South China Morning Post, Hong Kong's leading English-language daily newspaper, warned Hong Kong people against falling behind "in quest for putonghua" in a recent editorial. That's easy to understand. Our political leaders have repeatedly reminded us that the future of Hong Kong is inextricably linked to that of the mainland.

Even if our livelihood were not dependent on it, we would still need to improve our putonghua. Falling behind the Americans and Britons in our national language is embarrassing, to say the least.

In fact, our livelihood does depend on our knowledge of not only the language, but also the Chinese culture and philosophy that apparently affect the way people on the mainland think and do business.

To be sure, after 25 years of economic integration with the mainland in general, and Guangdong in particular, Hong Kong business people have fully accepted and skilfully adapted to the way business is done there. But still, they are frequently baffled by the logic behind the thinking of their mainland business associates.

At the factory level where cost, as expressed in dollars and cents, is king, the lack of insight into each other's culture matters little in the fostering of a close and profitable business partnership. But as this relationship evolves in complexity that requires a higher level of value-added input, a greater understanding of each other's frame of mind is essential to smoothing out the inevitable differences in business strategy and philosophy. Hong Kong business people have been saying that cultural clashes occurred most frequently in discussions involving relatively more abstract ideas such as design, branding and marketing.

Learning to speak the language helps. But that's the easy part. For a Cantonese speaker, picking up Mandarin is less daunting than learning to drive. It should come naturally after spending a few months in a Mandarin-speaking environment. Watching a lot of Mandarin television programmes can be a big help.

To be sure, you are never going to speak perfect Mandarin without formal training. But that should not be a problem as long as people can understand most of what you say. Some friends complimented me on my heavily accented Mandarin. They thought it was quite charming, although they could catch, at most, about 70 per cent of what I said.

The hard part is to learn the culture so that you can understand and appreciate the way your mainland business partners behave although you may not necessarily agree with them. What Hong Kong people should worry about is not so much falling behind in language skill but rather in cultural understanding.

Like most Hong Kong people, I was educated in a school where the medium of instruction was all English. I learned more about the history and customs of England than those of China. At junior high school, I was thrilled by the daring adventure of Captain James Cook, while knowing hardly anything about Admiral Zheng He, who, I later learned, sailed the great oceans in much grander style almost three centuries before the English explorer.

In many of the most prestigious schools in Hong Kong, then and now, Chinese is taught as a foreign language. Quite a few of my schoolmates elected to study French instead.

The Hong Kong government has been pushing hard for schools to use Cantonese as the medium of instruction. The aim is to make it easier for students to understand their teachers and to encourage greater interaction between students and teachers in the classroom.

But the curriculum has remained largely unchanged. Only token emphasis has been put on teaching Chinese history, literature and philosophy in high schools.

Singapore made the switch to teaching in Chinese (Mandarin) from English years ago when its leaders realized that the island state's future lies in its ability in servicing the rapidly expanding economy of China. I don't know enough about the Singapore education policy to comment. But its government has a track record of going all the way in everything it does. You can bet that they are not going to be happy just sharpening the language skills of their future business leaders.

At this point in time, Hong Kong still enjoys a distinct advantage over its many competitors, owed largely to the experience built up over many years of investing on the mainland. But that gap is fast closing, especially when the mainland has shifted its emphasis on attracting foreign direct investments to the higher value-added services sector from the manufacturing sector.

It's time for Hong Kong to seriously look beyond mere language skills to compete for a piece of the action.

Email: jamesleung@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 01/24/2006 page4)