5/30/12 Management philosophy and Tai Chi

Today was not the best day that I have had here in China. It started off well with an interesting lecture from Professor Qi Anbang about Chinese management philosophy. This was a rather confusing subject but I feel like Professor Qi did a very good job of explaining it.There are three main philosophies that are called the books of change. The first book is the Art of War which is 5000 years old. This book touches on the importance of war and the five things that must be known for a war, such as law, macro/micro environments, managers, and methods. The other two books are a little more prevalent in the Chinese culture. First, there is the book of Confucius or Confusiunism, which is the most popular philosophy in China, deals with knowing the law and using it for the people as well as taking things one step at a time. I found it interesting How Confusiunism tends to be more toward the democratic side of politics. Second, there is the book of Taoism which deals with knowing the law of nature and though you may be uncertain about something, do it anyway because it will bring no harm to you. Taoism tends to be more on the republican side of politics. Even though this lecture was confusing I found it to be very interesting. Later in the day everyone to take a Tai chi chuan class which was fun for a little while until I hurt my knee doing one of the exercises, which I have dislocated before, so that wasn't very fun even though I enjoyed the little bit of Tai Chi that I was able to do. Overall, today was a very interesting day and it was going well until I hurt my knee, but I can still walk and that's enough for me.