The Laughing Falcon by William Deverell - review

Authors Avatar

China: Its Cultural and Managerial Style


The fast economic development of China has attracted the attention of the international business community, creating a surge in foreign direct investments and international trade. Negotiating new business and trade agreements as well as establishing business subsidiaries and joint ventures, the number of foreign business people in China is increasing rapidly. The areas of managerial interface between foreign business representatives and Chinese nationals are expanding fast and an emerging academic literature is beginning to examine cross-cultural management issues in China.
China, no doubt is certainly the fastest growing and “exciting” market to be working in right now, and probably one of the most difficult for expatriates to survive in. After many years of being closed off from the world, China has opened up with a vengeance, and is therefore growing too quickly, too soon. It’s experiencing all the problems accompanying a new economic power emerging in an environment where centuries of development are trying to blend in all at once.

The New China 


Westerners have been trying to get rich in China for over 150 years. However, few of them have actually been successful enough to penetrate the “market of one billion”. With the “sweeping economic reform in the People’s Republic, and the merging of Hong Kong, Taiwan and China into a financial and manufacturing “powerhouse” called Greater China, an increasing number of firms from the west now reap profits there, including H.J Heinz, McCall’s, Bausch & Lomb, and scores of others.” (www.ptvchina.com)
In fact, it was also possible that the amount of Avon Products projected sales in China at $1.5 billion in 1991, and it hit an annual profit of approximately $1 billion per year. In this case, we see that any businessperson is therefore willing to prepare and persevere on profit in the China Triangle (This includes Hong Kong, Taiwan and China).
The term “Greater China” was termed by former Communist Party Secretary, Zhao Ziyang, as reunified China that included Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Mainland China. It merged into one independent called the “MegaChina”.
In 1997, Hong Kong and Mainland China were then united again. Taiwan will most likely still remain politically independent from the Mainland, even in the near future. However, the three China’s are uniting commercially, and “the entrepreneurial synergy generated by that unity fuels economic growth that is now unsurpassed in the world.” (www.ptvchina.com) Guangdong Province in South China, for example, has kept an astonishing 12.5 percent annual economic growth rate since 1985. The political and commercial divisions between the three China’s are rapidly disappearing. The border between China and Hong Kong has started to slowly to remove itself; people on either side are starting to come together.

Join now!

Economic Conditions in Mainland China 


China is increasing at a steady speed as it continues to sustain rapid economic growth. China’s average annual GNP growth rate of 10 percent during Deng Xiaoping’s (famous Chinese Government) reform program starting in 1978 “outstripped” almost every other country in the world. In 1993, China ‘s GNP grew by 10 percent, industrial output was up 18 percent, and foreign trade had risen by 20 percent. In Shanghai and Guangdong Province in 1993, the GNP grew by 22 percent and 18 percent ...

This is a preview of the whole essay