interested to get more from China and Taiwan expats on this issue, I’m just not sure how to ask them for their opinion…

Fili’s point is that it was disgraceful for Mr. Cushion to act the way he did and that he had too high of expectations for some peeps in the countryside. These two things aren’t connected.

Mr. Cushion didn’t have any expectations for the people in the countryside. He has expectations for his business, and his expectations were not off. He had a need and it wasn’t being met. It wasn’t that he was getting frustrated walking around town while taking in the culture.

I’m sure he did all that. Did the goofy “knee hows” and “shay shays” and his darnedest to take in the country and its culture – treating all of the people he met with the utmost respect.

But that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about inside his business, hiring for his business.

I don’t think anyone need apologize for having specific requirements and being frustrated when you’ve spent an afternoon entertaining people that just don’t make the grade.

I think the point we’re getting twisted on is that we’re assuming Mr. Cushion just hopped off the airplane and expected everyone in China to speak English – I’m sure he didn’t.

This is a very specific and isolated example, and one that someone had complete control over (I’m guessing his Chinese partner?). He was hiring employees. His expectations are whatever he’d like them to be. If he’d like them all to be able to play the pipa, then so be it.

Now if he were to go around town and say, “hey, why the hell can’t you play the pipa?” Then fiLi would be absolutely correct in his judgment of this guy. However, people don’t do that – well they do, and they’re assholes… but Mr. Cushion wasn’t.

People don’t just walk in for a job. They see an ad somewhere or hear about it from a friend. And I’m sure, absolutely certain, that strong English ability would have been on that ad.

So, if people showed up for a pipa interview and didn’t know the first thing about playing a pipa, well, I don’t know about you, but I’d certainly be asking WTF they were wasting my time for.

Additionally, how can you say that English isn’t the Lingua Franca of our time? It most definitely is. I’m not saying it should be, and I’m not saying it needs to be – but it definitely is.

Need proof? Do a search for ESL programs versus every other first initial you can stick on that SL – they don’t even compare.

Again, I’m not campaigning for it, and since June I’ve even stopped indirectly supporting it. But my opinions of it don’t change what it is.

Perhaps we’re assuming different things. I am assuming that he went through a hiring process similar to Western methodology. An ad was put out emphasizing the requirements of the position, the applicants were narrowed down by a gatekeeper, and he saw the best of the bunch.

I’ve done interviews in China, and I’m sure anyone else that has will tell you the same. The frustration with applicants doesn’t come from arrogant expectations, they come from realistic expectations not being met.

He’s not walking around the town and picking on random people’s English – he’s disappointed that these applicants with their flimsy English and overall inability to even discern simple things from their surroundings are the best he’s got to choose from. And he’s got to choose.