How To Live & Do Business In China
Eight Lessons I Learned from the Communists
by
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KIRKUS REVIEW
HOW TO LIVE & DO BUSINESS IN CHINA:
Eight Lessons I Learned from the Communists
First-time author Tadla delivers an eclectic volume that may be of use to North American businessmen.
Even at well under 200 pages, How to Live & Do Business in China is a sprawling
work that is part-memoir, part-travelogue and part-primer on Chinese culture.
Tadla writes
of his experiences as a 61-year-old Canadian adjusting to Chinese norms while serving as
a consultant to a U.S.-owned, Chinese-operated commercial production company. He
struggles at first, hindered by his Western prejudices, but eventually achieves what he calls
a change in paradigm and meets with success. As a first-person narrator, the author is a
likable fellow with a rough-edged yet generally readable writing style. As he contrasts
Western and Chinese approaches to just about everything—likening the cultural differences to
the difference between left- and rightbrained thinking—
Tadla includes personal anecdotes to illustrate his points. Discussing Chinese medicine, for instance,
he relates his apparently successful efforts to beat back prostate cancer using a method blending
Western and Eastern approaches to health care.
The book is organized somewhat haphazardly, and the author tends to run off on tangents,
a few of which a touching tribute to his late wife, for one—stray from the thrust of his work.
Most of his observations, however, prove useful in illuminating Chinese standards to
Westerners otherwise unfamiliar with the territory. Several sections—an overview of Confucianism,
an essay on the crucial concept of “guanxi,” a description of the Chinese haggling process—
may help ordinary tourists and businessmen. The author mangles a sentence here and there,
and he unsettlingly glosses over Chinese human-rights abuses while lauding the government’s
ability to get things done, but altogether this is a friendly, handy beginner’s guide to navigating
the society of a vast, ancient country.
Short, wide-ranging and serviceable.
Trafford (133 pp.)
$19.13 paperback
April 11, 2007
ISBN: 978-1-4251-0120-8
I just read your book "How to Live and Do Business in China" in two hours - could not put it down! It has to be
one of the most caring accounts of experiences of a Westerner in China! I came across your book during
my ongoing Amazon quest for information about living in China. Over the past six months I have ordered
a slew of books purporting to contain THE answer to what it is like to live in China. Your book is
crammed with useful information, told amidst a touching personal story. I am now consulting in both
China and Taiwan and every word you wrote resonates with me at the highest level!"
- Dick Cornell, Emeritus Professor,Instructional Systems, University of Central Florida
"How to Live and Do Business in China provides just what the title suggests: a personal account of Chinese
business and social interactions that taught author Ernie Tadla that "the right way for humanity is to
balance, to integrate the best of [Western and Eastern thought]." Tadla recounts how he applied this
maxim to the Chinese style of building business relationships slowly and focused on long-term goals
rather than immediate solutions. The book begins with anecdotal chapters on living in China,
which lead up to the second part: the eight business lessons Tadla "learned from the Communists,"
including opening the mind and changing paradigms, preserving face, understanding guanxi and
Chinese communication. These lessons proved to be valuable in his work with PPI, an American-owned
marketing communications company. The book is peppered with dozens of insightful stories, as
well as dos and a don’ts case study, including Microsoft and Wal-Mart. Tadla writes in an easy-to-read
style, with many lists, bullet points and quotable take-aways."
- Caleb March, Book Editor of Insight Magazine,a monthly publication of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, China.
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About the Book
Knowing and understanding these eight lessons on how to succeed in China could save you hundreds of thousands of dollars, earn you millions in profits and save you years of time. Read case histories on Wal-Mart, Micro-Soft, VW and DMG illustrating the lessons. This is a practical how-to book giving you insights into the psychology and behavior of how and why the Chinese act the way they do.
It is written by a senior Western manager who successfully managed an American-Chinese company in Shanghai. It will give you the information you need to decide if you should be in China and if so, what to expect and prepare for and why.
The first eight chapters trace his background and preparation, his entry pains and joys. The second eight chapters contain the Lessons he learned and wished he knew and understood before going. The last chapters contain case histories.
About the Author
A native of North Battleford, Saskatchewan and graduate from the University of Alberta, Ernie's business and management experience was gained working with Johnson & Johnson, Bristol Myers Squibb and Quadra Logic Technologies Inc. Later, as founder of Odyssey Consulting International Inc., he provided consulting and management training for his own clients as he had done for his corporate employers.