In the Year of the Dog I am going to learn Chinese (and you should too)
A little too late for New Year’s Resolution, huh?
Recently I stumbled upon an article stating that the author suggested to learn Chinese in order to stay up-to-date with the advancements on AI. It is no secret the Chinese Government is investing heavily on AI, while other western countries struggle to even give some sort of strategy to counteract this initiative. However, I don’t think this is the solely reason why someone actively working in tech should consider the idea to learn Chinese.
Consider my example: as a product manager for Glassup I am constantly researching suppliers or technology solutions and, because of the importance that China has in the global market, I usually find myself communicating with Chinese companies, especially in the Shenzen area. Of course nowadays Chinese sales people speaks English fairly well, so there is no real need to learn their language to establish business relationships: English is enough for what I do now.
But I am more than sure than in the next years the importance of China as a global economic and technological power will increase and, whether we like it or not, Western countries will have to deal with it.
More than 2000 years ago, Greek was the lingua franca, then came Latin (that lasted for a very long time), and more recently English became the dominant language thanks to the rise of the United Kingdom empire and of United States of America, afterwards. All odds are toward China to be the next principal actor in the global scene.
If you are a techie and you are not tied to some chauvinistic ideology, you definitely should consider learning Chinese: maybe you will never be able to learn a scientific paper, but at least you learn the basics to communicate and this could lead to more job or business opportunities.
You don’t have to wait for 2019 for a New Year’s Resolution. Learn a new language or -like me- start a newsletter! I am building a weekly newsletter about everything related to Product Management, if you think it could resonate with you feel free to subscribe
