With the advent of cheap newspapers and better transportation, the soft, quiet old days are over

"With the advent of cheap newspapers and better transportation, the soft, quiet old days are over," he said. People live, think and work at an extremely rapid pace (William smith,1886); "The gathering of the modern family, surrounded by the fire in silence, everyone buried his head in his favorite magazine." (Journal of Education, 1907); "More and more people, especially those in big cities, have a psychological and neurological weakness ... Broadly speaking, it can be attributed to the haste and excitement of modern life, facilitated by rapid traffic and almost instantaneous global communication (Pastor Magazine, 1895).

Sounds familiar? If the above newspapers, magazines, to change into computers, mobile phones, these words are now basically completely applied. People who have a better memory have long discovered that there are two kinds of words, ancient and modern, almost every generation of people say. One discourse is "Encebergo, moral Decay", "a generation inferior to a generation, blahblah"; another word, similar to the above citation, is that "because of the adoption of new technologies, the times have changed more, faster, more uncertain, more unpredictable, blahblah." ”

These words don't really stand up to scrutiny. First of all, the former, hundreds of years of moral decay, the vast majority of people, but still believe that the present society in all aspects than a few hundred years ago still be more civilized and more humane. For example, at least women do not foot-binding, not a bunch of breasts, cheating will not be immersed in the pond bar. Moreover, the latter, hundreds of years of change, most of us have to early go out to work, so with colleagues infighting, so with customers bargain; the sun still rises, the four Seasons so reincarnation, the birds still sing. What about the changes that have been agreed? It's not that it's not here, it's not as big as you think, at least not exactly the way you thought it would.

Industry consensus, a new technology in the early days, often there will be investment bubbles, bubble burst, the new technology slowly into the real economy. Rail technology, computer technology, Internet technology, more or less have this situation. Now the mobile internet in the ascendant, there are signs of bubbles, natural is also normal situation. Thanks to the policy of reform and opening-up, the greatest of which may be the famous Vie framework, and the go-between of those who have returned from studying abroad since the 80, China is fortunate enough not to miss the Internet tide.

And with China's sheer volume, cultural barriers, and unique consumer habits (relatively weak offline commercial infrastructure), China has become the only country in the world that has emerged as a world-class internet company except the US. The success of these companies has set an example for the mobile internet industry. Especially last September, Alibaba's listing, to the entire mobile internet industry hit a super big Chicken blood needle. A quote from Ma Yun: "If not Now, when?" If not me, who? (at this moment, not me!) ）”

Taobao can not be copied

Taobao's success, in essence, through the praise mechanism, Alipay guarantee, worry-free returns and other means to establish a network of credit, to solve the Chinese society of strangers can not establish a trust relationship between the sociological problems, from the famous sociologist Zacker so-called "based on trust" towards "based on the trust of the system", It has greatly reduced the transaction cost of trans-regional transactions in China, forming a nationwide unified market for bag shopping, which is almost the first time in Chinese history.

The proportion of the electricity quotient is now about 8% of the total retail sales in the world, and we have different views on how much growth potential there will be in the future. Regardless of the direction, most consumer goods companies must face up to this change, using good Taobao or similar national sales platform. Unconvinced, of course, you can also try to highlight their own characteristics, and gradually build their own online consumer community (fan group). Do not want to be shopping malls, large stores exploited, you can rent their own street storefront, so that customers come to the door, the line under the truth is actually the same. If their own characteristics are not obvious enough, but also on the shelf, look down on these emerging channels, there is indeed a network of emerging brands to eliminate the risk.

However, no one can step into the same river at different times. Ali in the Internet era in the bag shopping market this successful experience to replicate to other areas of the challenge is very large. Now the hot and O2O of all kinds of life service class, such as taxi, take-away, domestic, and so on, and bag shopping The biggest difference is that the local nature of these services, and due to its local nature of the duplication and stickiness, the value of its creation, nature can not be compared with the construction of a national reunification of the big market. Professional services such as home improvement, tourism, law, etc., may be relatively optimistic. As for the financial, educational, medical and other fields that many people are optimistic about, these belong to the industries with monopoly, administrative interference and low marketization, and the development of Internet enterprises depends more on the degree of the Government's regulation (deregulation). The money they earn, in addition to the dividends of technological progress, is largely a remedy for the loss of social welfare caused by monopoly and administrative intervention.

These are the consumer goods industry and services that are directed to individual consumers.

The internet, including the mobile internet, is likely to have a smaller impact on industrial industries. For example, Huawei's traditional telecommunications infrastructure business is about 380 customers around the world. Try to do well with 380 of customers, and strive to sell the latest technology to their telecommunications systems, from sales, to delivery, to maintenance, to ensure meticulous, no problem, this method and know-how, from the fax age, to the era of email, to the micro-letter era, if there is a difference, it should not be essential.

So, for the internet, most traditional businesses need no fear or fanaticism. Some people have helped to put the internet age (or the mobile internet age) and the industrial age in the same place, shouting to subvert everything, and everything must be again and again, in fact, it is a bit alarmist. The industrial revolution began with the "series of events" that followed the end of the western Middle Ages, from the Renaissance to the reformation of religion to the Enlightenment to the scientific revolution, followed by the industrial Revolution, the bourgeois revolution and the expansion of capitalism in the world, which is one of the most important events in human history.

Marx used countless "everything" in the manifesto of the Communist Party to describe the change: "All fixed rigid relationships and the adapted element of the concept and opinion of the revered are eliminated, and all new forms of relationships are not fixed and obsolete." All levels and fixed things have vanished, and all holy things have been desecrated ... "and that is the real epoch-making change, the real subversion. The logical juxtaposition of the Internet with the Industrial Revolution (and, more precisely, the steam engine and electricity) is a bit exaggerated.

Management is not obsolete

It is related to the "scientific management and even management is outdated" and so on. To be an enterprise, says the company, relies on the strategy and organizes two legs. Strategy is like seizing the runway, and really running, relying on organizational ability. Early start, we take the main runway, the organization is not unimportant, but because the team is small, and entrepreneurial passion of support, the importance of the Organization has not yet been highlighted.

Enterprise development to a certain scale, if not pay attention to the organization, do not pay attention to management, the basic is from disorderly, suicidal. Group buying industry that year "Hundred Regiment War", how lively, why the last surviving is the United States Group net? See founder Wang in a share of "self-cultivation Zi ping World" to sum up their entrepreneurial experience, I think so. Everything has cause and effect, no one can casually succeed.

Not only does the organization implement the strategy, it can also support the strategy and even revise the strategy. The best example of a support strategy is diversification. Strategy in the study of pluralism, the last study, the real impact on the success of diversification may be organizational factors. The reason is simple, how strong you are, you can support a wide front. If you have a strong leadership development system like GE, you can be a counter example in all strategy classes that emphasize the importance of specialization.

Perhaps the best example of a revised strategy is Ali. I've always said that Ali's business as a business is perhaps the stupidest in the world. Buyer sellers through your platform to catch the line, after the start of trading, but also you this platform what? But because Ali strong organization and cultural system, they actually in the soldiers in the corner of the time to open up Taobao this Xinjiang soil, Taobao and then grow out Alipay, Ali Empire's entire embryonic form came out. In fact, business-to-business business, Taobao, Alipay business nature, key success factors and requirements of the organizational capabilities are completely different, they can be in Ali's big Hat under the peace, and the management know-how, the general people really difficult to glimpse its Dongo.

Recently, the sound of the larger Internet enterprises can be divided into two categories, one is flat organization, the other is the market network. The flattening of the organization includes the project system (amoeba, small micro, fission-type entrepreneurship, gaming, internal markets, special forces, etc. the network of the market, including some of the emerging only to do a certain segment of the value chain, such as marketing, research and development, relying on social division of labor, such as crowdsourcing, public chip, to achieve the overall operation of the enterprise From the academic theory, these two kinds of experiments are not much innovation.

First, the network of the market. The research literature of this kind (so-called Alliance study) from the 890 's, such as mountains, such as the sea, a variety of research samples, all kinds of research methods to the top, full of wonders, covering all the business models discussed now. The changes in the Internet age only further reduce the cost of transactions between the various market entities, the market network, Synergy, fragmentation of the extent of the increase, there is no intrinsic theoretical changes.

As for the flattening of the organization, from the day of management, the "Holy Grail" of all management researchers and practitioners (Holy Grail). Participatory management, high commitment system, high performance culture, workout (teamwork), Open-book management, and so on, the ever-changing, a variety of best practices, the pursuit of this "without a word, do the romantic" management realm. The difference is that the Internet provides better technical conditions for flat management, and flat management is more in line with the values of a new generation of young people growing up in the internet age.

One of the most vocal of these is the amoeba management (which includes similar logic of small micro, fission entrepreneurial, etc.), looks very beautiful, but in the realization of the small team's strong incentive, but often lost only a large team, the Division of labor, cooperation can earn the super profits, gain and loss phase right, whether cost-effective, but also to carefully weigh, Can not simply generalize (refer to the humble article "Integrated Management and Amoeba").

So, last summer, when Zhang came out to talk about the use of Internet thinking to subvert Taylor's scientific management, Weber's division system, the general management of the law Joel, caused a lot of controversy in the industry. The essence of Scientific management is specialization division of labor, the core of the system is subordinate to the Boss command, the essence of the general management is to plan before implementation, more than two people working together, these are necessary to use the coordination mechanism, how could it be said subversion on subversion? Some commentators note that when Zhang talk about internet thinking, the company's 2013-year report just came out, Haier's total profit of 6.2 billion, has been the United States of 7.3 billion and gree 10.8 billion more than. More thoughtful is that, according to media reports, the so-called "small micro-enterprises", "Independent business" launched, tens of thousands of employees choose to vote with their feet, leaving Haier. Afraid to say is subversive, the result is toss, profits so thin company, still can withstand how much toss?

It is said that recently Zhang to the western new ideas, new concepts more keen, the new book out, even Chinese version can not wait, to rob the first read. I hope all this is just their propaganda strategy, if so, a little bit of the end. If you can not do a good job for the staff, so that employees identify with the enterprise, the concept of good is just empty talk ah. A company in the traditional consumer goods industry, such a leadership style, the prospect does let the human being worried. I have half jokingly said that a company's profit thickness, and the boss pouch thickness, often inversely proportional. Personal ability is too strong, the boss who likes to rush ahead in the first place, must solve is to learn how to do an empowering style (enabling) rather than the leadership of the heroic. "It's harder to change yourself than to change the world," Mandela said. "This kind of self subversion, its difficulty is no less than the subversion of an enterprise business model."

Subversive innovation is not an innovation

Christensen 1997, the concept of subversive innovation, in the academic position is not high. The earliest, clearest, most comprehensive, and most practical of the questions was not in line with him (referring to the humble text "Why Nokia Failed"). Largely because of the unique platform of HBS, he has gained a disproportionate influence in the practical world, especially in China's practice world. The bigger problem is that all these research on disruptive innovation can't tell you how to achieve disruptive innovation, and their biggest role may be to reduce the likelihood that the current industry leader (incumbents) is subverted by new technology. In addition, they can do as ordinary people, just after every subversive innovation, pointing to the body on the ground said, look, subversive innovation!

Prone to subversion, like the 20th century revolution, in fact, or to cater to the old habits of the Chinese people: impetuous, short-sighted, tricky, always want to find a trick, secret, shortcut, an enemy, overnight, once and for all, and refused to solid down to the heart, in the management of enterprises and their own leadership in the promotion of the above some hard work Stupid kung Fu and slow Kung fu. In the early 90 's, the Chinese business community is the most active is a group of so-called "idea Company", and later is the life insurance industry, MLM industry out of a group of successful master, Hawking is in fact similar to the real thing. Unfortunately, relying on ideas to get rich only master ideas, relying on success only successful learning master, shouting subversive innovation, the most want to subvert may be your wallet. It's better for everyone to be more careful.

Another point of view is the social structure of China. Over the past more than 10 years, China's social stratum structure has gradually solidified trend, poor again difficult to come out of your son, like the early 80 's batch of college graduates such career development opportunities and upward mobility (upward adroit), after the generation, the year to dare not think. These forums, whenever control the majority of China today's society, most of the political, economic, academic resources, and even further intensified, even the girlfriend to come and the generation, the son of a Rob, transposition thinking, young people are really feeling why (tea event as a solution). Their bitter experience, the pursuit of entrepreneurship, the pursuit of mobile internet, should also be a way to escape and struggle. Although entrepreneurship has always been a millions, not the fundamental solution to these deep-seated social problems, but since there are so many investors willing to follow up, they at least from the tyrants of the pot to a piece of soup.

I was quite hesitant to write this article. From a selfish point of view, of course, I would like to be the kid who shouted "Wolf".

On the one hand, graceful body, beautiful posture, on the other hand, there are rivers and lakes in the so-called "knock pot Method": iron cracked a small seam, tinker pot to take over, apart, when, when, even knock a few, and then show you, this seam crack is big enough, is not to give more silver? What's more, even a broken alarm clock, there are two points of time every day is correct. The crisis has not come, everybody when is the false alarm, laugh off; When you say it, you become famous overnight, becoming the great God to predict what crisis exactly.

But from a theoretical point of view, I can not forget the shouting "The Emperor did not dress" child. The Internet and mobile internet change the way people connect, to China's future political, social and economic trends will have far-reaching impact, but for most of the competitive industries of traditional enterprises, the fundamentals may not be what happened to change radically. If you do not want to change careers or retire for the time being, what they have to do is to really work hard to improve their own business and management level, improve customer products and service experience, excellence, perfection. In this process, the most important thing is, do the boss to amending, efforts to change the mentality, Gan man ladder, willing to "flooring", bravely put the company and the internet to grow up young people pushed to the front, let them go surfing, to meet this wave after wave of new technology wave. Compared to the roamed, chasing a bunch of eight pole not hit the entrepreneurial child to invest, the probability of success, or to a higher point?!