Business Leadership in China : Manifestations, Influences, and Trends in the 21stCentury

Abstract: This master thesis aims to put an abstract view on culture and leadership in China considering the context of a Chinese society, which is adapting and transforming within the age of globalization and a rapid economic development. The goal of our research is to investigate on influences, trends and manifestations, which help to characterize the foundation and exercise of leadership in China. In order to be able to answers our research questions, we travelled for six weeks to China to conduct in-depth interviews with 15 Chinese leaders in Shanghai and Beijing in order to draw conclusion from the utterances we were able to grasp. Many researchers try to oversimplify the Chinese culture and society as well as its approach to leadership. For this reason we tried to underline the complexity of conducting business in China, and what factors need to be taken into consideration in order to have a successful encounter. The key findings of our thesis are that it is hard to simplify the phenomenon leadership in China, since it highly depends upon the observed company, and also the generation of the leader or follower one is dealing with. Furthermore, it is important to keep in mind the complex and rich culture of China, which goes several hundreds of years and has still a huge impact on behavior of today’s Chinese.