Author, entrepreneur and Rutgers Business School alum to speak about how to succeed in China
September 18, 2009
All are welcome - Wednesday, September 30, 2009 @ 4:30 PM; Rutgers Business School, Room 216 - 1 Washington ParkAuthor and entrepreneur Sam Goodman says China is on a mission. “There is no doubt China wants to be the #1 economic superpower in the world,” he said 12-hours ahead of New Jersey time via Skype in Beijing. “They see what the US has, they want it and they are coming after it.” As Chinese businesses’ global reach expands and opportunities for American businesses to tap the enormous market in China grow, there is little doubt that this generation of Rutgers Business School students will be doing business with China. But they won’t have to make the same mistakes Goodman made. Goodman, who graduated from Rutgers Business School’s Executive MBA program in Beijing in 2006, has been doing business in China since 1995 and has made enough mistakes to fill a book, which he decided to write, “Where East Eats West - The Street-Smarts Guide to Business in China.” Goodman learned from his mistakes, learned Chinese, built and sold the ‘World-famous-in China’ chain of cafes, Beijing Sammies; was a Client Partner for the world’s largest executive recruitment firm and a successful negotiator in English and Chinese on Westinghouse’s US-China $5.4 billion, nuclear power plant bid. According to Goodman, the cultural and contextual difficulties of doing business with China can be overcome with knowledge. “It is so much easier, costs less, and is much quicker to learn from other people’s mistakes before you even start working with China,” he said. “I wrote this book because I kept running into foreigners in China who were making the same mistakes over and over. This book can give people the knowledge so that when they do start working with China and come across a puzzling situation they can say, ‘Aha, that’s what this is about.’ And then they can avoid these mistakes and be more successful faster.”Reviews of the book have been positive. “From sandwiches to nuclear power plants, Goodman’s in-the-trenches China experiences cover an unusually broad range and the advice he offers you comes unvarnished, unleavened, and unadulterated, just like he lived it,” opined Ted Plafker, Beijing Correspondent for the Economist . Goodman will speak to the Rutgers Business School community about the experiences in his book on Wednesday, September 30th at 4:30 PM, in Room 216, 1 Washington Park.For more information, please visit the event page.
