On returning to the USA recently for a business trip a picked up a couple of books in the airport in Shanghai.  Finding a decent collection of English language books in the airport is a new experience in itself.  I’d been thinking about how to help an expat friend of mine, a new arrival in China, who has been having some issues in adapting to the new surroundings (i.e. work environment.)  He was getting frustrated with the relative immaturity of business practices and with the perceived unwillingness of subordinates to follow direction.

So in the airport I found three books that I thought migth help: (1) The China Executive by Wei Wang, (2) China CEO, A Case Guide for Business Leaders in China by Juan Antonio Fernandez and Shengjun Liu, and (3) Red Star Over China by Edgar Snow.  Well the last one might seem a bit strange but of course understanding the transitions that have occurred in China in such a relatively short time frame are important.  It reminds me of an educational movie I saw in graduate school entitled “What You Are is a Result of Where You Were When.”  I’ve never forgotten this movie.  The movie itself was pretty simple, just a professor lecturing and scribling on a chalkboard, but the ideas really stuck with me.  The central concept of this movie is that everyone establishes his or her core values and attitudes towards life at a very early age – up to about 6 or 7 years old.  These stay with us for life and major changes occur only as a result of “significant emotional events” in later years.  So the idea is that “what you are now” is a result of “where you were” when your “gut level values” were formed.

Another of my co-workers is a Chinese man who has been a professor at Zhejiang University for many years.  He’s in his mid sixties and now serves as a senior adviser at the company where I work.  I have another Chinese friend in Beijing who was one of the founders of the computer science department at Qinghua University.  He is about 70.  I've had some really interesting discussions with him about those times.  Well these two men were both born around the time when Red Star Over China was published in 1937.  So both of these men formed their “basic gut level values” during the period of the birth of Chinese Communism.  And “significant emotional events” might have coincided with periods such as the Cultural Revolution.  These men relate to the world through their value prisms. 

Well, my expat friend who is now trying to adapt to China has his own value prism.  To the best of my knowledge his value prism was formed about 50 years ago when he was born into a prosperous upper-middle class family in the USA.  He received a bachelor’s degree and two master’s degrees from Ivy League colleges and has had a successful career at prominent high tech companies.

But our company’s average age is 27, and it is these people that my friend interacts with most of the time.  These people were born about the time that Deng Xiaoping opened China and their entire experience has been in a rapidly modernizing and developing China.  Many of these young men and women come from one child families.  The Chinese have a phrase "Xiao Huangdi” and “Xiao Gongzu” which means little emperors and empresses.  There are a number of potential implications of these terms.  One is that alot of energy goes into preparing these kids, as only children, for life.

When I teach my IT project management class at Zhejiang University I usually share with the class the story of this movie and the influence it had on me.  As PMs our success or failure has a lot to do with how we relate to others.  Motivation and discipline mean different things to different people depending on “where you were when.”   So this is part of the advice I’d give to my friend.  Try to understand “where they were when.” 

So what does being a “Xiao Huangdi” have to do with following or not following direction.  My point was NOT that these kids are spoiled.  It was that these kids have been provided with very good educations and reasoning abilities, and just “following direction” may not work.  Many of these kids have been taught from an early age that it’s OK to question if you don’t understand.  Others, born in a different time and place, would have different reactions.

The other books also raised some interesting issues related to adapting to China.  Next time I'd like to discuss The China Executive and issues it raises with respect to stereotypes.  Next time ………