The Confusion Of Enterprise Power Inheritance: Choosing Relatives Or Selecting Virtuous

　　 After Ren Zhengfei retires, who will control HUAWEI? As the second largest in the world Telecommunication equipment Ren Zhengfei, the 66 year old HUAWEI founder, has an irreplaceable influence and control within the company. "Can HUAWEI continue to write legend after all?" yes HUAWEI employees One of the topics discussed in private.

However, enterprises facing "successors" are not just HUAWEI families. According to statistics from public information, there will be 300 000 private enterprises in China in the next 5 to 10 years. After nearly 30 years of development in China's private enterprises, the first generation of entrepreneurs, after years of arduous pioneering work, has collectively withdrawn from the business arena. Many enterprises are entering a stage of new and old alternation. How to hand over batons to the next generation to maintain the sustainable development of enterprises is an important issue faced by these enterprises.

　　 Ability and loyalty How to balance the two coordinates?

Yin Mingshan, chairman of the Lifan Group in Chongqing, once expressed this view: "I know that if I give my class to family members, our business will die slowly, and if I rush to professional managers, we will soon die." Between dying slowly and dying quickly, I choose to die slowly. "

Galanz and FOTILE chose sons to support their father's career. Lenovo Group because of Yang Yuanqing's outstanding performance, Liu Chuanzhi very early on the association split, the digital China to Guo, and gradually realized Lenovo Group to Yang Yuanqing transition. Although Liu Chuanzhi is coming back again after the acquisition of IBM, he should not upset the original succession plan. Haier and TCL have been unsure, and there have been no signs of successors.

It should be said that Ren Zhengfei is a very farsighted and courageous person in Chinese entrepreneurs. Many of his internal speeches have been widely circulated in society, and these have also become important reading materials for many entrepreneurs and MBA students. In view of the fact that Ren Zhengfei's shareholding ratio is very low, only 1.42%, it is very important to choose a capable and trustworthy successor.

Enterprises are faced with a dilemma when selecting successors. The former solves the problem of loyalty and reliability, and relates to the survival of enterprises; the latter is related to the competence and the future of enterprises. Successor ability is on the one hand, but not reliable and unfaithful. This is like the two dimension of the coordinate system, ability and loyalty. We need to find a balance and form a combination.

Power inheritance is not only an old problem but also a new topic.

Choosing successors to enterprises is the key to the inheritance of power. Wahaha, Gome and HUAWEI are the same. After decades of business cycle, this has become a collective problem of Chinese private enterprises.

The selected successors should be able to be the successors and implementers of various factors such as corporate culture and business philosophy. At the same time, they must be loyal to the enterprises, inherit and develop, and base themselves on the current and innovate. In addition, good personal qualities, rich work experience and experience, excellent work performance and superhuman working ability are the basic conditions for successors.

Selection is the prerequisite for training successors. The selection and appointment of talents must be a long-term and important task for enterprises. Enterprises must adhere to the principle of openness, transparency and competition, and insist on starting from the needs of work, with quality and skills as the guidance, so that they can be independent.

Educating people is the guarantee for training successors. Enterprises should distinguish different levels and different objects, form echelons, and classify training so as to reduce costs and improve the efficiency of educating people. Starting from the foundation and establishing a mechanism of gradual training and selection are the means to guarantee talents coming forth in large numbers.

Employing people is the key to training successors. Business leaders should be good at hiring people, giving successors to you or the successors whom you plan to train, using workplaces and job opportunities to give them or them the opportunity to display their talents and value in order to realize themselves. Empowerment, responsibility and pressure.

Tolerance is the condition for training successors. To tolerate others is to develop their strengths and use their strengths. Tolerance is short, which limits what is short and avoids what is short. We should have the ability and ability to exceed ourselves, and try our best to make the best use of talents. Only in this way can we find talents and create a good interpersonal environment for training successors.

Take the Ford Motor Co of the United States as an example, on the successor issue, the Ford family is always the first choice. If we can not select successors from the family, we should consider choosing from outside or professional managers. But in order to ensure the succession of the family, even if the outside party is chosen, on the board's voting rights, Ford Motor Co still has a voting power of up to 49%, that is, an innovative mode of equity - gold shares. And this kind of power inheritance, for Eastern culture enterprises, such as Japan, Korea and China's Hongkong, Taiwan and other family businesses are even more impressive.

Several modes to solve the problem of power inheritance

The first mode -- slow fire soup mode

Experience shows that it takes years or even decades to cultivate a qualified enterprise successor. Especially in large companies known for their stability, such as IBM's famous bench plan and GE's "new man" plan.

In the past more than 100 years, GE has gone through seven leading leaders, the most famous of which is Jack. Welch later described his choice of successor as a most important and difficult part of his career. "The whole process almost drove me crazy and brought me countless sleepless nights." Starting from the selection of successors in the spring of 1994, he listed 23 candidates. After 4 years, the original 23 rank was reduced to 8; and after further selection, the last three were identified. Finally, Jeff Immelt won the three new candidates and became the new leader of GE.

Looking at the whole process, it lasted for 7 years. This "slow fire soup" mode of inheritance, although the time span is longer, but the selected successors after careful selection, long-term cultivation, and ultimately through the test to meet the company's requirements, reduce the probability of error and the future risk of the enterprise.

The second mode -- "trough feeding horses" mode

Unlike GE, Eastern culture and philosophy create a pattern of "trough feeding horses". The successful representatives of this model are Liu Chuanzhi of Lenovo and Li Jiacheng of Cheung Kong. Liu Chuanzhi has been widely praised by splitting the two companies of Lenovo and digital China. While splitting up the company, Liu Chuanzhi said that although the palm of the hand is meat, there is a way of making a choice. But no matter which side is bigger, Lenovo's cake is bigger. If one side is trapped in the future, the other side can help immediately.

Li Jiacheng has two outstanding sons, Li Zeju and Richard Lee. Li Zeju, the eldest son of a steady character and steadfast style, has been established as the new head of Cheung Kong industrial group. He also subsidized advocating free innovation and the second son who likes to show himself. Richard Lee also set up TOM.COM, PCCW expansion and other businesses. Li Jiacheng was relieved to see the rapid growth and outstanding performance of his two sons.

The third mode -- the "black sheep fund" mode

Li Jiacheng and Liu Chuanzhi are undoubtedly happy because they have many excellent successors to choose from. Everyone wants to "give birth to children like Sun Zhongmou", no one is willing to hand over the hard-working enterprises to the "unable to support A Dou". But when the leaders of enterprises are short of excellent successors, how to choose a successor who is worthy of this responsibility? In this case, Nan Cunhui of CHINT group of Zhejiang proposed the model of "spendthrift" fund.

At the CEO round table meeting of 2004 private enterprises in Zhejiang, Nan Cunhui, chairman of CHINT group, revealed his thoughts on the successor problem. He said: "CHINT has more than 100 shareholders, of whom 9 are senior managers. We encourage the children of these senior managers not to enter CHINT after they finish reading, but also to go outside to fight and observe and test them in the process of struggle. If it becomes a tool, it can be employed by the board of directors to work in CHINT group. If it is not a good tool, it is a black sheep. Our original shareholders will set up a fund, invite experts to manage it, and support the black sheep from the fund.

　　 In many foreign countries, there are foundations that run in the name of the family, but the successors of the fund can not control these assets arbitrarily. They need to have professional managers and supervisory bodies to operate. For example, the very famous Ford fund is like this. In this way, the decision-makers and the managers of the company have a clear purpose and will not bring harm to the operation and development of the enterprises because of the incapability of the successors.