PEAK'S Two Generation Successor: A Desire To Pform Enterprises

In Greek mythology, the sculptor Dai Da rose did not want to spend his life in Crete.

In order to return to his hometown, he began collecting and finishing feathers, trying to make himself a pair of wings that leaps over the sea.

Day Da Ross also made a pair of small wings for his son, and told his son: "if you fly too low, your wings will touch the sea water. If it gets wet, it will become heavy. You will be dragged in the sea. If you fly too high, the feathers on your wings will catch fire because you are near the sun."

This ancient Greek father's advice to his son can also happen between the founder and the rich two generations of Chinese private enterprises.

It is understandable that Dai Da Luo wants to go back home to understand that the process of the generation of private enterprises is to retire and make wings, which is the process of intergenerational pmission. The leap of the ocean is the conflict and collision between the father and the son, the traditional way of thinking and the new method.

This is not for China.

According to experts, starting from 2010, the next ten years will be the peak period for the generation of Chinese private enterprises.

With the retirement of the founding fathers, the two generation will gradually take over, or have already moved to the front desk or embarrassed.

To some extent, the growth and development of the two generation of successors will directly determine the overall trend of China's private economy, and even have an important impact on China's economy.

This is by no means exaggerated.

Data show that at present, private enterprises account for more than 99% of the total number of enterprises in China, and the private economy occupies more than half of the total GDP in China.

If China's GDP335353 billion yuan is calculated in 2009, it will generate at least 20 trillion yuan of wealth every year after the two generation of succession.

In fact, for a time, under the background of the widening gap between the rich and the poor in the society, most of the two generation of the negative image of "showing off the rich" and "losing the family" appeared in front of the public, and their overall quality and succession capacity were questioned.

Therefore, how to succeed in the family business has become a big question mark hanging on the top of tens of millions of private enterprises.

For private enterprises

The two generation of PEAK samples.

PEAK's performance in the past 10 years can be seen as the epitome of the "two generation succession" story of Chinese private enterprises.

China Weekly reporter Li Jiayu reporting from Quanzhou and Beijing, Fujian

At two fifty in the afternoon, the Secretary of PEAK chairman Xu Jingnan finally brought two bowls of steaming noodles.

We agreed to stop talking for more than three hours and concentrate on eating noodles.

After a while, the sound of eating away from the opposite side of me stopped. Xu Jingnan looked up and pointed to the noodles still hot. He said that our first generation could create wealth, but we could not enjoy the wealth brought by it, because we had a hard life, and the two generations were all very well. They knew how to enjoy it, but Chi Hua was an exception.

Be entrusted with a mission at a critical and difficult moment

Hou Lidong held a pair of cold, swollen, cold hands.

It was winter in Beijing at the end of 2002.

At that time, Hou Lidong, a journalist, visited PEAK's "little family" Xu Zhihua in the salt store outside the bridge.

The scene in the warehouse surprised Hou Lidong: "downstairs is white salt, with a pungent smell of the sea.

Upstairs is full of PEAK's shoes and clothes, and Zhihua's office is surrounded by goods.

It was very cold that winter, but there was no heating in his office, so he had to hold his hands up and his hands were red and swollen with cold.

This is obviously a far cry from the rich two generation in Hou Lidong's mind, knowing that the annual sales volume of PEAK had already exceeded 300 million yuan at that time.

Xu Zhihua read the surprise from Hou Lidong's face.

Pointing to the gold cup van in the yard downstairs, he told Hou Lidong that this winter, he was able to deliver goods to Beijing through its streets and alleys, and set up PEAK Beijing branch one by one.

At that time, PEAK was also in an unprecedented "winter".

"We were drowned at once!" Xu Zhihua commented on the performance of PEAK, created by his father Xu Jingnan, around 2000.

PEAK is submerged in Jinjiang brands like spring sprout. Anta and XTEP, which are adjacent to PEAK, have started a big round of licensing movement. As many as more than 40 Jinjiang brands are advertising on TV. What's more, they have built up sales network in the whole country, and they have quickly grabbed market share, and PEAK has not yet been liberated from traditional shopping malls.

"2000 is a watershed. Before, we are like sitting in the elevator, standing still and going up."

Xu Zhihua recalls.

But for PEAK, this scene is already a thing of the past.

Xu Jingnan also complained to him more than once: his failure to adapt to the pformation of the sporting goods industry from wholesale shopping to monopoly retailing in time. The management of the company is not in the same place. Some of the top managers are in the dark.

Xu Jingnan had no secret of his thirst: "I need help."

The helper he referred to was Xu Zhihua, the eldest son who was studying in Chengdu.

It is a familiar proposition for Xu Zhihua, who grew up in the commercial environment of Jinjiang.

In the summer of 2001, when Xu Zhihua was about to graduate from University, he once thought of giving different answers: he had already received the notice from HUAWEI, and could go to Shenzhen to be an engineer with a salary of over 10000 a month. He was also recommended as an excellent graduate to National School of Administration and became one of the only two candidates to take the official career.

Xu Jingnan held a family meeting specially. He told his son the story of his college entrance examination. In his senior high school, Xu Jing Nan's mathematics and physics achievements were always in the top three in the class. At that time, he needed to recommend the village for University, and two people were recommended for two years.

Xu Jingnan went straight to the point: "what background do we have? When will it be your turn?" at that time, he competed with Xu Zhihua for the grandson of governor of National School of Administration.

More importantly, Xu Zhihua is deeply aware that his father's business has fallen into a downward path.

Xu Zhihua decided to inherit his father's career. He never thought he was "rich two generation" but "two generation".

"We don't envy him."

In fact, at first, Xu Zhihua did not even want to create a "two generation". He had no interest in the family business. He never liked being called "the son of Xu Jingnan". He went to Chengdu to go to university in order to "get away from home as far away as possible."

In 1997, Xu Zhihua became a student of electronic information specialty in Sichuan University.

He is no different from other students. Like his roommates, he brings out 5 yuan a month to put in the living fund of his dormitory, and he shares paper towels and toothpaste with everyone.

He went to Four Girls Mountain and Xiling Snow Mountain with his classmates to sleep in 14 large shops.

Like every freshman, he was active, willing to join the club activities, and eventually became chairman of the student union.

The only difference is Xu Zhihua's attention and sensitivity to business news.

Xu Zhihua's university guest friend Cheng Shou Cheng recalled to "China Weekly" reporter: "he is very interested in some macroeconomic concepts, likes reading newspapers, and often reads fresh stories of financial news and business figures to us."

The identity of Xu Zhihua's "PEAK son" is known to everyone because of the collective selling of shoes in dormitories.

He brought the shoes from the agent of PEAK Chengdu, filled the wall panels of the dormitory, and the people who greeted the dormitories were involved. All the money earned was a living fund for the dormitory, but it was "business in general".

"Even though the students know Xu Zhihua's special status, everyone does not envy him."

Bing Shou Cheng stressed.

In the four year of Xu Zhihua's Sichuan University, Xu Jingnan and his wife have only been there two times, including sending their sons to school for the first time.

He wanted his son to truly have "independent ability".

His only advice for his son is to help students who have difficulties in life. When he graduated, Xu Zhihua also provided a student loan of 3000 yuan for a classmate to help him get his diploma successfully.

"We are doing business here and there."

Xu Jingnan is very satisfied with this state.

But he never told Xu Zhihua his own plan: "I decided to make him a successor from the day I sent him to China."

This is different from Xu Jingnan's previous statements about successor training. He never officially admitted that his son's training was deliberate.

"I don't want to let Zhihua know himself," Xu Jingnan said after his worries. "I don't believe that only by school education can we cultivate a qualified successor."

"Life.

Life is the best teacher. "

As the first generation of entrepreneurs with the highest academic qualifications in Jinjiang shoe king, Xu Jingnan, who graduated from high school, said this very philosophical meaning. This is based on his own experience.

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Family genes

For a long time, Xu Jingnan's deep memory of life was the hunger of poverty and poverty, and the helpless loneliness.

Before liberation, Xu Jingnan's father worked as an apprentice in a fruit shop. After liberation, he practiced "public-private partnership". After reading a few years of private school, Xu's father was a man of culture and became an accountant.

But Xu's father's meagre salary does not support a family of seven people. The only advantage is that Xu has a little ration. Xu Mu changes the ration to the sweet potato residue, and a jin of rations can replace ten jin of sweet potato residue. The sweet potato residue has been squeezed without starch, and it is hard to swallow. Xu Jing Nan five brothers often cry hungry.

In the face of hunger, Xu Jingnan was impressed by the fact that "my father never borrowed money from others," even though there was no food at home.

Later, Xu Jingnan read about his father's stubborn reason from his father's Diary of growing up: Xu Jingnan's grandfather came to Indonesia to earn a living when he was young, and only came back in the middle, but later he died in Indonesia.

When Xu Jingnan was nine years old, he was sent home from Indonesia by his uncle. But there was no one close relative. He had no roots and was helpless. Fortunately, the good hall aunt took him in to survive.

"The rule of father's survival is independence, and the law of survival he teaches me is also independent."

Xu Jingnan said.

In 1988, Xu Jingnan heard the news that Nike was looking for a foundry factory in Quanzhou at the dinner table. The message that was freely told from friends' mouth touched his sensitive nerve. At this time, it has been ten years since the reform and opening up. Xu Jing Nan has accumulated funds and experience after he has run more than 10 enterprises, including packaging plant, board car team and wooden box factory.

He learned from the government the policy of "welcome the second industrial pfer" and is worried about finding a project that is consistent with the spirit of policy.

Xu Jingnan decided to work with Nike to do the matching processing, although his understanding of Nike was limited to "a pair of shoes to sell more than 100 yuan, more expensive than double star and back force".

After negotiations with Nike, Xu Jingnan began to make full efforts to raise funds and build factories. When the factory was built, the Nike factory in Quanzhou moved to Putian, and the cooperation with Xu Jingnan ended.

In the eyes of outsiders, Xu Jingnan was put in a big dove.

Xu Jingnan made a decision silently: without Nike, I have to create a brand by myself.

At that time, this is not a bold idea, because almost all people are busy making profits from the foundry. The investment and risk of creating brand is obvious.

But Xu Jingnan vaguely believes that the future market is likely to be the brand market.

Xu Jingnan came to the conclusion that after he had gone around the market, he found that young people bought clothes and began noticing the nameplates hanging on their collar.

In 1989, PEAK was formally established.

After the evacuation of Nike, 80% of the technicians and advanced equipment were recruited by Xu Jingnan.

"We started out as a high starting point. When many of the enterprises in Jinjiang were still hand shops, we were already pipelining."

Back then, Xu Jingnan's speech was full of pride.

Noisy but not stiff

After graduating from college, Xu Zhihua did not go home. He traveled directly from Chengdu to Beijing to participate in the sports fair, and then went to Liaoning to explore the market.

Two months later, Xu Zhihua returned to PEAK headquarters in Quanzhou.

Xu Zhihua started from ordinary clerks. His main job was to sort out documents and answer the phone, but this did not stop him from quarrelling with his father even without cards.

For example, Xu Jingnan used to look for photographers inside the company to take pictures of new products, but Xu Zhihua insisted on paying high prices for professionals.

"Father is a bitter person. I have seen him have a hard time in starting a business. He can do it by himself. He can save a few dollars to save a few bucks, but I would like to make PEAK reborn overnight."

Xu Zhihua said.

The quarrel became the norm between Xu Zhihua and his father who just returned to PEAK.

"Three days, two big noisy, clapping the table, noisy I will not even attend, a person ran out."

Later, Xu Zhihua attributed these quarrels to the difference between one generation and two generations.

Behind the differences are sometimes two generations of different ways of thinking.

Xu Zhihua showed Xu Jingnan's goal in 2006. After watching, Xu Jingnan let Xu Zhihua increase from 50% to 80%.

Xu Zhihua took out market analysis data to support his decision and told his father that he had broken down the target of 50% to all departments.

His meaning is obvious - 50% is scientific and can not be changed.

But Xu Jingnan thought PEAK must have a breakthrough to bring back the slow growth losses in the past few years.

He asked Xu Zhihua to change it, on the ground that "this is my feeling".

The father and son had a heated argument on the spot at the office, and it turned out that Xu Zhihua followed his father's meaning.

Later facts stand on the side of Xu Jingnan.

"If there is no confrontation, which includes 06, 07, 08 years of 80%?", however, he admits, "Zhihua's data analysis is not wrong."

Xu Jingnan attributed the dispute to Xu Zhihua's immaturity.

"As a parent, give you advice, you accept it, or accept it in a different way, which is very smooth.

If you find a lot of reasons to contradict it, of course you will get into a fight. "

However, it is noisy and not rigid. Xu Zhihua said that the negative effects of quarrels will be eliminated within half an hour, and that he will be confident enough to work in full confidence.

"Father should not spare me any words or comfort me. My father has planted a sense of responsibility for the family in my head."

Second years after entering the company, Xu Zhihua began to push forward the reorganization of dealers according to his own thinking.

In his view, those dealers who had been developed in the wholesale era could not adapt themselves to the product sales work in the retail era. After visiting thousands of terminal distributors, Xu Zhihua gradually realized the idea of distributors, the ideas of consumers, and how to judge the quality of dealers. He decided to cut down these unqualified dealers.

However, because of the interests involved, Xu Zhihua arranged the task can not be completed at all, he had to do it himself.

"The faces that have been cut are very ugly. Sometimes they visit the distributors, and they are also bombed out."

Xu Zhihua said.

As a result, the doubts of Xu Zhihua inside the company began to grow, and some elders thought that few of them were "whimsical".

Xu Jingnan showed enough wisdom at that time. He sent Xu Zhihua to Beijing to set up PEAK Beijing branch to liberate his son from controversy.

Many years later, Xu Zhihua realized his father's good intentions: "what he has asked me to do is new business. No one else has done that. There is no place for the elders. I have done well, and I have not done too much criticism."

Indeed, Xu Jingnan has his own thoughts on the division of labor between the three sons and fathers: he is responsible for the coordination of the management team, and the eldest son Zhihua is responsible for the construction and marketing of the channels, and his youngest son is responsible for the production and distribution of clothing.

After the coronation

In 2007, at the invitation of Xu Zhihua, Hou Lidong came to Quanzhou from Beijing to serve as PEAK PR Manager.

He saw a Xu Zhihua who had never seen himself before.

"He used to be very talkative and gentle," Hou Lidong said. "But when I first arrived at PEAK, I went to his office to report on his work. He was speaking loudly to the planning department, his face was red and his facial expressions were different, just like a quarrel."

Xu Zhihua, who felt differently, offered to ask him, "am I very fierce?" Hou Lidong replied, "yes."

Xu Zhihua confessed to him: "I know that it is wrong to get angry, but the pressure is really great."

Xu Zhihua said, "my temper is very violent and easy to worry, but I always have a principle and things are not right.

The closer the relationship is, the harder it is to curse. "

At this point, Xu Zhihua's pressure has not come from outside doubts and criticism.

In the six years after returning to his father, under his leadership and influence, PEAK firmly launched its brand internationalization strategy on the basis of adhering to its original professional road with basketball equipment as its core. The successful signing of 7 NBA stars, including Jason Kidd, Sean Ba and Till, endorsed it as the official partner of the FIBA and squeezed Lining to become the official partner of NBA.

In September 29, 2009, Xu Zhihua, 30, came to his coronation: PEAK went public in Hongkong and pformed from a family business to a listed company with a market value of more than ten billion.

For Xu Zhihua, who inherited his father's career in 2001, this is undoubtedly the best proof for himself.

Xu Zhihua said he was an "extreme realist", and he desperately wanted to understand the business rule behind the chaos. He said, "I am very keen on finding a clear principle, and I don't believe in instinct."

He has visited more than 80% player agents. He will personally lobby NBA stars and personally measure the size of their shoes.

Xu Jingnan still has a fresh memory of his son.

"Once, I criticized him, when he asked me," are you not going to let me be a successor? "I said," there is no such problem at all. I chose you and chose the right person. "

Xu Jingnan said.

However, Xu Jingnan sometimes worried that the people next to Xu Zhihua would "beat the drum" for their son, especially when "Zhihua wavered and wavered".

"Zhi Hua learned to be independent, but he wanted to be independent."

Now, Xu Jingnan's biggest concern for his son is "lack of experience": "some things are theoretically correct, but in fact, it is very difficult to operate.

It can be used like this, and it can be used that way, but if you are biased, you will go farther and farther away. The final result is that you are becoming more and more unfamiliar with your own business.

However, Xu Jingnan and Xu Zhihua and his sons all know that professional managers are the only way to "liberate" them. They share common understanding in the general direction of "de familial", and they also have their own worries.

Xu Zhihua's pain is "seeing people is not allowed": "this point, my father is stronger than me, he talks to people only a few words, this person can not do, how, he probably knew, sometimes I chat with a person for a long time, do not know how this person is."

Xu Jingnan's worry is that "workers are afraid to be late and leave early."

Of course, apart from their worries, they now share the same sense of happiness. In seven months, Xu Zhihua will become a father. Xu Jingnan will become a grandfather. The PEAK family will have four generations.