Experience can shape One’s personality
Personality is made of a combination in attitudes, emotions and the patterns associated with the behavioral response of an individual. There are a number of personality theories explaining on personality from different angles. On my part, experience shaped by personality after I was introduced in online business where I could sell goods manufactured in the United States to China.
It is worth noting that doing business with China is a multinational business (Parhizgar, 2001), since the goods had to be transported from the United States to China. As an American, I realized that my culture was different from the Chinese culture; at first the online business of selling goods was very difficult, since there were communication barriers. Chinese people embrace collectivist cultural approach while the Americans embrace individualistic culture (Parhizgar, 2001).
I found out that Chinese people think and act as a group, an indication that decision making processes took long than I expected. I also noted that a Chinese may say yes, while he/she means no, in other words, the business was characterized with indirect communication (Parhizgar, 2001). I at times felt discouraged and in a number of times, I thought of quitting the business.
I opted to study the culture of the Chinese people, in order to improve my communication with my business partners back in China. I realized that Chinese culture is among the oldest cultures in the world, and that it varies with cities, provinces, regions and in towns. Understanding Chinese cultures forced me to learn Chinese music, literature, cuisine, business communication, visual arts and martial arts among others. China is made up of fifty six ethnic groups, with Han Chinese taking the lion’s share. I also noted that a family name is considered very important. Chinese people prefer hard cash in carrying out their business, they have not yet adapted to paperless money transfers.
Experience in doing business with Chinese people changed my personality; initially I was skeptical dealing with people from different cultural orientation (Parhizgar, 2001). I felt that the Whites were superior and that that they had more privileges as compared to other people in the world. I learnt from the Chinese people that different cultures in the world have a number of positive attributes and a number of negative attributes.
Doing business with the Chinese people taught me on how to value relationships while still doing business, and that people are very important in the society. This was a different approach comparing the cultural orientation in the United States where life is dominated with individualistic culture, where each and every individual is concerned of his/her part. Chinese people value the community, to an extent that when making decisions, the opinions of the community are more valued that the opinions of individuals (Parhizgar, 2001).
I also learnt the benefits of teamwork in business, in that Chinese people value diversity in teamwork, where unique solutions were generated, I also learnt that teamwork made us realize better results as compared to individual work, teamwork encouraged effective solution across the board and that teamwork encouraged mutual support (Parhizgar, 2001).
Teamwork encouraged diverse opinions and efficiency to an extent that the teams working in China and the teams working in United States were able to realize better outcomes, better ideas, efficiency, sense of accomplishment and mutual support (Parhizgar, 2001). Doing online business and selling of goods to china changed my personality in the way I look at things and people of different cultures.
References
Parhizgar, K. D. (2001). Multicultural Behavior and Global Business Environments. London: Routledge.
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