What Our Country Can Give You

FOUR CHINESE PHDS WHO STUDY AND DO RESEARCH AT BOCCONI TELL HOW THEY SEE THE EXPANSION OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC INTO OUR ECONOMIES

Weiqi Li, student PhD
Working abroad to import governance models and export Shenzhen

"Chinese companies are quite motivated to go abroad to gain a better managerial experience in corporate governance and brand promotion. Internationalization is also stimulated by a question of pride: colonial history is a sad memory for every Chinese and today the country is eager to recover respect and recognition from developed economies. Compared to European business management, there is a clear cultural gap that concerns above all relationships with the leadership. In the West, employees can call their own boss by name, express their opinion of course, or take a view contrary to that of their superiors. This does not happen in China, where leaders rely almost exclusively on their own vision and judgment. On the other hand, however, China can export the excellence of the Shenzhen model where innovation starts from observing market demand and not from a traditional approach based solely on research. "
 
Yuxi Wang, student PhD
The rhetoric of leadership

"China is an emerging country and, in the absence of significant past experience, a benchmark and a consolidated internal model to which to refer, the local decision-making processes of local leadership is evidently arbitrary. In addition, being a manager or entrepreneur in China involves a great sense of responsibility since, culturally, collective good often prevails over the individual. Another aspect that characterizes Chinese leadership is the rhetoric that accompanies communication: the speeches of those who hold roles at the top are often vague and devoid of any concrete information; dialogue is a pastime used to create a good harmony between the parties, to the benefit of any future negotiations. The Chinese tend to believe in “guanxi”, that is to say, to the whole plot of profound social relationships built on the sharing of experiences and leisure. This kind of relationship is where the pillars of success in business are built. "
 
Yingdong Lin, student PhD
Between Innovation and State

"The financial crisis has also slowed down in Chinese society: entrepreneurs and managers have started to be more cautious in investment and now make choices that minimize risks. In this situation of global uncertainty, the government has put into circulation a large amount of liquidity so that the economy does not stop and can continue to stimulate ongoing innovation. The success of new local companies is based on the combination of innovation and the availability of managerial talent, made possible by the fact that many of the young top Chinese managers have had a learning experience abroad. Innovation also brings with it a good amount of risk, which, on the other hand, the Italian business system, based on family business, rarely knows: in Italy, companies do not have to worry about achieving higher profits than their capacity. Two conceptual pairings are thus established: innovation and risk; stability and traditionalism. "
 
Zijian Wang, student PhD
Our managers? Less conservative, more creative and willing to risk

"Italian managers and, in general, Europeans are much more conservative than the Chinese ones. This may be because developed market companies must ensure long-term business performance, as they have to deal with a more structured system of social and worker protections. Chinese entrepreneurs, on the other hand, move into an institutional vacuum that allows them to be more creative than the business model to be applied, taking the typical risk of those who experiment. This tendency to innovation is also determined by the extraordinary growth of the Chinese market, by a social system not necessarily guaranteed, and by the wide range of young people belonging to the middle class who by their very nature have a cutting edge mindset. The most convincing argument of this thesis is the success of contactless payments (Alipay, Wechat Pay App), facilitated by a banking and bureaucratic system that favors development. "
 
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by Allegra Gallizia
Translated by Alex Foti