People

Nick Yang: Chinese Pride in the Present Tense

Published: May 10, 2007

By Rachel Sussman

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He may have spent half his youth and his university days in Michigan, U.S.A. But Nick Yang(杨宁) is thoroughly Chinese in both heart and mind. "Although I hold a U.S. passport, I still feel I'm very Chinese," he firmly asserts, a statement very much in keeping with the theme of our meeting. "No matter which nationality you are, [the culture that you identify with] is really in your roots; it's who you are." And from moment one, I can see in exactly which ground his roots are planted. With a fervent passion for Chinese language, history, and philosophy, Nick Yang – co-founder and president of KongZhong Corporation(空中网集团), a leading Chinese provider of wireless value-added services – adheres to what he terms a "very 'Asian' way of thinking."
 
En route to my meeting with Nick, I navigated the 35 th floor of the uniquely striking tower housing KongZhong's Beijing headquarters feeling no apprehension, no anxiety. As a Westerner, I deemed this a strange sensation, considering the setting. KongZhong's work environment lacked the intimidating corporate culture one would expect at the heart of a multi-million dollar operation. But as I would soon learn, there is a logical explanation for it all. My personal inability to reconcile KongZhong's power and prestige with its approachable atmosphere stems from a phenomenon well beyond the purview of KongZhong: the East-West corporate culture gap.
 
First things first – the purpose of a corporation, no matter its location, is to create a product or service and ensure it gets to customers. This much we know. But the hierarchical structure of loyalty upon which Chinese society is based, and which inevitably carries over into the corporate sector, reads nothing like Western values would dictate. China's business culture is not "Westernized," no matter China's advanced pace of development and international economic integration. Remember that old adage, "the customer is always right"? To that sentiment, Nick cracks a wide smile and a hearty laugh. "But the customer might not be right; the employees might be right!" he quips, laughing again. "In China," he continues, "[the companies] care about employees' well-being. They care about the team; they care about people inside the organization. Customers? Don't worry about customers."
 
Perhaps this is the cool response of a man thriving amidst the world's highest annual growth rate and market demand that consistently exceeds supply. In a country of 1.3 billion people and growing, who could blame him for his ease of mind? Nick isn't even aiming at international markets, at least not yet. 
 
"China is the fastest growing market in the world. We're here and we have lots of space to grow. I don't think I need to think globally yet. When I'm running out of room then I'll think globally. When the GDP is growing in double digits every year, I don't need to worry about my growth rate." He makes a good point. And despite his stature in the organization and his desire to promote his company's cause, we spend surprisingly little time talking shop. Yang is much more excited to share his knowledge of Chinese literature and philosophy than of technology or finance.
 
We swap stories of道理 (dàoli) gone awry. Dàoli, meaning "order" or "reasoning," governs a society according to the type of logic that society employs. "The Western philosophy only cares about [if things] make sense in law. It doesn't care to make sense in emotion or to make sense in the order of things." Governing by emotions is much more prevalent in society, exemplified by Nick's distaste for the procedural workings of the American legal system. "They might acquit a murderer because he or she didn't get read the Miranda rights!" In the United States, we hear that cry loudly and often. However, the U.S. legal system is often defended on the grounds that it is better to acquit a guilty party than convict an innocent one, a response Yang writes off as "ridiculous."

"If a woman gets beaten up by her husband for so many years and she kills him, she would not be acquitted [in the West]. She would be sentenced and that's working along with the order of law. But in China, we work in the order of emotions." Emphasizing the uniqueness of certain situations, he goes on, "she would get a light sentence because in the order of emotions the people feel that she was not doing something wrong." Bureaucratic hands in China are not tied so tightly, and with less rigidity – Nick insists – comes a closer-knit society built on empathy rather than isolation. 

But in Nick Yang's eyes, more harmful than the West's misguided focus on the logic of law is the pattern of Western ascendancy over Chinese culture on his nation's own soil. "In China, for a hundred years, people believed that everything foreign is good and that Chinese stuff is not…S elf-confidence was missing for a hundred years and it's only gradually coming back." He and I joke about Chinese companies fraudulently claiming European origins to boost sales and credibility. But underlying our humor is a sort of tenderness – one that can only emerge from the pain that this proud nation has suffered at the hands of external hegemony and internal disorder.
 
But Nick is optimistic: the way that national pride matures, "[is] all based upon whether your country is a strong country or a weak country. So I think with China, becoming stronger globally will really reflect on everybody." And in the years to come, this reflection seems geared to intensify, beckoning the world to stand at attention and renewing the strength which has these hundred years eluded China's grasp.
 
And KongZhong, Nick prods, will be along for the ride. "I truly believe the internet is changing the world. Wireless internet will be even more pervasive. It will be an extension of your brain, of your arm. I believe that I'm doing something very, very noble. It sounds very quaint, but I want to change the world." And for change? The world is ready.
 
Nick Yang's advice for new entrepreneurs:
 
1) "In Art of War by Sun Tzu it says: 'know yourself, know your enemy, and you can win a hundred battles.' 'Yourself' is yourself, and 'the enemy' is the market. You're fighting against the market. But the first thing you have to know is to know yourself, before you know the enemy. The market might be great, but that might not be for you. So, know which market is designed for you, what your strengths and weaknesses are, [and] what your skills are. Look inward before you look outward."
 
2) The Lowest Hanging Fruit Theory: "When you're first starting out take the lowest hanging fruit. Find a tree, but don't aim for the biggest fruit on the tree because if you climb up the tree, you might fall and land flat on your face and you might die. The lowest hanging fruit - pick it. It might not look good, it might be with worms or whatever. It's not the greatest fruit, it's not the biggest fruit, but it is fruit you can reach."

 3) The KISS principle: "Keep it simple, stupid. So your model should be very simple, very understandable, don't pull something complicated. When you have a lot of partners, if one guy messes up/falls of the chain you're done with."

空中网集团  /  kōng zhōng wǎng jí tuán /  KongZhong Corporation 空中网:a leading Chinese provider of wireless value-added services  [http://www.kongzhong.com]

 

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