On my first day at Factory A I was pleasantly surprised to find an excellent in house QC system. There was one "expediter" and "project manager" who managed the construction of the machine. They were on-time and an inspection of the machine's sub-assemblies left me very impressed. There were some small issues with parts that were supposed to be bought commercially that they had in fact chosen to fabricate, but all in all I was impressed and satisfied.

Factory B - Kept me waiting at my hotel all morning. Driver arrives around 10:30 and says we will meet for lunch first. This is where your business-in-China-Spidey-Sense goes off so bad you might think that there's a bullet about to hit you. I spent all day/evening/night on the phone with the project managers in China, US and Europe. They raised enough stink that I was allowed into the factory on Day 2. Complete and utter chaos. No project manager. They could hardly even put together a file with the original design drawings we supplied....

I spent several days a week travelling back and forth 140 km trying to help Factory A build the parts they should have purchased, and manage the fiasco at Factory B.

What was supposed to be a nice week in Jiangsu province doing a QC trip ended up becoming a 4 week crisis management conference with me and another engineer.

I guess my point is this. It may cost you a little to send "a body" to the factory every week or two, but it's prudent.

It drives me crazy when I hear "you don't understand China". It is a red flag when I hear it and it makes me go on alert mode and to start being even more skeptical than I usually am about the deal on the table in China.

My line I like to use when they say " you don't understand China" is "Well, you don't understand westerners, because in the west, we have rules and procedures and only trust facts that can be verified, not relationships. And if you want to be doing business with a western company, than you need to understand westerners better".

Part of the negotiating tactics of China is to make you feel less capable or weak. They will always try and make you feel as if you should be grateful that they have even decided to speak to you about business and you should be kissing their "ass" to do so. Don't fall for it. Only negotiate, as they like to say, "on mutually beneficial terms". That means it is a two way street and while you may have to be a bit flexible in accepting some reasonable terms from them, the too must treat you as an equal at the negotiating table.

So please people, stop offering them trips abroad or other perks to get them to give you business. How many of you fly to London to negotiate a deal with the idea that you are about to offer the Brit across the table a trip to Las Vegas as part of the deal to get him to sign. Or you would agree to help the wife the British GM apply for a visa to go to the US to visit their daughter in University as part of the deal?

If you would not accept those terms in your own country, don't accept them in China.

• “In fact, you really don’t know that much about China.”
• “I can’t be bothered to come up with a coherent argument or explanation, so let’s just attribute this problem to your ignorance.”
• “I know more than you, let’s keep it that way.”
• “I’ve done something wrong, but it’s ok because I'm going to try to cover up my actions with my country’s culture, inadequate legal system or pervasive corruption.”
• “This is China, I’m Chinese, let’s just do what I want to do.”

The simple solution to all of this, say "Explain it to me". Anyone who bothers to give you a clear explanation probably has interests aligned with yours, those who try to obfuscate are working against you and you probably don't want to do business with them.