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I'm the owner and president
of 889 Global Solutions.
It's a company that started
in 2000 here in Columbus
that works with China
and other parts of Asia.
It's international trade,
and then we do a bit of exports,
but mostly on the import side.
We started
with consumer products
and promotional products.
Trendy fad products that go
into corporate giveaways.
Some local clients
are like Honda, AEP,
but we've worked a lot
in sports teams.
And within
the last eight years,
we've changed our product mix
to have more machine parts--
industrial,
fabricated machine parts
that are made
out of metal or plastic.
We have clients
in the healthcare sector,
in the commercial food sector,
and just general
industrial manufacturing.
My activity on a typical day
encompasses
lots of communication
with my colleagues,
both in the U.S. and in China,
and also our clients,
making sure that you understand
the customers' needs.
I make a trip to China
once to twice a year
for 30 days at a time.
It encompasses, really, visiting
various different cities,
factories, our offices,
and it's just to establish
other new relationships,
to understand our new vendors
and their qualifications
but also to see how
our existing partners are doing.
My major in college
is actually communications.
As an undergrad,
wanted to become Connie Chung.
She was a Chinese anchorlady.
One internship that I did was
at a TV station, and I realized
that wasn't a profession
I wanted to go into.
So, during my junior
and senior year,
I double-majored
into marketing.
And that's really one of my
strengths, sales and marketing.
So I am utilizing
what I learned in college.
What helped determine that this
is a career for me to choose
is I took a semester
to go overseas to Hong Kong.
I saw the opportunity
that was taking place
in Asia at the time,
and I saw my niche
of the language and the culture
and the bicultural abilities.
I am at an advantage because
I speak Cantonese and Mandarin.
But there's a lot
of unspoken languages,
you know, body language
or cultural understanding
or nuances that's happening
within the culture.
So it is important,
outside of Chinese,
to know the culture of
the country you're working with.
To go into import-export,
you do need a college degree.
I would suggest
also doing some internships
when you're in college.
I think financial literacy
is the basic minimum,
but then financial understanding
in that degree
will allow you to advance
beyond where you are
in terms of import-export career
or any other career.
I can utilize my strength
of the sales and marketing
with customers.
The fact that I'm able to speak
that language on a daily basis
and really get involved
with that culture
is something that I try to do.
Funding to purchase and make
this educational production
accessible was provided by the
U.S. Department of Education.
PH:1-800-USA-LEARN (V)
or WEB: www.ed.gov.
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