PUBLISHED ARTICLES

In most Western countries, leaders are used to working in an environment where the employees are highly participating in meetings and contributing their opinions and experiences to the decision making process. A Western employee feels comfortable to argue for their beliefs and to share opinions in meetings with superiors. Furthermore, a manager in the West is not necessarily assumed to be an expert in his field or industry. On the contrary, he is supposed to utilize the knowledge in his team in decisions and projects. The Western managers are therefore used to lead highly interactive teams relying heavily on two-way communication. When a team achieves strong synergy, he can and will step down. The team becomes creative and manage it self. The manager will focus more on strategic decisions and leadership tasks. Many successful innovative Western companies have flat organizations and managers leading the teams with a democratic approach; coaching and supporting their team.

Chinese people are taught to learn by listening and modeling their superiors and teachers. The general assumption is that a questioning approach, especially to superiors and more experienced persons is disrespectful. It is professional in China to respect and support your superior, listen to your instructions and follow the leader’s example. A Chinese manager is not expected to rely on his team for knowledge. In fact, he is supposed to provide all the answers and decisions. The staff is supposed to follow orders and act them out swiftly and appropriately. The manager is expected to be autocratic and in meetings and interactions one-way communication is used. In the Chinese environment, the success of the company is therefore highly dependent on the hard skills and knowledge of the leaders. Great Chinese companies are frequently led by managers with great technical knowledge in his field and industry enabling them to lead the subordinates by giving clear tasks and instructions. 

Western managers’ arriving in China naturally assumes a democratic and collaborative leadership style often leading to great confusion among the Chinese employees. Instead of having clear tasks given by their new boss, they are included in meetings and asked to contribute to decisions that they usually have no authority to speak about. Without detailed instructions to follow and no clear orders from their Western leader, the Chinese employees feel uncomfortable and insecure. The local employee asks himself how he is expected to do a good job if not even his leader knows what needs to get done? In the other end of the table, the Western manager feels he is alone, with a team lacking initiative, not sharing opinions and not contributing to the decision making process.

Can Western managers succeed in creating two-way communication to be able to use coaching in China? The answer is yes. We have seen many successful companies who have achieved strong collaboration and high levels of synergy in China.  These Western leaders started out with a direct leadership style.  Slowly but surely they start coaching their employees taking small steps giving larger and larger responsibilities. These companies have broken the communication barrier and managed to get two-way communication in their workforce. In many cases these Chinese company divisions are outperforming all divisions in other countries for these multinationals.

- Peter J. Karlsson