Job Share Memo
TO: Mr. John
FROM: Qing Du (Chris)
DATE: Jan 19, 2013
SUBJECT: Job Share Memo
One year ago, I graduated from my university in Shanghai and got the bachelor degree of civil engineering. Then I got an internship opportunity in China Construction, which is a multicultural corporation in China, its branch offices spread many other countries. At that time, my position is a project manager assistant. My task is to help project manager deal with some basic engineering data and communicate with other group members. That project is real estate event in Shanghai. Our group team is made up by 20 department managers and the project manager who is empowered to command and coordinate all of things is top leader in this group.
As far as I can see, this group is a typical traditional Chinese team, which is filled with a lot of Chinese cultural element. I hope that my working experience in this Chinese team can help you to improve your CQ-cognition about Chinese culture. It is good for you to adapt background of Chinese culture in the future professional career.
To begin with, you have to pay attention to the power distance in the Chinese culture. The high power distance is an obvious character in any Chinese organization. According to Chinese culture, people would like to use hierarchy to distinguish personal status in China society. So a person who has high status should be more attention and respect than low status. This different attitude is a major reason to make high power distance in Chinese organization.
For example, when my project manager meets his business partners or joins in any business activities, there is no doubt that the first thing is to hand out his business card, because there is a clear identity description on the business card. So you can find the business card is a kind of symbol of status in China, you need to prepare a business card if you want to make a business in China. Certainly, when you can identify other people’s status, you need to adopt appropriate attitude and reaction in term of principle of high power distance.
In addition, I have to mention that our project manager have an absolute power in our group. All proposals and actions must get his approval. Even though you can see that our project manager gets along with his subordinates, this kind of power distance still exists between with them obviously. Generally speaking, the project manager is more professional experience, knowledge, competence and older than others in the group. On the basis of traditional Chinese culture, these people should be respected and appreciated. If you want to work in Chinese group,