Matthew Warr, China

Matthew Warr: I went on exchange to Beijing Institute of Technology in Beijing. The reason why I chose China as my host country was because I have been travelling to China and back to Australia and back to China for the last five years, so my career is headed in that direction, in the direction of Australia/China relations.

I’ve always known that networking skills have been very, very important, but it wasn’t really until last year when I went on exchange that I discovered they are vital in China, even more so than Australia – much more so than Australia. So I went to all the networking events at the embassy, Australian Chamber of Commerce. Ministerial delegations came and I volunteered my time to help out at those events.

Another thing, I guess, living in the student district of Beijing, [inaudible], I got to meet people from all over the world, and meeting those types of people – the types of people that come to Beijing to study Chinese, they’re the people that are, you know, they’re open to new ideas, they’re generally very innovative, and they’re the people that can really influence your life or your future life direction.