Authors: Amna Khan; John Murphy; Judy Zolkiewski
Trust is often treated as a static phenomenon by academic researchers. This view of trust neglects the dynamic nature of trust, which suggests, that trust, can develop, stabilise, decrease, re-develop. Limitations of the static snapshot to trust can be overcome by attempting to understand trust as a process and seeing trust as having a past, present and future. This paper explores trust development in Chinese business-to-business relationships, at both an inter-organisational and an interpersonal level. The study was conducted using Chinese buyers and suppliers and indicates that trust develops at both these levels and is interactive. At an organisational level, adaptations contribute to trust development and an interpersonal level, guanxi and renqing, (reciprocity) affect trust development, both interorganizational and interpersonal trust impact upon the overall trust in the business relationship. These results suggest that guanxi is an essential aspect of Chinese business interactions and is intertwined with trust.
Journal: n.a. (n.a. – n.a.)
Web Address: n.a.
Publish Year: 2012
Conference: Rome, Italy (2012)