China-Britain Business Council  

How does Chinese culture affect the business environment?

The main characteristic about business in china is that it's relationship driven, this means that in china you have to develop a relationship before you do business, whereas in western cultures you often do a transaction and then develop a relationship. There are certain characteristics about relationships in china otherwise known as guanxi, first of all they tend to be reciprocal in nature, so if someone grants you a favour, you have to grant one back, also when you maintain relationships in china, you have to pay attention to other aspects such as whether the Chinese side looses faith and that's going to damage a relationship. You also need to pay attention to hierarchy as this is another aspect which is important in Chinese culture, treating people according to their rank is important. These are other things unique to Chinese culture, for example, the attention that's paid to certain colours (red being a lucky colour and white being associated with death) or lucky numbers for example (the number eight which is pronounced ba is associated with wealth, whereas the word for four sl, is associated with death).