Che Wei has spent a lifetime building bridges between the West and China. Photo: Courtesy of Che Wei

As the vice president of Danfoss China, a Denmark-based industrial group and a world leader in climate and energy, the job of Che Wei is to promote environmental friendliness and to build a cross-cultural bridge between China and the West.

This is his fourth year in Danfoss, but his communication experience is much longer than that. For almost 20 years, Che, known as Alfred in the Western world, has been dedicated to building a bridge between China and the West with his broad professional communication skills.

Sitting in his office in Sanlitun, downtown Beijing, Che is kind enough to share with us his ideas and experiences in communications.

To be a good professional communicator, you need to embrace two elements, which are "ink" and "idea," Che said. Ink indicates that good persuasive writing skills are essential for public relations, and idea is about having a creative mind.

After graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University with a major in the Thai language in 1983, he worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as a diplomatic courier, during which he was able to travel around and to see the world as it opened to China.

Feeling the need to further his studies, he went to Yale to study political science and international relations, earning a Master's degree in the early 1990s.

During his studies, Che was impressed by the broad knowledge American scholars have of Chinese culture and history, but also perceived that there was something still missing in their understanding about China. "American's perceptions of China are mostly based on the books of China scholars like John Fairbank and Jonathan Spence, the reports of mainstream media, and even Hollywood films. They may find it quite different when they come and feel it here in China," Che said.

Perhaps with this recognition, Che's goal for his future career became clearer. He has dedicated himself to building channels of communication between China and the world through his profession.

In 2000, the Chinese government wanted to promote its domestic tourist industry overseas, and staged a cross-country campaign in North America. The administration adopted his advice and the publicity campaign turned out to be a great success. After all these years of devotion to building connections between China and the West, Che moved into the environmental protection field.

In 2010, Che joined Danfoss China as vice president responsible for all communication work of the company. His previous sophisticated knowledge enabled him to stand higher than many of his counterparts. He did not limit his duties to simply promoting his company's business, but expanded into spreading eco-friendly concepts to China.

Under his coordination, a book called Tales of Danish Zero Carbon Life by well-known Chinese writers Wang Fan and Liu Dongping was published in both Chinese and English. The stories told in the book, featuring best practices for the unique green development in the Nordic country that has successfully decoupled economic growth from energy consumption and emission, offers lessons to China and other countries on how to build a more sustainable world.

Che said that he discovered the very reason Nordic countries are doing well in energy and climate is because of their culture of "less is more," which coincides with the virtuous Chinese tradition of saving. "I found it makes so much sense to draw inspiration from best practices in these developed countries to improve the environment and energy situation in China," Che said. Through his life-long dedication, Che has expanded the possibilities of the communications field, bringing positive change to China.

Global Times