"Sketch" three generations of Chinese entrepreneurs, look at the nature of leadership and leadership.
The text is 5300 words| about 14 minutes to read
- Author | Sun Jianmin is a professor and doctoral supervisor of Chinese University, and a leading expert of Huaxia Cornerstone Group
- Source | Huaxia Cornerstone Management Review Selected Collection "How Executives Create High Performance for the Company"
To discuss leaders and leadership in the context of 40 years of reform and opening up, let's first scan what leadership and leadership are "like" in China. However, in China, there are great differences between state-owned enterprises and private enterprises; there are great differences between regions; and there are many gaps between industries. I often say that China has always been a corporate museum, and various types of enterprises can be found in China, so it is difficult to summarize the situation of Chinese enterprises and entrepreneurs as a whole, and we have the right to take the entrepreneurs of private enterprises as a sample to solve the proposition of "leadership and leadership".
Three generations of entrepreneurs "sketch"
I remember that more than a decade ago, "Chinese Entrepreneurs" published a special issue of "Portraits of Chinese Entrepreneurs", mainly the first generation of private entrepreneurs, among them were farmers, there were demobilized soldiers, and people who had squatted in prison, represented by Mou Zhong, in the 80s of the last century, the salient characteristics of these people were "barefoot and not afraid to wear shoes" and "how bold people are and how productive the land is." From the perspective of time, Liu Chuanzhi, Zhang Ruimin, and Ren Zhengfei should be regarded as the first generation of entrepreneurs, but their common characteristics determine that they should be classified as the second generation, that is, they have received some systematic education, relatively higher cultural literacy, and some professional background. Entrepreneurs represented by Ma Yun, Ma Huateng, Lei Jun, etc. are the third generation, they are from the class, really systematically trained, directly or indirectly related to the profession they are engaged in, and some people are even experts in this field.
If this division is established, from the perspective of the choice of commercial operation field, the first generation is an entrepreneur from a peasant background, simply put, a million yuan household; the second generation is more entrepreneurs who come out of the system, relatively professional, not completely punching and kicking, rubbing the edge ball, or, relatively speaking, "side door left" operation; the third generation is completely in accordance with the model of modern enterprises. And really from a leadership perspective, these three generations of entrepreneurs are not very different in nature.
The essence of leadership and leadership
It should be viewed from two aspects: leadership itself is a phenomenon, and the phenomenon of leadership exists everywhere. But a leader is a person, a position, and wherever there is a crowd – a group of more than two people needs to have a leader. As a leader, the problems to be solved are to inspire confidence, to give incentives, to lead change, and more importantly, role behavior. From this perspective, everyone can be a leader in different situations. But when people are in a particular situation, no idea, no idea, do not know what to do, someone says we can do this, everyone agrees, he has leadership.
Our Party has always emphasized public servants. In the 1990s, the concept of public servant leadership also appeared in the West, and I like this concept very much, and its most basic definition is that if a person wants to become a leader, he must first provide services to others. You can provide services to others, and others depend on you, not because of your position, but because he needs you and can't do without you.
I once read a story about a group of high-ranking officials and nobles in the West who traveled to the East and hired a servant to make a trip, and this servant was very thoughtful, and took care of this group of high-ranking officials and nobles very happily, and did not have to worry about anything themselves. As a result, one day, the servant was lost, and the high-ranking officials and nobles were lost and overwhelmed. It suddenly became clear that the servant was actually a leader. This story tells us that "leadership" on the one hand is to lead, on the other hand, to solve the problem of direction, which is the essence of leadership. This essence is that no matter what position a person is in, he can lead and guide, and give everyone a direction.
From this point of view, in an organization, the leader is indeed defined by subordinates, and subordinates agree with you, you are the leader; if they do not agree with you, you are not. Whether you recognize or disagree is whether your heart is convinced or not. But this perspective cannot be taken to extremes, a person is not a leader everywhere, and there is no leader recognized by mankind on a global scale.
In China's traditional social culture, pay attention to the difference between dignity and inferiority, the order of the elderly and the young, even if people who are not in a certain position can put forward a good idea, they are also small-minded, do not attract attention, and finally mix leadership and leaders together. It's okay to mix together, but it takes leaders to inspire confidence, give incentives, lead change, and influence others. The essence of leadership is to influence others, to let others follow you or to follow the direction you set.
What a leader does to influence others
So, what influences? The most common is administrative means to control the behavior of others, just like the teacher often says to the students: "Sit well, listen well, who does not listen well to the punishment station". It is also possible to make others willing, most typically religion. In traditional Chinese culture, there are also lawyers who rely on systems and norms; Confucians who rely on self-cultivation and self-cultivation, and so on.
What does this influence rely on? The Fa says that the Fa, the Technique, and the Potential are indispensable. Law is the rule of the system, no matter who it is, everyone is equal in front of the rules of the system; the art of power, also known as the art of leadership; the potential, is the power, in a position, high authority. To influence others, this "three-pronged approach" must be carried out, and none of them can be.
In the past 40 years, the three aspects of law, technique, and potential have generally not been well balanced, not taken into account, and it is easy to deviate. Relatively speaking, the weakest is the law. One of the important aspects of my admiration for Ren Zhengfei is that he is relatively balanced in these three aspects, with both systems and power playing skills. For example, if a subordinate makes a mistake, he does not look for a subordinate, but replaces the department manager, forcing the subordinate to feel uncomfortable. This is a typical power technique, but it has the effect of "killing two birds with one stone", which not only examines whether the department manager has responsibility, but also examines whether the subordinate dares to take responsibility, if the subordinate takes the initiative to take responsibility, not only will not be punished, but also praised. In addition, when it comes to Ren Zhengfei's position, a moderate low profile is useful, the higher the position, the more people need to be low-key, and the people at the bottom should be high-profile, because there is no "tune", how low! Han Feizi said that for people who have a certain position, they must know how to use this position. This is called "potential energy" in physics, which is what we usually call "aura".
From the perspective of influence, we can see the leadership characteristics of Chinese entrepreneurs
From the perspective of influence, three generations of entrepreneurs can summarize something common. The first generation of entrepreneurs did a good job, but the form was not elegant enough, a little earthy, with a little peasant habits. Although the second generation of entrepreneurs represented by Ren Zhengfei have more or less peasant habits to a certain extent, there are still some things that are beyond that era, such as vision, ambition, and pursuit, which are the fundamentals that determine whether Chinese enterprises can become bigger and stronger. The main reason why I am not optimistic about entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs in some emerging industries is also due to this.
This is really not singing high notes. When Ren Zhengfei entered the telecommunications field, he did not say that he wanted to achieve hundreds of billions and trillions, but only said that he wanted to become a world-class leading enterprise in the field of telecommunications equipment, what a great life ambition and pursuit. When Mr. Ford the Elder of the United States founded Ford Motor, he did not say how much wealth to pursue, how many billionaires to create, he wanted to let the American working class drive cars. Similarly, there are Edison, Zuckerberg, and so on. These people are not doing business from the perspective of making money, but only inadvertently making a fortune in the process, and are accidental billionaires.
On the contrary, many of the entrepreneurs I see and understand in domestic enterprises are more profit-oriented. Wanting to make money cannot be said to be wrong, but compared with career orientation and value orientation, there is indeed a difference. In the 90s of the last century, Li Dongsheng said that when TCL's goal was to achieve 150 billion yuan a year, he knew that the company was not optimistic. When Founder Group proposed to build 100 millionaires, it knew that Founder was not far away. We can think of money as a by-product, not as a core goal to pursue. The core thing of life is the pursuit of value and orientation, no matter when, it will not be obsolete, this is a necessary condition, not a sufficient condition, without this thing, you may be able to make a lot of money, but you must not really make the enterprise bigger and stronger.
"Wealth gathers and people scatter, people gather wealth and scatter", this phrase is only one aspect, not the fundamental. At that time, we were at Huawei, transforming from a community of interests to a community of destiny, and we wanted to make a big article. A common question is that through struggle, everyone becomes rich and has countless wealth, but wealth is not brought by life, and death is not taken away, so why should we struggle? Chinese companies have not fundamentally solved this problem.
Although Ren Zhengfei has not completely solved the problem of what a community of destiny is and how to achieve it, he at least has a relatively clear direction. It is not denied that a considerable number of people are interest-oriented, and they come to Huawei just to pan for gold, and they can go when they find gold; but only those who identify with Huawei culture and inherit Huawei culture can develop in Huawei for a long time and become a so-called community of destiny. For many enterprises, if they only advocate struggle, innovation, common suffering, family culture, etc. in slogans, they will not solve the fundamental problems.
Whether it is the past or the future, the entrepreneur's personal pursuit, ambition, vision, and influence will determine to a considerable extent whether the enterprise can become bigger and stronger. The more high-end talents, the less they will be attracted to material and general careers.
The West has summed up the seven characteristics of charismatic leadership, which are fully expressed in some entrepreneurs such as Ma Yun and Lei Jun. But the most full performance is Still Ren Zhengfei, even if he does not go out and knows the world's affairs, he completely "touches himself" and knows what will happen five years later and ten years later. Always tossing, always changing, once every three or five years, in 1997, the marketing department resigned collectively; in 2001, it took the lead in reducing wages; in 2007, it was another wave of resignation... Constant process reengineering, constant tossing, the starting point of these tosses is the concept of thought, the foothold is to change the concept of thought, and constantly guide new things out. There are also individuals under the influence of traditional Chinese culture, in Ren Zhengfei, Liu Chuanzhi, Zhang Ruimin, there are almost no loopholes to drill, even if someone wants to pit him, they can not find a handle, because they have no bad habits, eating, drinking and gambling are absolutely not done, which is the basic condition for being a leader in China.
The three core qualities of future leaders
There are many new terms for the description of the future, such as big data, Internet of Things, blockchain, crowdfunding, platformization, sharing economy, and so on. No matter what the industry direction and business model, in the future, for the leaders of the enterprise, I think there are three aspects of the quality that need to be possessed:
One is a sense of personal responsibility. Specific to enterprises, the sense of social responsibility will become more and more prominent. As an entrepreneur, it is really not just for the benefit of a few people, but for the benefit of the whole society. Only in this way will we operate the layout in the big framework and pattern, rather than the barbaric growth under the guidance of opportunity. The upgrading of enterprises should be reflected in the pursuit, social responsibility, and innovation of business models and management methods under the premise of abiding by discipline and law, so as to make profits.
This may be a challenge for future entrepreneurship and business, such as sharing bicycles, and it is good not to deny this idea, but since its birth, the sense of social responsibility has been relatively weak, because it has not taken into account environmental issues, and has not considered how these bicycles will be handled in a few years. These problems cannot be prevented by the system and the law, and cannot be blocked, as long as they rely on the personal consciousness of entrepreneurs. Laws and institutions certainly need to be strengthened, but the moral bottom line depends on individual self-awareness.
In the West, not everyone believes in religion, but relatively speaking, the whole society has a religious basis. In China, before the May Fourth Movement, the culture of self-cultivation was at work, and after that it was relatively weak. Huawei is good in that the two aspects of system and culture have been strengthened, and have been guiding ahead of schedule, without shortcomings.
The second is to have the ability to balance. One manifestation of our country's poor sustainability is that everyone is tired and working overtime every day. To make it easier for everyone to live and create value more comfortably, this requires a leader's all-round and comprehensive balance ability. In the past, a leader could be a good business person in a certain aspect; in the future, a leader, especially an entrepreneurial leader, needs to have a full range of balance capabilities.
According to the West, all stakeholders have to take care of each other, including employees, customers, shareholders, society, and so on. In the balance of specific work, just like Huawei's grayscale management, not only internally, but also in the whole external, we must also grasp the degree. For example, when considering customers, there may be some losses to shareholders, and when considering shareholders, there may be some losses to customers, so how to balance includes all aspects. Here we must use a concept that has recently developed in the West and has existed Chinese for a long time -- contradictory leadership or paradoxical leadership.
That is to say, a leader must be two-sided, not a single side, very kind on the one hand and very fierce on the other; see his gentleness on this side, and see his irritability on the other side. This characteristic is fully expressed in Ren Zhengfei, when it comes to ideological and conceptual issues and human issues, he does not easily delegate power; but in terms of property and business, completely open up, this can let the people under him find the feeling. The same is true of the current rotating CEO system, which on the one hand examines people and on the other hand allows everyone to find their feelings.
The same is true of Liu Chuanzhi, according to his statement, when I am sure, you will do what I say; when I can't convince you, and you can't convince me, you can do it, but you have to bear the consequences. Authorization on the one hand, dictatorship on the other, seems contradictory, but it can be at ease and maintain balance in contradiction. This is not exactly the same as the all-round balance, the all-round balance refers to doing things, contradictory leadership, paradoxical leadership is more of a way of thinking and values, a successful leader will relatively show two contradictory aspects.
Third, we must have an inclusive mind. According to the Chinese theory of yin and yang, things are not absolutely what is or is not, but depends on what situation is directed at whom, and cannot be targeted at everyone in an inherent way. To a considerable extent, this depends on "self-touching" or personal cultivation. Black and white, right and wrong, there is no sand in the eyes, good is good, bad is not good, you are not good, I will not interact with you, etc., relatively speaking, it is not inclusive enough. Not being tolerant enough, it is not a matter of ability, but a problem of mind.
The same is true of power and skill, and leaders must have certain skills to be able to grasp the balance in contradictions. Ren Zhengfei is low-key on the outside and high-profile in the company; low-key when the company is good, high-profile when the company is sluggish, it seems contradictory, in fact, he is thinking about things three or five years later. These ultimately fall on personal cultivation and exercise, and under this premise, there will be differences in business.
In general, no matter how the times change, the above "main themes" are the basic things, without these will not last, with these is not necessarily long-lasting, but with other things, it may be more long-lasting, more long-term.
(This article is based on the author's speech at the Huaxia Cornerstone 3+1 Forum, first published in Huaxia Cornerstone Management Review)
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