We have been increasing the number of business related lessons we publish in response to popular demand. In fact, we have found that “doing business” is one of the primary reasons people decide to learn Chinese. This makes sense when you think about the amount of economic activity that involves China these days. Hardly a day goes by without a China-related story in the business section of your newspaper. Not a very scientific measure, but a reflection of China’s increasing importance in the global economy.
There is no doubt that learning to communicate in the language of your customer or business partner can make doing business with them easier and more profitable. But what exactly do you need to learn in order to do business in China, with China and in Chinese for that matter? The answer usually depends on your industry, profession and relationship with China.
Enough generalizing, we need specifics. Tell us about doing business in China, and the language lessons that would help you succeed. John and our academic team have some great ideas of their own, but they need the input of professionals and entepreneurs with real life experience here in the middle kingdom.
Please post a comment or send us an email.
Kind Regards,
Matt Park 段伟
I don’t (yet) have experience in the middle kingdom but my real needs will be : discussing office life, running meetings, writing reports, organization (from IT to marketing department), reporting.
I know goals and performance were a recent topic.
Yv
When president Bill Clinton went to China and spoke at Beijing University, a pretty (and very sharp) co-ed stood up and asked him what he was hiding behind his smile. Although many Chinese business people speak English, I think it is very important for English speaking business people to understand a certain amount of Chinese language and culture to be able to guess what the Chinese are hiding behind THEIR smile
P.S. Is there an idiomatic expression in Mandarin for “Hiding behind one’s smile”?
Lessons that I would find helpful in learning business Mandarin would cover the following topics:
Establishing a Business Relationship with a Chinese firm,
Applying for a foreign funded company business license within China, The Main Types of business organizations in China,
Enquiring about stocks and markets and Hiring a Chinse web design firm to create your business website….
Love the podcasts!! Keep up the hard work…
Well, although I am not doing business in China, I actually ran into a situation where I needed to discuss business & IT issues on a professional level in China - each little grain of additional business language knowledge would have helped in that slightly uncomfortable situation.
First of all I personally would distinguish three levels of Business Language:
1. Language to properly *comprehend the Chinese business enviroment* - i.e. terms for addressing general pecularities in the cultural & environmental settings in which business is embedded (e.g. I would subsume your Guanxi-Lessons here, you could also add lessons discussing the political and legal institutions you will inevitably encounter in China).
2. Language needed to *formally conduct* business within the Settings described in 1 (preparation of business letters, writing a CV, holding meetings, interviews etc.).
3. Language needed to directly *denote business concepts* - the content that fills the situations from 2 and that are embedded in the settings from 1.
No. 3 would be the most relevant for me. For this level I would recommend starting top-down & sector-independend with generic management and financial accounting concepts: What are proper (legal) terms for concepts like “profit”, “balance sheet”, “asset”, “equity”, “liabilities” etc.? What are “fixed costs”, “direct costs”, “variable costs”, “benefits”, “sales”, what is “Activity based Costing” in Chinese?
Later you could move through the business functions (organization, marketing, sales, HR, logistics…) and introduce concepts from those. From there on you could move on to different sectors.
If you want to drill down further into my special areas of interest: I personally would appreciate the discussion of some Information Systems concepts (e.g. on ERP, CRM, SCM, Business Intelligence, Requirements Engineering, Systems Analysis & Design, etc.). I presume IT/IS related stuff is of interest not only for me.
If you decide to follow this path even further: Business Intelligence terms (Data Warehouse, Data Mining, OLAP, Metadata, ETL…) - but I guess those lessons would not fill large concert halls.
Oh, by the way: Thank you for all the business stuff you already had in your lessons! It is not all Terra Incognita anymore.
Excellent subject, Matt. Here are some real situations for me:
- Meeting a customer for the first time: Introductions, Are you happy with our product, what do you like about it, what should we change? Please tell me about your Company’s future plans, and how we can help you. Thank you for your business; Please come see us when you visit our country. Sorry I don’t speak better Chinese.
- Presenting our Company’s performance and goals to our China Team (a lot of the vocab that Henning requested would work here). Followed by recognizing somebody who made a special contribution.
Some vocabulary for a business dinner: a couple of toasts, smalltalk (what do you do when you’re not slaving at the factory?) informal business stuff (what do you really think about the situation?).
You get the drift. This would be so useful to me that I’d happily send a detailed outline. Let me know if that would help. Thanks again.
I’d like to know what sorts of words you should use to take advantage of your guanxi. I’m sure they could easily be too subtle or too overt if you’re not used to the formulae (lexical chunks) that are commonly used. Should one circumlocute?
And another vote for bureaucracy terms. Even if you’re not doing business, if you’re in China you’ll probably have to use them anyway.
One of my main issues with “Business Chinese” is that it doesn’t make sense to start learning it until you have a solid foundation in Chinese. So you wouldn’t want to start as a total beginner studying Chinese that only relates to business. As a beginner, everything is relevant. So I think that the serious learner needs to have a solid foundation at at least the elementary level before narrowing his focus on business. That said, there are a few newbie or elementary lessons which are more “businessy” in nature (for example, the Business Cards lesson), but the really “meaty” stuff comes at the intermediate level and later.
WHAT’S SO FORMAL - I would disagree with John (much like with Delta and Erica, it’s probably really just my version of total agreement with them).
Anyway, I find with many young Chinese here speaking English that they only have two versions of English: old Victorian-English and casual “Hey that’s cool” English from Terminator II movies.
It’s kinda the same with Chinese learners: there are the Tang text readers and the sound like a pre-schooler “ni hao, wo yao, tao yan” speakers. (That’s ‘me’ btw)
This I think is two-part problem of instruction and natural language development. While it’s true that language ability tends to progress naturally, hence simple sentences will come out of your mouth before more complex ones; I do think adults have the ability to sometimes ‘fake-it’ with more advanced patterns.
But instructional materials are either too basic, how many times have I been told that ‘nin’ is the formal of ‘ni’, but with little else.
Then on the flipside I get presented with textbooks with a chapter on export/import and a vocab list of 30 new words, 5 idioms, and embedded formal structures of grammar I know little about, and all in hanzi that I have to look up!
There’s nothing hard about making various lesson-levels that strikes a better balance AND convey content that is heard and used in a business context. Of course, it’s the easiest things in life that never get done!
NEWBIE
(Casual, spoken example)
哎呀，这个不好！
(More formal pattern)
请问，我觉得这个有点问题。
ELEMENTARY
(Casual, spoken example)
你要不要吗？
(More formal pattern)
您需要我帮助你吗？
INTERMEDIATE
(Casual, spoken example)
今天是十五日
(Formal, newspaper format)
今于十五日
ADVANCED
(I can’t really do this in Chinese, so just ‘imagine’ my English blurb below all in perfect Chinese).
“We’ve often heard people use the phrase ‘zhu/jin’ kou for export and import. If someone asks you what you’re doing, the easiest thing to say when your Chinese level is still quite low is to just say “chu/jin kou.” Then you’ll probably switch to English.
But in today’s lesson, we’d like you to try to add on a little more to that basic nugget, for exammple Big Boss of China Corp starts to talk to you real formally in Chinese. You know you’re going to swich to English and give him lots of face for his Yale-learned English, but before that starts, why not impress him by saying “For the last 5 years I’ve been an 9001 certified import/exporter”.
It’s not really that tough of a phrase. You just need to mention a time period with your ‘basic’ Chinese, and add the new words for 9001-certified, plus your overused ‘import/export’, and there you go, you’re sounding like the next trade rep. Let’s go thru this a few times. We’ll also do some variations you might hear.”
As a former Business English teacher, I’ve come to the conclusion there’s no such thing as “Business English” as presented in the usual texts. The only difference with ‘general’ English would be vocabulary and tone.
The more I get into the business world (in English) the more I’m surprize at how informal it is, how non-stuffy the people are. The language used depends on the situation and who you’re dealing with. If I can use curse words with my boss in Vancouver, is that Business English? When I meet a new client, yes, my language will be more formal and I’ll be much more careful with word choice, than say, when I’m meeting a client I’ve known for 5 years, who I’ll speak with in a casual manner. But the stilted language in the usual Business English texts doesn’t mention this fact.
I’d imagine Business Chinese would be much the same, but correct me if I’m wrong. What I’ve come across in Chinese Business English lessons seems again, stilted and robotic. Cpod can help bring biz to life by getting into the authentic speech that does exist out there. A lesson comparing the language used when meeting the 2 different clients I mentioned above would be a good way to show the difference in word choice, which is so crucial to the impression one gives others.
Lesson Ideas:
“How to keep insisting on that getting that permit”… I’ve come across countless examples of the bureaucratic “mei you” or “bu neng”, but the locals keep at it, pounding away until they get the deal done. What language is useful here? Usually back home No means No and you walk away, but in China I’ve seen people spend 30 minutes talking their way out of parking tickets.
Love the banking lessons already done - more would help…
- wiring money
- closing bank accoutns
- applying for a credit card
- ahem ahem… changing money… ahem… in the less than legal manner (it’s a sliding scale)
- getting a new bank card after losing one (I can help write dialogue here)
- taking out a mortgage (for us in China for the long-run)
Guess those are more personal than biz related but there’s useful financial lexis that comes up. Also would like to see anything to do with telephoning, participating in meetings, and schmoozing… how to turn those chance meetings and introductions into full-on business connections.
AHH - WORK’N IT - Reading Kris’s comment I realized something specific about China, Chinese culture, Chinese’z ness. Yah we need a couple podcasts on how to keep things going — it’s definitely a will of words and stamina, either me doing a small transaction with an ayi, or getting something done at the bank.
A verbal exchange of endless complimenting of your business associate would certainly be entertaining…and very ‘real-world’.
Example 1: buying an apple
How much?
4 kuai.
That’s too much.
It’s not a regular apple.
Looks the same to me.
No, no, this is from Australia.
No it’s not, look it’s damaged.
Here try this one, how many do you want?
1.5 kuai
You’re crazy.
Give me five. (actually here add another 18 exchanges)
2 kuai.
Okay.
At the bank: (I heard this actual conversation. It was a Chinese guy complaining! I bet he was from Taiwan though….)
Why did you let the other customer jump the queue?
He wanted to know about his account.
I’ve been waiting for 40 minutes.
He asked at the next window.
How long did you expect me to wait?
How can I help you?
Why didn’t you tell him to wait, that’s your responsibility.
It’s almost lunch time, it’s busy.
There are three of you here, why don’t you open another window.
Here’s your passbook back.
(#$&&$^ (customer exits stage left)
Business specs
That’s a great product.
Yes, it’s the best in the world.
You mean in Asia or all over the world.
We sell all over the world.
To North America also?
We sell to Russia and the Emirites.
Have you sold to North America?
We always ship to Russia, they order a lot.
What’s a typical order size?
Anything you need.
Can I just order 1/2 a container.
No, no, we only sell full-containers.
Do you have a North American expiditer?
We can ship no problem.
I have a expiditer company I’d like you to meet with.
That’s great!
Let’s go get some beer.
“a will of words” - yes Lantian, I agree, everyday is a test of speaking stamina and patience.
Your dialogues bring to mind many similar examples - good stuff. Makes me think I need a rolodex of questions for every conversation I have.
I totally agree with Kris. (Since you seem to agree with Kris too, Lantian, I’m wondering what it is that I said which you disagree with…)
Simply increasing formality does not make a lesson a “business lesson,” in my opinion. It’s about the topic and the vocabulary, as Kris said. Yes, learning about differing levels of formality is an important building block which prepares the student for business-oriented exchanges, but almost everything at the Newbie and Elementary levels also prepares the learner for business-oriented exchanges in one way or another.
Another thing you have to consider is how the material you taught can be used in the real world. We could, for example, do an elementary lesson on getting a quote from a supplier, but if that short lesson’s content is the only things the learner can say about the subject, they’re not going to be prepared for the ensuing conversation. So the lesson design really has to be sensible and responsible; it shouldn’t “throw the beginners to the wolves,” so to speak.
Well, I work with different Chinese companies since 6 years on a daily base. But I started a few Chinese projects already 20 years ago…
I am responsible of different OEM projects in electronics for different large Western companies (US and European)
I just would like to give you the following advices:
1- Do not expect that a lot of Chinese speak English, most of the time it is very basic and after a few meetings you will discover that they do not know what you are talking about. It is improving, and it is also depending where the company you are dealing with, is located in China. So make short sentences, repeat if necessary and take your time. Always start your next meeting with a resume of the previous one.
2- As John stated, if you are serious into having business, do not use your Chinese until you are fully fluent. By the way, it is also very good to listen to the translator and to hear what is being translated or not. I never tell my contacts that I understand a bit. It can bring you more info than expected.
3- Do not mind too much about Chinese culture, business is business. Never forget both parties want to make a deal, so they have to compromise with their cultures… Chinese businessmen are as hungry as you are.
4- Be yourself and you will get respect.
My conclusion: Business is fun, so enjoy it. Do not try to find a pattern how to make business in China (or in the rest of the world), it will not work. The key is simple: Always be honest and direct to the point. Understand your partner and try to make him enjoy the deal as much as you do.
dominque has provided some good holistic advice. I always like this kind of advice (help you find the wood in the trees, before you get going kind of advice).
If you were to take the post from domninque, simplify it a little, turn it into a discussion and then follow along with a couple more, you have your first business lessons. Lead us in gently by talking about doing business in China before introducing too many business specific terms.
Some nice English bits in that post with should convert to some nice intermediate level Chinese chunks that would suit every bodies needs. “my conclusion”, “so enjoy it” “direct and to the point” etc.
There are one or two lessons already (the one about mixing business with eating for example) that are kind of going that way already.
yeah I noticed the post comment containing a reference about ‘Victorian English’ too. Even my limited contact has seen English veering wildly from the kind of English my mother would have used when “putting on a posh voice” (think 1950s - 60s BBC womens radio English) to something they heard off MTV (sometimes in the same sentance.
So we get ‘thus’ and ‘for’ (used in an old fashioned for to do something type of way) etc. And lots of long words sprinkled about that you would only ever consider using in the written form now.
Then one guy forwarded me an audio file of something he was give to practice speaking ‘beautiful’ English. Guess what, it was some lady speaking 1950s - 60s BBC English (I think it was called new concept something or other but I may be wrong), I guess the audio was very old but he insisted that a lot of Chinese, used it a reference point to this day.
Whatever Business lessons are provided, just being reasonably upto date would be a great leap ahead of much of the written material I guess.
It makes me shudder to think of some of the anachronisms I may have been sprouting in my fledgling Chinese, although to be fair if i get correct for anything along these lines it doesn’t usually seem to be from Chinesepod sourced material.
Great discussion on Biz language!
If you want to help us understand and learn to use business Chinese (and you want to be different to boot) please teach business Chinese in the context of a goal statement. Let us know what the goal of at least one of the speakers is (it doesn’t have to be the non-native speaker).
My impression of a business conversation in Chinese is that of a winding, twisting road with multiple turn-offs that lead to dusty lanes. The textbook version of a business conversation is like a straight four-lane highway (with comfortable bathrooms along the way). Why don’t you take us down some of these twisting roads.
Hi Chris,
Holistic might be a big word… I just intended to be practical. I am always a bit smiling when I read about Business English or in this case, Business Chinese. I remember that when I got my MBA (long time ago), I really thought that I was going to use my best Business English… but I soon discovered that it was better to use simple and clear words. My first important meeting was in Thailand and my contacts barely spoke English and the translator was also suffering… It is important to know Business vocabulary, but it is maybe less important to use it. Most commercial deals are made with simple words, especially with no English natives. It gets different when talks are about finance and accounting, then you have no choice, you need to know the right terms.
I am dealing in China with all kind of different companies: state owned, private, joint venture… Each of them are very different and I have to approach them in a different way, but normally after a few emails and one meeting, I can feel what kind of relation I will have to build up. The most difficult thing in China is certainly to get the right contact inside the company, it is not always clear who takes the decision and it can be misleading (especially with state-owned cies). Chinese love meetings and long discussions, so you also have to learn how to shorten meetings. They also love to organize your full stay: they pick you up at the hotel, they invite you at every meal (breakfast, lunch and diner!!!), they shop with you…etc, so never tell them how long you gonna stay. In fact it is also a nice way for them to control your business activities… Maybe we should have a section: Business stories: language misunderstanding, anecdoctes…. that is the best way to learn.
As I’me working on a JV with a Chinese company near Shanghai, I’ve got a little bit of experience on how our potential partners react and relate to comments from non-native speakers of mandarin. In short they love it-even ifs at an elementary level. I think the average Chinese feel a compliment has been made from the effort that a lao wai makes to communicate even at a perfunctory level.
It would be overreaching to think that the average Chinesepod listener could conduct negotiations to the level needed to ensure that no “misunderstandings” occured in business dealings so I concur with earlier comments that a very general approach to the lesson format is ideal. Import/Export was a great example. Useful terms and well explained. John get better with each show.
SOLIDS - Hi John, it was your quote “is that it doesn’t make sense to start learning it until you have a solid foundation in Chinese.”
I’m not sure how to express my disagreement actually. If you read the posts that came afterwards, there were many great examples of how various people found ways to use Chinese, ‘in a business context’ without ‘having a solid foundation’.
Of course I would agree it’s best to get a solid foundation before learning a specialized topic, ie. business., in fact it is exactly my current approach. I am hoping that I ‘get the hang’ of Chinese, have a natural parser and generator that will make my learning of a specialized area much easier and enjoyable.
I have actually had a hard time resisting many of my friends suggestions that I hunker down and learn 30 new words a day in the field that I’m actually really going for.
Here’s the thing, I also think I’m pretty lucky that I currently have the time to take this approach. It’s a ‘Go for the Gold’ approach, I want it all. But is that really practical for everyone?
I wouldn’t like to see the Chinesepod resources and contents morph into a format that makes one level very inaccesible to another level. It was much like one of your earlier assertions that it was hard to design an advanced levels because students came into a particular lesson with varying backgrounds and vocab.
I don’t think language needs to be this linear. What if I never get a solid foundation? Can’t I still say a few good phrases well. Can’t I still hear some common phrases? Can’t I know some toughy phrases as well?
Maybe I’m a learner that is actually pretty advanced, but I have a fossilized accent and somewhat crippled grammar. Can’t I still interact and learn something new?
I guess the core of my argument is this: when I interact with Chinese, for the most part, they are all at an uber-advanced level compared to me, but I still have to and want to interact with them. I’d like Cpod to give me more strategies to do that.
If these strategies are practiced while I’m learning within Chinesepod, in a safe, comfortable, portable and fun environment. I’m much more likely to be able to use it in the real world. And maybe much more likely to reach that ’solid foundation’. I’m a guy that likes to eat sweet, not bitter.
With that said, I pretty much agree with all your words after that sentence. About ‘everything being relevant’ and such when you first start out. I guess we’d have to go back to defining exactly what ‘business English’ is also.
I think I tend to focus more on the formalities and round-about talking like in the podcast where you had some introduction to the boss at a party. Learning contract terms and such I think for ‘business’ you really as Dominique says, need to bring in a proper interpreter. At least until you pretty advanced.
Podcast Suggestion: I’d like to see a few podcasts on ’strategies’ of finding a language-communication level. For business I guess you might call this networking, building rapport, and strategies. Less so the typical “Today’s topic is on WTO terms”.
My situation is this, I often level set with new people I meet. It is not always entirely clear where the language will land up.
I met a businessman who holds a Canadian passport and his accent was pretty, well he had none, but after a while we reverted to Chinese because actually he doesn’t know that much English. Another guy, introduced myself in Chinese and we stayed in Chinese, but actually I found out after a while, his English is pretty good. We’ve switched to English, he’s actually Japanese and my Japanese wasn’t cutting it. Other people I met sometimes go with the flow and can rachet-down their Chinese to my level.
I’m wandering way off topic…guess I just felt like saying that! (Hope it spawns some ideas)
OKAY - here’s what I’m trying to say. In the Prof. Ning interview and posts they talk about a communicative approach and doing tasks together. THIS is what business is. In any given business context we have to interact with various people, at various levels, to complete tasks. More lessons should give us practice at doing this.
How to do this in a portable time-shifted podcast? That’s for your creative brains to figure out for us!!!
Thanks for sharing