Introduction to Business Mandarin Chinese

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Introduction to Business Mandarin Chinese Transcript

Hello Class.
Everyone hopes to live a better life. So they work very hard every day. This is especially true in such a populated country as China where businesses fiercely fight one another for market share .

As a worker in China, work life can be stressful as you have to deal with complicated"office politics" in order to move up within an organization. The younger generation in China, as a result, try to gain a competitive edge against their colleagues by learning as much as they can and one increasingly popular way to do this is through reading special books called zhíchǎng xiǎoshuō where zhíchǎng职场 means "workplace" and xiǎoshuō 小说"novel".

These "workplace novels" are a hot commodity right now among the Chinese, such as "Hidden in the Office" Qiánfú zài bàngōngshì潜伏在办公室 and "Du Lala's Promotion Diary" Dùlālā shēng zhí jì杜拉拉升职记，which have sold millions of copies, inspired a movie, television series and three sequels! Let's learn some useful business vocabulary right now,so if you are working or will work in China, you can use them in your daily life.
There are two types of offices for most companies, they are
zǒng gōngsī总公司 head Office
and fēn gōngsī 分公司 branch Office

They are usually run by a CEO, or xíngzhèngzǒngcái 行政总裁 who is sometimes the boss as well . Boss is lǎobǎn 老板 . Some companies have partners, or héhuǒrén合伙人 then working your way down, you have managers, jīnglǐ经理, supervisors zhǔguǎn主管, assistants zhùlǐ助理业务,the secretary mìshū秘书,,, accountants kuàijì会计计 and then colleagues tóngshì同事.

If you go to a business meeting be sure to bring míngpiàn 名片, can you guess what that is? Yes, business card! Many Chinese business cards have both a Chinese and English name on them . Work is gōngzuò工作 but starting work is shàngbān上班call in while getting off work is xiàbān 下班 call out.

Let's do a quick quiz!
Now I will use the words we learnt today to make 6 sentences , and you need to listen carefully. Pause the video after each one so you have time to think then I'll explain them in details to make sure you understand .

1 Zhè shì wǒmen zǒng gōngsī de kuàijì. 这是我们总公司的会计。This is the accountant at our head office.
2 Tā shì lǎobǎn de mìshū.她是老板的秘书。She is the boss's secretary.
3 Wǒ zǎoshang jiǔdiǎn shàngbān, xiàwǔ wǔdiǎn xiàbān.
我早上九点上班，下午五点下班。I work 9-5.
4 Liú xiānsheng shì wǒde zhǔguǎn.刘先生是我的主管。Mr Liu is my supervisor.
5 Wǒ de Tóngshìmen hěn bù xǐhuan wǒ.我的同事们很不喜欢我。My colleagues don't like me.
6 Wáng xiǎojiě shì lǎobǎn de héhuǒrén.王小姐是老板的合伙人。Miss Wang is the boss's partner.

Chinese fact:
Chinese workers don't have much vacation time and are expected to work lots of unpaid overtime at their jobs in order to prove their loyalty to their boss.

[dingoufadeelkayat]

i love your lessons so much, I have been learning chinese for around two years, but I found your lessons just last week. since then i ever got such progress. you so good xie xie. please keep going .you made chinese so easy and so clear .bless china

[OrionsFaves]

Hi Martin - Great points. I'm glad you brought that up. My intent wasn't to imply a strict equality between the past and 了, but only to focus on one of the subsets of the various uses of it. You bring up what I understand is another important use. At least, according to the book I've been using, 他走了, in the right context, can also mean "He has left", as in a completed action (which I consider as "past", and one can throw in more complexity with dependent clauses and so forth).

[martinphipps]

Another example: I was watching a movie once and a couple was breaking up and the girl said "我走了". Obviously she wasn't saying "I (have) left" but "I am leaving". In Chinese, tense is marked exclusively by time expressions: 了 doesn't indicate the past at all. This is important to understand: last week I was waiting for the cable guy and I called the company and they said "他來了". Obviously they were telling me "He is coming" and not "He has come" or "He came" as he obviously wasn't there yet.

[howtochinese]

Thanks so much for your attention and very pratical topic suggestions. I appreciate it so much. And I will do videos about these topics very soon. Have a nice week.

[trommelbiel]

Beautiful teacher. Keep them coming. I will soon surprise my Chinese business partners. They will be forced to give me more discount.

[howtochinese]

I agree. Everywhere in Australia, I see so many things made in China. And also Dalian, a city of China so far has the biggest port in the world.

[ruyperez]

I am just starting with Chinese learning, honestly i find it everything buy easy, but i hope with effort i can master it soon.

[martinphipps]

Hi, I'm not Lucky but I feel I have to tell you that you should avoid equating 了with the past tense: it is actually an aspect marker and is used to note a change of state. For example, 我今天看了一本书 means "I (have) read a book today" and 我 今 天看了一本书了 means "I have read one book today so far". The latter is clearly the present perfect tense as the emphasis is on the fact tha although you have finished one book you plan to read another.

[OrionsFaves]

Hi Lucky,

Great videos; guess I should buy your book one of these days. Ok: topic suggestions:
1) grammar-- Using le (了) for past tense, including usage in things with numbers, For example (I may not be doing this right..just a beginner)
我 今 天看了一本书。 vs. 我 今 天看了一本书了。 1a) using le vs. using de in past tense.
2) 音乐 . Concerts, music styles, instruments, verbs for playing different instruments, blah, blah.
3) 运动 (sports?) Basketball, football, (American football), teams, etc.

谢谢你

[randallskrabonja]

Xie xie nin for sharing your excellent videos lao shi.

[Cncking]

You should do a class about zoo animals! Really cool video Lucky!

Jon

[OrionsFaves]

Meh..character limits! Anyway, as I'm by no means an expert, I could still be wrong and any corrections of my misunderstandings are very helpful, so thanks. Certainly, 了 is a complex little character and probably deserving of an entire lesson on its own. For reference, the book to which I referred is 'Beginning Chinese" by John DeFrancis. (one of the older books I have on Mandarin anyway).

[ColonelMarcellus]

Haven't seen Lucky for years!   I guess she went off and got married and abandoned us.

[rinchennamgyal]

if your mandarin book can be find in india or not?

[Nilguiri]

Hi Lucky
I understand that nowadays, tóngshì 同事 also means a gay partner. Is there any risk of being misunderstood in a shop, for example? "Your tóngshì told me to speak to you." I imagine it depends on the context, right?
谢谢

[Nilguiri]

Ah yes, you're right. I was confusing 同志‘ with 同事!
Thanks

[howtochinese]

Hello. I guess you are saying tóngzhì同志‘gay partner’ not tóngshì 同事.We never use tóngshì 同事 to indicate that.