However, it was not the case. All company requires you must have work experience. But I just left college. I came to Shenzhen with $150 cash, no credit card, and no friend. And I need to pay rent, food, traveling fee, and everything. I had to get a job as soon as possible. Strategy changed. Any foreign trade-related job was acceptable.

I went to interviews in the daytime and submitted my resume at night. Finally, on the afternoon of the third Friday, when I was dragging my tired body to return to my temporary residence, I received a call from an international logistics company. Yes, I got hired. Very happy! It was the brightest day of my life!

The company is an excellent international freight forwarder. They found out that most of its customers are trading companies. As their office is in the city, factories are in the suburbs, and the city and suburbs are very far away. It may take 2-3 hours to travel.

They wanted to cooperate with factories directly. So, the company thinks they can build a new department directly in the suburbs, which is convenient for visiting the factory and building business relations with them. I guess because I was motivated and not afraid of hard work, I was hired. After 2 weeks of training in the city, I was sent to the suburbs.

I started to work there; I visited 10 factories every day. I’m trying to understand their freight needs, the major export countries, the production cycle, etc. I learned like a sponge! However, the work was very hard; I had to walk to the factories in the sun's heat. I don't have a car, and the suburban bus is inconvenient. Fortunately, factories are generally very gathered. In an industrial area, there may be hundreds of factories.

I made many foreign trade salesman friends and found most of them their basic salary is $600. Still, my basic salary is only $300. After paying all the bills, I had nothing left. I didn't care about money. But I knew it was vital to work in the right industry.

I learned the trade at college and so many things about international logistics and factories these months. I believe I can do the same as them, even better. Maybe it's time to be an export salesman now. So, after working in the forwarder company for 2 months, I firmly handed in my resignation letter. The company paid me my salary after I left.

I quickly joined a solar charger factory to work as a foreign trade salesman. The boss is mainly responsible for manufacturing and does not know English. He used to work as a technician and is a typical manufacturing boss.

First, learn product knowledge at the workshop and business skills from the sales manager. After passing the test, the company assigned some old customers to me. I closed a few small orders very soon. I know quality is the key. So, I insist on testing the products personally to ensure their quality.

I found some issues during the first-time testing, and I helped the production department fix them, then shipped them to the clients. However, the customer complained the quality failed soon after the customer received the goods. I felt strange and promised to give the customer a solution.

I discussed with the production department about the quality solution and communicated with the boss if we could provide any guarantee to customers or a refund to the buyers. I thought the boss would agree because it is responsible for the customer and the company's long-term development of good advice.

As a result, the boss did not agree to a refund and could only offer a discount on the customer's next order. But the customer is unsatisfied with this order; how can they place a second order? It is very unfair to the customer.

To avoid failing more customers, I insisted on doing deeper tests and checking each product more carefully before delivery. Make sure everything is ok. Even so, the complaints continue.

So, I went to the boss again. The boss was unwilling to refund or give any compensation unless the clients sent the failed cargo back, but it was impossible to return. The customers are very disappointed. Of course, the most disappointed one is me.

I continued communicating with the production department and helped them strengthen quality control. As a salesman, my main job should be to deal with customers. But, working at the production line took up close to 80% of my time, and the problem is still there.

Worse, the more you sell, the more complaints you receive. I think it's time to leave, the boss wants to do things right, but he can't. In total, I have been working in the factory for 1.5 months. I resigned! The boss also paid my salary, and I was very grateful!

1) The manufacturing industry is challenging; the process, production, quality control, worker management, efficiency, etc., are not very complicated.

2) Both Willingness and ability are essential for success. None is dispensable. Willingness means whether they are willing to do it well, their character, and morality. Ability means whether they have the appropriate methods and experience. Looking for partners must be an in-depth examination of these two. An irresponsible and dishonest supplier is disastrous for buyers.

3) Inspection of goods is an afterthought control and is inefficient. What is effective should be, spending time on screening suppliers. Fire prevention is more important than firefighting is the same reason.

4) About 50% of Chinese factories' bosses are technicians, and the other 50% are salespeople. Most of them can’t speak English. If you want to have the best deal, you have to find a way to discuss with the boss directly.

I think it is better to go to a trading company, no headaches about quality.

A friend told me that Huaqiang North is China's biggest electronic products wholesale market.

There were more than 0.1 million trading companies located there. They were purchased from Huaqiang North and then resold to foreign customers. They can get about 50% profit even more. And they only need to speak English and focus on marketing. I thought it was an excellent opportunity to try.

I soon joined a trading company near Huaqiang North, mainly selling USB flash drives, Mp3, Mp4, and memory cards. All goods are sourced 100% from the Huaqiang North wholesale market. My base salary is $500, plus the commission of 1% of sales. It's good.

The boss was a middle-aged man who used to work as a domestic salesman. He heard that the foreign trade business was growing, so he hired English-spoken graduates to enter the foreign trade industry. He does not know English but likes to ask about the clients' situations and teach us how to respond. But not to teach us how to do business in good faith skills, to put it badly, how to cheat.

For example, if the customer tries to negotiate the best deal, he will tell us to agree with whatever the price. By upgrading the product, the company can still make a good profit.

What is the upgrade?

For example, a customer buys a 4GB flash drive, and the company's procurement cost may be $3. But the customer does not know how much should be reasonable. He can only compare the price between multiple suppliers.

Some suppliers would cheat as they want to beat their competitors with lower prices. They may sell for $3.00, even lower. Then no profit at all.

Do you believe that some people do business without making money? Then, how could they still make a profit? Very simple, cheating and upgrading. Give customers a 512MB or 256MB flash drive to replace 4GB. With the software rewriting, it shows 4GB. The clients won't find it out easily.

In this way, the company just paid 256MB or 512MB USB flash drives; the cost may be $2 or even lower. Even if you sell for $3, there is also a $1 profit.  Because the company is a complete trader and does not do any production, this is net profit.

I disagreed with what the boss taught me. I don't want to sell any upgraded products to my customers. So, I asked other colleagues if it was common to cheat customers like this or if it was occasionally.  The answer was often.

Like me, most of my colleagues were fresh graduates with little money or savings. Even if they knew cheating was wrong, they couldn't do anything about it. Not to mention their bonuses and commissions were probably being withheld by the boss.

I thought I couldn't do it by working in a dishonest company, making money by deception. So, I quit after working for one month. When I left, the boss promised me my salary would be paid on the 15th of the following month. Finally, I was cheated too. I tried to get my salary back, but he lied repeatedly.

1) The boss is the soul of the company! What kind of values and character the boss has is too important. The boss is the initiator of everything. A dishonest boss can ruin everything.

2) Sellers are always shrewder than buyers. They have too many ways to cheat customers if they want. Cutting corners and fudging are commonplace for dishonest suppliers.