Learning Chinese in 1 Year

[veejay]

Hi, 

 

I am have just enrolled myself for a Chinese language program at Zhejiang University. I will be attending the Summer (about 4 weeks), Autumn (3-4 months) and Spring (3-4 months) semesters. I will have 20 hours of Mandarin classes per week. Just wanted to get an idea if this would be enough to get me business fluent by the end of the 3 semesters (by June next year). I would be looking to get a job in China after this (probably in finance in Shanghai).

 

I know this is sort of a vague question and learning the language depends on a lot of different factors, but I would like to get a general idea of whether it is possible to get business fluent in this time frame.

 

Any answers would be much appreciated - Thanks! 

 

 

[ZhangKaiRong]

IMO, business fluency from scratch in 1 year is not possible. You can get to a decent level in one year, but it won't make you be able to speak on meetings. I have been learning the language for five years, have absolutely no problem in my everyday life using Chinese, but I still not so confident when I have to attend meetings in Chinese or when I have to make a presentation in front of Chinese clients.

 

And to be honest, being able to speak Chinese doesn't really help you get a finance job in Shanghai as a foreigner. Good "guanxi", years of work experience, good English (together with US/UK/Canada/Australia passport, possibly) matter the most. Obviously, if you can speak some Chinese, that could help, but in terms of cost-benefit is not a good deal at all.

[rezaf]

What is business fluent? You will be fluent enough to find the address of your meeting and order lunch after that but you won't be able to speak about serious business and you won't be able to understand most of what people talk about in a serious meeting in Chinese. That's why they have translators and if you work in Shanghai many people in your field are able to speak English.

[uni419]

Not to sound pedantic, but I think a lot of this is going to hinge exactly on what your individual definition of fluency is, and the level of intensity and time you're willing to put towards you're goal. 

 

The courses offered by Chinese universities geared towards foreigners are, from my understanding, mostly concerned with preparing you for the HSK. That's great in some respects, because the HSK is a commonly accepted standard of language proficiency throughout the mainland and can be marginally helpful in finding employment, but also a major drawback in other respects, since the best a test can do is serve as a proxy of your overall language ability. 

 

A general suggestion I'd make before coming to the mainland is to defer communicative work in favor of developing a good structural base with tones and character components. Basically, eat your vegetables. If you can intrinsically differentiate tones, break up new characters by component to create pneumonics and have passable differentiation of initials and finals this will let you focus on learning the interesting "conceptual" parts of language (vocab, grammar, slang, differing cases of use, intrinsic meaning and implication of characters) instead of being perpetually hamstrung by "mechanical" stumbling blocks (why can't I hear differentiate tones when I hear them? Why can't I pronounce chu/qu differently? What the hell are all these meaningless squiggles in this character for ? Why do I have so much trouble writing these meaningless squiggles).  

 

Note, having this solid foundation also makes it a lot more easy/fun to get to the real meat of language learning, interacting with native speakers. If you're constantly ill-at ease because you're self-conscious about revealing sloppy-tones, poor grammar, bad hand writing, ect. then you're going to be less and less willing to interact with the language as you go on because of the negative feeling associated with using it communicatively.  

 

Emphasize communication with native speakers to develop a good base even when you're in school. Also, consider trying some mass sentence methods such as glossika if you've got the time or inclination after your first semester, or if you feel like you're hitting a stopping point. Most of all, make sure to integrate good passive input habits into your daily routine i.e. starting small and growing large. i.e. when you watch movies watch them with mandarin audio but english subs, once your comfortable switch your Ipod/MP3 to mandarin only, gradually transfer to reading the news in mandarin, ect.  

 

Circling back to your particular case. I'll defer to ZKR's expertise here and say that attaining full on "fluency" is going to be a hell of a difficult thing to do in one year, even in a limited field such as business, also simply speaking Chinese at a passable level and being foreign will probably not be enough to break into the financial sector assuming you don't have prior work experience in your country of origin. That being said, assuming that your native language is english getting a job in Shanghai or any other decently sized Chinese city working as an english language teacher should be no sweat. After that you can easily continue self-study with a tutor and try to branch out your connections to find contacts in the relevant fields. Obviously no guarantees of success, but the life of an english teacher isn't all that bad, and from what I understand from my friends who've done it, it is very easy to dedicate the vast majority of your time to studying Chinese if that is your true passion.

 

tldr - My $0.02 Eat your veggies first so you can do the fun stuff once you're in country, spend a good amount of time (1-2hrs a day) working on tone drills, memorising radicals, and reading some resources such as Hacking Chinese, and poking around here looking for learning methods you think will work for you. Spend the rest of your time getting hyped for the adventure to come. Try some light communicative stuff a week or two before heading out, and then remember to keep plugging along. 

 

edit: this is much more disorganised than i'd hoped, anyhow hope that there's some info of use in here and wish you the best on your language learning journey. 

 

edit2: for some much more actionable stuff search for tamu's thread from when he studied in taiwan for four months. Doing something along those lines during your winter break could do wonders (assuming you're interested that is, never push yourself too far, you've got your whole life to tackle mandarin and breakdown<vacation) 

[veejay]

Thanks for the reply everyone - some very helpful stuff there!

 

Just to be clear, I am not looking to learn chinese just to break into finance, but more so because I want to live in China in the medium to long term. I have a couple of years of banking experience, so I would rely more on that to land a finance job. I will be looking to work in a multinational (and not a local company). If not fluent, would a year give me enough time to be conversational with my colleagues and maybe handle some work over the phone even if I I'm not good enough to talk in meetings? I would want to continue studying the language even after I start working, but I thought studying for a year before i start working again would give me a good introduction to the language (as well as give me a break to to network and figure out what kind of a job I want to do within finance).

 

Thanks again!

[Shelley]

I would have thought "business fluent" would be more difficult than just "fluent" because of the high proportion of specialized vocabulary.

 

3 semesters IMHO will get you conversational, because unless you do a specific Chinese business language course, you won't be taught "business vocabulary".

 

Go do the course, see what happens, then choose your career.

[ZhangKaiRong]

"3 semesters IMHO will get you conversational, because unless you do a specific Chinese business language course, you won't be taught "business vocabulary"."

 

Even taking a business Chinese course would not be enough. Courses are taught by language teachers and not professionals, and above a very basic level it is a big problem in terms of vocabulary...

[Shelley]

Even taking a business Chinese course would not be enough.

 

I agree, that's why I said a specific Chinese business course ie one that is specifically tailored to your exact business vocabulary needs.

 

This is such a difficult subject, not only have we got to deal with the very subjective "what is fluent" but also the problem of specialized vocabulary.

 

If I wanted to go into finance, I would have to learn the vocab and I reckon there are 2 ways of doing it, one is on the job as it were, learn as you work and the other is to take a business course in the subject you want to learn about.

 

Doing it all in Chinese just adds one more layer to learn.

 

But this is no reason not to try, I hope the OP gives it a go and it has a happy outcome

 

 

[Flickserve]

Hi,

I am have just enrolled myself for a Chinese language program at Zhejiang University. I will be attending the Summer (about 4 weeks), Autumn (3-4 months) and Spring (3-4 months) semesters. I will have 20 hours of Mandarin classes per week. Just wanted to get an idea if this would be enough to get me business fluent by the end of the 3 semesters (by June next year). I would be looking to get a job in China after this (probably in finance in Shanghai).

I know this is sort of a vague question and learning the language depends on a lot of different factors, but I would like to get a general idea of whether it is possible to get business fluent in this time frame.

Any answers would be much appreciated - Thanks!

I think that would give you proficiency in General conversation if you were to practice using it outside of class.

You really need to be in the job to move to the next level. You wouldn't be able to follow much at the beginning but if you recorded the meeting, did a furious intense study of it and the vocabulary, I think it's possible to pick up quite a lot in a few months. This depends how good your foundations are from the first year of the course I.e. listening and reproducing tones and being able to differentiate sounds, grammar etc.

Now whether that is good enough so that you can fully function without an interpreter, I pretty much think not. That comes later. But it really depends how specialised the terminology is and how frequently it comes up in the non-meeting situations.

[kdavid]

Oral fluency is absolutely possible. 

 

I focused almost exclusively on speaking my first year and made tremendous progress.

 

If you bog your time down with reading and writing, it will take much longer. These are very time-intensive skills to master.

 

As for speaking, completely avoid hanging out with other English-speakers. Make Chinese friends right away. In fact, move in with Chinese people if you can.

 

Reality Check:

 

In the business world, most top-level Chinese firms will have employees with excellent English. Unless your Chinese is better than their English, they will always default to English, which can be very discouraging. I don't think you can get to this type of level in just one year.

 

Good luck!

[Lu]

No, you cannot get 'business fluent' in one year. You can get conversational, as others mentioned, provided you work hard and study in the right ways. Fortunately, you don't need to be any kind of fluent in Chinese to find a job in finance in Shanghai, you mainly need enough knowledge, experience and contacts in the relevant field(s). Once you've found a job in your field, it's possible to get to a level that you can conduct meetings and make presentations in Chinese, and my very rough estimation is that it would take you 1-2 years of hard work next to, and during, your job.

 

Good luck!

[ZhangKaiRong]

Another reality check: without a 1 to 2 years prior experience, there are basically no companies that is willing to employ you. Entry level jobs are filled by locals. And don't dream about an OK salary even with some years of experience. 30k+ RMB jobs are realistic after 5-6 years. And you need to earn a lot to make a good living in Shanghai.

"You wouldn't be able to follow much at the beginning but if you recorded the meeting, did a furious intense study of it and the vocabulary, I think it's possible to pick up quite a lot in a few months"

Yeah, if you have the energy/brain after a 12-14 hours workday. Working in finance is not a piece of cake in terms of working overtime, especially not in Shanghai, HK, Singapore.

[Bad Cao Cao]

It's not the amount of years or months you put in. It's the amount of hours you spend completely "awashed" in the language.

 

After 5,000 hours I was giving prepared talks in Beijing in mandarin. After 8,000 hours I was semi-comfortable in meetings. After about 10-12,000 hours I was comfortable in most business environments, but still looked like a dancing monkey when funky accents and dialects cropped up. 

 

Even if you spend 10-12 hours a day, after one year, you will only be a source of amusement to people that have never met foreigners with decent Chinese. You will spend the rest of your business time in English mode, or, living-through-interpreter mode.

 

If your motivation is to put "fluent in Mandarin" on your resume, then you could probably do that after 3 months/100 days. You wouldn't be the first person to try that lie on for size.

[Silent]

 

I agree, that's why I said a specific Chinese business course ie one that is specifically tailored to your exact business vocabulary needs.

I don't think the vocabulary is the big issue. Business specific vocabulary is not that big, my guess would be only a couple percent of the vocabulary. The issue in business is the exactness that is often needed, small details do matter. You can't negotiate a contract based on only a rough understanding while in day to day life a rough understanding is oftentimes good enough. In business even natives tend to hire specialists in order to get the details right, specially when it comes to legal contracts. But also on all kinds of technical specifications a lot of bickering over details can go on. In finance it's probably even worse as there are a lot of rules and regulations to consider. 

[Flickserve]

Another reality check: without a 1 to 2 years prior experience, there are basically no companies that is willing to employ you. Entry level jobs are filled by locals. And don't dream about an OK salary even with some years of experience. 30k+ RMB jobs are realistic after 5-6 years. And you need to earn a lot to make a good living in Shanghai.

"You wouldn't be able to follow much at the beginning but if you recorded the meeting, did a furious intense study of it and the vocabulary, I think it's possible to pick up quite a lot in a few months"

Yeah, if you have the energy/brain after a 12-14 hours workday. Working in finance is not a piece of cake in terms of working overtime, especially not in Shanghai, HK, Singapore.

we don't know the OP's capacity and motivation :-)

But yes, studying after a day's work can be done! I have had to do it on a regular basis. Not fun though. I wasn't doing it for Chinese - I am in another field.

[renzhe]

It's not the amount of years or months you put in. It's the amount of hours you spend completely "awashed" in the language.

In principle, that's right.

But the absolute time also plays a role, I think. Your brain takes time to fully internalise certain things, to develop automatic associations and long-term memory. You can accomplish a lot by studying intensely, but there are certain aspects which will benefit strongly simply by being engaged in an activity for a really long time, and which can't be rushed.

Obviously, the best thing is a really intense approach, over a long period of time

[Flickserve]

 

But the absolute time also plays a role, I think. Your brain takes time to fully internalise certain things, to develop automatic associations and long-term memory. You can accomplish a lot by studying intensely, but there are certain aspects which will benefit strongly simply by being engaged in an activity for a really long time, and which can't be rushed.

Absolutely agree. I am assuming as well as studying, the vocabulary comes up in daily work.

 

Just had drinks with a mandarin second language learner friend in finance industry. He would have the English and Chinese translations of financial legal documents on two computer screens and switch furiously between the two. When you have a few 10 or 100 of milliion dollar deals coming through, you learn pretty quick or lose the deal. Since the Chinese versions are written by lawyers, you can be pretty confident the exact terminology is used.

[JustinJJ]

I would just focus on trying to improve as much as you can and if you hit 'business fluency' at the end of a year that's great, if not, keep progressing and you'll get to your end-goal eventually. You will probably be able to understand more than you can speak.

I think your first goal should be conversational fluency. The reason for this, is that you'll need to have Chinese friends who want to talk to you in Chinese to build up your business fluency and they won't talk to you in Chinese until you can chat about simple topics first (or they will get frustrated). Make sure you get a tutor to train your accent to be 'Chinesy' or people will want to speak to you in English. As your level improves you can gradually talk about more complex topics such as finance. In other words, I think that initially you are better-off trying to become brilliant at the basics rather than knowing financial vocab but having painful conversations.

Also, there's a difference between 'business fluency' and 'finance fluency'. Business fluency might be more about talking about strategy, negotiating, etc, while finance is more about talking about investments, valuations, stocks etc - both require a different vocab set. I think the majority of native English speakers couldn't talk about complex finance in their native language e.g. CAPM, DCF, M&A etc.

To give you some context, my progression started with deliberately speaking to Chinese people with low education in China (i.e. zero knowledge of English), gradually progressing to conversations with more educated Chinese people. I had a dinner to discuss business last night in Chinese and will have one tonight and tomorrow - I go out of my way to socialise/network with young professional Chinese people a lot. I've been learning Chinese for three years - 1.5 in China studying 8-10 hours a day, 1.5 outside China where I only have time to study Chinese 3-5 hours a day while working full-time. I find normal conversations in Chinese quite easy, but business conversations are more difficult. I speak Chinese with my girlfriend every day as well, this is important for fluency. Most of my 'study' is reading and watching tv, rather than actually speaking, but this helps with becoming used to seeing vocab and internalising sentence structures.

[rezaf]

The most important thing is to try your best but not getting frustrated with difficult goals because with Chinese language things usually don't happen as fast as you expect them. Unless you are a genius language learner a realistic goal is to master basic conversational skills in the first year (add one more year if you also want some basic reading and writing skills) after that if you use these abilities in the right environment under some pressure like studying at a Chinese university or working in a Chinese company they will gradually improve. It takes 3~5 years to achieve relative fluency and about ten years to get close to native speakers (at least in one field).