From workplace tragedy to family business leadership in China

¶ … international students. My family wanted me to study in the United States to receive the best education. I worked hard to get into an American school and to get the most out of my American education. However, my goal is to apply my education to improve my family's business in China. I have always believed that I will be the one to keep my family's business competitive, anticipate the risks that face our company, and bring the company into the future. The education I have received so far has showed me how challenging these goals will be, but I am confident that I can succeed. My personal history shows how I came to this point of determination in knowing that I would lead my family's company.

I was born into an entrepreneurial family, in which my grandfather taught his business to my father, and my father intends to pass the company down to me. My family's business is in building materials. I know everything there is to know about the company, from its supply chain and inventory to its human resources and accounting concerns. Being raised in a business family is the best training there is, and I know I am lucky to have had this unique opportunity. There is no substitute for the kind of learning that can be acquired since childhood, in which all aspects of the business have become second nature.

However, I have had a few experiences that showed me the importance of formal education and training in business leadership, management, and finance. One is probably the most traumatic experience that has happened to our company in my memory, in which one of our employees died on shift due to a workplace accident. At the time, I was young and simply reactive emotionally to the death. Soon after it happened, though, I became aware of the procedural and structural causes of the accident. Without blaming my father, I understood that management needed to take responsibility for accidents that occur on our floors. We had to train our workers better, and we were not doing all we could to ensure safety standards were being met. It was not the fault of the workers that this accident happened, because the workers did not know about proper procedure.

While I was learning about management, organizational behavior, and other business concepts in school, it occurred to me that the accident in our factory was preventable, and I became more determined than ever to play a major role in transforming our company by improving its safety record as well as our record with sales and productivity. For a while, this became my passion. Specifically, I became interested in ways our company could use proven methods of training workers. I have already spoken with my father about what I have learned, and am encouraging him to take other steps to improve the company's organizational culture and structure. These types of changes can be difficult for a Chinese company, but with strong leadership, I am certain that I can help implement improvements.

The more I studied the different elements of business as an undergraduate student, the more I realized that it was really finance that attracted me the most on a personal level. I have been focusing on finance in my undergraduate career, including internships with the Bank of China and several in-depth projects involving financial analyses of companies like Boeing. Working with classmates on these projects gave me a taste of what my future will be like in a team of other members of an organization who are dedicated to reaching the same goals. I also became a member of the Student Finance Association. Finance is my area of interest, although I still view myself as being capable of also improving operational strategies and procedures in my father's company. Now I understand what to look for in a diverse management team.