Here is some note I took away from the reading. You should definitely read it too, by yourself.

According to Ben, he thinks the CEOs should do two things:

• Does the CEO know what to do?
  
• Can the CEO get the company do what he knows?

First one

About the first one, "Does the CEO knows what to do?", Ben suggested "One should interpret this question as broadly as possible". Basically, it is like: CEO needs to know everything. Don't laugh. It is actually very true. The CEO has to have insights of many things, from the office arrangement, to hiring, to marketing, to technology, to finance. Knowing what to do is about consistently keeping thinking about what's behind the surface. It is tough, but ... exciting.

In particular, the story - the question "Why"...

The other interesting part about know what to do is to make decisions. What Ben contributed in this idea is to clearly point out that CEO needs to make decisions with very limited information, always! The expectation to understand more about it is just not realistic. That actually gave me great relief about the situation I am in.

Second One

The second one is about getting the company do what he knows.

It turned out to be organizational capacity, get things done culture, quality of hiring, and the work environment. It is not surprising that Ben mentioned the Netflix culture building slides.

For Baixing, as a company with 50+ full time employees, we tried very hard to build a great company, and with great result. We are trying so hard to make sure the people are the core of the organization, and build the culture to help people to perform within it. It takes years of experience to get it...

The interesting part of life is to set traditions. We now have a new tradition: to meet quarterly within the community of Internet entrepreneurs in Shanghai. Here is the first gather:

They are the CEO of dianping.com, , 61.com, 51.com, pptv.com, jjdd.com, some of the most important internet websites in China.

Beautiful Life

Alan de Botton is really my favorite writer. I am re-reading his "Consolation of Philosophy", and it inspired me a lot. On Consolation of Lack of Money, he wisely quoted Epicure about the natural and necessary needs of human. It turned out that those does not cost a lot of money, like running, is natural and necessary, while expensive houses and fame are not. We really need to switch the paradigm of this world.

Mileage of Running

I tend of enjoy accumulating mileage of many interesting programs - United Mileage Plus, or HHonors... But nothing is comparable to the feeling of accumulating calorie burns. I started to run about 3-5 km per day or walk the same distance. It turned out to be very exciting experience. Thanks to Nike Plus that help me to record that, and accumulate.

Other Learning

Controlling the scope of a project, or a meeting is one of the most critical part of success. We continued to recall some of the most important principles in project management.

Time to sleep.

It turned out that the Pudong IKEA store is exactly 500 calories away from my home. That means, if I want to increase 33% calorie burn, or get rid of what I got from a dinner, I should just decide to visit IKEA.

A Joke

I finally understood why a typical dinner in Shanghai cost 20 RMB and a taxi ride for 6 km also cost 20 RMB - because it takes 20 RMB worth of calorie to walk over 6 km, or you can choose to take taxi - the cost and the result are the same.

I also understand why IKEA sells ice-cream at as low as 1 RMB - because it takes 90 calories to walk through the IKEA store, and that is basically what the ice-cream compensate for - 90 cal for a typical ice-cream.

• Why We Prefer Founding CEOs
• When Smart People are Bad Employees
• Microsoft Buys Skype
• How Andreessen Horowitz Evaluates CEOs
• How to Minimize Politics in Your Company
• Peacetime CEO/Wartime CEO
• Nobody Cares
• What’s The Most Difficult CEO Skill? Managing Your Own Psychology
• Taking the Mystery out of Scaling a Company
• Four Things Some VCs Do That I Don't Like
• Why Startups Should Train Their People

P.S. John Morgidge, CEO cisco, once said

If you can’t see your car from your hotel room, then you are paying too much.

Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn once said: “If you are not embar- rassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.”

Let me put a little context to what Reid Hoffman said.

That means, it has to be 1) very easy to release. 2) very easy to change, 3) free to try out.

You cannot use the philosophy on hardware product (Well, I am still thinking about the iPhone 1.0 case), and you cannot use it on something too expensive to try. Image you asked your user to buy a $1000 product that is really not ready, and you expect the customers to buy it again few months later. (Well, iPhone 1.0 case?)

I am still thinking about the other context Reid Hoffman didn't tell in the simple sentence.

Here is the link:

Video Like: http://vimeo.com/19443634
Slide: http://www.slideshare.net/LuisFelipeFernandes/innovation-at-google

We setup Sonos system at home. Good speaker with an iPhone type of system in it.

And Wendy fell in love with the new Kindle.

Hmmm.

It is pretty handy to get back to Wendy's home town Nanyang from Shanghai. Along the way, we started from G42 and went across G15 and G2 in Shanghai, G25 and G3 in Nanjing, G35 in the middle of no where and G45 near east of Xinyang, G4 at Xinyang and finally G55 in Nanyang. That is basically the traverse of the China National Highway System.

This shows the benefit of consistent naming convention. You just need to follow on route to get to somewhere far away. Just keep driving and driving.

It also replace the original G312, just as I-40 replaced US66, the story Cars was telling. We have the same feeling. The exit to G313 was everywhere along the road. G312 goes right across the towns while G40 just bypass them.

Here is the question: why we love hotels?

It is empty. There are drawers but nothing in it. There are enumertable number of items even in the washroom: soap, shampoo, lotion, tooth brush. There are desks, but basically nothing is readable on it. There are TV - yes. If they remove the TV, it can bring more sense of emptiness.

Emptiness brings peace in mind. There are so little options and you put all the pressure above a solid umbrella: I am travelling and I cannot do things. I am at hotel!

The emptiness, to an extend of boredom and loneliness is a perfect emotional status for our busy life.

Besides emptiness, it also provide cleanness. Even the most picky full time housewife cannot create the cleanness comparable to hotels. The towels are always folded as a flower and the cups are always covered with a nice while paper cover. Everything is in order - at least at the moment when you step into the room.

Understanding the reason, we actually have the hope to recreate the experience somewhere and some time in the other part of our lives.

PS: one problem - a mobile or iPad will completely destroy the wonderful status.

I want my readers to know the news, and if you want a meet up, please drop an email to me at jianshuo at hotmail.com

P.S. It is OK not to speak Cantonese.... :)

Finally, one of the three very similar Chinese IT bloggers got into the same photo, for the first time. It is also my first time to meet Yifeng in person.

Regional Culture Shock

China is large, and China differs a lot from region to region. The recent trip to Xi'an is pretty shocking in some ways - how people see entrepreneurs, and how people value their fixed income jobs - very different from Shanghai.

China is as big as an Europe, and the diversity is maybe at least as big as the european countries. There is no such a thing called China. It consists of so many provinces. The place I grew up - Luoyang, is very different with, even the neighboring cities, no to mention the cross province contrast.

System Culture Shock

What system means? It is the government and the party system. It is a very strong system with a very strong culture. I was completely shocked from time to time when I deal with the system. Something we care, they don't. Something we don't care, they care a lot.

For example, I was consistently educated by the government guys when we meet. They told me I should bring a notebook, and the book I brought the second time is too small to show respect. They complained the table to host the government guys were too small, and claimed that we should have the budget to buy bigger tables. Things like this.

Culture Shock is Normal

The more I see this world, the more I understand that culture shock is just part of this universe. Even in the relatively more melted culture like Silicon Valley, the culture shock between relatively very similar companies in the same industry is big enough - look at current Yahoo! v.s. Google v.s. Facebook v.s. Twitter - they are so different and I assume people transiting from one company can find it hard to fit into the other.

The nature of culture shock is really about finding people in another company/society/system/group sing highly of something that you hate, and try to kill many things you value...

This can be universal, and long lasting.

Here are some random notes of today. (As Paul suggested, some times to spend time to record the random note is helpful to relax, and get more unstructured inspiration. I added, the other way to do that is just to draw - follow what you see, and don't care what is drawn on the paper).

Shanghai is raining today. I drove from SJTU to BEA Tower at Lujiazui. Shanghai's traffic is generally bad, and it causes delay, but it is still reasonable, most of the time. A lot of times, things changes faster than you imagine, and I cannot believe Shanghai's traffic is still under control these days.

Cross Industry Knowledges

Photo by Ron Xu

I am a strong believer of vision and inspiration. To be able to be visionary, you have to consistently look beyond what is already in your landscape by listening to people who are out of your knowledge. This cross-country, and cross-industry in-depth event helps me to understand more about something I completely have no idea.

My friends are so kind of guide me to their world, and help me to understand. The key of this mentorship is, they are not just someone who is from that field, they are actually one of the best in their field.

I just cannot miss the chance

• to learn how to conduct an orchestra from the director of Lincoln Center in New York, or
  
• to learn how space shuttle works from an astronaut who are back from the space, or
  
• to learn architect from the famous architect of many landmark buildings in New York, or
• how military works from someone who is controlling the air force of US army in Iraq (How Matt twists the plane to escape from missiles was so funny), or
  
• what the north korea things are all about from the person who lead the negotiation from White House… or
  
• Ballet - yes, Ballet, from the top ballet dancer Jeremy!

The list goes on and on and on. More interestingly, most of the talks happened not in the conference room. They were the side conversation when we were bored on a bus, or walked in the dark night under the splendid stars, or at the mountains in the middle of nowhere. That experience was so unique, and precious.

Share and Learn the Personal Experience

Photo by Ron Xu

Beside the cross industry learning, the more meaningful thing is sharing of personal experiences. People were selected into the program from 10 years ago when they were under 40. Now, they have been mature enough to experience the key moments in life - ups and downs, and how they handle the criss also gave me great power. (Obviously I will keep strictly confidential about that part, which is so private to each of us). Things like religions, Buddha stories, how to mediate, and to things of how to schedule trips, or just some piece in the history, are talked. Big or small, they were so helpful. I believe there must be a reason for this group of people to archive what they have archived. To learn from that is also a meaningful experience.

Friendship

Photo by Ron Xu

Last but not least (actually it is the most), it is the personal connection - the friendship. I am committed to do whatever I can do to help my YLF friends I know because of the many things I received. Just like Paul repeatedly gave behind-the-scene tours to YLFers to White House, Mark helped the Chenggang to bring the wedding ring to the space and back (of cause), Kebo were kind enough to sponsor group activities including flight tickets, people have the natural tie, just like a family. This friendship fostered deep engagement after the conference ends. We have people marry each other (Mark and Gaby), investment in each other, work for each other. Just like Steven Jobs mentioned in the Stanford commencement, a forum of 24 people started 10 years ago is just one dot, and the dots got connected in the future. Looking forward, you cannot understand how the dots were connected. It is obvious only when looking backward.

At the end, I felt I made a wonderful choice to come here. There is no short term return on events like this, but it has so long time impact to my life. We really need to set apart time to work on some long term things, and we should be generous enough to invest in ourselves to be a more capable, more connected people.

End of my Travel Season

There are time in a year that we travels a lot. I visited Europe, and then US, and Xi'an. It is too much of travel, and I have a lot of things to do. So, after the YLF trip of today, I officially claim the end of my travel season this year. I will avoid future travel by the end of this years, unless it is absolutely necessary. You will be able to find me in Shanghai.

Music is Universal, Dance is, but Popular Songs are Not

This is my observation of this interesting event. The music is universal. When the music started, no matter it was Chinese or English song, people just started to get excited and swung, and danced with it. That is the mutual bounding between the people. We never feel we share the same humanity as much as when we are dancing with the same music.

However, there IS some major difference about the song itself. When the songs like 铁血丹心 of 射雕英雄传 was played, it suddenly became an express time traveling train to take me back to the 1980s when we were in middle school and all the memories of the middle school came out, with some details like the faces of my schoolmates. I believe the American must feel the same when the 1970's or 1980's American song were played.

Songs are not just songs for us. They are memories, and they are the real time capsule that preserve the feelings of our early time. Playing a song of 20 years ago is just to open the time capsule and release the old memories. People of similar age will share that feeling.

Unfortunately, that feeling is not easily shared by Chinese and American. I have no idea about many songs American picked. Well. There are some common songs, like Michael Jackson's, however, I don't know even the same song brings the same cultural feeling for people cross the ocean.

Photo Taken by Ron Xu. Note: Please let me know if anyone feel I should remove this photo

Songs at Childhood Makes the Gap between First Generation Immigrant Parents and their Children

I discussed with Sam Wang several years ago about the challenges first generation immigrants face about their children. The key gap between the parents and the native born kids are, the kids grew up with completely different set of songs from the parents. That difference will break the culture binding between the parents and the kids. Typical examples are Chinese first generation immigrants to US, and their kids. There are other examples, as far as I know, are the Indian expats in Shanghai, with their kids. The kids sing all the songs their Chinese classmates are singing, and ops.... a gap between the two generations.

Mixing World

We don't need to have a solution for this. It is not a problem. It is exactly the diversity of world. We should keep it. By having more events like people from different culture to dance and sing together, we are providing a very good exchange among the cultures.

P.S. Todd shared about his experience of meditation, and Paul shared the tool of staring at one thing quietly on the bus. That was very helpful.
P.S. 2. If you are in Shanghai, you can turn to CBN (Chinese Business Network) 第一财经 on Sunday night at 9:00 PM to watch this episode of BossTown. At the theme of "Solute to Steve Jobs", I am one of the observers to talk about the topic with Kaifu.