Chengze Business: Hold Firm and Be Tactically Innovative in VUCA Age
Jul 11-2024
The 3rd edition of NSD Chengze Business, held on July 2, 2024, featured a lecture by Prof. John Yang and three roundtable discussions by experts and business leaders. Prof. Yang is NSD Alumni Foundation Endowed Chair Professor and former Co-Dean of BiMBA Business School at NSD.
Launched in 2024, Chengze Business puts down root in NSD’s business management pedagogical and research resources and works as a business symposium platform jointly curated by the NSD and its alumni and partners. By having both the academic and business circles share insights into economic situations, industrial policy, and business management, it empowers individuals to transform for the better and organizations to achieve innovation-led development, as well as boosts the growth of Chinese businesses and promotes international exchanges of business studies.
Speaking on the topic Safeguard Core Values and Be Tactically Innovative in Times of Change, Prof. Yang pointed out the multitude of challenges confronting entrepreneurs and executives in current VUCA era (VUCA stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity). Based on reflections on both domestic and international situations, he pioneered the Ternary Leadership Model to help business leaders grasp directions and missions. Ternary Leadership is composed of the power of ideas, the power of competence, and the power of character. The power of ideas encompasses mission, vision, values, and thinking modes; the power of competence synthesizes smart decision-making, talent empowerment, and artisan spirit; and the power of character entails being sincere and open-minded, being accountable and dependable, working for win-win and shared win, and staying brave and gritty. Together, the three powers lay out a comprehensive set of criteria for assessing leaders. Ternary Leadership fuses the thinking modes of both Eastern and Western leadership and aims to help Chinese business managers to effectively enhance leadership competence and assist Chinese firms to achieve better development, particularly abroad.
