You will hear an interview with a manager on blending Eastern and Western ma

Woman: Welcome to our programme today. It’s a great honour to have you here.
Man: Thanks a lot.
Woman: As we know, your corporation is a famous joint venture in Shanghai, China. Could you tell me what its managements are like as a whole?
Man: The management can be seen as the outcome of the integrating international practices with the realities of working in China.
Woman: What are your corporation’s expectations of you as a manager?
Man: Within my corporation, I am responsible for supporting the general manger and helping to oversee 1,515 employees, including Chinese and foreign managers.
Woman: What’s important for Chinese managers when working with foreign managers?
Man: It’s particularly important for them to understand advanced management techniques and something about cultural differences for the sake of organisation’s harmony and efficiency.
Woman: Has your MBA training been useful to you?
Man: While my engineering background prepared me for the technical side of my work, my MBA courses helped me understand how employees think, what managers can do to motivate them better.
Woman: Could you give us an example of what you really did at work?
Man: I encourage people to be more independent in their jobs. I believe I should first be a manager, then a consultant, and lastly, a friend.
Woman: Are there some unique concepts of Western management particularly for Chinese mangers to grasp?
Man: Actually there are a number of differences between the U.S. and Chinese mangers. For example, making tough personnel decisions doesn’t come easily. Chinese managers find it hard to give written warnings to employees, and even harder to fire them.
Woman: Then what about the best workers?
Man: If workers do well, they will get more wages, and will stand a better chance of being promoted.
Woman: Compared with managing a traditional state enterprise, what has been the biggest change in managing a joint venture?
Man: I think it is the salary system. Traditionally, older people were paid more than younger people for doing the same job.
Woman: Yes, it’s true for some Chinese factories.
Man: At our corporation, we pay for the job and will only promote according to performance.
Woman: That’s fair.
Man: Also, we have been trying hard to keep personal and family issues out of the workplace.
Woman: So managers don’t get involved in personal issues like marriages, childcare, and parents’ illnesses.
Man: Yes.
Woman: What are strengths of Western management?
Man: In China, the government plays a big role in running state enterprises. But the U.S. management philosophy gives each manger a great deal of responsibility.
Woman: Could you explain in more details?
Man: For example, managers in the U.S. firms generally have some degree of spending autonomy. In China, in contrast, every penny spent should be approved by the boss’s boss, right up to the top.
Woman: And in what areas is a foreign management approach less suited to Chinese conditions?
Man: Chinese managers take a long-term view, and tend to think about the next 5-10 years, or even the next century. The U.S. business people do have long-term goals, but are more concerned with short-term results.
Woman: Will that affect your job?
Man: Sometimes. The parent company’s managers sometimes push me to introduce new policies, while I encourage foreign mangers to accept the limit posed by local conditions.
Woman: Are workers responding to the blend of Chinese and Western management styles?
Man: Yes, they readily adjust themselves to the mixing of Chinese and Western management styles and actually, most of them say they have benefited a lot from it.