Business in China from a PR perspective

Never fight a war you can’t win

In the German prmagazin 3/2022 (print edition), an article was published as a follow-up to the Olympic Games in Beijing. Industrie-Contact board member Uwe Schmidt also has his say in it as a China communications expert:

“Chinese culture is very much about form. Many things are ritualized. This form should not be broken, if possible: The Chinese separate business from other areas. In the West, it’s different. In exchanges with Chinese, this can lead to misunderstandings that may not even be noticed because the Chinese do not show to the outside world what they actually think,” says Uwe Schmidt.

“In China, there is an old saying: ‘Never fight a war you can’t win.’ Many Western companies are just learning that this wisdom must also apply to them if they want to play in the Chinese market.”