Global forums present special challenges for American writers. Translators take the edge off a speechwriter's subtlest presentation tools leaving only dull declarative sentences. 

The challenge is to study, and come to appreciate the historical, cultural and spiritual heritage of each country. Drawing parallels and metaphors from a country's rich and, often ancient, legacy, expresses respect for your hosts, and gives credence to your words. 

Example Overviews speech is one prepared for Vaughn Koshkarian, President of Ford of China, to deliver at a government-industry conference in Beijing. 

Tao of China's Family Car

We are honored to participate in discussions for development of a family car for China. 

We respect the wisdom expressed in much planning and thought before launching such an important project as the family car. 

As Confucius said, "People who do not think far enough ahead inevitably have worries near at hand." 

Last year, Ford explored the long-range view of how China's family car project can serve many of the grander goals of the People's Republic of China. 

This year we are here to explore how automotive parts and components contribute to the successful development of a family car market. 

Yet this is the same discussion. 

"Each leaf is the tree," Lao Tzu said 2,000 years ago. 

To understand the importance of one humble leaf and how it functions in balance with the tree is to perceive the entire tree and how it is a small, yet integral, part of the unity in a grander order. 

Western science is finally confirming this ancient Chinese wisdom. Scientists now say that each cell of a leaf contains the genetic pattern for the entire forest. 

Each part is a complete representation of the whole. 

At Ford, we have long believed that should also be true of the 10,000 parts of a great car. 

Each part must be constructed to precisely the same standards as every other, and function as one with the other 9,999 parts to produce not just a car, but a great car just as the Great Wall requires every stone to fit perfectly. 

Ford Motor Company is the second largest vehicle manufacturer in the world. We make more than 6 million cars and trucks worldwide each year. 

That adds up to 60 billion individual parts. 

Each part must express Ford's commitment to quality, long-life and affordable cost. To accomplish this, each parts supplier must have the same inner value system. 

Each part supplier must be as the branch of a tree, so that each leaf is representative, and in perfect harmony, with the whole. 

This holistic philosophy of car making has a long tradition at Ford. 

In China, where you measure your history in thousands of years, I am reluctant to speak of my company's long history of just 92 years. 

Yet by automotive standards, Ford is a long-established company. 

Ford grew, in fact, from a single family and a single great family car. 

The family was that of Henry Ford, his son, his grandsons, and now his great-grandsons. 

The Ford family car was the Model T. 

At one time more than half of the cars on this entire planet were identical Model T Fords. 

Most cars in the earliest days of the auto industry were what was called "assembled cars." 

That is, a car maker simply bought major parts from many independent suppliers and then pieced his car together. 

Mr. Ford felt that to achieve the Model T's unity of purpose, he would have to control the making of every single part. 

Mr. Ford carried his belief in unity to the extreme. 

At one time, he owned the iron ore mines, the ships that would carry ore, the mills to make the steel, and virtually all of the parts manufacturing operations. 

The Model T became the first car in which the vast majority of parts were built by either a single auto manufacturer, or by a supplier that was partially owned by our company. 

What we did was to build a corporate wall around our entire product, so that we could achieve uniformity and absolute consistency within. 

The wall served an important purpose. 

Yet over the years we have realized tremendous benefits by extending the wall to bring an entire world community of Ford suppliers into our family circle. 

The benefits have been many. 

For one, it shares the cost of development. 

Today, the development of a totally new, and technically sophisticated, car costs several billion dollars. 

No company, or even country, can afford to do this alone. 

Just as important are the many benefits of collaboration. 

For example, Ford now enjoys four joint ventures already established in China, with several others under discussion. 

There is great synergy in these collaborations, and we are interested in hearing ideas for other products which we could collaborate on together. 

Ford gains much by participating in China's culture, where people understand the value of mastering the most intricate art forms. 

And, I hope, each joint venture partner gains by being connected to a continuous flow of new technological ideas from throughout the Ford global community. 

This collaboration is important because it brings different perspectives. 

The more viewpoints we can concentrate on each question, the more complete and robust our answers can be. 

It is from our differences that we benefit. 

As Confucius said: "Cultivated people harmonize without imitating. Immature people imitate without harmonizing." 

The great benefits come from harmony, yet with mature respect of our differences. 

So over the years, Ford has extended the wall to include thousands of joint ventures and alliances with suppliers. 

Yet we have not forgotten the wisdom of Mr. Ford's insistence on unity of purpose in every single part. 

At Ford, we strive to incorporate our joint-venture partners into everything we do, so that, for all practical purposes, they are one with our product vision. 

Suppliers and company engineers come together, and stay together, throughout entire car development programs. 

At Ford, we feel strongly that our suppliers are like the streams that feed into a great river. If each stream is not free of obstructions, then the river can not rise. 

So we assist suppliers in establishing financial and business systems that assure a significant level of economic efficiency. 

If a supplier has a problem, we send full teams of experts to assist for as long as it takes to regain health. 

In all things at Ford, we place the highest value on loyalty and truthfulness. We establish a trust that can endure. That is why Ford is a family. 

Yet to experience the good of being part of a greater whole carries with it responsibility to live by the patriarch's values. 

All must live by the philosophy of total quality assurance and service to customers in all things. 

This is a very high standard. 

It has many aspects. At our Ford presentation this week I hope you can all attend to hear more specifics on how this global community works... and what we have learned from our experience over many years. 

But for now, I would say only that this is a very high standard to live up to , but it is the only way to assure that there is one vision everyone in the family of Ford shares. 

One vision even though our supplier partners may go by many different names, and may live in many different countries, and speak many different languages. 

In this way, from hundreds of thousands of individuals, we form one family... From 10,000 parts, the unity of a family car can be achieved... From 10,000 stones of different shapes and sizes, we can built a wall of great strength -- a great wall with a road on top that can carry the people of China to a better future. 

A great wall is not built in a hurry. 

It is in constant nurturing of relationships, trust and commitment, that the parts become one in purpose, and the family car is in harmony within itself--and becomes a truly great car. 

A great wall does not just happen because many committed people drop stones into piles. It requires a master architect, and a unity of purpose. 

At Ford, we believe that the PRC's vision of the family car provides that unity. 

The idea of a car for the Chinese people, for jobs, for technological growth, for environmental harmony, and for global expansion, is a clear and noble vision. 

It is Ford's humble suggestion that as we gather at this conference to discuss individual parts, that we keep the unity of the PRC's grander purpose before us. 

Ford is not here to sell parts. Ford is not here to help piece together an "assembled" car. 

We are here to contribute in any way we can to something much greater. 

The famous Chinese architect, Ji Wufou, once said: 

"The things which people make together can last a thousand years." 

The PRC's family car can be the foundation stone of a Chinese automotive industry that can last, and serve, for many, many generations yet unborn. 

Xie xie ni (Good day).