Chapter 8 Chapter 5 Second Entrepreneurship

Before Zhang Zhiyong took office, there would always be such a person in a company: petty, short-sighted, stern-faced, dedicated, middle-aged, dressed in a gray suit, with profound analytical skills, but lacking in charm.The reason why they are not called "dumb geese" by their joking colleagues like engineers is simply because they still manage their colleagues' money. This person is an accountant. However, this time, in Li Ning Company, a slightly different accountant is about to appear.Initially, though, he was no different. He is Zhang Zhiyong, a graduate of the Central University of Finance and Economics. He joined Li Ning Company as a cashier in 1992, as the general manager in 2001, and as the company's CEO since 2004.

As the 14th employee in the history of Li Ning Company, when Zhang Zhiyong entered Li Ning Company, due to the company's lack of manpower, he often played multiple roles, such as a salesman and a porter... According to the report of "Back View Li Ning", as one of the few to Beijing Zhang Zhiyong, a Shanghai native who came here to make a living, is for his girlfriend and current wife in Beijing.The reason why he came to Li Ning Company was "one because he liked sports, and Li Ning was the best sporting goods company at that time." In addition, when he took his resume to the Beijing office of Li Ning Company to apply for a job, the company gave him a very good job. Good first impression: no local account required.

After coming to Li Ning Company, Zhang Zhiyong initially worked as a financial cashier, and his immediate boss was Chen Yihong.Later, Zhang Zhiyong was promoted to the manager of the finance department and began to participate in the company's annual plan and budget formulation, showing a rigorous and pragmatic attitude.By 2001, Zhang Zhiyong was already the chief financial officer of Li Ning Company.But he is not satisfied with simply doing finance. In addition to financial analysis reports, he also submits management reports related to operations, consciously demonstrating his ability.Chen Yihong appreciated this subordinate very much.When he became the chief financial officer, the company also placed the storage and transportation department, subsidiaries, and management department under the charge of the chief financial officer, aiming at cultivating more comprehensive and excellent management talents.

In 2001, when Chen Yihong needed a successor, he recommended Zhang Zhiyong to Li Ning. In 2001, after Chen Yihong resigned as the general manager of the company and became the legal representative, Zhang Zhiyong, who had been an assistant for half a year, successfully became the new general manager of Li Ning Company.So far, the heavy responsibility of Li-Ning brand building falls on the shoulders of Zhang Zhiyong. Zhang Zhiyong experienced a period of negative growth for 26 consecutive months in Li Ning Company, which impressed him with a product backlog of more than 600,000 pieces at one time.He also saw that Chen Yihong reversed the negative growth situation, but still could not break through the magic-like upper limit of 1 billion yuan in sales.

He knew that what he needed to face was a difficult challenge. Maybe he is powerless to change the fate of Li Ning Company, but his fate is destined to be changed by Li Ning Company. Zhang Zhiyong decided to go all out.The first problem he needs to solve after taking office is: how to use limited resources to enhance the company's financial capabilities?Zhang Zhiyong believes that it is the retail end that has the most influence on short-term sales growth. When there are activities at the retail end, the business is the most dynamic.Opening a store is the easiest horizontal growth, and it is the most visible.According to this judgment, Zhang Zhiyong devoted almost all his resources to channel support at that time. The channel reform that had already started in the hands of Chen Yihong was now intensified in the hands of Zhang Zhiyong.Zhang Zhiyong promoted the Li Ning store strategy on a large scale, opened new stores, unified the visual identity image of the old and new stores, and promoted promotions, and continued to do this for three full years.

Zhang Zhiyong must shoulder the burden, and these drastic reforms are likely to come at the expense of employee morale, and the challenges facing Zhang Zhiyong are compounded by the fact that many employees have mixed views on their new young leaders. A group of designers represented by chief designer Yang Chao chose to leave. The May 2006 issue of "Global Entrepreneur" "Li Ning at the Crossroads" recorded the worries of designers: they worried that "Li Ning" paid too much attention to expanding sales channels and neglected product design. "Zhang Zhiyong likes to engage in capital operations." Yang Chao said.

At the end of the most challenging year of his life, Zhang Zhiyong decided to increase the difficulty of this challenge.He hasn't made personnel changes with much fanfare -- though he's always had that in mind.There are still some old employees in the company. Zhang Zhiyong persuaded them to leave, and then introduced new ones on a large scale. In fact, in China's sporting goods industry at that time, not only "Li Ning", but almost all companies were facing more or less adjustment needs.Beginning in 1999, Anta launched an advertisement for Kong Linghui. In 2000, Xtep spent huge sums of money to invite Nicholas Tse as its spokesperson. The "Jinjiang model" of "star + CCTV advertising" began to develop.More sporting goods companies are slowly changing, and the domestic sports industry has begun an overall upward phase.