One Mistake Not to Make While Doing Business In China

Doing business in China is a lot different than doing business anywhere else in the world. For one you need to be aware of the cultural aspects. Also you should be very careful of what you say to people and how you joke about things. Establishing a relationship and networking in China to most people is very important for good business. Chinese people are patient people doing business and it may take a few dinners, and get togethers before you close a deal. But this is what you will want in the long run, establishing a relationship established and gain trust in the individual.
One mistake you shouldn’t make doing business here from the start is ask them how their brothers and sisters are doing. It is not a big deal if they have brothers and sisters but many Chinese people are the only child. For that matter it was outlawed that if a family has two or more children they must pay government taxes for each child they have. It may seem a little weird to you but China has over 1.3 billion people.
A long time ago the Chinese families wanted only sons. That reason was that they felt daughters could not take care of the family. Males were born because they have the ablility to do harder work, and establish a better lifestyle for their family. When daughters were born, families would try to produce sons, and if daughters were again born. Then they would try to produce a son once more. It was getting more crowed and in 1979 Deng Xiaoping the Chinese president at the time, first introduced the One-Child Policy to his nation. China's population had more than tripled since 1900 and the government was feeling constant pressure to bring down the numbers. Because of the Chinese tradition involving giving birth to at least one male child, female infants were often killed, aborted, or left to die so that the family would only have the one child being a male, because families must have a male, thus creating a large surplus of males in China.
So when you go out to eat with the person you are doing business with in China. Don’t ask about their family until they ask about yours. And from experience, asking them how their brother or sister is doing, may affect your business deal.