Not all staff in China are looking to jump ship at the mention of a better paycheque. Many, given the right opportunity, are steadfast

By Kathleen Lau

I met her when she was 19. Newly arrived in Shanghai direct from the rice paddies, she was hoping the city's life could improve her own. I hired her as the cleaning ayi for my first restaurant in Shanghai. She didn't know how to work the toilet paper holder and she had a hard time understanding how to use the cleaning products. But over the months, I began to notice this waif of a girl who worked quietly and diligently when no one else seemed to be busy. We called her Jade.

By the second year I realise how rare it was to find conscientious and stable staff for a small restaurant that couldn't compete with the staff benefits of the hotels and restaurant groups cropping up by the dozens. We needed trusty hands in the store room, someone who would watch over our inventory and daily flow of goods. "Why not Jade?" I said.

Just one chance

So our ayi was promoted to the store room. In time she learned to fill the forms, to recognise names from arugula to zucchini and became the indispensable guardian of our small stockpile of alcohol and canned goods. When I sold that first Kathleen's, Jade went on to help the accountant with a new venture. We kept in touch and I followed her progress. One day I heard that she collapsed from the heat in the stifling room she lived in during the heat wave that summer in Shanghai. We talked about eating better and the need to take better care of ourselves.

When I opened Kathleen's 5, she was one of the first staff to sign on. This restaurant was bigger, the stock room more complicated and in addition to the paperwork there was now a computer programme to update. She learned to navigate Excel, using the English names of each item, and became a walking encyclopaedia of the latest price increases or the history and supplier of each stock.

Hardly the shy teenager of our first meeting, she was now the veteran and star performer of one of our most important sections. Though her abilities had increased a hundredfold, she was still the quiet country girl she had always been and not yet confident in the glitz of Shanghai. While she knew what needed to be done and was willing to work beyond the call of duty to finish the work, she was unable to maintain order when others broke the rules. And so her abilities were lost in a maze of problems when company procedures were not followed. As we grew, so did the problems, and we began to think of other solutions while she thought of other types of work.

One day we had a long talk. It seemed that after seven years of growing up with me, she was ready to try something new. An American family offered a live-in position au pair position. She would learn English with the children, move from a small room without facilities into a villa built for expat executives. I could not match the benefits and it was time to try something different for us both.

Fast forward to a year later. Our department did not improve with Jade's departure. The people who came after her were better educated and more mature. They spoke more English and had more life experience. But they resisted learning and making changes. Their idea of management was turning in pristine reports that had no basis in reality. It covered up problems rather than solved them.

Crunch time

When their departure left a hole in our section, I turned to Jade for emergency aid. Come back for two weeks, I said, while your current bosses are on vacation in the States. She was back at home in the countryside and said she could be there in two days.

Two days later she arrived with a bag direct from the train station. A two-hour bus ride each way from her current home didn't keep her from arriving at eight o'clock on the dot. Thank goodness you were free these two weeks, I said one day over lunch. Well, she began hesitantly, it's actually harvest time at home and I was needed to help.

"Oh, how were you able to get away?" I said.

"I asked my sister to come home and help instead," she told me simply. "She didn't want to because harvesting rice is hard work." "Your sister was free?" It would have been a lucky coincidence.

"No, my sister took two weeks off from her job here in Shanghai," Jade said simply.

It took me a few moments to realise the extent of the arrangements that Jade had made in order to come and help me when I asked. A simple, "I'll come in two days" meant causing her family a great inconvenience. She would not have even mentioned it if I had not stumbled upon the truth.

Beyond the CV

I thought about all the articles I had written about how the Chinese mentality makes it difficult for foreigners to manage in China. I considered the different ways I had explained that the Chinese felt more obligated to personal relationships than a corporation, and how leaving to help a friend in need is frequently the reason for resigning without notice.

But for every cavalier employee who started his own business on company time, who learned everything from me and went off to start a competing business, there were those like Jade who paid back in sweat equity with interest to spare. I have worked with them too over the years and even now, a decade later, I know I can call on them if ever I needed their help.

The people in this group may not be the corporate ladder climbers or famous school graduates, and most likely don't have the self-confidence to run a department. But they are loyal and will stay with you when the college grads are long gone. They are adaptable, putting up with every new operational change without complaint, diligently following your procedures as best as they can. Some on my staff, like Jade, are quick learners. Others like her became fluent in English. One ayi I trained went on to work as an accountant and earned her CPA certificate. When I sold that company she stayed with it. For a year, when I was too busy to care for my own home, she would come after working all day to help me clean house.

Unfortunately, foreign managers who don't speak Chinese have little access to this group. Those in manufacturing or in companies with few English-speaking staff will have even fewer opportunities to experience this best part of working with the Chinese. What's lost in translation in your manager's report on staff development is the local's prejudice of focusing only on someone's education level. Imagine if your company's training brings this group along, the loyalty that so many bemoan is lacking in China can one day be greater than that in the West.

©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 author.