[School Post] - Siemens China

I have an Asimco Post in draft form but this stupid site won't take me there from the posting link page. Will try again.

Thursday (Sept 9th), we visited Siemens China and Boeing China. These company visits are making the trip a bargain. We are getting so much inside information!

At Siemens, we met with the director of HR and the “Siemen’s Management Institute” head: Han Qing. Jeesh! Working at Siemens is better than going to school. They outlined a terrific management training plan that (from what is sounds like) virtually guarantee’s success and mgt. Knowledge for anyone willing to take advantage of it. I find that Siemens is very up on the idea of employee retention and as we saw at Asimco, one of the issues that challenges businesses in China is retaining local managers who are bi-lingual and gain the skills as competent managers.
Mr. Qing also spoke about how Siemens (and I suspect American companies in general) over emphasize the effect of cultural differences. They are aware that they exist and they provide training to managers and employees to deal with them. However, when it comes right down to it. Professional, educated adults need to get the job done and communication can only be diversified so far before it loses its intent of getting the job done. I found this to be a very pragmatic approach. We found this type of dialog at BiMBA (Beijing International Business School at the University of Beijing). The MBA students there echoed similar sentiments. I liked that. In American education, I find that we deliver the message of sensitivity to a point of near guilt on our part. I have always suspected it was to far to the edge and the comments of the educated, professional Chinese students and managers here have confirmed that. Please know, that I know cultural sensitivity is important to the point you need to understand where the other person is coming from in order to get things done as well as not take offense (or give offense) inadvertently. A good manager, or employee will take this skill and make what they can out of it. If they still cannot cope with a diverse landscape at the workplace after this, well then they are not cut out to work there. It is funny. Many times, I hear people talking about this a lot in class. How important cultural sensitivity and tolerance is. However, I have observed that a few times, these people are the first to mock things (and people) that they don’t understand here. It could be a simple case of social awkwardness - you know, say something for the sake of saying it in an uncomfortable situation. But nonetheless, practice what you preach please!