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董事 (dǒng shì) — board member, director (of a board of directors)

Definition

A member of a company's board of directors. Unlike 经理 (day-to-day manager) or 主任 (head of an office/department), 董事 governs a company at the board level — collectively with other board members, not in daily operations.

noun
board memberdirector (of a board of directors)
Measure word · 位
Easily confused

Examples

  • 董事。
    Tā dāng xuǎn wèi gōng sī de dǒng shì.
    He was elected as a director of the company.
  • 董事。
    Gōng sī xū yào zēng jiā liǎng míng dú lì dǒng shì.
    The company needs to add two independent directors.
  • 董事。
    Suǒ yǒu dǒng shì dōu tóng yì zhè ge jì huà.
    All the directors agreed to this plan.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
动宾dòngbīnVerb + object

An action followed by what it acts on, fused into one word.

董dǒngsupervise
事shìaffairs

董 means supervise and 事 means affairs, together denoting one who supervises affairs.

Characters in this word

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
艸艸cǎograss
Sound part声符shēngfú
重
重zhòng董dǒng
Close in sound todayThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

董 is made of 艸 (grass) and 重, which is used for the sound.

Open 董 →

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

In 事, 又 is a hand and 中 is a flagpole with a drum; holding a flag in hand depicts performing a job.

Open 事 →
Appears in
HSK 3.0 Level 7-9ManagementProfessions & Jobs

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