The "Three Views" of First-class Entrepreneurs

"Have you ever seen someone with a cocoon on their hands who is dishonest?" seldom. ”

Source | Masawa Island

Author | Chen Wei (Vice President and Editor-in-Chief of Zhenghe Island)

(This article is the preface by Mr. Chen Wei for the book "The Seven Business Giants That Influenced American History".

Because of Ford, the car was able to change from a toy for a few rich people to a means of transportation that ordinary families could afford;

Because of Eastman, photography has changed from a professional activity in a laboratory that requires huge equipment and complex processes to a daily entertainment that everyone can enjoy;

Because of Carnegie, steel bridges replaced timber bridges, large-scale railways were built, and cities were connected;

Because of Neuss, we have integrated circuits, and then we have today's highly developed intelligent era.

Entrepreneurs in every era are promoting industrial progress and human society with perseverance and innovation, natural wisdom and love of technology.

The Renmin University Publishing House sent a manuscript of "The Seven Giants of Commerce That Influenced American History" and was able to get a sneak peek.

It's a good book. Liang Qichao advocated "translating a strong country" in that year, proposing that "the country wants to strengthen itself, based on more translations of Western books, students want to strengthen themselves, and take reading more Western books as a merit", believing that translating Western books and introducing Western studies is "the first important meaning of a strong country".

A hundred years have declined, and people have more channels to obtain various ideas, information and knowledge from abroad, but the effect of translating more Western books and reading more Western books cannot be underestimated.

As far as this book is concerned, after reading it, combined with reality, I have a little impression to share with my friends.

In the book, the author Richard Tedro recounts the 7 living business giants of the Golden Age of the United States, Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, Sam Walton... Almost everyone in the Chinese business community has a wide range of recognition.

After reading their business life, you will sincerely sigh: If the American dream has color, it must be the color of gold. The American Dream is underpinned by entrepreneurs, and without the achievements of entrepreneurs, there is no creativity and impetus for capitalism.

Through their own struggles and extraordinary talents, these entrepreneurs have created a better world for the public while achieving their own achievements, and they have painted the basic color of the American dream together with many outstanding entrepreneurs in the United States.

The "Big Seven" have different styles and different industries, but in them and some outstanding entrepreneurs throughout the ages, you can still see a few rare but common traits.

1

Cosmology: Anchoring one's own coordinates in space-time

Mu Xin said that the really big people have a cosmology. "No matter what character, there must be a basic philosophical attitude, a basis for thinking about the universe. In this way, all the great figures of the past and the present can be regarded as incomparable. I have not yet met a great man who did not begin with the cosmology and ended with the cosmology. Otherwise, they are all small people. ”

The pre-Qin miscellaneous family said, "The four directions up and down are known as the universe, and the ancient and modern are known as the universe." Universe is space, and Zeus is time.

To have a cosmology is to have a temporal view. With a thorough view of time and space, we will follow the principle of "first nature" and will approach the origin of things and reason, time and voidness. There are words in "University", things have the end, things have an end, and if you know the order, you are close to the road.

Space is established, it gives people a sense of protection and security, but also brings a sense of limitation and constraint. Family, hometown, homeland, homeland, are the origin of the sense of space, they make people attached, but they also limit freedom and breed resistance.

Entrepreneurs are inherently restless people, so they have to break free, break through the snare, destroy, run, wander, and leap. Among entrepreneurs, there are few people like the philosopher Kant who have lived in their hometown all their lives, and they want to go to the sea to surf, feel the pain and excitement in the wind and waves, and make a contribution.

Shen Congwen said that a soldier either died on the battlefield or returned to his hometown. The entrepreneur's choice is to run away from his spiritual homeland and go to the battlefield.

In this sense, the revolt of free will against established space has led to what Schumpeter called "destructive innovation," a sense of spatial consciousness that allows entrepreneurs to create a new physical world and spiritual home through their self-built business empires.

The sense of time brings people a sense of life, and the abundant sense of life will stimulate a lofty sense of mission. Time is always passing, and the dead are like this, not giving up day and night. How to leave a shadow mark in the long river of time instead of silently sinking to the bottom of the water? This is the torture of the self by every aspirant. At some stage of life, once the mission awakens, like the possession of the gods, they begin a new life that is turbulent and uncontrollable.

Tedro uses many words in the book to describe the sense of mission of these self-cherished and ambitious protagonists.

Ford's mission is to build an ordinary car, and Eastman's natural mission for Kodak is to "become the world's largest manufacturer of photographic equipment, or it will go out of business." Watson's mission is to "build International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) into a giant in the information processing industry."

The most typical is the steel king Carnegie, whose sense of mission is like a worm's heart, making him sit still. For whatever reason, Carnegie was experiencing some kind of fluctuation inside. Like many successful businessmen, he was both deeply insightful and always self-deceptive. He believes that whatever he does will 'greatly push' some change to happen.

To satisfy this psychological need, he demands that he not pursue more than six different business interests at the same time, no matter how successful they may be. No one ever told Andrew Carnegie to be ambitious, but that had gone deep into his marrow.

Carnegie understood that to become the king of the coming era ——— the Age of Steel, he would have to mobilize all his resources—that is, all his wisdom, financial resources, and business relations must be focused on one goal. No matter how big the steel industry is, he has to be stronger, and this is his way to accomplish his mission, and it is his way to calm his inner troubles."

Churchill said: "We are all insects, but my confirmation is that I am a firefly." "Under the vast night sky, everything grows on its own. It was the desire to shine and fly that made those creators stand out.

2

Belief: Using faith to cross desires

Big entrepreneurs are people who use good products to popularize all sentient beings.

Military leaders who have expanded their territory on the battlefield are the stage protagonists of the old era, entering a modern and secularized society, entrepreneurs have become heroes of the era of peace, and some of them have become popular idols and become "god-like forces" in the eyes of the world.

Ford used the Model T to create the United States on wheels, and when he died, he was called the greatest president of the United States, Lincoln; Jobs used the iPhone to connect peoples, and after his death, he received a rare global mourning and commemoration.

These phenomena have surprised the author of this book, Tedro, in fact, it can be predicted that the good drama is still to come - if Musk really realizes the fantasy of leading human colonization to Mars, he will undoubtedly be regarded as a contemporary savior.

Why can these entrepreneurs gain the high prestige and admiration of secular society? I am afraid that they can awaken and stimulate the unimaginable potential of employees, use products to convey love and respect to consumers, and greatly expand the boundaries of freedom and imagination of the world.

Business is a confluence of reason and sensibility. Entrepreneurs take it as their duty to make good products, and first-class entrepreneurs dig into the gold mine of human nature, resonating with the concept of truth, goodness and beauty and physical objects, and soothing people's hearts. In the context of Western society, where modern science and technology are not strong, the light of faith is needed to bring warmth and guidance.

As the historical philosopher Toynbee put it, "If science and religion seize the opportunity to draw near to God and work together to understand the fickle human psyche created by God, not only to understand the deep subconscious, but also to grasp the superficial consciousness, what kind of reward can be expected once this concerted effort has finally achieved its goal?" The rewards are very lucrative, because the source of human spiritual life is the subconscious, not the intellect."

Seven or eight years ago, I went to Tibet with a group of entrepreneurs. On the way, there was an exclamation: religion is the best business. After all, mortals need God, build an idol, monopolize the right to explain, and form a complete industrial chain, and money will continue to gush like an irrepressible source of living water.

And the best business, in fact, has a certain religious nature. The best entrepreneurs, consciously or unconsciously, are building a temple on earth with products and ideas. The person who built this temple may not be worshipped by the public, but he used his magical hand to draw out what people wanted in their hearts and tell them: This is the "paradise on earth" in your minds.

The movie "Big Entrepreneur" tells the legendary journey of Ray Bullock to build the McDonald's empire, and it is worth watching. Ray Bullock is not the founder of the business, but the loser who has previously run into a wall in his life was surprised to find the "Gate of Heaven" after seeing the golden arch designed by the McDonald's brothers.

He told the McDonald's brothers that in America, every town has two things: churches and courts. The church is topped with a cross, the court is atop the flag, and McDonald's is the third thing, which represents the American way of life, which not only provides food, but also holds people's spiritual ideals. Above McDonald's isn't just a golden arch, it's a totem that declares that you're walking into a new-style American church.

In short, many excellent companies in the United States shine on "cultural marketing", they inject emotions and ideas into their own companies and products, and even make it a kind of faith, which is worthy of our local enterprise research and learning. And the real learning, not to imitate the method, but to go deep into the underlying logic and cognitive core of the business, to find their own cultural soul.

From the perspective of entrepreneurs, in addition to business performance, it is especially necessary to find the meaning of business, so as to cross the other side of life, get away from bitterness and happiness, and obtain liberation. Li Shanyou said that we thought that when the living conditions became better, we would be happy when we had a career, a family, and various convenient high-tech. But suddenly the whole world discovered almost at the same time that when we attain the riches of life, we must survive through something illusory, something called "meaning."

The philosopher Schopenhauer said: Life is a lump of desire, if it cannot be satisfied, it is painful, and if it is satisfied, it is boring, and life oscillates between pain and boredom.

If entrepreneurs want to cross the swings and pains of life, they must find the real heart, overcome fear with love, and cross desire with faith.

3

Labor Concept:

A man with a cocoon on his hand has honesty in his body

One flaw of Confucian culture is the contempt for manual labor.

There is a story in the Analects of Fan Chi asking Jia. Fan Chi asked Confucius for advice on how to grow crops and vegetables, but Confucius did not know. Turning his head, he also said to people, Fan Chi is really a villain. If you know how to be faithful and faithful, the people will be attached, and they will still need to grow crops and vegetables by themselves?

This kind of inaction is undoubtedly undesirable for people who want to do things, especially entrepreneurs. Although the technology is advancing day by day and the times are changing, the real entrepreneur needs to be like the old farmer, without leaving the hoe and the foot from the ground, and has been cultivating in the fields of business and life.

The entrepreneurial spirit of the United States is actually the puritanical spirit. Driven by faith, entrepreneurs desperately make money, desperately save money, and work endlessly as a means of soul redemption and glorification of God. If labor is regarded as a virtue and a need, it will naturally bring about a sense of presence and personalness.

Entrepreneurs have faith in their hearts, and they have strength under their feet. Entrepreneurs who have achieved a certain degree of success will be constantly pasted with gold, if entrepreneurs cannot take the initiative to break the self-superstition, go deep into the front line of labor, maintain diligence and self-examination, it is inevitable to go to conceit, rigidity and failure.

Many excellent entrepreneurs have maintained a personality characteristic that makes people feel kind and admired throughout their lives. Kazuo Inamori, Japan's "Saint of Management", believes that there are gods on the spot. He has been in the product scene for a long time, in order to do a good job of Kyocera products, and even sleep with the products; he often stays in the work and life of employees, participates in the company's "empty bus" cocktail party, talks freely with employees, and cohesively; he declares that he is willing to be a "servant of customers" and do his best for customers.

Wang Yongqing, the "god of management" in Taiwan, emphasizes the "sense of being personal." This businessman who started selling rice, others sell rice are customers come to buy, and the rice bought is often mixed with impurities. He carefully picked rice, delivered it to his door, and helped customers clean the rice tank for free. He quickly won the victory and maintained his industrious and simple nature throughout his life. In his lifetime, he ran non-stop every day, maintaining a keen sense of body in "working hard and struggling his mind".

The same is true of Ren Zhengfei, the mainland's "entrepreneur of entrepreneurs." His language is simple, but full of grand patterns and profound thoughts. He is famous and old, and he often travels alone, pulling a suitcase to and fro. Ren Zhengfei never read the works of those management masters, in his view, the so-called modern commerce is actually no different from farmers planting crops, "management is to enhance the fertility of the land, more grain."

In The Big Seven in Business that Influenced American History, entrepreneurs like Ford have similar traits. Ford "frankly and proudly positioned himself as a farmer hero." He wants to be seen as a hero of the general public who makes money through hard work, not an elite from Wall Street who makes money from capital operations.

He once asked, "Have you ever seen someone with a cocoon on their hands dishonest?" seldom. When men have cocoons on their hands and women's hands become rough, you should be sure that honesty is in them. You're more certain of this than those soft white hands. ”

Of course, in order to achieve career and realize self, the factors of the times cannot be ignored. The reason why the entrepreneurs in this book can accomplish their mission is not only their personal talent and hard work, but also importantly, they are sailing in a river that is moving forward.

The twentieth century is undoubtedly the century of the United States, and according to relevant records, by the 1960s, 70% of the sales of the world's top 200 companies came from American companies, and about 40% of the world's economic activity was initiated by American entrepreneurs.

In this context, the Big Seven bravely stood at the head of the tide, chopped the waves, and wrote a legend about the fate of individuals and businesses, they are the representatives and epitome of the American Dream.

Today, on the stage of the 21st century, the story of China is playing out.

The waters of China's economy are not calm, but there is no shortage of adventurers in the wind and waves.

In the vicissitudes of the sea, in the rushing waves, in the hundreds of boats, how many stories will be born that hang directly on the clouds and sails to the sea, and how many proud sons of heaven that also "affect business history" will be achieved? What wonderful "Chinese Dream" will be written?

We look forward to it, and bless it.

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