Addressing a Chinese audience

I haven’t been in China long, but I’ve had the pleasure of seeing some great gaffes on the part of Westerners who are trying, in vain, to establish relationships with Chinese people in professional meetings. They hear that Chinese culture is strongly interested in ‘gifts’, so they fret over who they should give the golden pens they brought along from home. Then they try to provoke conversation across the table and end up just talking to fill the void of silence when they receive no response. Afterwards, they try to make conversation at lunch about how they decided to be vegans at age 19 ‘because eating another living creature is wrong’ and wonder why their Chinese colleagues are appalled.

Sitting in a particularly boring meeting like this the other day, I decided to write a list of suggestions for anyone contemplating a first time introduction into the Chinese professional world. The primary purpose of this list is to ensure I don’t forget my own learnings here, so if it happens to useful to anyone else … bonus!

• Don’t expect to be able to hold an informal dialogue about working topics. For some reason I can’t fathom, Chinese people expect the format of any professional meetings (aside from those over a meal) to be presentation party A - Q&A - presentation party B – Q&A and so on.
• At the end of any speech or presentation, there’s usually applause. Something niggled at me for a long time about this applause that I couldn’t quite pin down, and then it occurred to me … it’s too short! Chinese audiences only clap for maybe half the length of time that you would expect an audience at home to do. I didn’t even know we had applause rules, but there you go.
• Use a powerpoint presentation. Call it a ‘ppt’.
• Use pretty, simple pictures on your ‘ppt’, especially graphs.
• USE SIMPLE LANGUAGE. EVERYWHERE. I cannot stress this enough. Someone tried to use the word ‘Orwellian’ in a comic way and it met a lot of blank stares, obviously. Chinese people will not ask you to explain if they don’t understand your English, because it’s embarrassing for them. So don’t be an idiot, speak slowly and use words that are easy to understand rather than jargon. This also applies to any written documents and the ppt.
• Don’t assume your Chinese counterparts will have any background on your topic, even if it’s their field. Academia in China is … different to the West, and the differences are felt throughout the business world. I once saw a director of an institute with decades of academic research under his belt say that he couldn’t understand how agriculture produces greenhouse gas emissions.
• Assume that their views are China-centric (this is definitely not something that only occurs in China) and assume that they will repeat Government language/ideas.
• This should be self-evident, but avoid criticising (or appearing to criticise) the Chinese government, culture, food or popular ideologies in China.
• Use lots of figures and numbers to gain respect, while still trying to make a point.
• Ignore the people walking in and out of the room, sleeping on their desks or taking pictures with their huge Nikon cameras. They don’t realise you think this is rude.
• Bring some kind of sweet food if you can, even if you’re not the host, and make sure tea is available if you are.
• Always introduce important people at the start of a meeting and use highly respectful forms of address. An important Chinese guy I know once addressed a group of PhD candidates from another country as ‘your excellencies’ (ok, maybe this was a bit of Chinglish, but it gives you an idea of what is expected!).
• Use excessive language of thanks and imply prestige where you can.
• Gift giving is a part of Chinese culture, but you don’t have to give gifts if you don’t want to. It's much more important that you pick up the bill for the food if you are the ‘host’, although a small gesture (e.g. a trinket) will always be appreciated.
• Providing a lunch or dinner is necessary for almost any meeting. Try to arrange the meeting to be before lunch and then have a banquet – you’re likely to get more interest and appreciated feedback from participants. A dinner is even better, but there are a whole set of social rules you’ll have to navigate, and they are likely to try and get you ridiculously drunk.
• Avoid saying ‘no’ directly in response to a question. Instead, think like a politician and ignore the actual question by diverting the discussion onto a tangent.

Shanghai, land of ... Westerners?

So I finally made it down to Shanghai over the weekend. To be honest, I was a bit ambivalent about it when we were organising the trip. Shanghai wasn't on my list of 'must-see' places because I usually don't like big cities, and I particularly don't like touristy places. I try (often unsuccessfully) to get off the beaten track and make a bee-line (aside: do bees really fly that straight??) to anywhere that is famed for natural beauty. Particularly mountains. Unless you very tall buildings as mountains, Shanghai is not known for any kind of natural beauty. And it's a big city. And it's touristy. But, as it turns out, Shanghai is absolutely magnificent.

It's so incredibly Western that I almost forgot I was in China at times. In fact, it reminded me so much of Sydney the resemblance was uncanny. The Bund is exactly like Sydney Harbour—tall buildings, a long esplanade, pretty lights, expensive shops and lots of tourists (a key difference is, at the Bund, everyone is interested in taking photos of me, rather than the buildings!). The (former) French Concession really reminds me of the ritzy suburbs in Sydney like Wollahra, with loads of little boutiques, cool cafes and tree-lined streets. And East Nanjing Road pedestrian street seems unsettlingly similar to Pitt Street Mall.

The Bund:

Shanghai Museum:

Cool ceramic camel in Shanghai Museum:

Even the people seem to be more 'westernised' than in other parts of China, including Beijing. Like, they pause for you when you approach a pedestrian crossing. I was so confused the first time this happened I stared at the driver wide-eyed until he crossed in front of me anyway. And the streets are far less noisy because drivers don't feel the need to honk every few seconds lest there be a moment of peace and quiet in the middle of the day. Taxi drivers didn't scorn us just for existing, and picked us up as soon as we raised our hands.

English seems to be much more widely spoken than in Beijing, and we discovered that 'western' food is actually cooked into something that resembles what I eat at home. It even seems as if they don't push as much as the rest of China does to get on the subway or across the street or into a doorway. We got to the end of the trip and realised that, not only had we not had the pleasure of seeing someone vomit or piss in the street, but we so not a single person spitting, either. What is this strange alternate universe?

It was a nice break from China for a weekend, but I'm still glad of my decision to move to Beijing, even if I had had the option of moving to Shanghai. What's the point of living in China if you're not experiencing Chinese culture?

Notes for travellers:

• The fast train from Beijing to Shanghai goes at least once an hour every day. It takes 5 hours, is very comfortable, and costs 555 RMB (cheaper than air tickets, so I hear). Not difficult to get a ticket at all, so no need to stress out about booking too early.
• We stayed at The Phoenix in a triple room. Very comfortable, quiet, and more hotelish than a hostel. It's kind of in the middle of everything but just far enough away to catch a cab or subway anywhere. Next time, I'd stay in the French Concession. All accommodation is expensive in Shanghai, so it's worth just staying where you want to be.