professor Zhang Jun

A soft launch of our speakers' bureau

Today is at the offices of Chinabiz the quiet beginning of the speakers' bureau I'm helping to emerge as the famous economist Zhang Jun of the Fudan University and writing for Chinabiz is speaking at a private event (so, I cannot tell too much about that.)
When Maria Trombly told me last year I would be the best person in China to start such a service, I had to look up first myself what a speakers' bureau actually is. They organize speakers for events, not the events themselves, so stay mostly out of the limelight as they work for professional speakers and event organizers. It is the kind of high-end service where China is now ready for, I think.
In the past month already half a dozen possible event organizers approached me as they heard about the upcoming service, so there might well be a market. Today it is a soft launch, since we are still in the process of signing up with a famous US-based partner, setting up a company, website and hiring people to do the job. Formally, we not even exist so keep even for a speakers' bureau a low profile.
Possible speakers I have to discourage at this stage: we are still setting up our systems and for the time being will search for people as soon as we get an assignment in. Not the other way around. On the other hand: event organizers or others who need a professional speaker are already more than welcome. The contacts we are having now are very helpful in also defining the market more exactly.
Through our international network we will be able to get celebrities to China, but are also very eager to get Chinese speakers out to the rest of the world.
What kind of events should you think off? The sky is the limit of course, but up to now we got requests from a business school whose EMBA'ers are visiting China, a few international conferences, an international company whose board is meeting in Shanghai. Very soon you will hear more.