Mr. China
Tim Clissold

Tim Clissold's memoir, Mr. China is a great read and a captivating look into the chasm of social and economic contradictions that are China. Its anecdotal case studies provide for a real life understanding of how business is (or has been) done in China over the last decade, including descriptions of sub par condom factories and run down mountain factories where unplanned explosions seem to be a daily occurrence.

Clissold enters China as a young and inexperienced member of the British investment community. A trip to Hong Kong leaves him exasperated but encouraged as he tries to sort out the existing anti-capitalistic culture. He finds that businesses have no incentive to serve customers - restaurants will say they are out of everything and hotels will refuse that they have any rooms. It is almost a game to them:

"I sensed a rapport with the people I met; it was almost as if they enjoyed the game of wits and they often gave me a laugh or a smile once they finally gave in. I never felt any malice from them; it was more like a bad habit that no one seemed able to break."

After this quick stint in China beginning to learn Mandarin and seeing the incredible opportunity he goes back to Britain to urge his firm, Arthur Anderson, to set up a satellite office within China. He is all but laughed out of his job.

After he decides to quit his job go to China to study Mandarin full time, the story really begins. Alongside his newfound mentor Pat, a wildly successful investment banker with connections on Wall Street, he travels all across China in search of investment opportunities. The factories they visit are usually comical to say the least. As you read you begin to have a real sense of what China really means in terms of management. At first Western investors are all but disgusted with the situation in the factories and refuse to invest. Pat and Tim realize that they will have to do this through a wide network of connections, and that is what they do. Working with Ai Jing, a motivated Chinese beurocrat, they set up a network (over long nights of genital delicacies, Baijiu moonshine, and kareoke) with Chinese officials across the country looking for Western money to fund improvements and expansion. Pat brings their identified investment opportunities to Wall Street, and they are granted $158 million to invest in different projects in China as a joint venture.

What follows is worthy of a Will Farrel movie. As millions of dollars disappear overnight, factories begin producing unauthorized products, and they try to deal with multiple government agencies (like the anticorruption bureau which demands a sack of cash and a new car before starting any investigation), the team begins to realize that the Western private investment model of "fund it and leave it" just isn't working. Westerners assume that laws keep companies relatively under tabs while the companies themselves are motivated for success to gain their own rewards. Apparently in China this isn't the case.

Clissold's account of their missadventures give Westerners an inside perspective on business in China, and is indispensible for anyone planning to enter the Eastern market. It also provides a realistic look at the investment opportunities and how difficult they are to manage as a Westerner in an Eastern world. While conditions may have changed in some places in China over the last few years, this remains business lesson and story for the ages.