Chapter 58 Chapter 10 Suspense of "Huawei Successor"

Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei and the spiritual leader of 100,000 Huawei people, is 67 years old this year. As he grows older, the issue of successors is probably the most pressing issue facing Huawei.Choosing a successor is a headache.Jack Welch, the CEO of the world's number one, believes that a long-lived large company is firstly the transmission of corporate culture, and secondly, it depends on the cultivation of successors. Like most private companies in China, Huawei was deeply imprinted with the founder Ren Zhengfei in its growth.There is no doubt that without Ren Zhengfei, there would be no Huawei.Today's Huawei, the top management of the company is a team called EMT, which is similar to the board of directors of Western companies, but Ren Zhengfei himself is still the absolute "spiritual leader" of Huawei. Normal functioning plays a vital role.

As for the issue of Huawei's successor, the low-key Ren Zhengfei did not evade.In fact, as early as more than ten years ago, he had thought carefully about the issue of successors.He also recently publicly stated: "Huawei has established a line since the day it was founded that appoints people on their merits rather than cronyism; Huawei will not have a situation where one person decides the fate of the company." Article 102 of the "Huawei Basic Law" clearly stipulates: Huawei's successors are leaders who are naturally generated from employees and cadres at all levels in the collective struggle. This is called the "full-staff succession system."This fully shows that the company's professional and institutionalized development is Ren Zhengfei's first appeal to his successors, rather than family control.Ren Zhengfei said in his early years: "If they (shareholders) can unite to drive me away, I think this is just a sign of the maturity of the company. But as far as the current situation is concerned, it is not possible, because the company is still struggling to develop. Among them, they still need me. If one day they don’t need me, and they unite to overthrow me, I think it’s a good thing.”

Writer Zhang Lisheng wrote in "Military President Ren Zhengfei": Although Huawei has thousands of Ph.Ds, the majority of its employees have undergraduate degrees and above, and they have excellent execution capabilities, but they lack visionary strategists and mature managers.Ren Zhengfei is also aware of this. He often mentions the introduction of external talents to keep the internal mechanism alive forever. However, it is difficult for the introduced high-level executives to integrate into Huawei's strong culture. It is also difficult for Huawei's internally grown entrepreneurs to accept external managers. Li Yuzhuo, the only foreign vice president, only stayed at Huawei for 4 years.Ren Zhengfei believes that only by promoting professional management can a small number of "airborne troops" have the soil for survival and development. Ren Zhengfei lamented in 1999: "We have not yet digested the ability of the 'airborne troops'. As a result, we have neither been educated, nor have they played a role. But if we don't use them, when will we be able to revolutionize 'peasants' like us Did it succeed?" In 2000, Ren Zhengfei also proposed: "When the company's management is standardized, we will introduce a group of ambitious people into the company to activate the sedimentation layer." However, judging from the current situation, Huawei still adopts more cautious strategy.For several years, Ren Zhengfei has been looking for a successor, but the result is that there is no confirmed candidate.

For Huawei at present, under the circumstances that the governance structure and decision-making mechanism are not perfect, the strategic choice of business development is of course important, but the gradual improvement and improvement of the internal mechanism cannot be ignored.While paying attention to strategic development, Ren Zhengfei has also continued to pay attention to the transformation of Huawei's internal operating model. In 2005, Huawei established the EMT (Operation Management Team), the highest daily decision-making level, consisting of Chairman Sun Yafang, President Ren Zhengfei, and six vice presidents in charge of different fields, forming a democratic organization for group decision-making, and implementing the "rotating chairman" system. Different vice presidents are in charge in turn, and the company's strategic decisions are discussed regularly every month. The EMT team has the highest decision-making power, and Ren Zhengfei, as the CEO, only implements his resolutions.Huawei has begun to move from Ren Zhengfei's personal-led management model to an EMT management model. Huawei's new mission and strategy have begun to get rid of Ren Zhengfei's personal will and reflect the will and value demands of the EMT team. It has a more global vision and international thinking. be more open and compatible.Most of Huawei's EMT members are low-key and calm. In Huawei, the topic of internal "successors" has thus been downplayed.

At that time, Ren Zhengfei really did not need to think too much about the issue of "successor" if he only considered age. On February 5, 2009, when Lenovo Group suffered a huge loss, Liu Chuanzhi, who was the same age as Ren Zhengfei, chose to come back. It took only one year to turn losses into profits and lead Lenovo Group out of the predicament.On the issue of successors, although Liu Chuanzhi is cautious, he is also step by step to solve the mechanism problems for the camp. By introducing Oceanwide Holdings, the management of Legend Holdings will further increase its shareholding, and it is already preparing for the handover.

However, Ren Zhengfei does not seem to be eager to find an answer on this question.In the past few years, Huawei's internal operating system has also undergone changes, and it is shifting towards collective decision-making. In 2005, Huawei abolished the original position of executive vice president and president office meeting, and established EMT. The company's major strategic decisions are all made by EMT. It was also in this year that Ren Zhengfei made drastic adjustments and reforms to the company's internal organizational structure, and reorganized and established seven functional departments including sales, marketing, R&D and supply chain, finance, strategy and cooperation, and human resources.However, just the adjustment of the organizational structure cannot guarantee the effective inheritance of corporate management rights.

In 2010, Huawei announced two major strategies and a series of internal adjustments to better implement the strategy and assign tasks to people. In January 2011, in order to meet business needs, Ren Zhengfei once again adjusted Huawei's organizational structure according to changes in internal business departments. Ren Zhengfei believes that Huawei is not a family business, and its rapid rise relies on institutional guarantees.However, if Huawei wants to ensure its future advantages, it must constantly adjust its organizational structure to make it more reasonable and perfect.Only by straightening out the system can Huawei operate smoothly.

James Collins, author of "Built to Last", said: The American sages were committed to creating such a system: After their death, they can continue to cultivate excellent leaders and talents for the United States.The same is true for enterprises. Some companies, such as General Electric, were founded a hundred years ago but are still alive and well.Because their sages built an organization that can continuously cultivate excellent successors.The tradition there is that each president has to select several successors to choose, and then determine the only heir, and those who are not selected will leave the company to prevent management difficulties in the future.Due to the abundance of talents, the leadership of large American companies comes from General Electric. It is this system that ensures the company's undefeated success.