Practical Tips on Business Meetings in Chinese Culture

Doing business in China? Then you’ll be attending lots of meetings!

If you’re attending meetings in China, then it’s important to understand a little about Chinese business culture and how meetings are run.

To get you started, we’ve pulled together a simple slideshow that outlines some of the most important considerations.

These tips can help you understand the Chinese approach to meetings and how this may differ from your own expectations as well as help you create new strategies on how to create positive outcomes.

Slideshow: Tips on Meetings with the Chinese

The considerations in the slide show below include reference to:

• Important Chinese cultural values such as harmony, group, hierarchy, and mianzi
• The need to build trusting relationships with your Chinese peers if you’re to get things done
• The importance of guanxi and mianzi in networking and trust-building
• Important behaviours to avoid if you’re to protect the ‘face’ of your Chinese peers
• The role of the ‘group’ in Chinese meeting structures
• The importance of hierarchy in the way people are treated and seated
• Prolonged decision-making due to the need for the Chinese team to reach consensus

The slideshow below has more tips. Click to expand the slide show on your screen.

Image by Richter Frank-Jurgen on Flickr (CC BY 2.0)