Business

For one chairman, talk of 'team' isn't a game

By Zhao Yanrong (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-11-19 10:59

DONGYANG, Zhejiang - As Chinese basketball fans wait in anticipation to see if former NBA player Rafer Alston signs with the Guangsha Zhejiang Lions of the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA), very few know the 36-year-old man behind the scenes working to recruit Alston for a spot on the CBA team.

Even fewer know that the man, Lou Ming, as of August the new chairman of Guangsha Holdings, a property developer with total assets of 23 billion yuan ($3.45 billion), is a massive basketball fan and recreational player whose managerial style of both the CBA's Lions and his corporation mirrors his style of play on the blacktop.

"On the court, he is a good basketball player and team leader," said Cao Wenyuan, director of administration for Guangsha Holdings. "In our business, he has a clear thought of the company's development."

Modishly stylish with a brown T-shirt and a pair of black trousers, Lou is typically casual in a world of stuffy corporate managers. Not many managers after all, can talk about the benefits of playing basketball and how it translates into running a company.

"Playing basketball is teamwork, which is important for a company," Lou said. "The team spirit is also the core value of our enterprise culture."

His favorite position on the court is, of course, the point guard spot, the position in charge of running both the defense and offense. He said he fell in love with the sport during his service for the People's Liberation Army after high school. After Guangsha Holdings purchased the CBA's Guangsha Zhejiang Lions in 2005, Lou immediately thought like a point guard and looked for a transition. He began thinking bigger, about the NBA.

He set up a private meeting with Houston Rockets' center Yao Ming in February. Lou said that Yao has the kind of connections and resources in the NBA that he needs to find a foothold in the league, perhaps through investments.

"When I am prepared for it, I will invest in the NBA, like Huang Jianhua (who actually failed in his attempt to invest in the NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers) did," Lou said.

But managing Guangsha Holdings, which was established 26 years ago by Lou's father, has been at times much more difficult than playing a sport, Lou said.

As the eldest son, Lou accepted the chairman's post from his father about four month ago. The young chairman said he is cooperating with many of the senior managers, who worked with his father for Guangsha. "I do respect them," Lou said.

But Lou is an innovative manager, just as he is creative on the court. As chairman, Lou has hashed out a different plan for the company's future, which has thus far not sat well with some of the senior members.

"I prefer to have more new ideas in the team, and I will try to convince them until they accept my ideas," Lou said. The young man even visited their houses to get them on board. He said he prefers to have every member envision his ideas for development.

During the past decade, Guangsha Holdings' total assets have increased more than 30 percent annually, according to the company. They have had their hands in almost every major city in China, such as the St. Regis Hotel, which United States President Barack Obama stayed at during his visit to Beijing last year.

When Guangsha was founded in the early 1990s, Lou's father aimed high and looked to expand. But after the younger Lou took his seat as chairman, he broke away from the company's philosophy. He wasn't eager to expand and instead invested in human resources for the first three months as chairman.

"Only if the company exists for a longer time, Guangsha will have more opportunities to be fully developed and to be more competitive," he said.

He has also reworked the company's regulations, visiting many of the former State-owned factories in Zhejiang province that the company bought up during the past two decades.

He visited all of the company's branches in the province and planned a series of reforms for the firm's salary and accounting system.

"I have not done any personnel changes in the past three months yet. But when my transparent accounting system comes out, I will make sure it works for every department of the company," Lou said.

Besides construction and real estate, Guangsha is also investing in the energy industry and financial sectors. The company has spent just less than 1 billion yuan on an oil storage and transport program on the Huangzeshan Island in Zhejiang.

Lou said the company's future lies with the biggest economy in the world.

"We recently set up an office in the US and we plan to start with oil and other energy products in short time," he said.

Asked if he had the ability to run the company and the team, Lou was confident.

"My father believes that I am capable of running the company, and I have the confidence on myself too," he said.

Spoken like a true point guard.

China Daily