Recently the Youth Lake Forum: Business Startups and Innovations was delivered by Ma Yunfeng at the Datong Student Center on Peiyang Park Campus, Tianjin University. The Youth Lake Forum is a non-profit forum founded by the Communist Youth League Committee, aimed at advocating business startups and fostering innovation. It also intends to combine public speeches with Tianjin University's features and humanistic concerns.
The keynote speaker Ma Yunfeng is the founder of an individual new media outlet called Mayunfeng Online. He obtained substantial working experience in various enterprises, including state-owned organizations, overseas-funded enterprises, and private ones.
Ma Yunfeng started his speech with an inspiring claim: "the future belongs to the young". He used a road as a metaphor for his previous experience and outlined theories which can guide you to the future. However, the real cognitive world in his eyes was a dark tunnel with a single glint of light, and we were blocked from other possible roads, we have to keep on going and searching for the future.
He held the view that it was hard to predict the future business world and the deductive method was losing its effect.
"You can't deduce the future with previous experience because it is full of indeterminacy. You will feel insecure."
He drew a comparison between the future business world and the tide, saying that one needed to know when the tide would start and how long it would last, and said that those principles could be applied to the business world.
"We all know how Steve Jobs and Ma Yun reshaped enterprises. But the problem is, faced with the changing business world, how we, especially young college students, should react to it."
"First you need to become familiar with your potential and what you are good at." He reckoned we were still learning the subjects that the industrial era had required us to study. But time has changed. We need to find our talents and shape ourselves so that we are suitable for modern society.
From demand to supply reform he suggested we should learn to meet the needs of customers, try to get rid of standardization and also to innovate.
He stressed the emphasis on marketing skills required in the current market and appealed to every student to focus on the needs of sponsors and customers. "Don't blame others for not understanding your techniques. You have to put yourself in others' shoes to let them enjoy your products."
There are two ways to satisfy customers according to Ma Yunfeng. The first is to have insight and share the ideas with people, like Steve Jobs––"I know what you want and I will surely amaze you". The other way is to provide a selection of products like Lei Jun, president of Xiao Mi, by defining the settings and giving it meaning that customers can accept. In the second way you need to interact with your customers, satisfy their needs and avoid homogeneity.
"Find your own traits and avoid being blocked by your previous cognition. The future is in your hands" he proposed to every student.
By: Cai Wenting, Student Editor: Xu Lanzhi
Photo: Tu Yu
Editors: Qin Mian and Christopher Peter Clarke
