In times of crisis, whether the founder has the determination is the key to the survival of the enterprise. At the same time, stabilizing the morale of the military is also the most important task of every enterprise founder and manager in times of crisis. Only in this way can we ensure the willpower and combat effectiveness of the enterprise, and will not be defeated in a hundred battles. How do good business leaders deal with crises?In the book "The Art of War", Wu Ting, the founder of the guest business school, used Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei, as a sample to review how he survived the darkest moment. At the same time, President Wu Ting also gave 5 suggestions for founders on how to deal with the crisis and stay focused. Enjoy
In the course of every interview, I ask entrepreneurs the question: "If one day, your company goes down, what do you think it would be for?"This question has been answered hundreds of times so far. The number one answer came from Yingke's Feng Yousheng, Horizon's Yu Kai, and the Three Squirrels' Zhang Liaoyuan......Their common answer was, "I'm not keeping up with the times and out of touch with my customers." Yao Jinbo of 58 Group and Liu Zihong of Royole Technology also had a similar answer: "If I can't do it, the company will fail." "We can see that in this era of accelerated business changes, the founders and CEOs have the ability to accurately grasp the direction, keep pace with the times and adapt to changes is the first priority, which has also become a general consensus in the business community.
The first important part of antifragility is the founder's determination, which is especially important in times of crisis.
As the ancients said, "There is calm in every major event". In 383 AD, the former Qin Fujian led millions of people to destroy the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Xie An of the Eastern Jin Dynasty sent his younger brother and nephew to lead 80,000 troops to meet the attack in Weishui. This is the famous "Battle of the Water" where less wins more. The life and death of the Eastern Jin Dynasty was in this battle. While the two sides were fighting, Xie An played chess with the guests at home. The battle report came, and after Xie An read it, he continued to play chess without changing his face. After the chess game was played, the guests couldn't help but ask about the front-line war, Xie An only said lightly: "The little one is a big thief." ”
In a critical moment, whether the founder has the determination is the key to the survival of the enterprise. At the same time, stabilizing the morale of the military is also the most important task of every founder and manager of an enterprise at a critical moment. Only in this way can managers ensure the willpower and combat effectiveness of the enterprise, and the team can not be defeated.
Founded in 1987, Huawei is a leading ICT (information and communications technology) solution provider, focusing on the ICT field. Its main business includes program-controlled switches, transmission equipment, data communication equipment and broadband multi-** equipment. In 2013, Huawei surpassed Ericsson, the world's largest telecom equipment manufacturer at the time, for the first time, ranking 315th on the Fortune Global 500.
By 2022, Huawei has ranked 44th on the list of the world's top 500. Its products and solutions have been applied to more than 170 countries and regions around the world, serving 45 of the world's top 50 operators and 1 3 of the world's population.
So, how does Huawei maintain long-term growth?A very important reason is its strategic determination, just like Ren Zhengfei himself said in an internal letter to employees: "The bench will sit for ten years." ”
At the corporate strategic level, Huawei's most representative "determined choice" is that the company does not choose to speculate in real estate. Around 2000, China's real estate market was booming. Taking land, building buildings, and selling money, the process of the market is simple, but the profits are very high. Many companies have put down their main business out of eye heat, and changed careers to make a lot of money.
At this time, there were subordinates within Huawei who were ready to make a move, suggesting that Ren Zhengfei do real estate: "Anyway, we are so rich now, if we don't invest some money in real estate by the way, we can easily earn 10 billion (yuan)." ”
However, at this time, Ren Zhengfei's strategic determination was reflected. Not only was he unmoved, but he openly criticized this idea, saying: "In the age of great opportunity, never be opportunistic. ”
Since Huawei's mission focuses on the communications industry and the communications field, Huawei must continue to do so. During the years of the real estate spree, Huawei invested money in R&D, technology and talent. Therefore, this is the fundamental reason why Huawei can surpass Europe and the United States in terms of 4G (** mobile communication G (fifth generation mobile communication) and even 6G (sixth generation mobile communication) in the future. Although many countries have had to suspend cooperation with Huawei due to some specific factors, this does not affect Huawei's 5G development. According to the data of the global communications market in 2021, Huawei is still far ahead of European and American companies, ranking first in the world with a share of nearly 30%.
If Huawei had been distracted from real estate at that time, China might have one more real estate company today, but one less technology-based company with core competitiveness.
Over the past 30 years, Huawei has encountered not only real estate, but also financial online loans and the Internet. However, in the face of every opportunity, Huawei has always focused on the field of communication equipment, concentrated funds and forces to improve its technical level, and dug deep into the moat of the enterprise, which has achieved today's business.
In terms of corporate culture, Huawei is even more focused on promoting the "professionalism" of sitting on the bench for ten years. For example, in June 2014, Ren Zhengfei invited Professor Li Xiaowen, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, to endorse Huawei, and wrote "What spirit does Huawei adhere to?".It is the advertising slogan of "sincerely Xi to Li Xiaowen".
At that time, people were discussing who Li Xiaowen was. The results are impossible to check, and similar content has appeared in China's major current politics, science and technology and financial newspapers such as "People**" Reference News, "Global Times", "China Youth Daily", "Economy**", "Guangming**", "Science and Technology**", "21st Century Business Herald", "Yicai**", etc.
Through these news, people know that Li Xiaowen is a "titan-level" figure in the field of remote sensing in China. The "Li-Strahler" geometric optical model led by him has been named "a milestone in quantitative optical remote sensing in the 20th century" by the academic community. Although he has a high income, he is very simple in life, can endure loneliness, and always wears a pair of cloth shoes to teach students. Therefore, people respectfully call him "Academician of Cloth Shoes".
Through such publicity, Huawei wants to reaffirm Huawei's persistence and perseverance, so that people can see its own values. Ren Zhengfei said: "What Huawei wants to adhere to is the spirit of craftsmanship, and tackle tough problems one product at a time. If this craftsmanship spirit is abandoned, Huawei will have no future. ”
At the ideological level of the founder, Ren Zhengfei always emphasized the importance of "long-term perseverance and hard work". For example, at the end of 2000, when Huawei was ahead of its Chinese counterparts and growing rapidly, Ren Zhengfei wrote an article titled "Huawei's Winter". He would like to take this opportunity to remind all Huawei employees to have a sense of crisis of "living to die".
In this article full of worry, Ren Zhengfei said: "Have all the employees of the company considered what we should do if one day, the company's sales decline, profits decline or even go bankrupt?Our company has been in peace for too long, and there are too many promotions in peacetime, and this may be our disaster. The Titanic was also in a sea of cheers. These views and speeches all reflect Ren Zhengfei's determination and vision as the founder.
Any company, in extraordinary times, positive or negative news, will be examined by the magnifying glass of the market. The founder is calm, which means that he has a bottom on the goal, and this background is the spark of a spark, which can not only burn the prairie in the public, but also burn the prairie in the city.
In fact, in the course of more than 30 years of development, Huawei has experienced many crises, including the life-and-death battle in the initial stage, the cold winter of the communications industry in 2001, the Meng Wanzhou incident, and the sanctions and suppression of the United States. As the helmsman, Ren Zhengfei is like a lighthouse, leading the company forward.
For example, from 2000 to 2002, Huawei's internal employees continued to leave, especially the general Li Yinan, whose departure caused Huawei's R&D to lag significantly. During the same period, Huawei also encountered external rivalry and interception, which can be said to be internal and external troubles.
However, Ren Zhengfei was in danger. In his internal speech, he said, "Winter is also lovely, not hateful. If we don't go through a winter, it is very dangerous for our team to be fluttering all the time, and Huawei must not be proud. So, winter isn't terrible. ”
He also reassured employees: "We can get through, this year we may have a little bit of a profit down, but we won't lose money." Compared with companies in the same industry, our profitability is relatively strong. We also need to put things in order to meet the future development. ”
At the end of 2018, Ren Zhengfei's daughter, Meng Wanzhou, who is also Huawei's chief financial officer, was in Canada**. In May 2019, Huawei was added to the "Entity List" by the United States**, which prohibits Huawei from purchasing important technologies without special approval. Since then, restrictions have escalated further, with Google, Intel, Qualcomm and others abandoning Huawei.
However, Ren Zhengfei frequently said that "the current Huawei is not the most difficult and crisis-oriented time", and "even if the United States comes to upgrade technology to attack Huawei, the impact on Huawei is limited." ”
Management consultants Barbara Perry and Harry Hutson once published an article called "Leaders Give Employees Hope", and Ren Zhengfei liked one of the sentences: "Hope is the tinder, and with hope, people will no longer be cynical and aggrieved." Sowing hope is an important part of a leader's job, and before acting or speaking, leaders ask themselves: 'Is it possible to extinguish hope or ignite hope with the actions or words I take?'They will reap great benefits. ”
Obviously, Ren Zhengfei knows this well. He always stepped up to the plate and ignited hope for his employees when it mattered most.
5 rules that shape the founder's concentration.
Once the "black swan" comes, what should the founders do best?I have prepared here the "5 Rules for Shaping the Determination of the Founder".
First, always listen to the voice of users on the front line. The founder's business decisions cannot be taken for granted, and the founders cannot hear some wind and grass and change what they insist on. Especially when the company enters the expansion stage, the founder has to go to the front line to listen to the feedback of users and analyze the market data, rather than what to make money and what to do quickly. At Huawei, there is a consistent principle: the front line calls for artillery fire.
The so-called "frontline calls for artillery fire", that is, the power of planning, budgeting, accounting, sales, decision-making and other powers is given to the front line, "let the people who can hear the sound of artillery call for artillery fire", because they are closest to customers.
Second, do the countdown to the life of the enterprise. As a founder, you should monitor your cash flow, monitor your account balances, and have your CFO ring the bell on a daily basis to alert and urge you to think about how to keep the company running healthily, how to develop new products to survive, and how to expand the market size.
Third, sort out the antifragile chain. Carding is about learning from each other's strengths. The founder is the first link in the antifragile chain, but the founder also needs to sort through the other links in the chain to see which links can hold up and which ones need to be repaired.
Fourth, IP-based survival. The founder of Lao Xiang Chicken, Shu Congxuan, tore up the application for a joint ** salary cut of employees, and exploded the circle of friends in the spring of 2020. Shu Congxuan told me that this internal **, which was not deliberately released, finally gained more than 2 billion people.
I believe that it must be a very difficult decision for Lao Xiang Chicken not to take a pay cut, because catering is already one of the hardest hit industries.
Zhang Liang, the founder of Zhang Liang Malatang, also told me during the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic that he reluctantly reduced the franchise fees of all franchisees for half a year, and in areas where the situation was even worse, he directly waived it for one year.
This is a great sacrifice and "bloodshed", but these measures have also eased the difficulties for franchisees. As soon as the news came out, its brand reputation was quickly improved. These are desperate situations and are the embodiment of IP-based survival.
Fifth, use loneliness as a scale and never give up. In 1941, Churchill accepted the invitation of his alma mater to give a speech entitled "The Secret of Success", when Britain had just experienced the Second World War, and the full text of Churchill's speech was: "Never admit defeat, never admit defeat, never admit defeat." "What's the Boss?The one who has no one else to complain about is the boss. The boss takes loneliness as his hardest scale, uses loneliness as a scale, and never gives up.
In a critical moment, whether the founder has the determination is the key to the survival of the enterprise. Whether or not they can pass through the darkest hour is also a litmus test for business leaders. Through entrepreneurs like Ren Zhengfei, we can learn that in the cold winter, the heart of a leader must be strong. In times of crisis, leaders must boost morale and give hope to employees, because hope is the "spark for winter."
Author |Wu Ting.
Source |The Art of War