Winning (Chapter 11) Strategy - facebook email from Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg

So many enterprises would like to develop the latest strategy for their portfolio, investment etc. In this chapter, I will discuss how to implement the strategy in process. Three main initial steps are the key principles which are:

1)      Come up with a big aha for your business, a smart, realistic, relatively fast way to gain sustainable competitive advantages.

2)      Put the right people in the right jobs to drive the big aha forward.

3)      Relentlessly seek out the best practices to achieve your big aha, whether inside or out, adapt them, and continually improve them.

According to the first chapter of Art of War, it is the chapter of laying plans which is similar to this chapter. Today, I pick up the Facebook  email account and I will introduce 2 persons in this chapter, the CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg and the COO of Facebook Sheryl Sandberg. Mark Zuckerberg is an American entrepreneur who co-founded the social network Facebook. Sheryl Sandberg is the COO of Facebook, she used to be vice president of global online sales and operations at Google. She used to be in Google for 6 years until 2008.

On 15/11/10, Facebook introduces a modern messaging system. The new service incorporates chat, SMS and email functions to allow people to share however they want to share according to Facebook. The new firm is named as Titan and its message tool is broadcasted as Gmail killer. Mark claims that it is a convergent modern messaging system. The users can handle messages seamlessly across all the ways to communicate within a single inbox. This messaging service blends online chat, text messages and other real-time conversation tools with traditional email ( Microsoft’s Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail ). Facebook is applying its social networking strategy to prioritize messages from friends and family. The Facebook users won’t need to check all their email accounts. They can simply check 1 Facebook account and broadcast the message within an inbox click. This action can be incorporate more instant message on email messages and instant test messages on mobile platform. Thus it is more personalized and customized message service against the traditional email platform. With such a large user base, 500 millions Facebook users, the free personal facebook.com email account is a threaten signal towards Microsoft, Yahoo and Google.

The internet war depends on the user’s spending time. Google currently owns this honor but Facebook has proven that its addictive service can hold people’s attention for long period of them. Currently, Gmail is Google’s greatest social asset and it is the main hub of communication and social activity in Google universe. Mark finds out the competitive advantage against Google which is the Facebook fans page. People would like to share the instant message among their friends whom they know. Sheryl Sandberg introduces that email is a very slow message tool. Fans pages can be a powerful tool to find the friends whom they know and whom they don’t know in terms of internet adverting and marketing. Obviously, it is extremely valuable.

Jack Welch simplifies the strategy is to find out the right aha and set the direction, put the right people in place and work crazy to execute better than every one else, finding best practices and improving them everyday. To be honest, Mark Zuckerberg finds out instant conversation and social network will obsolete the traditional email service and marketing advertising. All instant conversation can apply in mobile platform. As web 3.0 is approaching, Mark seeks this demand in the future. He hires a very great person Sheryl Sandberg as the COO of Facebook to operate this strategy. Mark is concentrating on the program for web 3.0 everyday. He is a very good model for this chapter.

The social network

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg at Nielsen Consumer 360

Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO

Winning ( Chapter 9 ) Change - Allan Zeman, the chairman of Ocean Park

The American President Barack Obama uses the word “Change” in his speech quite often. However, I didn’t choose Obama as a topic in this chapter. I would like to introduce the Chairman of Ocean Park in Hong Kong. He is known as the Father of Lan Kwai Fong and the mouse killer from Forbes article in 2007. Firtly, let me introduce the 4 practices of change in Jack Welch’s theroy.

1)      Attach every change initiative to a clear purpose.

2)      Hire and promote only true belivers.

3)      Get rid of resisters.

4)      Look at car wrecks.

Allan Zeman is a Hong Kong businessman. He was born in Germany, raised in Canada. Zeman came to Hong Kong in 1975 to source clothing in China and export to Canada. In the early 1980s, he felt that Hong Kong had no western restaurant that suited his needs, he opened California Restaurant in Lan Kwai Fong. It is a narrow street in Central. In 1984, he started to be an entertainment operator and property developer of Lan Kwai Fong. Nowadays, this narrow street is one of the most important bar and night life districts in Hong Kong. He was the first guy to organize the Halloween concept from western festival to Hong Kong traditional Chinese culture. He changed a former garbage collection center to a nightlife hotspot of dozens bars and restaurants. At that time, who can figure out this guy can become the competitor of Hong Kong Disneyland.

In 1995-2004, Ocean Park was losing money, the employees were waiting for retirement pension fund. All the members in Hong Kong Government suggested to close down this theme park. However, Zeman was amazed by the mountainous seaside view and the traditonal cable car for the first time visit in Ocean Park. The first thing he did was usher CEO Randy Guthrie into retirement and replaced him with a 44 years old Tom Mehrmann. He had the experience of implementation of Warner Brother’s Movie World in Spain. Zeman’s primary focus on live animals, pitting dolphins, sea lions and pandas against Winnie the Pooh, Mulan and Mickey mouse. He rebuilt the facilities among the elements of ocean, environment, education and conservation. One of his winning team members is Randy Kalish, a former Disney executive who had helped to build Hong Kong Disneyland.

Besides, Zeman is concentrating on organizing special events every two months for holidays such as Christmas, Chinese New Year and Halloween. He applied the lessons in Lan Kwai Fong that Hong Kong consumers are hungry for the new Ocean Park. He aims to keep people coming back and having fun. In his world, there is only first class, he won’t accept business class or economy.

Most successful businessman and investor would like to take opportunities from regrettable circumstances. Allan Zeman has his own clear goal in Lan Kwai Fong restaurant business and Ocean Park management. The word change must be connected with a bright vision, hire the team members with passion and experience and having a sense of perceiving opportunities under any terrible situation.

http://www.oceanpark.com.hk/html/en/home/

Zeman renounces Canada

Lan Kwai Fong forever


Ocean Park Halloween Party 2010


Allan Zeaman's document about Ocean Park in Chinese


Part two


aTV 香港百人 第四十六集 2011-5-10

Winning ( Chapter 8 ) Parting Ways - layoff by HSBC

Work isn’t a perpetual paradise. We will discuss how to manage a parting of ways with as little pain and damage in this chapter. Usually, the manager carries out letting ways in 3 situations.

1)      Firing for integrity violations

2)      Layoffs due to economic

3)      Firing for nonperformance

In the movie of Up in the Air is based on a novel which is published in 2001. Ryan Bingham ( George Clonney ) is a consultant who is conducting layoffs for bosses. He needs to travel around United States and delivery the lay offs message between the large firms. He also delivers motivational speeches, using the analogy “What’s In Your Backpack?” to encourage the jobless people to start a new life. Actually, he brings the new vision, courage and optimistic until the end of each parting ways conversion. 

Another character Natalie Keener ( Anna Kendrick ), she issues a brand new plan to cut costs. She implements a new method which is using internet web cam meeting service instead of the old fashion firing people process. However, she doesn’t have any experience on firing before. After she faced the impulsive anger from the employees, a death notice from a fired woman and her boy friend dumps her via a text message. She realizes that the firing process should include, build up his/her self-confidence, coach him/her and let him/her know there is a good job. The goal for the fired employee is a soft landing wherever he goes.

HSBC in Hong Kong carried a lay off 500 staffs in Asia after the first month of the financial tsunami in Oct 08. The superior announced that this was the formal action due to deteriorating economic conditions and its cautious outlook for 2009. Meanwhile, some of the layoff employees claimed that HSBC fired the employees for a bogus reason. Many of the workers with 15-19 years of service for HSBC faced the axe in this layoff process. On the Blog message from one of the staff was “One individual was fired because they did not delete an email that was (inappropriate) sent to them by some else 4 years ago.”. Several similar cases such as 5 minutes late attending to office or after lunch period were also used as a non-performance reason.

It seems there was patterns with HSBC letting people go with 15-19 years of service. Many of these employees were grandfathered under the household pension plan. This is a nasty procedure to get rid the employees to save on pension costs. All the layoff employees’ personal belongings were shipped by the courier instead of carrying out of the entrance from HSBC to protect its brand image and get rid of investigation by the news reporters.

In the end of this chapter, Jack Welch indicates that if the persons have an integrity violation, you should kick them away from the door and fast. In most of the cases, the manager faces the layoff due to economic crises. The manager should let someone go in right condition with no surprises and no humiliation. According to the action in Oct 08 of HSBC, it is shame that this bank is nominated as the best private bank in the world. In my point of view, to be honest, FUCK YOU HSBC.

Up in the Air - Trailer

Up in the Air - Firing Clips

Winning ( Chapter 7) People Management - Google management

In this chapter, Jack Welch lists up 6 rules for the company to manage people well.

1)      Elevate HR to a position of power and primacy in the organization.

2)      Use a rigorous, nonbureaucratic evaluation system.

3)      Create effective mechanisms – read: money, recognition, and training.

4)      Face straight into charged relationships with unions, stars, sliders and disrupters.

5)      Fight gravity, and instead of taking the middle 70% for granted.

6)      Design the org chart to be as flat as possible, with blindingly clear reporting relationships and responsibilities.

Google is known for having an informal corporate culture. On Fortune magazine’s list of best companies to work for, Google ranked first in 2007 and 2008. Today, this company employs 10,000 people around the world, receiving a C.V every 25 seconds.

Jack Welch introduces HR is on track, pastor-parents. Since they can help managers build leaders and careers. Laszlo Bock serves as Vice President, People Operations of Google Inc. He used to be an Engagement Manager at McKinsey and Company, serving clients in the technology. His client work also extended to broader business growth, a compensation consultant as Hewitt Associates. Laszlo Bock has the skill to settle the crisis, channel anger, forging compromises.

If you go to visit the Google management in this link: http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html#msmith

You will find out a clear organization chart of this company. All the persons in each level have their own responsibility and relationships. Every employee in Google understands whom they reported to, who reported to them. A good organization chart can reduce the confusion for every piece of information travels through the layers.

The Googleplex is the corporate headquarters complex of Google. It is an employee-friendly enviroment to work.  This building contains swimming pool, free food in eleven catdterias. Free fruit drink dispensers are everywhere for employees and guests alike, no coins or credit cards required. The Googlers wear jeans, t-shirts, sweaters and even show up in pyjama bottoms.

To work off the pounds, and the stress, Google has its own state-of-the-art gym right on campus offering weight-training and a host of exercise machines, rowing machines, lockers and shower rooms.

For workers spending long hours in front of computers, or to just work out the kinks, there are massage rooms with professional. The employees can play pool, video games, ping pong, football, pinball machines in the middle of the day.

The top management structure of Google, Larry and Sergey account for the success of the 20 percent projects. The employees are able to utilize 20 percent of their time to pursue projects which interest them. Google provides a new way to cultivate ideas internally and utilize the power of creativity. Many new features have been started as employee projects. New ideas came out such as Google News, Froogle, Google Reader etc.

According to 2008 of the astonishing revenue, each employee from Google is $210,000 per year. In fact, the salary range of from Google is higher than other I.T company.

Jack Welch indicates that the managers should really know how the employees are doing, provide great reward, motivate and retain wisely with money, recognition and training. Once you have hired great people, your job becomes managing them into a winning team.

Google Recruitment Video

An Inside Look at Google - Working at Google

Winning (Chapter 6) Hiring - Cathay Pacific Airways career program

In this chapter, Jack Welch indicates that hiring is to get the right players on the field. He develops several techniques to test the correct candidate. First, a short look at three acid tests which are integrity, intelligence, and maturity. Next, he will consider the 4-E and 1 P frame. They are positive energy, ability to energize others and edge which the courage to make tough decision. The final E is execution which is the ability to get the job done. The P can be expressed as passion. In the case for hiring senior leader, he will consider four more characteristics; they are authenticity, the ability to see around corners, a strong penchant to surround themselves with people better and smarter than they are. The final characteristic is heavy duty resilience.

In this chapter, I select the Cathay Pacific Airways career program. This airline company is the flag carrier of Hong Kong, with its head office and main hub located at Hong Kong International Airport. The major career program consists of fight attendant, cadet pilot and management trainee program. In addition, there is a unique education program “I Can Fly”.

This program aims to nurture an enthusiasm for aviation and the spirit of social service among local young people. Each year, Cathy Pacific will select 100 with the age range of 15-18 teenagers to join a 3 days training camp. I am sure that the 100 teenagers should meet the level of the first 3 acid tests. These 3 acid tests can find out persons with a regular personal behavior. In fact, those candidates are not the staffs in this company. Details of this I Can Fly program will be shown in this URL http://icanfly.cathaypacific.com/en/index.php

Providing Service Straight from the Heart is the principal of the fight attendant in Cathay Pacific. They are the trained safety officer, a caring team player and an ambassador for Hong Kong. Each year, only around 20-30 persons will be selected from 4000 applications. In the process of the selection of flight attendant, 4E and 1 P frame will be used in this case. This frame is more likely testing the ability of team work.

The two top levels recruitment for Cathy Pacific in each year are the cadet pilot and management trainee program. Each year, only around 10 junior pilots and 10 management trainees will be selected from the pool of around 3000 applications in each group. Each selected candidates should have the additional 4 characteristics. They need to have an instinct of leader with self confidence, has a vision and the ability to predict future, would like to approach the smarter people and keep moving forward away from failure.

Details of the fight attendants, cadet pilot and management trainee will be shown in this URL http://www.cathaypacific.com/cpa/en_INTL/careershome

If you would like to fully understand the working situation in the airline industry, I suggest you should watch the TVB drama of “Triumph in the Skies”, starring with Francis Ng, Flora Chan and Joe Ma. The procedure of hiring cadet pilot, training and fight attendants’ duties are showing on each episode. For anyone who wish to join the airline industry. Please review this drama and this chapter. I wish you luck.

TVB drama: Triumph in the skies. http://tvcity.tvb.com/drama/triumphintheskies/story/index.html

Cathay Pacific - I Can Fly


TVB drama Triumph in the Skies 衝上雲霄

Winning ( Chapter 5 ) Leadership - Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks

In chapter 5, Jack Welch points out the rules of leadership. Leadership requires distinct behaviors and attitudes, and for many people, they debut with the job.

He brings out 8 right ways for leaders should follow:

WHAT LEADERS DO

1)      Leaders relentlessly upgrade their team, using every encounter as an opportunity as an opportunity to evaluate, coach, and build self-confidence.

2)      Leaders make sure people not only see the vision they live and breathe it.

3)      Leaders get into everyone’s skin, exuding positive energy and optimism.

4)      Leaders establish trust with candor, transparency, and credit.

5)      Leaders have the courage to make unpopular decisions and gut calls.

6)      Leaders probe and push with a curiosity that borders on skepticism, making sure their questions are answered with action.

7)      Leaders inspire risk taking and learning by setting the example.

8)      Leaders celebrate.

Jack Welch indicates that when you become a leader, it is not just about you. Success is about growing others. Today, I would like to introduce the owner of the trade mark of Frappuccino.

Starbucks Corporation is an international coffee and coffeehouse chain based in Seattle Washington. It is the largest coffeehouse company in the world, with over 17000 stores in 50 countries. Howard Schultz, he is an American Businessman and entrepreneur best known as the chairman and CEO of Starbucks. Schultz has a keen business sense, positive energy, optimism and a rare ability to create vision much greater than anything existing leadership could hope to offer.

In the early 80, he would like to create a gathering place with its own language and culture by selling really fine coffee, and treat his employees with dignity. He shared his vision with Starbucks decision makers. Despite, he was informed that they had no interest in getting into the restaurant business such as McDonald’s, he started his own small, friendly café in Seattle. Five years later, he bought out the Starbucks partners for $3.8 million and developed a series of practices that were unprecedented in retail. He insisted that all employees working at least 20 hours a week get comprehensive health coverage, including coverage for unmarried spouses. In additional, he introduced an employee stock-option plan. These moves boosted employee loyalty and led to extremely low employee turnover.

Jack Welch mentions that leadership is to perform balancing short and long term demand results. As a result, Starbucks is using this concept within the balance between short-term profits and sustainable development. In March 2010, Starbucks launched nine kinds of tea drinks, including three kinds of Chinese tea: white peony tea, Pilochum green tea and Oriental Beauty oolong. It even changes its signboard at one of its branches in Beijing from traditional green and white to Chinese-style golden and black.

Presently, Starbucks has 376 cafés in Mainland China and over 700 cafés in Greater China Area (including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau). Starbucks began to further exploit the Chinese market. Howard Schultz forecasts that China will soon replace Japan to be the second largest market following the USA, where Starbucks is headquartered. This is a typical “Starbucks-style” operating pattern focusing on long-term benefits. His team always follows the rules in purchasing and finding high-quality coffee beans all over the world, building a purchasing chain with sustainable development possibility and suitable cost performance, guaranteeing local coffee beans farmers’ benefits and protecting local environment and ecology.

In Schultz’ autobiography, “Pout Your Heart Into It”, he presents all the 8 rules which Jack Welch mentions in this chapter. Schultz has all the classic entrepreneur elements of being a successful leader. The book contains dozens of revealing quotes by some of the world’s greatest minds. It shows all about his optimistic, relentless and mercurial in his life. It displays his passion dealing with the challenges of rapid and significant growth, truly serving and caring about the customer, nurturing employees, helping people from the heart. It also highlights his experience to make unpopular decisions, and his overview of new market development with new unique coffee.  

In the end of this chapter, Jack Welch gives us an advice of all the leader. Leader should inspire risk taking – trying something, getting it wrong and learning from it; or getting it right and gaining the self confidence to do it again. In Schultz’s conversation, he always says "I love being the underdog," for several times. Except he is the chairman, CEO, and president of a company that made more than $300 million in profit last year, that is the most followed company on Facebook, and one of the most recognized brands in the world. Would anybody really call Schultz, or Starbucks, the underdog?
AG MINUTE: History of Starbucks

Starbucks customer service


Starbucks - Howard Schultz at APEC SME Summit 2009 China


Starbucks CEO on outlet in Forbidden City


Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul

Howard Schultz on Leadership

Winning ( Chapter 2 ) Candor - Stephen Green, the chairman of HSBC

In the second chapter of Winning, Jack Welch mentions that lacking in candor can block smart ideas, fast action, and good people contributing all the stuff they’ve got.

The effect of candor can lead to winning process with three main ways.

1) It can get more people in the conversation. More ideas can be collected and study in the meetings.

2) It can generate speed. The solutions, new ideas and improvement can come out rapidly as many people debate rapidly.

3) It can cut cost, reduce the meaningless meetings and reports.

Jack reminds us the key factor to keep exisiting of  candor, we should reward it and praise it and talk about it. We have to demonstrate ourself in an exuberant and even exaggerated way.



Stephen Green, the chairman of HSBC will step down from the bank to take up the role of trade minister in the coalition government. He worked at the bank for 28 years. He will join British Prime Minister David Cameron's coalition government as trade minister next year.

He is a hugh proponent of candor. In 2003, he reliazed that HSBC made the wrong investment. Plently of the shareholders from the public were disapppointed and lose the trust of the service from the bankers. He reported to the public that the industry did so many things wrong. Green was the first person refused to receive the bonus from the bank referring to HSBC's $15Bn acquisition of the sub-prime lender Household International in 2003. He is understood to donate a substantial amount of his own salary to charity while so many top executives at HSBC still received massive pay packets, with five bankers sharing a £38m bonus pot last year.

The prime minister mentioned he was the vital role of trade minister with his experience and expertise. To be honest, Green has a particular ability which can drive strong economic growth in UK.

Davos Annual Meeting 2010 - Stephen Green