Friendships gained.

In these 12 days, not only did I gain myself a pool of knowledge, I’ve gained myself many new friends. A few of them are similar to me in many ways, and that made us the best of friends.

We share the same interests, hobbies and past experiences.

We talk about everything under the SUN!

It can be as serious as...

political issues

and as casual as ...

pretty girls...

I truly cherish the friendships gained, people around me always tell me, “Cherish the friendships you have now, when you grow into the adult world, very often you will never know whether the friendships gained are genuine or accompanied with ulterior motive.”

Be neither complacent nor stagnant

This lesson should have been learnt ages ago, either in your early primary school days or at least secondary school days.


Most often than not, people tend to become complacent when they have achieved some results or success; you can shirk your responsibility by saying it is human nature though.


Here, we learn from the various Managers that one can never stop improving. So what if you are at the top now? One always has to reinvent and be proactive in order to be ahead of others.

This is a competitive and fast-moving society, if you complacently laze around, within a wink of an eye, you’re already far lagged behind others.

Never to forget accessibility for your business

Infrastructure has been much developed now in China compared to 10 years back. We learnt that the accessibility to your warehouse, factories etc are important as it often means extra costs if it’s inconvenient or too far away.

Yes, rental of a place may take up a lot of capital. However, transportation costs can weigh heavily and drag down a company too.

“Locate your factories in China, locate your factories in China” is what everyone is preaching. On the surface, it’s as simple as that because in China everything is cheaper.

Give it deeper thoughts though, if your factory is in China, and include all the oil expenses, shipping expenses, import and export tariffs and taxes, it may ultimately not be worthwhile to locate your factory in China.
Doing research is essential to investigate all the real costs and benefits.

Know the meaning of having good relations or “Guanxi”

Yes, we have heard from many bodies about the need for “Guanxi” in order to be successful in China. The Director from IE Singapore, Mr.Nee during our tea session further filled us in that “Guanxi” is often more important in less developed areas of China.

One important fact people often are ignorant of is that having good relations alone is definitely not enough. First, you have your potential, next relations roll in.

It’s actually very similar to the education system. If you have good grades, schools snatch to take you into their cohort. And if you don’t do well, too bad you’ll have to then snatch together for the willing-to-take-you-in schools together with the not-good-ones.

One thing you should note. Let the Chinese know “I can bring you $$, I want to establish relations with you” and not the other way “I have nothing; I want establish relations with you so you can help me attain something.”

The Aztech Director Mr. Mun brought up,

“In China, if your firm is making money, the government officials will start to establish relations with you, hoping to have a share of the profit.”

Have your basics; then take advantage of the relations you possess.

Finally, we get to know from the regional Director of IE Singapore (International Enterprise Singapore was previously known as TDB), Mr. Nee as to why having relations in China is more important in contrast to Singapore.

"The thing is that Laws and Regulations in China are not as clearly-defined in China as compared of Singapore. Hence, if you have the right relations, the government officials can interpret the law more favourable to you. "

What do Mr. Nee mean by that? For instance, the law states littering can be fined from 5RMB to 200RMB, depending on the decision by the Government official. Some of us may now shout UNFAIR!..

It isn’t unfair actually. China has a wide range from poverty to riches. Hence using the above example, it would be too hefty to fine 200RMB in a poverty area and too “peanuts” to fine 5RMB in a developed area.

Do we now get the meaning of what exactly do people mean that relations are important in China?

Doing Business in China V.S. Doing Business in Singapore

International business first guided us in with an introduction of the merging of people’s taste and preferences etc. Yes, many things are coming to a merging point but do not forget the difference in doing business in China and Singapore!..

From our experience, tell me the difference between bargaining in China and Singapore. Yes, try and bargain in Singapore? “Cheapskate, no money don’t buy la.” But if you don’t bargain in China? “Wa Stupid, kena my chop chop! haha”

Not to mention, the massage parlours at China and Singapore. Over there at China, it’s often common to ask a parlor if there’s “Special services” available.

However, try asking in Singapore’s general massage parlors and see what you’ll get.

Well, so if you are an international businessman, when you do business in China, of course we should capture that market share as well right? Only by doing that, we can attract customers in that section.

haha

China is very BIG!.. Hence, every part of China = DIFFERENT!

Recalling during our workshop days...
the Guest-of-Honour, Mr. Law Sit says that it would be too boastful of him to talk about his "China experience" since China is such a huge country.

"How could anyone claimed to have China's experience in just a few years?" was his comments.

After the 12 days IBSM trip, I can further confirmed that his statement is true. Why do i say so?

We've been to Zhuhai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan, Zhongshan, Shunde. Even though all of these are in the same Province Guandong, their characteristics differ to a large extent.

This can be in terms of Security levels, kinds of people. the way of doing things, the infrastructure and facilities.

Even norms can differ from one area to another.

In some areas for instance, girls are not supposed to wear skirts on streets and even if they want to, they will have to match it with stockings. Otherwise, they may be misunderstood as the “ji” or prostitutes over there.

Another good example would be how you address people. In certain parts of China, we should address ladies as “Gu Niang” instead of “Xiao Jie” as the same goes, the person may be offended because “Xiao Jie” over there is used to described prostitutes.

What we KNOW now…

This trip has taught us valuable lessons

What to do and what not to, what to say n what not to. Or perhaps what can be said at one time may not be said at another time. The key sentence is to say the right things at the right time.

For instance, “Market surveying”.

Teamwork is crucial, and staying together as a team is further more important. This can be in terms of a lot of things such as tapping of each others’ potential and strong points when doing assignments or using the correct person to do specific things. Send the suitable face to go on the cross-the-custom mission if you have bought some not-so-legal stuffs.

(Definitely not smiley face Mr. Wong =P)

And also definitely not someone with HK-TriadBoss-look

I would say the most significant is when we bargain for the things we want to buy. Togetherness means strength. Most often than not, when we as a team bargain continuously from one person to the next, we managed to get our “market survey” items at a much discounted price.

We learnt how to be independent. Edward on the 6th day fell ill. He has to learn to be independent, to stay in the hotel all by himself.

We learnt to respect others’ culture and to understand that every place has its own culture and practices. Hence we should be flexible and not have a stick-on-the-mud mindset when doing business. Complaining all day does no help; learn to adapt.

Every place has its own norms. And of course, every person has his own way of presenting information. Right now, does anyone appear in your mind???

Some clue for you...

BINGO!.. Professor Le Che

Well, no intentions, just that maybe less wordy slides would be appreciated.

He seriously put in a lot of time and effort in doing up the slides. We can tell.

*Thanks Professor Le Che!