Zhou Ying was born in Sanyuan County, Shaanxi Province. It is said that she was talented and entered a big Wu family in Wubao, Jingzhou, and married Wu Pin, the owner of the Wu family. Later, her husband and father-in-law died one after another, and the Wu family gradually declined. She went through hardships and established the Wu family's "business empire" in Shaanxi, becoming the only successful businesswoman at that time. Zhou Ying didn't remarry. She worked hard in business all her life, leaving many legends. Her righteous act of helping others and forward-looking business philosophy are still widely praised by local people.
Zhou Ying got married at the age of 17 in Wu An Fort, Wu 'an Town, Jingyang County. Only one year after marriage, my father-in-law was killed and my husband died of illness. In the face of shopkeepers embezzling assets and intrigue within the family, she was ordered to take charge of the family. With extraordinary wisdom, she successfully resolved the family business crisis, turned a commercial building that was about to collapse into a commercial empire, and created a stirring myth of "Qin Shang".
Take charge of the family business at a critical moment.
Qin merchants, also known as Shaanxi merchants, are regarded as the earliest commercial gangs in China according to their geographical affinity. The well-known words in history, such as "Silk Road", "tea and horses occupy the road" and "going to the Western Ocean", all come from Qin merchants and can be said to be "living fossils" of China's traditional commercial culture.
Zhou Ying is a legendary figure in a generation of Qin merchants. She was born in 1869, when she was in Tongzhi for nine years. After two Opium Wars, the Qing government has revealed the ruin and desolation of the last days. The turmoil of the current situation has also brought about changes in thinking. In the past, the tradition of "emphasizing agriculture and restraining business" was challenged, and businessmen became active groups in society.
His father's name is Zhou, and Zhou's family is also the home of wealthy businessmen in the local area. /kloc-at the age of 0/7, Zhou Ying married Wu Pin, the only son of Wu Weiwen, the richest man in Jingyang County, and they were suitable for each other. Wu Weiwen is not only an official in North Korea, but also a famous salt merchant, who undertakes salt monopoly in Jiangsu, Anhui and Jiangxi provinces. He is a red-crowned crane merchant of Hu Xueyan's contemporaries.
Marrying into the Wu family is the envy of everyone, but I don't know that her husband is seriously ill. Wu Weiwen deliberately concealed his son's illness and wanted to break up the "white tiger fierce star" through the wedding "red dragonfly according to life".
On the wedding day, Wu Pin confessed his illness: "I lived for 18 years and drank 18 years of bitter soup. I know my life is on thin ice, on thin ice. If Miss Wu Pin doesn't want to be Qin Jin, I am willing to open the door of the back garden and send her back to Mengdian Village to escape marriage. "
Although Zhou Ying was both surprised and angry, years of family education soon calmed her down: "Today, I went to the bridal chamber with" xianggong ".I, Zhou Ying, am your married wife. Today, I am very happy. I hope that "xianggong" can be cautious in spirit in the words of Wanli, and Zhou Ying and I will hold up the car of fate together ... "
Who knows that fate likes to play tricks on people, and the happiness after marriage is soon broken. Soon after, my father-in-law was killed, my husband died of illness, and the Wu family gradually declined. Because the Wu family has no male heir, the Wu Zhou family has become the only heir of the Wu family.
In the turbulent society of the late Qing Dynasty, it takes a lot of courage for a woman to stand in the public market. But she resolutely took responsibility. At that time, the Wu family still had many businesses, shops and capital. With the support of original capital, there are dozens of capable people around her, especially Luo Tianzeng, Yang, Wang Younong, general managers of Yangzhou, who are resourceful and well managed.
In order to maintain the operation of Wu family's business capital, such as shops, land and real estate, she showed amazing business talent. Her drastic reform is unprecedented, and many commercial laws still give us great inspiration.
Become the leader of Qin merchants
She was only 18 years old when she became the head of the company. After taking over Wu's business, she first began to inspect her business map all over the country.
At that time, the supervisor of Chuanhua grocery store in mountain products and Yangzhou, who supported half of Wu's business, both wanted to take advantage of the death of their old club and take the business for themselves. After she knew it, she secretly investigated and got a lot of evidence. In the process of confrontation with the two main managers, the mountain of irrefutable evidence and the strict righteousness of benevolence, righteousness, propriety and wisdom made the two supervisors lose ground.
In the struggle with Li Hongtu, general manager of Chuanhua Company, Zhou Ying showed her public relations ability to cope with the crisis. First of all, she broke the rumor that Li Hongtu "Wu Weiwen sent him the total number of Sichuan flowers"; Secondly, the government office of relevant officials was set up in Chengdu, Sichuan Province. Completely defeated Li Hongtu from the standpoint of morality and law, and made him lose the hearts of the people. Later, this honest guy was promoted to the management of the company by her.
Liu once said that the core of company management is to manage people, and the core of managing people is how to select people, how to employ people, how to keep people, how to prevent "big enterprise diseases", ensure the smooth flow of information, and reduce departmental disputes.
The same is true of ancient management. Zhou Ying is proficient in personnel management. In order to stabilize people's hearts, she implemented the principle of "obeying the yin and the yang", giving employees a 20% salary increase and increasing the year-end bonus. When all the staff in Yulongquan get a 20% salary increase, their salary is 30% higher than the minimum annual salary in Yangzhou business community. Together with the annual dividend, the salary of Yulongquan employees is superior among peers in the south of the Yangtze River.
This decision links the income of employees with the interests of stores, and now the income distribution of most enterprises is similar. This kind of equity incentive system, which is close to modern enterprise management, has greatly mobilized the enthusiasm of shop assistants. As a result, the business of "Yulongquan" has not been damaged because of the change of owners, but is thriving.
Because of Zhou Ying's strong personality, many talents are willing to follow her, which is also the premise for her to brainstorm and quickly grasp the market operation. She regards them as brothers and sisters and the housekeeper as brothers and sisters. She is more grateful to those extremely talented people who have been following her, not only for the family, but also for their education.
Nowadays, many enterprises attach importance to employee relations, and Zhou Ying is undoubtedly the pioneer in establishing employee relations.
The land problem has always been the key to China's "three rural issues" and the core of rural economy. Zhou Ying, deeply aware of the importance of land to farmers, began a drastic reform: returning farmland to rent, reducing rent, and taking responsibility for its own profits and losses, which will remain unchanged for 20 years. She distributed the land she managed to tenant farmers and cultivated it almost free of charge, because the agricultural economy at that time could only support the family, and the more promising was the commercial economy. Since then, she has won the support of the villagers.
The secret of making her truly the richest man is the application of the laws of market economy. Before China's concept of market economy appeared, she knew that she should play cards according to market rules. At that time, the Wu family's industries involved cotton, oil mills, wineries, grain shops, rice shops, cloth, etc ... The prices of many products fluctuated according to market rules. One autumn, cotton got a bumper harvest. However, the cotton merchants in Guanzhong wanted to take the opportunity to bargain, causing dissatisfaction among cotton farmers, and some cotton farmers simply stopped selling.
She proposed "making amends with abundance" and bought cotton at a price higher than the market price, resulting in a monopoly in the cotton industry. The leaders of Xi 'an cotton industry had to turn to Zhou Ying for help because they could not supply customers, so they had to buy cotton from Zhou Ying at a high price. The following year, the cotton crop failed, and Zhou Ying beat other countries because of the cotton reserves of the previous year. In seven years, she went from importing and exporting 3,000 tons of cotton every year to purchasing more than 1 1000 tons of cotton a year, from a small fight to a large cotton merchant in Guanzhong area.
She has many advantages that many businessmen don't have: attaching importance to honesty, being good at employing people, being good at sizing up the situation, seeking innovation and change, and even transnational. She studied advanced science and technology and bought more advanced machinery and equipment and textile fabrics that were not available in China. Later, it was exported to Europe and the United States through cruise ships, and the commercial map of the Wu family extended overseas under her operation!
As a businesswoman in the late Qing Dynasty, she was able to find business opportunities again and again in the turbulent and chaotic situation, which was enough to make her a leader of Qin merchants!
Win the respect of businessmen
The relationship between Zhou Ying and Empress Dowager Cixi is the most concerned topic in her life.
1900, when Cixi took refuge in xi 'an, Zhou Ying provided Cixi with 65,438+102,000 silver. Cixi personally inscribed the plaque "Mrs. Protecting the Country" and accepted her as an adopted daughter. After the signing of the "Xin Chou Treaty", she paid tribute to the Qing government and went to the national disaster together, and was named "the imperial edict of Mrs. Yipin". Cixi hit it off with her at first sight, not only because she donated money, but also because they were widows and they had a foothold in the male power circle.
She not only gave generously in times of national crisis, but also did charity for the village. Because of this, she has won unparalleled popularity and reputation among society, business circles and ordinary people.
Building water conservancy, running education, building Confucian temples and helping the army to make a sound have made her a well-known "businesswoman" in Guanzhong area. Due to war and natural disasters, a large number of hungry people appeared in Guanzhong area. Zhou Ying decided to open a warehouse to release food and set up a porridge factory to help the victims. She opened a porridge factory in the disaster area of Guanzhong, and let Jingyang, Chunhua, Sanyuan, Pucheng and Fuping rice shops open warehouses to release grain and distribute it to poor families around. Jingyang County and Sanyuan County specially recorded her charity in the county annals.
In fact, at that time, there were different opinions on handing over money to the government in China, but Zhou Ying's view of home and country was simple: "When the court is gone, the country is gone, and the home is gone."
Before her death, she divided the property she earned and left some money to rebuild Zheng Baiqu in the future. However, after a long war and absurd political struggle, rebuilding Zhengbaiqu became her unfulfilled wish, and the treasure used to repair the canal disappeared with her death.
Zhou Ying/kloc-widowed at the age of 0/8, died at the age of 42. In just 24 spring and autumn periods, he successfully reversed the declining trend of Wu's commerce, won the respect of the world, and won an unparalleled reputation for himself.
People call her a "living bodhisattva" because she has done many good things, such as building a Confucius temple, running a charity school, opening a warehouse to release grain, sending porridge to help the victims, donating money to dig wells, and diverting water to repair canals.
When she walked through a bumpy and legendary life, she could not help but make future generations respect.
"Honesty is not fraud, self-discipline. Learn wisdom, do business for the country, have plenty of food and clothing, and eat with servants on the fifteenth day of the first month ... "Every article is a great inspiration to company managers.
"When the vertebra is buried, it will tilt with the passage of time, and the change is general." Her success is not only to build a commercial building that is about to close down into a commercial empire, but also to spread her business all over the country. More importantly, in the traditional concept of businessmen seeking profits, she won unparalleled respect for herself and the merchant group with her business wisdom.