Updated July 2, 2020
There is one thing that freaks me out about working in China: So many meeting!
Literally.
Initially, I just didn’t realize why there were so many meetings.
In fact, once a week, we also have a group meeting. Guess, how long would be a group meeting?
It’s normal to have that group meeting for 5 to 6 hours. We often mess up our timings for both lunch and dinner.
Moreover, the group meeting usually happens on weekends.
This really sucks!
In western culture, we usually focus on efficiency. We care about the time. The old cliché “time is money” is worth mentioning.
However, in China, the meetings are way too often.
After talking to some of my colleagues, I learnt that Chinese people feel that it’s quite okay to have multiple meetings.
Reasons?
Well, somehow, in Chinese culture, people are very cautious about making decisions. Quick decision making is probably not so important. The Chinese managers are just not used to make quick decisions.
That’s also a reason why there is too much of the paperwork in Chinese organizations.
I remember, once I needed a simple software for my computer, and I requested my boss about it. It took more than 1.5 months to get the software installed on my machine. Actually, we had to purchase the software from the official sources. It took lots of time to pay the bill and get the license number. There were multiple stages of paperwork (such as getting signatures from too many people). All these time-consuming steps were probably intended to ensure the proper use of money, collectivism, and accountability.
On a positive note, the culture tries to minimize the risk by using the concept of collective decision-making. This is aimed at lowering the risk of failure. That’s why, the Chinese people will often “double check”. Doing things “slowly but carefully” is encouraged.
Chinese people will try to finally do the job well even if it takes a longer time. There is a heavy focus on mutual understanding.
Often, I feel that the Chinese people are a bit scared of failures.
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