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Cultural understanding is essential for effectiveleadership in China/hro/features/1020572/cultural-understanding-essential-effective-leadership-china

09 Dec 2011, Barbara Wang, HRO

The Blackwood Report, published earlier in 2011 revealed FTSE 100 firms miss out on growthopportunities in China due to lack of cultural understanding. According to the report, companiesoperating in China have to deal with the twin problems of a lack of senior Western talent thatunderstands Chinese culture, and a small pool of native Chinese talent able to work well withinWestern multinational corporations.

To overcome cultural hurdles Western leaders need to have an open mind and be willing to learnabout the Chinese mind-set. A basic knowledge of Chinese history and culture is invaluable, and oncein China, you need to continue your learning by associating with local Chinese people.

There are a number of key cultural norms and values that Western leaders need to be aware of in theirdaily business life in China. The most important of these are the concepts of face, building gunx andcreating harmony, which are critical for success.

Face-saving has a much deeper meaning in China than in the West. 'Face' is about dignity, respect,and a person's social role. A person can lose face by declining a social or business function on a weakpretext, refusing a present or being too independent. Loss of face is a serious business, and can resultin reduced social resources to use in cultivating a connection network, or gunx.

Gunx is much more complex than the Western concept of networking. It is the platform for socialand business activities, and consists of connections defined by reciprocity, trust and mutualobligations. In China, personal relationships and trust are paramount.



For the Chinese, communications is about building relationships, while in the West it is aboutefficient exchange of information and getting things done as quickly as possible. Leaders in China areexpected to express themselves much less directly than those in the West, partly because of facesaving and preserving harmony. It's not that Chinese are unwilling to share information, butWesterners will have to prompt Chinese counterparts if they want details. Alternatively, it may be bestto approach someone on a one-to-one basis, in private.

Power and rank pervade all aspects of Chinese life, including communication. We recommend thatmanagers communicate with their Chinese boss, peers and subordinates in a similar way to how theycommunicate with their parents, brothers/sisters and children, respectively. This mirrors Confucianvalues, whereby the family is paramount and the rules of hierarchy and respecting positions ofauthority are firmly entrenched.

Motivating the Chinese can be quite different from motivating UK employees. In comparison withWestern people, you may need to spend more time chatting with the Chinese privately, showing yourrespect and regularly giving recognition. Zeng Shiqiang, a popular Chinese leadership andmanagement thinker, said that reasonable unfairness is an effective way to motivate Chinese, becauseunfairness is everywhere. Fairness is an essential clause in the 'psychological contract' in the Westernworkplace. In China, however, people value 'reasonable' more than 'fair'.

Chinese teamwork requires a strong leader, and building a high performance team is challenging.Although delegation is daily practice for Western managers, in China, the story is very different. Thestart of a new relationship in China is marked by distrust or, at best, cautious trust. Generally, peopletend to accept the authority of the position, rather than the person holding that position. Managers areexpected to take full responsibility for all projects, so most Chinese managers do not delegateauthority.

Key concerns for Chinese managers are: 'If I delegate my authority to others, will people still respectand listen to me?', or 'Can I trust the person I want to delegate to? Has this person proved that he/sheis trustworthy?' On the other hand, the employee delegated to would worry about how to exerciseauthority in a way that steers a correct path between two unforgivable sins by Chinese standards. Thefirst is failure to fulfil one's duty, and the possibility of losing one's job or position and, secondly, thedanger of exceeding one's authority, which is perceived as an even more serious sin.

In Western management models, such as Belbin's, the role of 'leadership' is not necessarily onlyexercised by the team leader. But in China this role is expected to be played exclusively by thelegitimate team leader. Otherwise, people will lose respect for the leader, and accuse the persondelegated to of exceeding their authority.

To overcome this dilemma, when Western managers delegate, the legitimate delegated leader must beannounced to Chinese team members for them to accept and follow.

Many foreign managers in China still have an ethnocentric approach, where they use the same styleand practices that work in their home country. But, failing to develop cultural awareness and adaptleadership style can leave managers open to damaging mistakes, and risks rendering theirorganisations unsustainable.

Barbara Wang is the China representative and Harold Chee is a client director at AshridgeBusiness School

Chinese Leadership, published by Palgrave MacMillan, reveals how to be an effective leader in theChinese market.

Reader comments



The importance of culture considerations in Coaching

I am currently providing Leadership & Management Coaching to a Senior Manager of Chinese origin.This article has helped me understand why this individual is struggling as a Senior Manager in hiscurrent "Western" workplace as it would seem that he is trying to employ his Chinese cultural valuesand meeting great difficulties in gaining staff compliance and productive outcomes. So I think thisarticle is helpful as a starting point in thinking about effective leadership in the UK by leaders ofChinese origin who may need to better understand western culture.

Posted by: [email protected] , 18 Feb 2015 | 14:05

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