The many meanings of "bu hao yi si", and how to receive face as well as give it - By Kathleen Lau

-----By Kathleen Lau

Read any book on doing business in China and you'll find the Chinese concept of face explained. In my own book, Riding the Dragon, I wrote a section on why giving face is so paramount to doing anything in China, business or otherwise. This is the concept where you don't risk humiliating anyone to the point of not saying anything when someone calls you Mr Smith ... and your name is Jones.

While all the advice books caution the newcomer on how to give face, they don't warn about receiving it. Unfortunately, we receive face more than we realise and without our wanting it. It can be as simple as not being told about the lettuce stuck between your teeth from lunch, or as baffling as not being disagreed with no matter how absurd your misunderstanding. Witness the following overheard conversation:

Tourist: These Buddha are beautiful. This must be a temple. Can we go in? Guide: Yes.

Tourist: This one would look so great in my living room.

Guide: You can buy it.

Tourist: You mean the temple sells their Buddha? Guide: Yes.

Tourist: Well, I don't want to take their religious icons away.

Guide: It's okay, they're for sale.

Tourist: Is this a temple or a store? Guide: Yes.

Tourist: Which is it? Guide: Yes.

This is funny when it's happening to someone else. But when the person in question is yours truly and it's happening at the workplace and not on vacation, it's different. How often have you asked your interpreter on what the other side said, only to be told yes to two contradictory questions?

You: Did he agree to my offer of 5 million? Interpreter: Yes.

You: Or is he sticking to his price of 6 million? Interpreter: Yes.

Mixed signals What you have just experienced is the cousin of face, which is bu hao yi si. It is so subtle, so invisible to the foreigner that there's not even an English name for it. Literally, it translates as "not good meaning", and we know it by its most common usage, which is "sorry", as in:

You: Did you get the email I sent you?

Client: Bu hao yi si, I haven't checked my email for a week.

But the more subtle meaning, the one you'll never hear but surrounds you at every turn, is "I'm embarrassed to бн." Fill in the blank: I'm embarrassed to say, to point out, to tell you that I don't understand what you have just said, and so on.

Your assistant might be embarrassed to tell you that the meeting time you've scheduled conflicts with her other meeting. So instead of bringing it up, she tries to change the other meeting which involves four other staff members and suddenly you sense that there's excitement and tension around the office only to discover бн damn it, why didn't you just tell me, I can change our meeting anytime. It was just a briefing.

This hesitation to bring up anything that conflicts with what you've said - that is, giving you face - leads to not asking you questions or communicating with you in general. In an office environment, this can lead to each staff member filling in the blanks for himself and creating stories about why you make the decisions you do.

He likes that secretary, that's why he bought the desk for her when he hired her. So if she starts asking for RMB800 reimbursements for "business" lunches, it must be because she has his protection. (Actually, when the manager in question found out about these expensive phantom lunches, he fired her.)

When bu hao yi si goes bu hao

But it can become more serious when the stakes are higher, as in "I'm embarrassed to tell you that your assistant just asked for a kickback." Or: "I'm embarrassed to tell you that your accountant made the mistake on the form and that's why you're being investigated."

People who are not a part of your team will not clue you in on even the grossest violations, because not only are they not obligated to, but they are also bu hao yi si. And then there's the censoring that your interpreter does for you because she is bu hao yi si to translate what you say so directly.

You: Tell him to stop playing around. If he adds on another charge that he hasn't told me about, I'm outta here.

Interpreter: My boss said he's sorry but he cannot pay more. He thinks your deal is very good but this is all he has. He asks you not to add on any more charges.

Sometimes it works. And sometimes it doesn't. There have been times when your interpreter did know better; particularly if you're negotiating with government agencies. There, you truly have to be careful on giving face and play the bu hao yi si game. But when the other side is another company, or just another department in your company, such hesitancy becomes corrosive. The lack of communication that bu hao yi si leads to works in a stated-owned enterprise (SOE), because those companies tend to managed by one central authority that is not based on information from the market or from the ranks. Lack of communications helps the ling dao (leader) maintain power. But we know how well SOEs perform.

However in Western-style management, where authority and responsibility are decentralised, not communicating spells disaster. The manager can only make decisions when information flows freely within the organisation. When your staff stays mum for fear of bu hao yi si, what you need to make a good decision is lost.

As bu hao yi si is so hard to recognise, there is no sure-fire way to guard against it. My experience, as politically incorrect as it sounds, is to do some profiling of your employees. If you need someone with maturity, you have to be aware that anyone over 30 has spent his formative working years in an SOE - and developing SOE working habits.

However, even the fresh-out-of-school types have parents that have worked in SOEs and are indirectly influenced to various degrees. Anyone who has worked for a foreign company or boss might be more amenable to Western-style management (though not all foreign companies have this tradition - think Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indian and other non-Western companies).

Over time, acting on information to make good decisions, asking lots of questions, and rewarding those who speak out will start to create an atmosphere of open communication. You'll weed out the hard-core, inflexible ones and the open talkative types will get more comfortable. But don't expect even a trusted long-time employee to be totally honest in all situations. bu hao yi si is bigger than any of us, and we can only learn to coexist with it, never without it.

Copyright 2007 by Kathleen Lau. No part of this may be reprinted - in any language or format: printed, electronic or otherwise - without express written permission from the author.