I've always loved listening to other people's stories.
In August 2020, I embarked on a special journey to listen to stories. This walk is thousands of kilometers and months. I interviewed 30 entrepreneurs in one go with my team partners in the name of "Walking into the Family".
These entrepreneurs, there are a founding generation, there are family women, there are new economic people, and there is a vibrant new generation.
30 entrepreneurs, 30 families, and 30 very different lives.
I wonder, how are these entrepreneurs and their businesses doing under the pandemic? In the current business environment, what kind of business philosophy and methodology do they have?
I wonder if many companies are a little confused when they are facing transformation and reform, and when they are passed down from generation to generation?
I also want to know, if the family is in danger of falling apart, do they have the most basic protection measures?
From Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, to Suzhou, Ningbo, Yiwu, to Anji, Zhuji and other places, I have experienced a wonderful journey.
Thank you to all the entrepreneurs who opened their hearts and shared their businesses, families and lives with me.
I also thank the small partners of the "Into the Family" co-producer Huagang Home Office for accompanying them along the way.
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1.
I often support the ukrainian female entrepreneur Zhang Jiying on rainy days to give me an umbrella. The chairman of Zhejiang Xingbao Umbrella Industry is doing things related to umbrellas.
The umbrella industry is no longer traditional, and Zhang Jiying and her family are doing it very seriously. She started from the small commodity market in Yiwu and sold her products all over the world, making a successful sample of grassroots entrepreneurial families.
Zhang Jiying's story
Similar to Zhang Jiying, several of the entrepreneurs I interviewed were family women who created or co-created wealth.
I have repeatedly seen in them the wisdom and tenacity of Chinese women. The strength of the family has always been an important concern in the family wealth community.
Ningbo Yahoo is a foreign trade benchmarking enterprise in Ningbo. Gong Lihong, who started his business with Mr. Gong, is also a deputy to the Ningbo Municipal People's Congress and the vice president of the Ningbo Chamber of Commerce.
I once asked her how to handle the disagreements in the husband and wife's joint venture. She said: When there is a disagreement, you think about your original intention, is it more important to be a company or your happiness in life? Is it necessary to tear down the home for work?
Her statement about whether the child will take over the class has also resonated with many people. She said, why is my daughter, who is related to me by blood, that she can come here and be the boss?
Gong Lihong's story
Ren Hefen, a female entrepreneur also from Ningbo, has the typical pragmatism and composure of a generation of entrepreneurs. For more than 20 years, she has focused on the magnetic materials industry and has achieved fruitful results.
She said: I do business like raising a son.
Compared with Zhang Jiying, Gong Lihong and Ren Hefen, The post-70s Francontech chairman Jin Hongping is younger. This well-educated Mesozoic entrepreneur insisted that the company be listed on the main board and insisted on learning after work for several years.
Every decision a business, she says, is a risk. She enjoys the joy of these adventures and challenges.
When talking about the succession of children, she appears open-minded and shows full respect for independent individuals. In her, I could barely see that she had any baggage about intergenerational inheritance.
Ren Hofen's story
2.
In interviews with genesis entrepreneurs, I consciously chose some new economy entrepreneurs, as well as some from traditional industries.
The pace of the new economy entrepreneurs obviously feels more hurried, and the thinking of business logic seems to be more important and in-depth. I spoke with Shen Hui, founder of WM Motor, Zhou Shihao, founder of Where to Transport, Huang Chunying, former general manager of Dongyao Pharmaceutical and vice chairman of the board of directors, Zhu Jiang, chief growth officer of TouchPal Technology, and Calm, co-founder of Menglian Group (Love Inventory). Every time I communicate, I feel that I have benefited a lot.
Shen Hui was once a successful professional manager, and now he is also a popular entrepreneur, and there is an obvious aura. Zhou Shihao chose a hard-working cross-border logistics track, and his thinking and expression are meticulous and novel.
Zhu Jiang, another executive of a public company who graduated from Jiaotong University, blurted out a sentence when sharing his past experience: "Pain is the most precious wealth in life." I remember writing about him at the time: "He loves to think, and when he breaks into no man's land, he is used to reading to find the answer in his heart." ”
Zhu Jiang's story
The co-founder of Love Stock is calm and started a business with her husband. In just a few years, the company has experienced rapid growth and encountered many challenges. In 2020, there are some things that I believe calm will not be forgotten for a long time. That is the improper suppression of love inventory by competitors, including the "two alternatives" incident that has now been severely criticized.
Cool story
The path of enterprise growth and wealth accumulation of these new economy entrepreneurs also makes people see a silhouette of China's current Economic growth.
There are also two entrepreneurs from traditional industries, which I am quite impressed.
One is Mr. Lou Zhongping, the chairman of Yiwu Shuangtong Straw, whom I call "from industrialist to preacher." This grassroots entrepreneur, who only attended primary school in the formal education system and grew up picking up goods from a young age, walked the streets and alleys to do the "chicken feathers for sugar" business, but he can export meticulous business ideas and philosophical concepts. In dialogue with him, he emphasized "talking about ideas and collisions."
Lou Zhongping's story
Compared with many family business leaders who are still wandering in the chaos, Mr. Lou seems to have a little "prophetic" meaning. Where the business goes, how the family is passed on, he has his own answers and practices.
The other is Mr. Yang Xiulong, chairman of Beijing Banquet and CEO of Pretty Jiangnan. The past story of Pretty Jiangnan is well known to everyone, and now under the leadership of Mr. Yang, it is also a legend.
Yang Xiulong has been practicing his theory of Chinese service, achieving the Beijing banquet and saving the beautiful Jiangnan. He said this sentence that touched me very much, "a group of people, a lifetime, one thing".
I often share this sentence with other entrepreneurial friends, and many people appreciate it.
Yang Xiulong's story
3.
Of the 30 entrepreneurs surveyed, about 7 or 8 are new generations of their families.
I was fortunate to meet such a group of young people with a strong sense of family responsibility. Some understand the hardships of their fathers, shoulder the burden of succession, and some choose to start independently and become the second generation.
Cai Shaohua, chairman of Huajia Holdings in Zhuji, Zhejiang, is full of true temperament. He took over the family business and admitted that doing business was tiring and fulfilling. "But you say I enjoy it or not, and I don't enjoy it very much."
He was sent to New Zealand by his parents at the age of 12 and returned to China at the age of 25 to take over. He will often miss life in New Zealand. He told me that when he was a child, several playmates were also the second generation of some wealthy families, who were sent to the world by their parents when they were teenagers, and when they grew up, they naturally went their separate ways. But they all remembered their childhood friendship, and it is said that at the end of each year, they will return to the small town called Diankou in Zhuji, which is where they started in life and get together once.
After listening to these sharing, I was very touched and told Cai Shaohua that I wanted to make a documentary for you. He smiled and said: Teacher Wang, arrange it in 2021.
Cai Shaohua's story
I once shared the story of Cai Shaohua with some other new generations of families. Most of them listened carefully and were also moved, such as Wu Hao, the second generation of the Zhejiang textile family who started a business in Shanghai.
This is an Oxford graduate. He felt sorry for his father, but did not simply take over his father's business. He had no interest, nor did he feel that he would do a better job than his father, who was more professional in the textile field. Together with his partners who graduated from Cambridge University, he founded Vista International Education. Like his father, Wu Hao's final choice was to start from scratch and embark on the road of entrepreneurship.
Wu Hao's story
I have heard this mention of my father's distress from the mouths of Li Jialun, general manager of Shanghai Xuelun Pharmaceutical, Shi Nasha, president of Shenzhen Shixingkai Group, Wang Tianxiang, the master of Shanghai Yuanzhongtang Shaotang, and Mi Fengyun, a "small town youth" in Zhuji.
When we talked to Shi Nasha, we also talked about such a topic: since wealth is so free, why do we have to fight so hard?
Her answer was, "You find joy in altruism."
Such an answer is no longer purely material. Shi Nasha tries to find the meaning of business development, family inheritance and even life itself from values and beliefs.
Shi Nasha's story
Zhang Wenwen, the second generation of the Suzhou family, also has a lot of affection for the transmission of spirit. She hopes that wood has always been an important element of their family.
This beautiful girl from Gusu City was a Christian.
One afternoon in the fall of 2020, she spoke to me about Christianity, business management, and family. On the culture wall of her company, I also saw the classic passage of love in the Bible:
"Love is enduring patience and kindness."
Zhang Wenwen's story
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The articles and opinions published by Chinese Family Fortune do not constitute any investment advice. Readers should make investment decisions based on independent judgment, and Chinese Family Wealth does not bear legal responsibility for the consequences of investment.
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Wang Xiaobo
Producer of "Chinese Family Wealth"
Founder of the Carmela family think tank
Observers and researchers of the Chinese entrepreneurial family have more interaction and connection with overseas Chinese entrepreneurs and domestic high-net-worth individuals.
Areas of focus include family business growth in transition, family wealth management, etc.