Multicultural Leadership Prism – China

Multicultural teams are a business norm now through almost all industries at all levels. A celebration of DEI is increasing the need for cultural EQ for everyone. In addition, many of our businesses work across international boarders with partners, suppliers and customers and we must navigate cultural dynamics in addition to business dynamic differences to become true global leaders. The term Multicultural Leadership Prism was created in the International Women in Business group in Chief to focus on learning from each other for those exact differences, patterns and assumptions. I'm very happy to be a part of that group learning from others and had the opportunity to share my insights on the US/China cultural prism which I have summarized below.

A quick note on my background: I was born in China and moved to Texas at age 10 at a time when there were only 4 Chinese families in the entire city. In my 20+ years of working in product across tech, FinTech and EdTech, I have led and managed multi-cultural teams in the US, Canada and China. I have developed products and expanded businesses for the US and global markets including China, Europe, and SouthEast Asia.????

Managing Chinese Team Members in the US – 3 Reminders?

1. Humility is a prized cultural trait.? There used to be a common question on job applications for programmers that asked you to rate your skills in different coding languages from 1-10. I knew a Chinese programmer who rated himself a 6 in a language where he had developed one of the libraries where a US programmer would have easily rated himself a 10. Remember that not only is humility prized, boasting is also a negative trait no one wants to be associated with. Similar to my recommendation in managing China-based teams, judge their capabilities on actual work samples whenever you can.??
2. Elite university education earns high respect.? In the US we tend to forget about where anyone went to college 3 years after they’ve graduated.? But with Chinese team members, how far you went in your education will always command their top respect. (ie. PhD’s are highly respected, not scoffed at for wasting 6-8 salary earning years becoming over-qualified.) Because of this, share this information and inquire about their universities when appropriate.? As much as I shy away from this personally, somehow every Chinese team member I’ve ever had has known where I went to college.
3. More than national identity, regional identity is a much stronger affinity bond. As much as someone from China dislikes being mistaken for being from Korea, or Japan and such, you’ll get a lot more smiles and camaraderie if you actually know the province or city that they grew up in. China is a very diverse country where the culture, dialect and even personalities vary greatly from province to province.? You will make an instant connection if you know that someone is from Szechuan, where there’s lots of spicy food, the women known for their fiery tempers and once was one of the major kingdoms in the famed Tri-Kingdom epic.?????????

Managing Teams based in China – 3 Pitfalls

1. English fluency does NOT equal capability. I see this mistake a lot with managers who do not speak mandarin. They hire and promote those with better English and often end up with teams with poor performance. There is a similar tendency even when not crossing language barriers. Less experienced managers commonly hire and promote those who speak well, and speak up instead of spending more time to assess capability based on actual output, execution and accountability. More often than not, I ask job candidates to do sample projects, analysis, coding tasks etc. instead of relying on interviews alone in hiring.??
2. Education from elite universities does NOT equal high work capability. This is a culture that highly values education, but also an education system that rewards extreme repetition, strict adherence to rules and conformity. Anyone with college degrees from top universities command much higher salaries, but do not necessarily have an inkling on how to collaborate, think creatively or work through trade-offs. Because of this, I put much higher emphasis on referrals and references from people already on the team during hiring and peer feedback during performance reviews.??
3. Don’t discount the financial pressure on those of marrying and childrearing age. The housing price, child care and education costs are astronomically high relative to the average white-collar salary. The cultural expectations are that you don’t get married unless you can buy your own house and you don’t plan for pregnancy until you can pay for elite kindergarten tuition. With that pressure, especially on the men, will push them to move jobs for salary bumps, or potential IPO payouts even when your team might have better culture, better mission and better leadership. To retain your best talent, keep very close track of what competitive offers are and manage to align to it.???

Leading in the US as a Chinese-American – 3 Learnings

1. Evangelize your team’s accomplishments. With the ingrained negative cultural bias against boasting about my own accomplishments, I’ve learned to instead highlight my team as often as I can. Don’t do it as a comparison to other teams, but it’s a great demonstration to beat out competitors or previous expectations. Whenever you’re showcasing your team, it also reflects positively on your ability to lead them.
2. Improve your English fluency, not your accent. The ability to communicate with impact is one of the top leadership traits and a hard-won skill for many foreign-born execs.? How you speak plays a large part in people’s perception of your capabilities. We can get very self-conscious about our accents if you have one, however, the US is a true cultural melting pot, and accents are actually not a barrier to perceived capability. Instead, what is a major factor in others’ perception of your capability is the pacing of your speech and the use of phrasing with confidence and intent behind them.? I was advised by a very senior executive early in my career to practice mimicking the news broadcasters.? This can be a great way to practice pacing, emphasis and tone.
3. Leverage your natural lean towards relationship building to expand your professional influence.? While the US business culture is well known for being output driven and “getting down to business”, in contrast to “guanxi”(relationship building) being a must-have to doing business in China,? being able to cultivate relationships in the US can differentiate yourself as a leader and increase your scope of influence.? The simple things of always asking about weekends, hobbies, or the family before you get into the agenda in meetings will help others feel heard and seen as individuals and not just their jobs.? It might feel easier to do this with your team members, but remember that relationship building is even more important with your peers, your senior execs, board members and investors.? The old adage “it’s lonely at the top” means a more human connection is even more treasured in a working relationship.

Leading in China – 3 Observations

1. The executive embodies hyper-excellence in their hobbies as well.? One thing I noticed while in China is that all executives (not necessarily Chinese themselves) were all hyper achievers in their hobbies.? Marathon runners and ultra-marathon competitors were very common, as well as competitive level athletics in fields like skiing, fencing and martial arts among the China C-suite ranks.? Another common area of executive hyper-excellence is the arts: singing, piano, violin, and calligraphy are great examples.? My father is a retired professor from Beijing University, but his coup-de-gras with his students is his flawless tenor singing of classical Chinese love songs.??
2. The senior leader is also a parental figure to the team. The executive is often invited to weddings of the young team members, not only asked to toast, but sometimes to preside over the wedding and bless the wedding couple. In hiring, firing and promotion times, the executive also commonly needs to speak to the parents or spouse of the employee. The respect shown to a senior executive is very similar to that of the elders in the family and expectations of blessings, ceremonies are quite common. I have definitely done my share of wedding toasts and baby blessings.
3. The key to succeeding with “guanxi” are drinking, karaoke and education. It’s common knowledge by now that “guanxi” (relationship building) is a must not only for doing business in China, but also for being successful as a leader. Afterall, you can’t lead if you can’t achieve business results. Drinking and karaoke is by far the most common way of strengthening relationships. Toasts are done to show respect, give blessings and demonstrate trust and transparency. Even if you don’t drink alcohol, make sure you’re still doing the toasts. I’ve used tea, or water for toasting instead and can be equally as effective as long as your sincerity is unchanged. Karaoke is very common for team building and celebrations. Keep in mind that this is a good singing culture and not a bad-karaoke one. Even if you’re not a singer, at least practice a few well-known sing-a-longs that will get others to join in. In addition, if you come from an elite university background or someone in your family is in academia, it can also be a very effective starting point to developing “guanxi”. I have definitely provided advice and references for college applications in my time there.????????

The greatest advantage I have gained from having worked in depth across US and China is the global point of view I have gained on business and cultural dynamics. You also gain the ability to identify different assumptions and patterns underlying those dynamics faster. I look forward to the rest of the Multicultural Leadership Prism series that will focus next on South America. ?