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In a small business context, the importance of relationship marketing has not attracted much academic attention. This study explores the discursive resources on which small business owner-managers draw, when making sense of business to business (B2B) relationships and networks and constructing identities in various socio-cultural contexts. Through unstructured interviews with 21 British and 22 Chinese owner-managers, we find that both British and Chinese respondents show a noticeable preference for long-term interactive relationships and portray themselves as being interpersonal skillful. Yet British owner-managers describe themselves as being relational, trustworthy, and committed mostly at interorganizational level. According to them, interpersonal relationships are merely employed as a marketing technique supporting organizational goals. In contrast, Chinese owner-managers make sense of their identity merely at interpersonal level. They shape their self-images as trustworthy "friends" on both cognitive and affective dimensions. Chinese owner-managers present themselves as being personally committed to their relationship partners and highlight the importance of being reciprocal, cooperative, flexible, empathetic, respectful of "face", and willing to compromise. Chinese owner-managers verbally attach interorganizational relationship to interpersonal relationship and thus present a more complicated image of self. Some discourses of Chinese owner-managers show similar pattern of sensemaking with British owner-managers. This echoes structural changes of economic ideology as well as legal and contractual infrastructure. The concrete findings support the utility of sensemaking and identity construction as a framework for studying relationship marketing and business networking.

This case presents a scenario that pertains to the effective management of human resources in a Chinese cultural context where guanxi and face are of considerable importance. It depicts actual situations in detail, but the names of the organization and participants have been disguised at the request of the interviewees. The scenarios deal with issues of managerial appointments, promotion, husband-wife team in an organization, threat of resignation, effective leadership and achievement of subordinate respect and performance. Human resource management in China often requires a different approach from that espoused in the Western literature that currently dominates orthodox management theory. With China's growing economic power and the numerous foreign joint ventures in China, examining the cultural differences provides important insights for understanding the ways in which the norms and informal rules in general, and face and harmony in particular, function in Chinese organizations.

Previous research suggests that guanxi "costs" are significantly higher for private Chinese enterprises versus all other enterprise types, i.e., state, township and village (TVE), domestic and foreign enterprises. Also, consistent with its cultural context, guanxi is considered to be equally important in business as it is in life for all types of Chinese enterprises. Herein, the discussion is extended to describe the concept of guanxi as a means of garnering social capital in order to maintain legitimacy. Furthermore, some practical means are suggested for entrepreneurs and small business owners to build a necessary foundation for survival.

In 2017, Luo Mingxiong, CEO of Jingbei Investment and one of the most popular angel investors in China stated publicly that his company is not investing in companies or start-ups that have a female CEO. Luo’s comment provoked outrage from women, human rights groups, and especially female entrepreneurs. This case discusses gender equality, female entrepreneurship, and venture capital investments in China.

In November, 2016, JPMorgan Chase was found to have an internal program called “Sons and Daughters.” It prioritized hiring the children of high-ranking political officials and business executives in China and Hong Kong SAR as a means of doing business. They were fined for bribery by the Securities and Exchange Commission for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. This case discusses what is and is not proper hiring protocol, the Confucian notion of guanxi, and provides an imagined scenario for discussion and debate.