The Chinese people attach great importance to personal relations. They give more considerations to the establishment of a long-term cooperative business relations rather than the fulfillment of the present transaction. Such an event took place several years ago: Someone was entrusted to help a Chinese businessman to look for an American cooperative partner to establish a joint venture. Through two years of efforts, a negotiation attended by all those concerned was finally arranged. However, finding that the American party had not only worked out the contract, but also brought a lawyer when he arrived, the Chinese businessman was deeply hurt and left. The matter substantially reflects the different ways to do business in the two countries, i.e. the Chinese businessman wanted to establish business relations with the American party at the first meeting, while the American desired to hold talks on the concrete matters immediately instead of establishing the personal relations. There are many popular sayings in this respect, such as "Friendly relations should exist between buyer and seller even if they fail to clinch a deal", and "place what is right above material gains".
The Chinese people often try to establish good business relations through various means, such as entertainment and wine-drinking, as if making personal friends. Many expats can't understand this, regarding the Chinese unscrupulous way in separating public from private interests. In fact, however, this is not the case. As the Chinese believe that acquaintances handle affairs easily, one should first try to establish a good interpersonal relationship with his counterpart if he wants to make a deal with the other party. Of course, matters such as entertainment and wine-drinking is unavoidable.
