联想员工的英文名

联想员工的英文名

 
 
英国《金融时报》刘励和(Justine Lau)香港报道
2006年11月15日 星期三
 
 
 
最近，一位驻香港分析师打电话给电脑制造商联想(Lenovo)北京办事处，按照一位员工名片上的英文名找人，对方的答复却把他弄糊涂了。接线员告诉他，没这个人。

困惑之中，他又打了一次电话，按中文名找同一个人。电话就接通了。

这位分析师遇到的是一个变化中的联想。联想去年收购了IBM的个人电脑部门，此后公司文化转型偶尔导致了一些困惑。甚至在公司内部也是如此。

现在，一些联想员工会收到来自“约翰”(John)或“玛丽”(Mary)的内部电子邮件。除非找出了这些人的中文名字，否则很难确定他们是谁。

一位联想员工表示：“过去，我们习惯彼此称呼中文名。现在由于我们的许多联系中，都有美国同事参与，一些人可能发现用一个英文名更方便。”

员工自发采用英文名字，可能在造成一些混淆，但这突显出联想文化更广泛的变化。分析人士将这视为成功管理IBM的个人电脑部门的关键。

做成此笔交易后不久，联想聘用了戴尔(Dell)前高管比尔•阿梅利奥(Bill Amelio)担任首席执行官。公司将总部从北京，移到美国的北卡罗来纳州，并将公司的工作语言从中文变成英文。还在公司内部建立直言文化。

中银国际(Bank of China International)分析师周诚(Randy Zhou)表示：“过去，联想的行事方式，和任何一家国有企业都一样。（但）它已发现，为了成为真正的全球企业，第一步就是放弃一些老习惯。”

译者/梁鸥

 

STRAIGHT-TALKING, ENGLISH-SPEAKING CULTURE BRINGS COMMUNICATION PROBLEMS
 
 
By Justine Lau in Hong Kong
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
 
 
When a Hong Kong-based analyst recently called computer-maker Lenovo's Beijing office and asked for an employee by the English first name on her business card, he got a puzzling response. The operator told him the person did not exist.

Baffled, he called back and asked for the same person in her Chinese name. He was put through to her office immediately.

What the analyst encountered was a Lenovo in flux where the transformation of a corporate culture has yielded occasional moments of confusion even within the company.

Some employees at Lenovo, which acquired IBM's PC unit last year, now receive internal e-mails from a “John” or “Mary” whom they struggle to identify until they find out their Chinese names.

“In the past, we used to call each other by Chinese names. But now since a lot of our communications involve our US colleagues, some people may find it easier to have an English name,” says one Lenovo employee.

The spontaneous move by staff to adopt English names may be causing slight confusion, but it underlines broader changes in the company's culture which analysts see as key to its success in managing the acquisition of the IBM unit.

Shortly after the deal, Lenovo hired Bill Amelio, a former Dell executive, to be its chief executive. It moved its headquarters from Beijing to North Carolina and changed the official company language from Chinese to English. It is also establishing a straight-talking culture inside the company.

“Lenovo used to behave like any state-owned enterprise. [But] it has realised that in order to become a true global company, the first step is to drop some of the old habits,” said Randy Zhou, analyst at Bank of China International